Show. So I just popped into my head to day as I was listening to various conversations over the last couple of weeks, comparing these current times to which I used to look at, read about history books, watch documentaries about and think, man, that must have been something to live through. Ugly constant protests, violence, police versus the people in the street. You're either on their side. There's no there's no staying out of it. You're either on that
side or that side. We're clearly there now. Well to discuss, to compare it to contrast, and to just say hello, please, welcome back to the Armstrong any show. Are esteemed a newsman, Marshall Phillips, Marshally, you were with us for a cup of coffee? What was it fifteen years? It was about fifteen years, Yeah, a little more than a cup of coffee. By the way, guys, I have not left my house
since January one. I've had to deal with things like raccoons in the chimney, and you know, the the neighbors complaints about my growing pyramid of chardonnay bottles out in front, that growing pyramid of chardonnay bottle. I was actually thinking because I remember before you retired from this program, discussion of how much you're gonna follow the news or whatnot, and I could see checking out completely. So it just occurred to me. We could get you on the phone.
You could say that what now the protest about what there's a there's a disease. You're not following news? No, no, my friends, I h a. I have been following the news, probably even too much. In fact, you get to a point, especially when you're talking talking about the pandemic and and the action on the streets, and that well, as far as the pandemic goes, I get a cough, you know, and all of a sudden, I'm going, oh my god, I've got the virus. You know. Then you just got
to calm yourself down. Then I looked at what has been going on in the streets, and I got to tell you, in a lot of ways, this is very similar to what was happening in nineteen sixty eight, except it's not being played out against the background of a pandemic. It is being fueled by a lot of people who are just really chicked off with what they see as the current state of affairs. Back in the sixties, it was the Vietnam War, which a lot of people felt
was illegal, hadn't really been explained to them. They had friends dying, and now you've got another another ground swell. It's actually, you know, spread worldwide, fueled in large part by young people who have just gotten out in the streets and said we've had enough. Well was it? Was it the same way in it's the way it seems from eating about it. But I wasn't old muff to know what was going on. Where you're either on one side or the other. It was very, very difficult to
be neutral. Yes, yeah, I mean you were. You really were on one side or the other there. It was hard to find a middle ground at that point and again, and the anger was fueled by both sides. People who wanted peace and would condemn the soldiers and people who thought the war was righteous and would condemn the people who wanted peace. There were it was real hard to
find a middle ground. Do you remember people being uh dragged out into the public square and their careers being executed for being on the wrong side of various arguments? Back then? This, of course a lot of its social media. Maybe without social media you couldn't do that, do you remember anything about that. No, not so much. No, not so much. I mean, and again, as you pointed out,
social media has made a huge difference. I mean, you can be told you can say the wrong thing or try to say the right thing in an awkward way and be crucified for it. That that that was that did not exist back then. Although although fiery tempers did produce fiery results both in and today. You know, it's probably worth pointing out the average sandwich shop owner or or you know, NBA announcer or whatever, they had no way to communicate their opinion to the masses, and so
you'd never hear about it anyone. You didn't know what Frank and Gifford thought about the Vietnam War necessarily right, right, yeah, you know, and yeah exactly, and again, uh, even if people would say certain inflammatory things, a lot of the reporters wouldn't report it. They would just say, all right, well that's just background, and they wouldn't actually put it in print. That and again it's when I started to work in radio. Oh god, no, so many years ago.
You would call the president Mr President or Mr Trump, you would or Mr Nixon. You would never just say Nixon or it was always much more formal. And again, how about you lying communist, morbidly obese Nazi. Well, you know, as time went on that began to appear in the free press and other alternate media. Yes, yeah, what so what? But so in between sixty eight and recent times, we obviously came back together, you know, in a in a in a in a period of time where we we
were now thinking, oh, those were the golden days. How do we get those back? What? What ended the division? Just the war ending or or did it run its course? Or do you have any idea you're talking about the end of the Vietnam War? Well, what what brought us back together from the sixties to a more a calmer period through the seventies, eighties, nineties. I think I think a lot of it was the fact that the war ended, the draft ended, and people started talking to each other more.
You know, you had if you knew somebody that came back from the war, you saw they were in paid, so you you know, you might you might be more willing to talk to one another as opposed to just getting on social media and trying to dog somebody. Well, and a lot of the race that go ahead and Marshall. Sorry, I was just gonna say I noticed that happening through the years, especially as we got to the end of
the seventies into the eighties. There was a lot more of all right, I appreciate what you thought you had to do, and I appreciate what you thought you had to do, so you had more of that back and forth. It's also significant that the Nixon administration, in the wake of the race riots of late sixties, launched enormous social programs, huge spending by the Republican administration then, and a lot of people thought, Okay, that'll help, that'll be good, and so, okay,
we won't burn the cities anymore. Um, and a lot of it actually didn't help. It hurt, in my opinion, but um, and then Watergate came and went, and then the war ended. So yeah, just was on TV and everything was you know, we we intended when you retired to check in with you now and then on retirement. Unfortunately you retired right at the moment of a global pandemic and a and a great depression, so rough timing for your retirement, I realized, And you know, I will
be very honest with you. Part of me is sad, and I'm not happy that I retired at this period of time. But part of me is also saying, all right, you know, now it's a good time to step back, at least for now. You know, retirement doesn't mean forever, but at least for now. And it's given me, in all honesty, a really good chance to observe other people dealing with things in their real life against this whole background,
against this panopally or what's going on. Hey Marshall, I'm sorry we have to jump in even as you're making a beautiful point. We got about twenty seconds left, okay, all right, Well, I we'll tell you this. I am living in an undisclosed location five months. It took five months, but my house, my other house, is up for sale. Excellent, excellent, And I assume you're continuing the stockpile gold and weaponry. Everybody. Marshall,
Phillips are esteam News. Went always great to talk. Thanks for your Marshall, Armstrong and Getty