All right.
The strange of George thorough Goods electric guitar can only mean one thing, and that means it will He's out and I'm in. It's the average American in for the great American on this Chile Wednesday. Great to have you with us as always, And I don't say that capriciously, for without you, what would I be? I would be one man sitting in a room babbling incoherently to himself. And why would I have to leave home to do that?
Now?
There's a lot going on here locally, a lot going on in the world. Answer me this. How could a man drive from Washington State all the way across country to Washington, Washington, d C. And then allegedly shoot two National guardsmen? And is this not a warning sign, a red flag deluxe for the federal government. Maybe what happened in Washington, d C. Is not going to be an
isolated instance. We hear all these stories about all of these foreign nationals that are in our country, either legally or illegally, And in this case, this Afghan was in this country legally. He was brought in under the auspices of Joe Biden's administration and then turned loose on the streets of the United States and the highways that led allegedly from Washington to Washington, d C. How did that happen? And are the people that helped us in Afghanistan Afghanistan
all those many years, are they truly trustworthy? Regardless of what we have heard, There was absolutely no vetting Gune, despite what the national media would have you believe. But standing by to join us as somebody who is a former CIA officer, a veteran of the conconventional warfare side of the United States Special Operations Command, what does that mean?
Means he worked under the cover of darkness. He worked under the cover of what was going on militarily in Afghanistan and worked alongside a lot of the Afghan nationals that were helping us. But does that help extend past the time that the United States was over in Afghanistan? And if so, does it extend peacefully? I speak of a man by the name of Adam Hartage. He is the author of the book The Alpha Blueprint, Preparing the
Next Generation for an AI Future. And it's great to have Adam Hartage back on the show Whether Us again. At Adam Hartich, how are you on this glorious Wednesday.
I'm great, can thanks for having me on.
Appreciate it, you bet, you bet. Now, by and large, what the CIA needs from operatives in a country when they're in there trying to fight a war or win a war, whatever it may be, compared to what those particular assets will do when they arrive in another country like ours, are two different things. You worked alongside a lot of these folks that are considered to be quote unquote wartime surrogates by at large, What was the trustworthiness of these people you worked alongside?
You know, I'll give you the my my most honest answer that I can in the sense that it's all very much colored by my perception, my perspective when I was there.
And I'm not saying it's the caveat.
I think I just want to actually have.
A real conversation about this. So you know, at the time during the war, these guys are literally fighting for their lives every single day.
The trustworthiness factor is extremely.
High because you'll be working alongside them, fighting alongside them sometimes. And then as well, you're talking about guys who you know, they they've got you know, they've got just as many bullets in their gun as you do, you know, and so to work together, especially in a small unit like that, at the trustworthy in factor has to be extremely high. So first off, when we left Afghanistan, there was no
vetting of anything of anyone. I mean, you're talking about literally palace of cash left on the tarmac.
You're talking about people.
Falling off of the wings of the seventeens trying to you know, trying to ride on top of the wing all the way home to America.
I mean, it was an insanely.
Irresponsible way to leave a warzone a country. So that falls squarely on the Biden administration. And I'm not trying to get political and just you know, say one administration over the other. What I'm saying is there was no excuse that was completely unfrigeable.
They were seven people on airplanes or anybody, let's go get out, get out. No, there's no vetting.
But in truth, exactly there's zero, zero vetting.
But in truth, not all of these guys that were used that were our wartime surrogates. We're all on the up and up. I just saw on the cable shows here a couple of weeks ago, there was a bronze star recipient, man by the name of Mark Lucas. He said Afghan allies were quote unquote untrustworthy and perpetuated a barbaric culture of pedophilia and abusing women. He said, you had to watch these guys twenty four to seven or they just might attack the Afghan women. That might be some wartime surrogate.
So I don't introduce any of that as the character.
Yes, So okay, so you had that going on, you had information with the CIA that you're trying to extract from these dudes, which I'm guessing you were getting, and then all of a sudden, here comes the fall of Afghanistan. Here comes that awful scene at that air base where those thirteen men and women in service were killed. And all of a sudden, these people that were running around the hills of Afghanistan are on a plane going initially to these pods around the world before being dumped into
America unvetted. And this might be within six to eight months from them being goat farmers up in the hills of Afghanistan. So who didn't see a problem with that, right right?
Well, so this goes this goes to the deeper problem of also cultural assimilation. So it would be one thing. Let's say that in a perfect world, here's what should happen. So you go over there, you work, You work with these paramilitary groups or the as surrogates or insurgents or whatever you want to call them, train them up to a high standard.
And instill some some.
Western values in them, because I mean you won't there's no exporting democracy place.
Like Afghanistan, you know, but you.
Can instill some sort of non barbaric trustworthy that trustworthiness standard and everything else, and so you can vet.
Out over time.
Let's say you're working with them for a series of as a lot of these guys were, then you can build a real dot, a real personal file, a real okay, now this guy.
Really is that it.
He's worked for us for ten.
Years, his wife is very lovely. You know his kids, we know whose children are?
All this stuff, right, And then you could sponsor them through an immigrant feed the program, which we saw some success out of a rock doing that. And then once they've gone to all that and they get to the US, then you put them through a program to assimilate them to American culture and comes in attritions, I mean literally, things like you cannot you cannot perform BC reality. You know in America, you know you cannot take little boys off the street for.
Hurricane Night on Thursday.
Like these things are illegal. You cannot do what.
Was hurricane night.
Hurricane night is when they would round up air quotes.
And this is better if I'm on video.
But I'll just have to explain. So what they do is is.
Say they, I mean, the men of a village, of an Afghan village, will round up the boys who are around nine or ten years old.
Basically it's before you have hair on your face.
So children, they'll round them up, put them in dresses, a makeup on them, and have them dance like little girls.
And then the rest happens.
They rape the boys and they go all night, and it's every Thursday.
They call it Hurricane Night.
So but this alleged, and we have to keep using the word alleged, But this alleged assassin that shot and killed one particular National guardsman a woman, and then severely injured another who remains in critical condition. He drives cross country and pulls this off just before Thanksgiving. And what I saw it, obviously, I was absolutely appalled and disgusted. But Secondly, I'm not so prized by this. There are a lot of people, as you well know, Adam, that
are running around this country. We have no idea who they are, what they're up to, and what their motives may be, that have committed this country legally through this this this plan that we had to relocate Afghans that were sympathetic to us to the United States and illegally through the southern border. So I'm just wondering, do you sense that this is a warning shot or do you no pun intended? Or do you sense that we're going to see a lot more of this as the years progress.
My honest sense of it is that there's more to the story. It doesn't really I'd like to get deeper into this guy's personal motivations because I would be surprised, frankly if it was just one of these truly ideological things that I'm you know, have my personal jiad to kill Americans. Usually things like that have a sponsor behind them, a sponsor meeting that this guy was recruited by some intelligent source that directed him to go carry out and attack.
I would I would guess that would be based.
On my experience, based on the things that I know, I just it never passes the sniff.
Test me that that like the loan gunman.
So to speak.
Yeah, you know, and this guy was apparently what's some group called zero unit over in Afghanistan? What is zero unit? Because I mean that sounds like it was some select group that could carry out missions and fight and all that. What is what was it? Was it zero unit? Totally Afghans? And what what was it?
Yeah?
So the zero teams or zero unit, there was I think four or five of them, and it was and it had zero one, zero two, zero three.
And it just had to do with their regional.
Designation where they were, whether it.
Was you know, coast or Kandahar or whatever.
But uh, but yes, they what made them think of them as kind of like an indigenous Delta force if you will, trained by by our c i A, trained by our pier special operations units, and they operated under very loose authorities, kind of outside the traditional Afghan National Army, kind of like the kind of like the untouchables, if you will, and so and so if you think of like c I A peeramilitary officers or you know, your your real meat eat and steal Team six guys, your
Delta guys. Uh, it's the same kind of thing, but with an Afghan.
Play very very very very highly trained Okay, and the.
C I A worked let's train best equipment.
Right and wait, worked hand in hand with these guys. Did how complicit is the c I A Uh? And with all these people that were that were taken out of their country that weren't fitted and understand that you build a dossier on a lot of these guys as you were working with them. But it seems to me that maybe the CIA dropped the ball here. Why not insisting more when these before these these people got into our country? Did the CIA drop the ball on this?
I mean I personally, I don't know who is responsible for that, but I would say most likely the interest either yeah, at the agency where it's some other bureaucracy, whether it's state or you know, the presidential administration, the White House. I mean, I don't know exactly how that was handled. I mean it seemed like so I was not I would I had. I was gone out of
the service by the time we fled Afghanistan. Yeah, and so I was not really super privy to the inside baseball of what happened or how it was happening.
But what it seemed to.
Me is that one day we're there and the next day we just weren't any more. They said, oh, it's gonna be chaper to leave eighty five billion dollars worth of stuff behind, but we're just going to flee. And as I recall too, didn't have something to do with you know, I mean this was during the time they were throwing everything at Trump, you know, ninety some indictments
and endless you know, collusion, this and all. As I recall it, I think it was just more trying to you know, smear mud on a space type thing.
It was horrible politics.
So this plane takes off and there's several planes. It wasn't one plane.
His plane takes off, and they just showed people on these planes. And as I said, they didn't vet them. And even my Arcis, who was Homeland Security director at the time, said, yeah, we really didn't talk to everybody that got on those planes. Uh yeah, there wasn't really great vetting. And now come to find out there wasn't much vetting. But what vetting could have taken place, Adam, because as I said, in Afghanistan, because of just the
way that country is. It's a third world country. You don't have even birth dates for people, you have birth years. But after that, how do you vet and who does the vetting? It's I just think when I hear the word vetting that, okay, how did you accomplish it? Well, it didn't seem like they tried very hard, does it?
Well? No, of course not.
And I mean it doesn't pass a common sense test either, because so if you think back to like the fall of Sidon, you know, as they're as they're lifting the helicopters off the rooftop with the people clinging to the pylons, you know, I don't I think I don't think that they're asking.
Them to Okay, well watch you we just we just for a second, let's.
Do you your immigration interview, and we'll get your fingerprints and we'll get your family history.
There's none of that.
It's like, oh my gosh, the.
Taliban or you know, the Vietnamese or whatever, pick your war, right, the VC is at the gates.
And we got to go, or the Taliban is you know what I mean.
So of course there's no betting, you know, So for.
Them that maybe they're like, oh, yeah, well, later.
We did some betting.
You know, we asked them what their name was, Like, well, you're talking about a country.
It doesn't even exist administratively in a lot of places.
Adam's book is the is called The Alpha Blueprint, Preparing the Next Generation for an AI Future, and it's out everywhere.
Amazon has it and whatnot. And if you've got kids, you're right, where do you find truth? Because there's a lot passing for truth that is not truth. Adam good insight as to what may have transpired with the shooting and its roots, and you stay well, and you know, we'll talk down the road. Thanks absolutely, you, yeah, thank you.
Well.
Yeah. Vetting is an interesting term, just acknowledging somebody is not vetting. Just shoving them onto an airplane is not vetting. Just greeting him at the border as they cross illegally into the country is not vetting. And there's been a decided lack of it over the last five years. And here we go, this is what happened. Is it an isolated instance? I don't know. I hope the hell it is. I hope there's nothing else like it. Oh, we got a lot of people running around this country. That just
got in here in the last five years. And apparently this guy allegedly thought he was going to change the tide. For whatever tide he wanted to change, there's a whole lot of it. And anybody that thinks there isn't or tells you there isn't, they're going in an opposite direction of reality. It's twelve twenty five. It's the average American and for the great American on this Wednesday, and glad that you're along with us, because without you, what are
we doing here in the first place. Seven hundred wt WELW ten, one hundred w lw all one time one Sandy.
It's the most wonderful time.
No, we have not gone all Christmas music, Calm down.
Kids, jing little belling, and everyone telling you be of good cheese.
It's playing this because had he been alive, Andy Williams would have turned ninety eight years old today. Of course,
he died back in twenty twelve. But Williams was born in Iowa, but the family quickly moved to Cincinnati, settled in Shivy, Itto, And if historians are true, one of the first places Andy Wiodiams sang publicly was right here on this radio station, seven hundred w welw all those many years ago and moved to LA and of course found great fame in television back in the sixties and seventies. But ninety eight years ago today, Howard Andrew Williams came upon this earth. I love to get an air check
of him singing on w welwa. Maybe Matt Reese, the station historian, can get cracking on that one. Would they have had tape back then? Did Bing Crosby event tape back then? Welcome back seven hundred w welwim ken Brew. A couple of things to get to on the program today. Number one, Obamacare. It is going to be a major issue again in early January because again we are eyeing
a government shut down possibly in January. But it's also an election year that's coming up, and invariably, you know what happens in election years, the party that's out of power just hammers the party in power, and the number one point on the hammer will be healthcare. The Dams have already been whistling that tune. That's what led to the shutdown. When the Democrats shut the government down back in the fall, it was all was all about health care.
They wanted to extend the extra credits, the extra benefits that the Biden administration put in place during the pandemic for Obamacare. They were only meant to be temporary, weren't meant to be permanent. But that's what the Dems want. And Obamacare, which is really from a financial point of view, was never really on firm legs, will eventually implode, and so there's got to be a better way to ensure those who don't have health insurance. Well what is that.
We're going to talk to a guy that knows the healthcare industry inside out, coming up at two o'clock. At one o'clock, we had an election last night out in Tennessee where the Democrat was someone who openly, it would seem, hated.
The people of the state she wanted to represent. She didn't like country music, she didn't like the police, she didn't like this, she didn't like that. He was soundly beaten by the Republican. Now there's a lot of narrative out there.
Well, Donald Trump, you know, you know, he won that county by twenty two percent. What's Donald Trump? Which is the conundrum for Republicans any election that Donald Trump is not involved in for some reason, and you would have to ask these people why for some reason Republicans don't show up at the polling places, particularly and off your elections. Well they did for a special election last night, and
the Republican soundly beat the Democrat. But there's a new Gallup survey that's out that shows that we all, you meet everyone else, regardless of what we feel from a political standpoint, we all embrace democracy. And now, according to this survey, eighty percent reject political violence, which would fly in the face of several surveys and Gallup polls and whatnot that were taken within this last year that chose at the younger end of the demographic seems to have no problem with violence.
If it leads to political change. We'll get into that at one o'clock.
We of course, Andy Williams, you know, little holiday spirit should be in all of us. Thanksgiving is in the past, and now it continues on in robust fashion with holidays like New Year's Eve, and holidays like Christmas and han again everything else. And sometimes it's the giving powers, the power of gratitude that can maybe save you and change your brain a little bit and possibly change your life.
There are scientific surveys that are out there that will say doing good things for other people makes you feel better about yourself. But sometimes people just don't feel better about themselves and they have to have something to look forward to. You and I have a lot to look forward to. Not everybody does. So there's a neuropsychiatrist, and I have no idea what that means, but I'm going to try and find out here in a minute. A
neuropsychiatrist by the name of doctor Jeffrey Disarbo. He specializes in how achievement and gratitude can help grow your brain, make you smarter, make you happier, make everything else neurologically better. And he said, all we have to do is just one step at a time, a little something for someone else, little something for me, and all of a sudden, now the road seems a little less bumpy and the future seems a little brighter. At least that's what he would
have you believe. I'm kind of hooked on this neuropsychiatrist thing, but nevertheless, let's bring into the conversation about all of this during this time of the year. The aforementioned doctor Jeffrey Disarbo, how are you on this glorious Wednesday.
I'm doing pretty well. I can't complain.
I would guess you're not someone who worries much about the termination of life. I would guess you're somebody that lives every day to its fullest, because that seems to be what you preach. Am I right or wrong about that?
I would say in my case, that's absolutely true. But I had a great teacher from that, which was my father. I always say he taught me both how to live and he taught me how to die as well.
And part of the.
Key to not fearing the end of it all is to make the most of it while you're here. And that's why I always say the book, which is The Neuroscience of a bucket List, is really I feel he kind of co wrote that with me in Spirits.
Why are so many people in this world today having trouble living in the moment? Because it sounds like you live in the moment. It sounds like you wake up in the morning and you experience a new day. A lot of people don't do that.
They worry about jobs and family, They worry about whether or not they have enough money to make it through the week.
Let alone through the rest of their life. Life chemes at you pretty hard, and I think there are a lot of people that probably don't have the same outlook as you do. Would you agree with that?
Well, I'm not perfect, you know, I do have some of the worries that most people have. It's just that I've always felt living with a bucketless style of mentality and approach is counterbalance to it because we're really being fed through through media and social media, you know, always to be on edge, to be looking out for what comes next, making people feel like they're not in charge of their own life, their own future, especially the younger
generations now more than ever with anxiety. But a bucket list really gives somebody the ability to kind of take control of a lot of different things. They have control and decision power over in their lives by making plans that they want to do.
When people hear bucket list, they think, well, I want to do this before I kick the bucket, which is literally what it means. But it doesn't always involve things that are you have to commit a lot of money too. It's not always that Alaskan cruise, although that would be nice. I mean, you can find bucket lists, things to do on an everyday basis. In some of them probably not too far from your back door, right right about that?
Oh absolutely, just even within your house or sometimes you know, like you said, you can go camping or tempting in your back yard. And that conception that had something to do before you die or once in a lifetime, things like world travel or skydiving or get that corvette.
It's not just about that.
A lot of that comes from the movie The bucket List that came out and it kind of got stereotyped to me and that, but it's really about defining what you want to do that makes you happy, and it's small things in life, visiting a new farmers market, taking a different route to work, seeing things that are in your own backyard, and Cincinnati.
It's a lot of great things like that.
No, absolutely, there's no question about that. And I do think that a lot of times people though, stop doing that. They don't live in the moment. They live for the other things that we talked about just a while ago. So if somebody is like that and we're thinking, oh my gosh, a bucket list, you know, I got to worry about paying tuition for my kid next month. Now, what would you.
Tell them, Well, it's stopped starting small. It's like I said, you can start just thinking about what's in your neighborhood. It's one thing about AI right now. You can go on to a open AI chat GBT and say, what's in my town that I may not be aware of that is kind of bucket lists worthy. And you start getting ideas and most people find out, Yeah, I've never been to these places. I haven't taken pictures here, I haven't gone to these restaurants.
You know.
So there's that's that's how a bucket list starts, is just trying to pick out some things.
That you enjoy doing.
And I often say this, there's a hundred there's hundreds of different categories, not to mention thousands of items that can go in those categories. That are you know, traveling the world is great, but it doesn't have to be there, And it says and bucket listing doesn't have to cost a lot of money or anything at all.
Yeah, is it too simple to cause? Does it call something like that reason for living?
No?
I think that's one of the things that a bucket listen still is reason for living, you know, a lot of times I'm working with my clients and I'm saying, you know, we're all here from point A to point B.
It's and in between. What are you going to do with that? You know?
And again I go back to my father, who you know, I think he was the first person who told me, don't fear dying, fear not living.
And he was you know, I grew.
Up in a lower middle class neighborhood and he was a printer for the state. But you know, he's done amazing things. You know, he has had terminal cancer for his last seventeen years, and he did more in that seventeen years than he's done his entire life, and that most people will ever do so.
And probably added years to his life. I would guess, oh, oh yeah, somebody. If somebody's diagnosed with cancer, immediately, you know, the rain starts just starts pouring on top of them. And for good reason. I'm not suggesting that, right, it wouldn't be a good reason, but I think if you have something to live for, then that may extend your quality of life. It may not extend your life, it'll
extend the quality of your life. And who knows, well, you know, I mean, my gosh, you're a neuropsychiatrist.
What is that?
I have heard of a psychiatrist? What is a neuropsychiatrist?
Well, first, I'm a psychiatrist, and you know, I work with people who have all different types of mental health issues, whether it's just depression, anxiety. I do a lot of work with eating disorders and bipolar disorder. But a neuropsychiatrist is also working with people with cognitive issues that are
related to how the brain works and functions. And that's why, like, when I was looking into this whole concept of how I was living with a bucket list and everything, I want to understand, well, what's the brain do with all of this? And that's kind of the key difference that a lot of people are completely unaware of is it's a workout for the brain. It has this anti aging quality that's as important as eating the right foods, exercising.
Oh so okay, so that's interest an anti agent quality. So what else what a bucket list do? From what you've come to know for the brain? What else would it do for Because you know, all a firm believers a layman that if it's not working upstairs, chances are the rest of what you got isn't working either, and you won't be long for this earth. So okay, So what does besides you know, hopefully holding off the anti aging process. What else?
What a bucket list or quote unquote something to look forward do to the brain.
Well, it's it really starts to work.
The brain likes when you give it something new, and I'm always using the word novelty, something different. So whether it's a new food, a new street, a new coffee, a new experience, it's the brain starts to release dopamine and our reward pathways espential, especially you know the ones that sometimes makes us feel very happy, and dopamine is
the brain's way of saying, do more of that. So over time, these little bursts strengthens our memory circuits and it increases what's called neuroplacity neuroplasticity just a fancy way of saying, you know, your brain rewires itself to stay younger, sharper, more resilient. So it works on other regions too, because when people kind of settle in into their comfort zone, you're not forcing the brain to work out all its potential.
The same way if someone was lifting ten pound weights and then after a while, they get used to it, but never push that. They're never going to expand that muscle and the brain. We need to do the same thing with is keep working it out and expanding it and living with a bucket list and novelty is one of those ways.
Yeah, but you know our culture, you know our society, people don't really want to leave their comfort zone. They don't really want to take that step. So my guess is part of what your practice is all about, and
part of what the neuroscience of a bucket list. Getting the most from your brain in life your book is all about, is getting people outside that comfort zone mentally, certainly physically as well, But I would guess mentally, you know, start taking on more as you mentioned, more challenges for your brain and exercise it as you would any other muscle.
Yeah, I mean, the rain does like to settle into this comfort zone. It's very cozy, but it kind of prevents future growth. And when everything is predictable, the brain gets lazy. Neuropathways they kind of like become these old ruts in the dirt road. They're deep, they're familiar, they're rigid, and the rewards circuits quiet down. So that's when people start feeling stuck or anxious or bored. It's not because life is bad, but because nothing is stretching the brain anymore.
Doctor Jeffrey Disarbo is our guest. He is the bucket list Doctor. You can find him at bucket listdoctor dot com. So when someone goes to bucket listdoctor dot com, what do they get.
Well, it's a site that I've recently revamped.
It has information, of course, about who I am and everything, but I have information about the brain as it relates to bucket lists, planning, goal setting. I've been writing more and more blogs.
I think the.
Last one I had was how therapy itself can be a bucket list item.
How I wrote an.
Article on Helen, Heaven and Hell on Earth, eight places that are almost impossible to go to, but that entirely impossible.
So it really is something to kind of stimulate people to think about life, how they want to maybe pursue it differently, how you know, just to think out of the box in today's world, because, like I said, we're kind of getting the brain's getting programmed to be a pretty negative thing if all we do is fall into that path of you know, listening to what people tell us how bad it is.
Yeah, exactly. I mean you can find you know, do them and gloom anywhere on any level, on any platform, right in that. Yeah, the neuroscience of a bucket list getting the most from your brain and life. Doctor Jeffrey Disarbo, I think you you might have helped some people today, and for a doctor, if you'll, hope if you just help one person today, you've done your job, right.
That's that's all I set up to do.
I'll do what I can and same for you, you know, And you're bringing this to them. I hope they're graceful and see, Oh what a bucket listing. I heard this story today.
Let's do this again. And I don't say that capriciously. I love to talk to you again. Thank you, doctors, stay well, we need to hear your voice.
Okay, absolutely, thank you so much.
Ken you bet there you find it. Neuropsychiatrists, we found out what that's all about. Bucket list. Neuroscience of a bucket list, getting the most from your brain in life. Who doesn't want to get the most out of life? If not, what are we doing here? Same question I asked at the end of the last half hour. What are we doing here? People often asked that about me. Twelve fifty five News Radio, seven hundred w WELW.
All right, one O nine on this Wednesday, one O nine on this Wednesday.
Good afternoon. So we brace for more cold weather. We're bracing for the teens tomorrow. Why do I feel like that will seem like summer in about a month? Hey, look at Cincinnati, just wait a while. The weather is going to change. It's gonna get cold tomorrow, and then it'll warm up and we'll all get sick because there'll be the crud in the air. And then before you know it, it'll be January. Everybody will be shut in because a huge blizzard is hit. And then February, Oh come,
we'll all get trick. We'll be at on the golf course in early February, then some more snow, and then all of a sudden, it's Opening Day, ladies and gentlemen. That is the next four months in a nutshell. But that's why we like it. That's why we stay here, because it's so much fun. I was going through the internets last night with Bush forty one, and I found this a gallop kettering survey of more than twenty thousand Americans,
significant number, twenty thousand of US. It shows broad agreement on the foundational Democrat principles, things like life, liberty, the pursuit of happiness, things that this country was founded upon, a lot of the ability for government to stay out of our lives. So all of that was in this report, and then I found this that was interesting. Over eighty
percent of you, me, everybody else reject political violence. Now I'd like to talk to the other twenty percent and exactly what they're thinking about political violence and why they think that's a good way to get anything done. But nevertheless, the overwhelming majority of people are like you and me, and we believe that compromise in government should be at the forefront, not digging your heels in, not yelling and spitting at the other side, but a way to get
the business of running this country done. That's why these nitwits, and that's all they are, basically, the nitwits in Congress, the nitwits in the Senate. That's why we send them to Washington, DC. To get the business of the country done. Not to appear on cable TV news shows, not to put out fancy tweets, not to do deep dives into idiotic, stupid things that have nothing more than politics as their base.
We just want this. And I thought it would be interesting to get onto this program today somebody who came to this country legally and came here because he thought the American dream was the ultimate dream. Anyone could have the ability to be themselves and do anything they want
to try and make their lives better. And if eighty percent of us agree that political violence is not good, and more than a larger number than that believe that the foundational democratic principles of our country are the things that we should base all of what we do on. And I thought there would be no better guests than a man I had on this show. I want to
say it was about two or three months ago. His name is Peter Lemage, and he is a political strategist, an attorney, and he emigrated to this country from a communist country, Albania, and he got to the United States and he got here and he wanted to do what would make this country better and has a very firm view of what that may be or may not be, and why that this is still regardless of everything that you may hear on all of the cable news shows
the hilarity that evolves there. This is still the greatest country in the world. So it's with great honor and with a little bit of excitement. As always, we welcome in the aforementioned Peter homage. How are you on this glorious Wednesday.
I'm doing well. Thank you for having me, sir.
I'm glad you're back with us, because I think we need to hear your voice. I look at this Gallup Kettering survey, twenty thousand Americans. That's a fairly large poll, and it shows that we all agree on something, or most of us do eight and ten of us do we agree on the fundamental Democrat principles. Over eighty percent reject political violence, support compromise in government, and the US benefits from a mix of race, cultures, and religions. This is America that I know. I don't know what the
other twenty percent are doing. I can't speak for them, but this is the America I know and love. So why is America teetering on so many different issues at this point in time? Why does this survey say one thing and we seem to see something completely different in real life?
Look, the most important thing to realize here is that if we disregard the mainstream media, the academia, the politicians sometimes and elected officials, I don't think that Americans wake up in the morning disliking each other. I don't think that Americans wake up in the morning thinking that I'm going to dislike or hate someone because they look different from the way I look, or they believe or they pray in a different way than I do. Americans are
very common sensical people. We like each other, We like ornaborhoods, we like our schools. We want to have safe neighborhoods. We want to have lower taxes. We want a government that functions. We want the government to leave us alone. And these are the common sensical Americans, regardless of the small or little differences between us as ordinary folks.
The problem is the mainstream media.
There is always trying to drive a wedge between or amongst people who may look or sound or feel different from each other. The same thing with the academia. The same thing sometimes would be elected officials because they benefit from this. But ordinary posts like you and I and we're just we have no problems with our neighbors being there for each other, helping each other getting together, all
of us celebrated as something that is typical American. We wish each other, you know, merry Christmas, happy things, giving all these but when it comes to the media, they tell us, well, no, no, you should say happy Holidays is not Christmas. We don't pay attention to these differences that the media emphasiz.
Up on us. And I'm so happy to see this poll.
I'll be frank with you that it is one of the rare times that I really felt very comfortable to see these Americans like you and I coming together and saying that we don't care. But the differences that all this are emphasising up on us, they do not exist. We respect each other's you know, differences, but we respect Americanism.
And that is this is good news. It is good news.
It is Peter. It is eighty percent reject political violence. And yet then in October a poll came out that was done by PBS News and NPR. Of course, every time I see PBS, I tend to discount it. It is a deeply liberal organization. And then NPR gets involved in it, and it really takes it down the liberal drain. But what it says there is nearly a third of Americans thirty three percent now believe political violence may be necessary to get the country back on track. That's right.
That was on the heels of the Charlie Kirk assassination in Utah. And I'm just wondering as we look at these poles, which one should we believe, which are corrupt? And what is truly going on in our country? Is it what you and I just talked about, Because how can you have this gallop pole and then have an NPR PBS poll that's not even a month and a half old that says that thirty three percent believe political violence may be necessary to get the country back on track. What's going on here?
Well, I believe that certain poles are conducted with the intent of shape in the perception of there, the public perception of there, and PBS is one of them.
The latter pole should be the ones.
That I firmly believe we should trust and looking to more seriously, because, as I said, ordinary Americans like you and I, they don't care much what PBS said. But Kevin, you know certain polls indicating that Americans believe in political violence. I don't think we should even promote that we should even make that a public news for whatever reason. But I don't believe they do. I live amongst Americans every single day. I wasn't born and raised in this country.
I have yet to see anyone any American boar citizens dislike me, or dislike my family, or threatened me or going after me and my family because we speak with an accent, because we were not born here, because we moved into their neighborhoods. As a matter of fact, I've
seen love, I've seen caring, I've seen admiration. I've seen people come into our health and assistant and when we moved into their neighborhoods in Pairfield, Henrickett, they came to my house with cookies and wine and you name it, and walks out there well than me and my family there. And you know, I'm really thankful that generally speaking, most Americans are the way that they are descrubed in this
letter fall instead of the previous one. So I still believe that Americans great, that the American people are great.
They have a big heart.
They look which is the greatest holidays that we celebrate over here, whether it's Thanksgiving, Christmas.
You name it.
Then you see Americans coming together reading each other saying, you know, happy Holidays or Merry Christmas, or Happy New Year or whatever we say.
And if you look the.
Smile that you see in their faces. And sometimes, as I said, we have to turn up the media. I just say, you know something, disregard what the media saying. Our neighbors are great, our people are great, Americans are great. Let's celebrate what brings us together, which is Americanism, which is our Judea of Christian values, which is Constitution, which is the founding documents of this country.
I mean, we have so many things in common.
That we have to celebrate instead of following these falls that indicate that everything that we stand for separates us.
That is not true, and I don't believe it. For a second.
Scallop pole, the one that survey twenty thousand people, it had something interesting in it. It said over the past twenty five years, which would be since calendar year two thousand, since five since since twenty five years. In the last twenty five years, forty nine percent of the people's surveyed believe that cultural change in the US has happened too fast, which means that fifty one percent thinks that it was just right. So we're kind of split fifty to fifty
there on cultural change. Do you think cultural change has happened too fast over the course of the last twenty five years. It would lead me to believe you would, because close to two thirds of Republicans sixty four percent, think that cultural change did happen too fast over the last twenty five years. Has it happened, in your opinion, too quickly?
I think it did. And this is one one thing that I.
Agree with the full deathok having a cultural change happening quickly and bringing people to unlistates who may not be compatible.
With the values that we have here.
In certain groups are refusing to assimilate and embrace the values that we have here. They are trying to impose their values that they bring from their countries upon the American people. I mean, this is something that we have to look into, the kind of immigration that we have, the kind of people that are coming to United States. But this is not the first time that we have seen this kind of transition in the United States.
I mean, if you go way back when the Irish.
Came to the United States, they pay face challenges with the Italians game to the United States. They did face certain challenges, but there were different kinds of breed, if you will, for lack of better term, that they were willing to embrace the American values and assimilate into these values and become good Americans and serve the country, join the military, join.
The political right.
Whatever they did, they became American Americans. Now, we have certain groups that are coming to United States that they are being enticed. Our government is enticing them to come to United States for the benefits that we offer them instead of Americanism.
For example, you live in Connecticut right now and.
You're illegal, you get it with forty thousand dollars a year for doing nothing. You get free housing, you get re education. They will get your driver's license, you know. I mean, it pays to be illegal in the United States right now, and this is something that we have to stop. You want to come to United States legally, there's a process. You follow that process. My family and I did that. I mean my brothers and I will remained or were held in a concentration camp or refugee camp.
It was a refugee camp for eleven months to be processed to come to United States legally and at that time, you needed a sponsor and you conducted. We were submitted to background investigation. They wanted to make sure that we were at criminals or terrorists or whatever it comes they were using, and they wanted to make sure that we were coming to United States to be Americans.
And I'm proud we did that and faifully, batfully waited. I mean, we had no problems to wait for that staff period of time.
Nowadays, people would come to UNIE the States, and the following day that they come here, they're looking for the benefits that we shouldn't offered to them.
Say yeah, there are certain concerns that we.
Should have it, but you know the kind of immigration that we have, you know, allowed to come.
Here in the past twenty five years or so.
And this is something else that I found interesting. Americans who divided evenly about whether or not the government or themselves should be responsible for making sure that their basic needs are met. Forty eight percent said government, fifty percent said themselves. The younger demo, the eighteen to twenty nine crowd, sixty three percent said it should be the government. To me, that's walking dangerously down the road to socialism. Is that a march down the road to socialism.
Yeah, yes it did. Americans should remember one thing. When we hit the government shut down a few weeks ago, everybody was complaining that we cannot feed certain amount of people, a number of people. They should remember that the government can feed you. The government can start you. If the government controlled the way your life, the way you live your life, the government can modify it, can change it. I mean we shouldn't you know. The difference between the
United States and other countries is this. We believe that our rights are god given rights life, liberty, in pursuit of happiness. The founding part is made that were on the Declaration of Independence. Then we rute the constitution to make sure that these god given rights are protected from the government. Because we knew that, or they knew that the government can violate these god given rights that we have.
No other country in the work has this. And if we allow the government to become part of every part of every aspect of our life, this is something that is moving towards a socialistic government.
And we don't need that.
That is not compatible with the American system that we have. Republicans and constitutionalism gives everyone an opportunity to succeed. It doesn't guarantee you equal result, but it guarantees you equal opportunity. And if we get eco opportunity, anyone can pursue that to achieve their greatness based on his God or her God given ability.
And this is what we appreciate.
Refugees like me and my brothers and my family when we come to United States, we appreciate the opportunity. We're not looking for anything else. If I may give you an example, when my brothers gave to the United States and we landed at JFK, there was a lady who approached us with an interpreter and we were as to sign certain forms to join the welfare system to get certain benefits.
We didn't know what that meant.
My brother Tony said, no, no, no, we didn't come here for government candoubts. We came here for the American opportunity, for the American dream. You cannot achieved the American opportunity and the American dream.
Well, the government help.
If the government is guiding you, he sa impose it stuff on you. You have to do it on your own. And the way in your own is when the government stays out of your life. And I hope that Americans appreciate the fact that we hit an e raded government with um rated powers.
Important.
We're very clear that the government should never have more than these enumerated powers, and we're losing that and we should lose it.
Well, Peter Lamage, we need more people like you in this country, not less. And your thoughts here today on this I think are really terrific. Peter Lemage, how do people find you? You're a strategist, you're an attorney, You're a graduate of the Cardozos School of Law. How do people find Peter Lomage.
I'm at Peter Lamage dot com. That's the website. The other platforms are there.
I really appreciate this, and Happy thanks Giving, Merry Christmas if we don't talk before, and then happy New Year as well.
All right, Peter, good stuff and stay well. We need to hear your voice. Thank you, thank you, sir, Yes, sir, yes, sir. Absolutely, twenty thousand Americans eighty percent reject political violence. Love to know what the other twenty percent or thinking one twenty six on this Wednesday, it's the average American in for the Great American Glad you're with us to seven hundred wlw.
Oh hello, hello, quiet, I'm Skulls.
I'm broadcasting you bully.
God shake. You look disappointed that I'm here and not your boy Willie. Are you disappointed? Seriously? No, you're happy?
Well, I mean he's uh, he's in Florida. Probably look looking at what an eight nine foot going left or into his right, and probably you know, a couple couple of big dollars are on the line, probably two bucks a putt eight foot out.
It's probably a three foot for him.
Or he's he's taken a nap and getting ready for the cafeteria today.
I understand it's chip beef. That's four o'clock. Maybe you got to get there between four and five. Everything is creamed.
Everything you can take corn, take your dentures out and suck it down. Ken Brew the stooge reporters of Proud Service, every local Tamestar heating and air conditioning dealers Tamestar quality you can feel in beautiful Milford, the home of one Main Gallery and Little Miami Brewing. You call Baker Heating at five one three, eight, three, one fifty one twenty four spots.
You know, I think I see those Baker guys in there at Little Miami. Did I tell you I think I've seen like their shirt wearing their shirts. I think I've seen them.
There Ken Brew, Ken Rosenthal and also Mark Sheldon is reporting that the Reds are in have a serious interest in one Kyle Schwarber and he is interested in a potential homecoming.
Yeah, I don't see what happens. They don't have the money. I will to think they'd have the money, but I mean, from what I'm reading here in this athletic report, he's looking five years, one hundred and forty five million. Is what are you looking at? And with the Reds only having about twenty million to spend. You know, since Martinez took a hike, I we'll see the Mets are in play for him as well. So we'll see.
Let's see Hot Stove League tonight six oh five here on seven hundred WLW Pitcher Reet Lauder will be the special guest. Well, that's good college basketball. Miami goes to seven and oh they beat IU East last night. Dayton is seven and two after beating East Tennessee State, North Carolina got by Kentucky at Reperna sixty seven sixty four.
That was a hell of a game. Wildcats are five and three. Yeah.
NKU opens Horizon League play tonight, opening up and up against Cleveland State six point thirty, Fox Sports thirteen sixty.
Wright State goes on again. It takes on Youngstown State.
Let's see cross that skyline Chili Crossdown shootout update brought to you heartby Cincinnati Tech Resolution power by Tove Sheldon. Of course, the big game is Friday night, Cintas Center. The Bearcats, the the Muskies.
I don't know, Seg. I mean, I've looked at Zabers playing a lot better lately. Yes, they are the Bearcats. They sputter, They look good one night the next night, and it depends on who they play. Now, obviously all this depends on who they play. But I know there is great, great nervousness in Clifton. There's a lot of nervousness there.
Let's see high school football. It's Anderson, the Raptors up against Avon tomorrow. Talking about the fans, Seg. Not necessarily the team talk about the fans. You're going Thursday seven o'clock Division two State football Championship, a rematch of last year's final, and the Raptors are looking to go one game better.
As the Raptors back then? Was that ever the Anderson Redskins?
Right?
But last year? But last year they were the Raptors. I mean that all that stuff happened.
Okay, Division one state final course on Friday night, seven thirty and beautiful Canton.
It'll be Saint X and Olan tangy Orange. I heard Rockney's given the pregame peptar.
How about that?
So I heard that. I don't know if it's true, but I heard that. I heard that today at lunch. Let's see college football.
Ohio State offensive coordinator Brian Hartline expected to be named the next head coach at South Florida.
That's a blow. That's a blow to the boys, leaving the Buckeyes right wide receiver. You in Columbus.
Let's see Bengals update, brought to you by Good Spirits, wine and Tobacco and Party Town. Bengals quarterback Caan Anderson now a finalist the Pro Football Hall of Fame class of twenty twenty six.
Yeah.
The other finalists include Bill Belichick, Robert Kraft, Roger Craig and L. C.
Greenwood. You know Anderson should have been in like ten years ago.
Correct?
They can only take one of that entire group, only one gets to go in, and everybody's thinking it's going to be Belichick.
I don't know. I mean it's tough, but if I'm reading this correctly, only one from the entire group that we just mentioned is eligible.
Also Bengals cour Bengals kicker Evan McPherson Moneymack is the AFC Special Teams Player of the Week, where his efforts in the win over Go Baltimore last Thanksgiving ninety perfect six for six and field goals and two for two and pat.
Just make the one that counts, because you know that one's coming up. It's going to be like a two point lead they have to erase. Just make the one that counts, correct, Nobody cares about piling on. Make the one that counts.
Let's see soccer. Former Mount Notre Dame star and NWSL champion Rose Levelle nominated for the US Soccer Female Player of the Year award. Wow, that's that's an honor just to be nominated for about that. That's that's pretty strong. I think it's next week they announced the winner. So years ago tonight, you know what happened.
It was the Who concert concert yehund Front Coliseum forty six years ago, tonight, forty six years ago right now, eleven people were still alive.
Uh.
And that of course changed the way people attended concerts in this town. Really everywhere, I mean, festival seating was banned and everything was like that. I forget how many years ago it might have been. Five years ago. What Toddy O'Rourke had a great special on that whole thing, talked to talk to Pete Townsend, talked to Keith Moon, not Keith Moon, Keith Townsend and Roger Daltrey. Roger Daltrey, thank you. I saw that.
I remember, I remember when I saw that this morning, I thought, you know what, I remember her talking to them and that band was that band was really affected by the whole thing. They I guess they figured they said they shouldn't it should have never went to the next town.
You know, I produced my share of documentaries in my time, and I've seen a lot done. That might have been the best documentary I've ever seen.
Great.
Uh, you know, maybe they'll rerun that tonight. I don't know, Maybe I don't know who knows. Seguy forty six years ago tonight was you know, one of those knights that live in the proverbial infamy. That's what it is. Unbelievable. Seg well, you're doing well, you look well, you go, you're going there. We've got the big client party here today. Are you going to that?
Yeah?
You're yeah. What do you think we're going to have? What do you think we're going to have?
Here?
Say?
What kind of food? Because they've got it under wraps, They've got like four salespeople guarding it right now.
I think it's going to be prime rib, primary green beans, mashed potatoes.
Wow, and a roll? You think prime reb?
Really?
Well? Maybe on a smaller scale. I thought Arby's because it's right across the street.
I was.
I was under ye, maybe maybe maybe the clients who have restaurants are bringing it in.
I thought, maybe we're going to get some beef and cheddars. But you think it could be prime rib? No, I don't think so. Wow, that would Now, that would be a party, that's for sure. I once want to here. I will not name the station, but I want when it went to a Christmas party, Yes station that I worked for, sir, and they actually charged you admission to get in. I said, what everybody got there and it was ten dollars to get into your station Christmas party.
Where'd they have it as some establishment or so they rented out. No, it was like this hotel and they and they rented a room out and you get to the door and there's the general manager's secretary is sitting at a table and she's pay her ten bucks cash to get in. I'm thinking, what a lot of people just say the hell with that. I'm going to the bar for ten bucks. This was a while back. Ten bucks you get like three beers, don't get any ideas, just saying, seig, the whole world's out of whack and
it's a little rough one. We're the only ones in lockstep, you know what I mean? That's for sure? Ken Brew is what is that aging veteran back here? I'm not in tomorrow? Is he in tomorrow?
No, he's out until I think he comes back Saturday or Sunday.
Right, okay, you bigger? He flies coach? Do you think he goes first class?
I think he finally got that private plane that they offered him when he was doing his show in New York.
Dis custom mate, and I think they finally they finally said, oh here take it. That's single engine prop right war exactly.
Too, like one of those planes in Indiana. Jones SEG, that's all I got. You'll be back here in several minutes. I'll have more thoughts that I want to impart upon you. You got ken Brew, always got to talk to you.
Well, think I got a good idea too. But get us out of this whatever this.
Is it, we're in ken Brew and honor of this Wednesday, we leave you with the immortal words of the stood report. I have yet another vision that it was clear now and my crystallized cylindrical pulsating sphere right see a rope on man with cherry cheeks and a hearty laugh, prancing.
About in the snow. No, it's not Santa Claus. It's Brian Kelly.
The Wow.
The writing on that show ken Brew should have won awards, and that show should have won yeah.
Or it should have gotten or it should have gotten canceled, which is what happened.
Bring them back, Bring them back, Go to me TV, bring bring back, bring back, bring back sports rock me all right, sig on seven hundred WLW to a wait News Radio seven hundred w l W. The average American and for the great American on this Wednesday. Glad you are with us as well well, if you're scoring and keeping track of these things. The next government shutdown is scheduled for January the thirtieth of next year. That would
be January the thirtieth of the end of next month. Yes, the things that brought us forty days of living hell could rear its ugly head early in the new calendar year. And at the center of it all is funding for Obamacare.
Now a little history. Obamacare was voted in, as you well know, and named after the president that was in office and pushed for it in the late two thousands, two thousand and nine, twenty ten somewhere in that area, and the Republicans, when they got control of the House in the Senate, tried to pare it down somewhat, the Skinny Bill. Of course, that famously resulted in John McCain walking down the aisle at the last moment and doing
thumbs down. And so much for that, And Obamacare is basically chugged along, almost collapsing under its own weight ever since. But what shut down the government, according to the current group of Democrats, for forty days was the fact that these temporary subsidies that were put in place by the Biden administration in the wake of COVID make sure everybody who had Obamacare had enough money to get health care. They're expiring, and the current group of Democrats wanted those
things to be part of a permanent deal. It's not a good idea, it doesn't make sense. In fact, it doesn't make sense to a lot of Democrats, but nevertheless that's what united them. Health Care in this country's broken. It's broken out a number of levels, not the least of which in Obamacare, but just on a number of different levels. But Obamacare is here. You're not going to get rid of it. You have to make it more palatable both to not only the people that are funding it,
but the people that are using it. Can't vote against Santa Claus. You're not going to vote the thing out. So what are you going to do to to try and fix this thing? And what now will be a very short amount of time before what could be another government shutdown over this thing in about seven weeks. Standing by the way, in is the smartest man there is an America, in my opinion, when it comes to health care. He's written a book called the sixty percent solution rethinking healthcare.
He's a good guest of this program. He is Todd Furnis. Todd, how are you on this glorious day?
I am doing dandy, Ken, Thank you so much for having me today.
I want to talk to you about how you fix Obamacare because it's been kicked down the road. Kicked down the road, Republicans seem to have no real plan. They've come up with something called the Health Reimbursement Arrangements HRA as an alternative to what the current system is. But the fact of the matter is it's not fixed. It's ready to implode, and the Democrats don't want to give up what they have. They want more money thrown into it. So Todd Furnis is now in charge of fixing Obamacare.
Where do you start?
Well, I would challenge the original thesis, which is Obamacare did not give anybody access to healthcare, not one person. Obamacare gave people an expensive way to pay insurance companies for insurance companies to pay for somebody else's medical expenses.
And there's a big difference there.
If I said, hey, Ken, I'd love for you to pay my bills, you would say, well, I ought to know what those bills are.
Going to be, shouldn't I?
And I said, well, yeah, but you got to take that chance because I don't know what the bills are going to be. Well, you say, well, I'm gonna have to build in a model that gives me a lot of wiggle room for the risks that I'm taking because you don't know what your bills are going to be, and I don't know what your bills are going to be, because remember, insurance is paying me in advance for something
statistical and probably statistically improbable to occur to you. In other words, it's unlikely to happen to you, but if it does, I'm going to pay for it. And then then if I do pay for it, I've got to build in the overhead and I've also got to build in a margin to cover that expense. So what that means it is one out of one hundred percent of the time, it's going to be a lot more expensive for you to have somebody else pay your bills.
I don't know when.
You say I was the smartest guy in healthcare, I was. First of all, I got to tell you I was disappointed I was only in healthcare, but I don't think I'm smart at all. I think that's just really just basic walking around stuff. So you know, maybe we think about things differently here in Texas, but that's the way I think about it is it's always going to be
more expensive if you have somebody else paid for it. Now, the reimbursement plan that is being kind of kicked around as saying, hey, you know what, this Obamacare thing doesn't make any sense. So what we're going to do is we're not going to pay the insurance companies the subsidies that are coming out of the Obamacare extension, because that's
what they are. What they're doing is they're saying, we're going to pay the insurance companies directly to subsidize the healthcare you're getting to the corresponding ACA marketplace.
Well, that doesn't make any sense either. What you're saying is these.
Subsidies are essentially saying, I'm giving money directly to the insurance companies again to pay for the bills that you're going to incur.
Right, So just I'll stop it. Can I just put the brakes on right here to explain what h ris are.
This is.
I guess the plan that some Republicans want. Basically, as I read it, it allows employers to set aside tax free dollars for their employees to use on medical expenses for themselves the families. The employer does not pay payroll taxes on the contribution, and it literally extracts what are basically direct payments to these health insurers. Am I right?
Yes, Now it's a little bit The question you haven't asked is you said, hey, cod you know you kind of talk about this in your book one hundred years ago that you wrote, which is because it's.
Very analogous to something called the fessay and the essay.
So the fssay is a flexible spending account and that's another employer and employee funded opportunity to ask that question.
I was going to ask that question next, Todd, but go ahead. I was about I was about to ask that question next, but you said as the question I was.
Going to say, Todd, just give me a chance to get through these questions.
Go ahead.
I'm sorry.
Well, we're on number five, and keep you if you're keeping support home. So the the health reimbursement is a little bit different because that's funded by the employer. The flexible spending account is primarily funded by the employee through pre tax payroll deductions, but employers can also contribute. The problem is that with an FSSA, if you don't use the money at the end of the by the end of the calendar year, it goes back to the employer.
Right and uh by.
Contrast with a health savings account, which is actually interview back in twenty three hundred George W.
Bush by a.
Guy named John Goodman, who is the guy who you are, was the architect of that. Without saving the account, you the employee gets to use the money and keep the money, and you can invest it in. The money stays the under the ownership of the employee, and it's also pre tax dollars, right, And who's putting the money in and who gets to keep it at the end of the year.
And Obamacare basically prohibited hr is from being used to purchase coverage right for the individual, and then Trump put it back in in twenty nineteen, and then Biden didn't mess with it.
So you may be the smartest guy in healthcare.
God bought the smartest guy in healthcare.
I just read your book.
But the fact of the matter, the fact of the matter is it ain't working, and the Democrats wanted to put all of this, make all of these these emergency this emergency funding that occurred during COVID, they wanted to make them permanent. And even if people like the Congressional Budget Office said that if you extended those things, your deficit would probably go up three hundred and fifty to four hundred billion over ten years, and that another's probably
fifty to sixty billion in interest costs. So that's not working, and they're probably going to come back with the same thing. So if you're if you're there and you've got the Republicans, you got the Democrats in the room, and you say, okay, Obamacare is not going to I mean, whatever it was, you're not going to vote against Santa Claus. Nobody wants that. Okay, Then how do we make this thing viable and something that isn't going to unplode from its own weight. What would you do.
If you start up with a problem that is solved using bailing wire and duct tape, adding more bailing wire and duct tape is seldom a permanent conclusion. And so I have a problem with the premise, which is fixing Obamacare. You can't fix Obamacare. It's unfixable. That's the challenge. And so people have in their mind that Obamacare somehow was a good thing. I never believed that it never was a good thing, and so I think we need to
sketch out a different plan. It starts with a different set of structures and incentives if.
We want to. You know what, here's the other.
Thing we have talked a lot about in the public commentary in the last several months about this guy in New York City called Mamdami, right, and we talked about socialism and what FDR did when he created this model of allowing corporations to deduct healthcare benefits as a business expense without taxing the recipient as compensation. What he really did was create another flavor of socialism called corporate socialism.
He's moving the obligations of the individual not to the federal go because FIFTR knew he would never get that passed. He moved it to the corporation and said, hey, you the corporation are going to be responsible for this, and as a result, we're not taxed. The issue that nobody's talking about is this is in fact a form of compensation,
but the individual employee is not getting tax on it. Yeah, And if you really wanted to solve the problem in a way that would make everybody uncomfortable and be kind very controversial, you say, no, let's recognize it for what it is.
This is compensation to the employee. If you did that and employees paid.
Tax on the compensation, down many on the benefits has compensation, it's about three quarters of a trillion dollars that would go back to the federal treasury.
Yeah, that's got that doesn't have legs politically. I mean, we know that.
I mean, there's no way that the Democrats are going to say, Okay, we're going to give you. You're going to have to pay tax now on this.
But I can completely agree with that. I completely agree with that. But at the same time, you and people are saying, well, we have to find we have to fix it somehow. Okay, Well, fixing the catastrophe that is Obamacare is not going to be the answer because the yere's the other thing that's happening.
And I think I may have shared this with you before, Ken.
What we're also doing is in the public hospitals, we're moving the financial burden for those who have ACA plans to the local county taxpayer.
So what's happening is because the ACA.
Plans are typically high deductible, and the people who have those plans are typically unable to pay that deductible, then the county hospitals are only collecting about ten cents on the dollar of what they would get reimbursed if they were getting paid through Medicaid. So what's happening is you're saying, Okay, we want all this money, all these ACA plans. The Fed's going to subsidize some of that, but where the money's really coming out of is the county taxpayer at the local level.
And nobody's talking about that.
No, Well, you're the first that actually brought it up, at least on my show that that's going on. So okay, so Obamacare, okay, so we're fixing Obamacare here in the next three minutes. So what you're saying is Obamacare doesn't work. The premise of it was just flawed from jump, so we have to replace it. And these HRAs look encouraging. They do. I'm not sure you're going to get a lot of You're going to get political pushback for a
lot of different reasons. Simply because it's an election year next year, and I don't know if you're going to be able to get everybody into a room and agree on this thing, but it's certainly something that is going to be very much in the political forefront for the off year elections. So the shout the loudest voices, as you well know Todd wind up on cable channels. But the people that get things done are people that you
don't even know their names who they represent. So I'm just wondering, what do you think the chances are, I mean, realistic chances of getting this thing last sewed in so that the seven percent of Americans who actually use Obamacare insurance won't be left out in the cold and the rest of us won't be just taxed to the hilt to try and pay for it.
Yeah, and you know, I go back to we've been having a conversation as a nation about healthcare and who pays for it for at least.
Eighty years.
I was going to say at least since the end of World War Two.
Yeah, but he was actually Baylor down in Dallas where they were for fifty bucks a month they would take care of teachers, and so the first time the federal government ever got involved was actually under John Adams because we had sailors who were coming over with.
Scurvy and they were incurring.
Medical expenses, and so they were taxing five cent nickel basically for every sailor. So I've been talking about it for quite a while.
HR is an interesting idea.
It's fairly new, and anything that new necessarily.
Has an adoption problem.
But it's a fairly new idea and it's going to probably run into some headwinds because it's going to be a tax benefit to the company, and the folks on the left typically hate anything that's a tax benefit to the company, right, But I don't like taxing the companies. They don't like tax benefits, right.
I mean, inevitably, you're going to blame the one percent. Ineforably, you're going to blame corporations. And inevitably it's going to be the Republican's love corporations. And look, they're not taking care of the little guy. But the little guy is
going to get left at the post. I just I think it's going to be fascinating Tom because we have the the off year elections and now there's a push by the Democrats to, you know, just extend these things for three years, these these emergency subsidies, and then you're right up against the presidential election. See, all of it's couched against politics, which is what I think plays into
what you just said. We've kicked the can down the road so much on this that it's become a political game, not necessarily a healthcare game, and the only people that seem to be doing well are the insurance companies. And I think that's where that's where we are right.
Now, and that lands up in Luigi Mongoni right shooting the guy from you know, but I think that the other issue that you're correctly pointing out here is that it's it's it feels like it's an intractable solution, but
a problem. But you know, the other problem that I kind of tongue in cheek as hurt is it goes back to the clear failure of the education system because the Democrats have clearly not understood the definition of the word temporary, right, because these were never supposed to be permanent subsidies, and now they're saying, wait a minute, how can you leave us out on the cold? These were well, the they were always supposed to be temporary. And guess what it was the Democrats that made it temporary.
There wasn't a weak thing that we said, Hey, let's go do this temporary thing. It's a good idea.
So I think there's a we really need to get back to the core issues of how do we pay for stuff? And the models that have always worked one hundred percent of the time is when people pay for stuff themselves, and it never works when you have somebody else pay It's just another form, like I said, of corporate socialism, a relicive FDR.
That's why you're the smartest man in the healthcare industry. His book is The sixty Percent Solution, Rethinking Healthcare. Todd's due for another book. I'm just telling you, you got to get another one out there, Todd Furnas you stay well, you know we'll be in touchdown the road. Thanks for your insight today. We appreciate it.
Thank you so much. My friend take care.
Yep, he's due for another book. He's been living off this one far too long. But you know, it was just on CBS this week. I was watching a congressman from California. I believe his last name was Lecardo. I don't know his first name, can't remember it, but he said that the push by some of these other dams in Congress to extend these Obamacare subsidies for three years is kind of cynical because you're right up against the presidential election year. Then they had a Kylie who was
a Republican from California. He was on there too, and he said, you know, it's yeah if you do it, but if you just do it through twenty twenty six, you're up against the midterms after that. I mean, they this is a political hot potato and there's no easy answer to it. But if they get to health reimbursement arrangements where the insurance companies aren't getting paid but the individual employee gets the money to determine his or her healthcare path and don't tax that, I mean that sounds
like everybody walks away happy. Sure, the corporations are the ones are the other ones that would benefit from it, But so what if you and I benefit from it? What's wrong with that? Sure, are wasting a lot of tax dollars on anything everything else in this country, aren't we? I'm down off my soapbox. It's two twenty seven. News Radio seven hundred w wel w.
I have yet have another vision that has become clear now and my crystallized cyindrical pulsating sphere, I see a roton man with cherry cheeks and a hearty laugh, prancing about in the snow. No, it's not Santa Claus. It's Brian Kelly.
Hello, quiet, and I'm I'm broadcasting.
So good to see you again. Same here, ken Brew, the rock is here to what do you think I have cataracts? I'm looking right at the guess jack and see. Good to see your rock. You look great. You're all dressed up for the Christmas part?
Oh?
Absolutely? What my reindeer costume on? As you can see, I can see that. That's right.
Are you prancer or acer dancer? Yes?
Much more, much more effeminate reindeer.
Yeah.
So what what what is expected of us at this this gathering today? What do we have to do besides it?
That's how I plan on really doing. But now we're supposed to you know, wine dine and pocket line.
Pocket line wine dine and pocket line yese best. Nobody leaves without a three year bonus. Ly no contact of commercials. Nobody seg year deal. The sales department has done such a great job. We only have a few minutes here,
so why don't you get us rolling? Ken Bruthy as the student report is the proud service of your local Thamestar Heating their conditioning dealers Thamestar quality you can feel in beautiful Western Hills called Durban Heating and Cooling at five one, three, five nine, eight eighty four forty nine or go to Durban Heating and Cooling.
Dot com Western Hills right correct. Who's the most famous singer ever to come out of Western Hills High School? Pete Rose Andy Williams. How about that turn? If he were alive, he'd be ninety eight years old today Today was his birthday. See here he is. Yeah, he got to play it. It's got to start singing on this radio station.
It's the most wonderful time.
See that's why I like your show.
I had I've heard this song ten thousand times in my life, and I had no idea.
You're telling me. The guy singing this song went to West High.
Went to West High.
Yeah, went to West High, and I think when he was maybe like a senior, they moved out to Los Angeles.
You were in the drama department at sant.
X one Iran. It yeah, absolutely, medal winner two years in a row.
A lot of drama before those report cards came out right, two or three days before. It's a lot of drama.
Yeah, it's the employment allis there was for sure.
All right.
See what's going on at sports?
Throw the Bengals for working out outside the next couple of days, getting ready for that, getting used to that Buffalo weather they're going to face on Sunday. Trey Hendrickson's not going to practice again. Imagine that t Higgins limited in practice. He's working through that concussion protocol Bacon progress, but don't know whether or not he'll be available on Sunday or not.
We'll wait and see. Rok, what do you think about that on Sunday? I mean I could see if the Bengals always handle the Bills well. But this is a huge game for the Bills, right, I mean they're still chasing the paper.
Yeah, they're still chasing it. You know, the Bengals are inspired by Joe Burrow.
The Bengals defense have looked better the last two weeks, so you know, and there's something to play for you win out, which is not easy, and then the Ravens and the Steelers split, saying there's a chance.
What happens if they beat the Bills and they beat the Ravens and then lose to the Dolphins. That's not good.
We cry and cry and cry.
Yes, Bengals kicker Evan McPherson is the ASC Special Teams Player of the Week with his efforts in the Ravens win. They went perfect six for six and field goals money man and two for two and pats unbelievable. Ken Anderson finalist the Pro Football Hall of Fame class of twenty twenty.
Six should be in there already. Amen.
Anderson takes on Avon tomorrow night in Canton for the Division two title. The Bombers go at it Friday night. Yes, you made Anderson High School. Ken Anderson isn't taking on Avon, right he should? I think I think he's playing for the Raptors. But don't tell anybody, Okay, don't tell him. Okay, you know always looking here, you know the other for the Ken Anderson. I mean, it's gonna be tough. You got to get eighty percent of the vote.
You got Belichick and you got Brady on that and that could be some drama they both get in. Robert Craft. Yeah, yeah, Robert Craft in Belichick, I'm sorry, yes, thank you for correcting me on it. Anyway, I was going back looking at some statistics here at Rocky. Do you remember the two thousand and six season you guys played the Colts played the Patriots up in New England. You beat him twenty seven to twenty.
You remember that in two thousand and seven, yes.
Yeah, yeah, it was that magical year.
That was.
I'm trying to think what the dead. No, you played in November fifth of two thousand and six.
Okay, no, you're yeah, you're talking about the sixth season we played in an AFC Italium, but that was at our place, right, Yes.
You played no in two thousand and six, you played them in New England, rock I got the stats here right in front of me.
That was the regular season game in the AFC title.
I'm talking about that regular season Yeah, Corry Della had a couple of touchdowns. Vine Terry was going crazy. You played in that game, So I mean you probably sent both Belichick and Craft home unhappy into that wilderness that is New England.
Magical year.
Yes, I believe, I said Dallas Clark. Yeah, Joseph and Die, you had a great team. Marvin Harrison.
The Colt now, Robert Bob said, Sanders of safety, the eraser Colts now are a little bit of in a crisis. We have Sauce Garner's right.
They got a quarterbacks, got a broken leg that's playing on a fractured leg. Say continue, please.
College basketball tonight, NKU opens up Horizon League play, taking on Cleveland State six point thirty on Fox Sports thirteen sixty. Among the one of the Reds that'll be making their appearance at Redsfest next month, Andrew Abbott, Graham Ashcraft, TJ. Friedel, Also, Terry Francona and his coaching staff, brons At Arroyo, Oh, Skeeter Barnes, Skeeter Barnhardt the Cowboy, they're digging them up. Sean Casey, Danny Graves, Wow, Devin Mezzeraco, De Infamous. Dave Miley, Dave Miley, Sam LeCure.
You know Dave Miley. I was in Tampa when Dave Miley was a high school athlete, and Dave Miley was a better football player than he was a baseball player. And he was a great baseball player. Miley could have played in the NFL. That's how good he was about that could have played in the NFL. It looks like got Brian Hartline is off to South Florid, Florida. Yeah, going to Ryan.
Day says he's gonna continue on coaching the Buckeyes.
See how far they go?
Ken Brew, Are you as upset as I am about here we are? It's the end of the college football season, the part were it's supposed to be more fun than ever, and we got the you know, the bowl games coming, the playoff coming, and it's a mess. There's coaches going everywhere, leaving teams. The playoff is a disaster too. You got a seven and five duke team playing the ACC title game. No one knows who's going in, who's not going in.
It's a mess. It's supposed to be one on the best part of the year and it's a mess.
And the Ohio University he's not there. Nobody knows why he was. Just that's walked into a meet the idea apparently walked into a coaches meeting, told everybody to get out, and then told the head coach go away, you're on leave. Nobody knows why.
Well, I have Chuck Martin at five of five. Can maybe I'll ask him, he'll know I do Chuck.
Is Chuck Martin the best coach in the back.
I mean, he's the best coach in America. I think he's fantastic. He's so good.
They overschedule, they get the paydays early on, and then man, he's ready to go. His quarterback quit on him. He's that's some guy never heard of. I thought it would got The guy's kid's name is Gutkowski. I thought it was the kicker that used to be with with New England. Look what he's done. The kid was the red shirt freshman throwing three three touchdown passes last week. And Chuck Martin's the best football coach in the back. You may be writing, maybe the best football coach in the matter.
I've been saying for a while.
Ken, you know everybody's looking for the next hot young offensive coordinator to become the next head coach of this and that. Well why not go to Kurt Signetti model right of a guy who's just won, the guy who just wins. And Chuck Martin, whether it's a Grand Valley State or Miami, he just wins. He knows the ins and outs of how to run a program through the ups and the downs and the portal and all that get a guy.
Like, hey, you guys, ever heard you? Guy's ever heard this?
Absolutely?
You know who this is right? Yes, Black Sabbath. Today's a monumental day for Black Sabbath rock. You know, in a good groove.
This is right here.
If he were alive today, Ozzie, Ozzie would be seventy seven years old on day.
How about that he's passed what about six months ago July, late July.
Yeah, yeah, he did that that concert and like a week and a half later he was dead.
Gone.
Yeah, he's unbelievable.
He's unbelievable.
And heard your dog Elvis their rock?
Yeah, well dad, you say that can brew my dog. He was sixteen years old, over retriever.
Unbelievable. Was really?
Was he named after Elvis Presley or Elvis Costello?
Elvis Presley because he is the king? Yes, the King is sixteen?
God bless God, bless that. That is a wonderful breed. I used to have a golden and I cried like a baby to day she died. It was unbelievable, the best unbelievable yes, take care of your pets absolutely. Well, what do you got coming up rock at three o'clock? I don't want to spend too much time here because I know the agent veteran that you work with gets upset. What do you got coming up at three o'clock?
Well, first of all, Eddie's out again again.
I mean we've got he's gone more than Biden, and Biden was gone the day.
Yeah.
So Jason Williams is in right out of the gate. This would be fun. We have Jack Grinder on Attorney to the Stars.
I don't know who is who is he?
And he's in a.
Local attorney and he wrote an OpEd about you know there's a time you're a porch pirates, right, Kener you steal the packages?
Well, he was asked a question if I set a booby trap?
Right?
You know you've seen those those videos where they they steal the package and it blows up and it's like, you know, pink dust or something.
Yeah, he's gonna tell him if that's legal or not. So I thought that was timely. That's why I gate at three. I know it's not in New York. True, they take the victim, they don't take the criminal.
In New York every single time. Yeah, and then at four o'clock we have a woman coming on, a research and author. I'm going to talk about Americans using AI to choose their Christmas gifts?
Can people do anything on their own anymore? Do we have to use AI to do everything? I mean literally everything?
That's why I take Seg shopping with me, Amen, Seg? Is there anything else we need to get to before we cut into Rocky's time? And who are you what today?
Jason, Jason Williams and Jason Williams and some woman that's going to do some AI shopping for you, and some guy that wants to blow up packages.
And it's another day on the editing Rocky shows.
I thought I was doing well. Nobody well and they want to blow up?
Is the last three hours here with hey say get us out of the Steward's Report.
We got to go mingle with the guests ken Brew in honor of our Christmas party.
Today we leave you with the immortal words of the stewd Report.
You got it. I will come on in time you ask me, because I mean, there's there's no bigger highlight than anybody could happen to be on the Bill Cunningham Show.
All the famer said, said said, who who.
Is that Ken?
That's Ken Anderson. Oh, I didn't know that. I didn't recommend to JEMs.
I don't know.
Hey, Rock, you get older, man, your hearing goes.
You know that.
You know my dog Element he's alive, but he can't hear anything.
Let me just say it, when you get older. The second thing that.
Goes, we'll ponder the first thing in the in the five o'clock hours, Ken
Two fifty five Dues Radio seven hundred W LW