Yes, y'all, welcome to another episode of Civic Cipher. I'm your host, Rams, this job.
Called me q Ward and it just so happens to be my name, Ramses. What's up, bro, everything in the world. Man, back in the building to talk more about the state of the Union. I like how you put that. You sounded very presidential, if you will.
Indeed, that is the vibe that I'm going for here. You know, we haven't had a lot of examples of that in recent times, trying to trying to make sure I set the tone for things to come.
Appreciate it, appreciate it.
So yeah, here we are on you know, the other side of a presidential campaign, or.
What we hope is the other side of it, well.
The election part of it, yes, indeed, But the first thing that we have to talk about is where we stand right now, which is Donald Trump's repeated, uh baseless uh claims that this election was somehow stolen from him and what that means on all sides. So I know you're you've been listening.
Yeah, I can't help it, man, I haven't. I have yet to exhale from the announced results because of, you know, the continuous claims of fraud from the other side.
Right, well, I'm gonna say something that I believe needs to be said. This appears to me I'm gonna have to assume too many people like a bona fide loss through the lens of or or on the terms of rather Donald Trump, where if it's possible for him to cast doubt on it so that he can say face, he'll do it. His ego is obviously very badly bruised, and he's an egomaniac, has been well documented during his
time as president, and anything that he can do. I don't know that this is as much another power grab as it is his feelings are hurt, you know, and he doesn't want to have to carry that stain with him to the grave. And that's not to say that he would not like to hang on to power. I'm sure he's having a great time telling everybody what to
do and everyone having a bow before him. But I think above all else, you know, his ego seems to reign supreme over everything that he does, everything that he is, and that's always been the case even before he was president, from what I knew of him, and so at this point it really just feels like his feelings are hurt, and if he can confuse his exit, have his exit from the White House muddled in uncertainty, that he can save a little bit of face.
You know.
It's just like whenever you you know, you know, being little when playing video games, you know, versus your brothers and sisters or cousins or whatever it is, whoever's the better player wins, right, we all know that. But if somebody says, oh, you cheated, well, it's not possible to cheat on video games, so it's very unlikely, you know. But the implication there is that if we were both playing the same game, I would win, and then they
can save a little bit of face. Their ego's not as bruised, and hopefully they can come back and you know, if they win the second time, they could say see I told you, and they complete and validates their first laws. Right, So you know, I don't mean to call the president a child, Yes I do.
Oh okay, why don't you was gonna be my question?
No, I just the analogy kind of painted the picture there, and so I kind of saw the shot, had to take it. But the unfortunate consequence of that behavior is that and I know it's been said. But it undermines our democracy. It undermines people's faith in our democracy. There's already you know, most people who are eligible to vote don't participate in all the elections that they can, not just presidential elections, but midterm elections as well. It's just
not as big of a deal to them. And you know, a lot of folks feel very disconnected from the system, and therefore they don't feel compelled to cast a vote for every election. But something like this further erodes the American population's confidence in our.
Election systems, in the entire democratic process exactly.
And to spare this one man's ego, he's going to take that away from seventy million people.
They voted for him, And the biggest problem with that, in my eyes, is that such a large percentage of those people didn't just vote for him, but they believe in him, yeah, and are going to take very very seriously his claims of some sort of injustice here, sure of some sort of of him being shorter in some way, of the game not being played fair. And that's the
part that's so discouraging. Sure, right, it's very discouraging that seventy million people want more of President Trump, but even more so that seventy seemingly intelligent adults wholeheartedly believe in what he sells them and for lack of better have to move forward themselves feeling cheated themselves.
You know, the worst part of this is that instead of those seventy million people coming to terms with perhaps a flawed ideology that they have that they carry, come into terms with the fact that, you know, their party, political party, political affiliation might be on the wrong path, rather than come to terms with the fact that you know they back the wrong horse, whatever whatever it is.
You know, instead of coming to terms with those things like normal folks would do, they'd sit down reassess, Okay, who am I, where do I live? What is what is our nature? You know what I mean? Why did we lose this one? How do we move forward? You know, this is typically how societies evolved. You know, if if the next ten elections are all democratic, you'll find that the Republican party will adopt some democratic philosophies and then
both parties will have to evolve in that direction. That's typically what happens because people are able to sit with the losses and find out what went wrong, who they are who the society is? Where are what are people's values? Now? Do you understand? And so what's happening by this man filing all these lawsuits and all these different states alleging widespread voter fraud and somehow, you know, millions of people have You know, if the illegal ballots were encountered, he
would win the popular vote as well. I know for a fact he said that certainly on his first election, because the alleged voter fraud then as well. And you know, out of all the cases of voter fraud going all the way back, you know, Google is free. You know, anything that's been substantiated is it's measured in I believe, the hundreds out of the billions of ballots that have been cast in this country's history.
So even if it's even if it measures or counts in the thousands.
But it's measured in the hundreds. So it's a minuscule issue, and it's largely caught. It's very, very difficult to do, and this is part of the reason why we have faith in our democracy. There are systems in place. This is why we have faith in our currency. There are systems in place to ensure that the bottom doesn't fall out, because even if Donald Trump was the president for eight years, he's not going to be the president forever, even if he tried to be, He's going to die. There's only
you know, the only certainties in life are death and taxes. Well, sorry, I take that backs. Obviously Donald Trump doesn't clearly, So maybe I'm wrong clearly, but I still that went out. I do believe that the grim reaper comes for all of us. You know, everyone has their day, and so this democracy, this country has to continue, and so there are systems in place to protect the long term interest
of this company. And for him to just in one fill swoop level all these baseless claims that erode the trust in those systems, the trust that his grandchildren and great grandchildren are going to have to need in place in order to continue to function in the society. Again, suggest just how inflated this man's ego is. You know.
Interesting. I don't know if it was a Freudian slip or not, but you said this company instead of this country, and either word works ironically. Sure, sure this corporation that we pledge allegiance to, that was a that was a good slip. I enjoyed it. Even if it wasn't intentional.
I like that though, Let's roll with that for a second, because I think that that sort of speaks to why we had a Donald Trump in the first place. There's there's, you know, this celebrity crazed society that we live in. Already, people used to accuse about Obama of being a celebrity. He's like too cool for the office. Right.
It's really ironic when you start thinking about the things that he was accused for and criticized for, and then you look at the guy that's in there now and all of those same critics seem to have developed amnesia or developed an entirely new set of moral principles. Their entire core has been replaced.
Yeah, well, in any case, you know, and it's really tough to juxtapose the presidencies because they're really apples and oranges. It's two different things. But the point I was making is that if you're getting someone to run your company, typically you will try to get someone who has a record of success. You know, someone who has actually had the experience, oftentimes from the ground up. You know, someone
who had values. You know everyone who's involved in the uh, you know, all of your stakeholders, in your in your business. And Donald Trump's failures almost ring louder than his successes. You know, his successes have always, you know, been alleged to be baseless or otherwise inflated, and as it turns out, they very much are. But his failures have been you know, broadcast to the world. You know, his casino failures, his stake failures is university failures, and they like he can't teach.
And none of that mattered, the fact that he was a celebrity, the fact that I heard it said before that Donald Trump is a poor man's version of a
rich man. And for folks who live in the middle of this country, as we've seen from the electoral the the elect election maps, as those are monitored, you know, and I do understand this, there's a lot of folks who are white, who are middle class to poor, a lot of these people, a whole lot of these people, and they feel like everyone hates them for being white. They feel like they don't you know, whatever it is.
Life feels a little different for them as they age, right, it feels like they're more and more pushed out of the conversation. Now you and I Q know the truth, and that's that well, more people are taking their rightful place at the table of humanity, but from their perspective in their lives, where it's a very limited view of the world. If you're in Kansas and you grew up in farm country, you know, on a farm, farming, than what you know is farming, you don't know anything about,
you know. And we're very fortunate living in big cities, our whole lives where we get you know, the richness and the diversity that comes along with being a part of the human family. Excuse me. So these people who you know, you know, they're they're in their limited view of what success looks like. That the name Trump, to his credit, has been marketed in such a way to where it's synonymous with wealth. Maybe not success, but wealth,
you know, And that's what we all want. Capitalism compels us to pursue wealth, not happiness, not time with our family, not health, wealth, you know. And I'm not trying to make light of wealth, because obviously wealth is good too, but it seems to be the only thing or the thing that reigns supreme until your health starts to decline, and then you realize that money can't ask Steve Jobs,
wealth can't buy you health, true to push Tea. So we end up in it in a situation where these peopleeople in Middle America have this celebrity businessman as far as they know, who is wealthy, and they think success is going to tell them the truth. They think that he cares about them. Donald Trump obviously has never cared about anyone besides Donald Trump. And he suggests to them he speaks their language. And you know, obviously, no matter what their reality is their reality. So I don't want
to take that from them. That's not fair to do. That'd be the same as if someone came to me and says, Will Ramses, why are you worried about the police? You live in a nice house and you have, you know, a lot more than most people have, and you get to be on the radio and television and everything. What do you have to worry about? And it's just not a fair conversation. So I don't want to take that away from these people. Obviously I have a different view
of what's happening. Again, but Donald Trump comes along and he says, they've forgotten about you. They're all buddy buddy with each other in Washington, DC, but I haven't forgotten about you, and I'm rich and you're gonna be rich too. And even if he hasn't said it out right, he has. But even if he didn't say it in one of his rallies at a certain city at a certain time, that's the impression that folks got from this guy.
And then if you're not rich, it's not your fault that part. That part, there's people coming into the country illegally, still in your jobs, and so on and so on. I don't even want to dive into that pit hole of really really divisive and incorrect ideology. Sure, but the idea that you are only less than because of someone else. The only way you could possibly not be winning and not be successful is it if the game is rigged against you.
About that, I e.
The twenty twenty presidential election.
So oh, and let me say this while I have it, while we're here. If you feel this way, or if you know anyone that feels this way, do me a favor after you google it, of course, after you do your own research. If you don't believe in Google whatever conspiracy theories have trapped you in your corner of your mind, But you know, do your own research and learn for yourself that people on welfare aren't messing up the system. You know, and I've said this before, I'll say it
as many times as I need to. It's the nature of capitalism to have unemployment when there's one hundred percent employment. That's why there's always an unemployment rate. There's never one hundred percent because when there's one hundred percent unemployment, wages go up again.
Or one hundred percent employment employment.
That's what I mean to say. You can't if there's if everyone has a job, then you can go into your boss's office and say I want a raise, and if you don't give me the raise, I will quit, and they have to give you that raise because there's no one else to take that job. Do you understand. It strengthens the employees, it strengthens the workers, et cetera, et cetera. But capitalism needs every last ounce of labor, money, utility,
et cetera. It demands that. That's the nature of capitalism, and so there needs to be some unemployment in order for capitalism to thrive, in order for wages to stay low and prompt companies to stay profitable, and so no one on welfare none of these things that you might think are working against you are actually working against you. There is nobody from Mexico that's going to take your job,
because capitalism compels robots to take your job. Might be five years, might be ten, but you will not have a job. And this is part of the reason why people who were progressive, people were forward thinking, people who were enthusiastic about Bernie Sanders were so excited about him because he was actually looking toward the future that is barreling toward us now. Can't spend too much time on that at lame duck president, can't spend too much time
on capitalism. The show exists to celebrate blackness, to empower black voices and brown voices and Native voices when I can get Native guests on the show, and Asian and so forth. But this is a black space, admittedly and deliberately, and I want to take a moment, regardless of how you feel about the politics or the history of this person, I want to take moment to acknowledge our vice president elect. Now, Qward, what are your thoughts on our vice president elect?
So I owe her an apology, Okay, because I let the negativity the divisiveness, the ignorance, the misinformation of this election, of this administration to cloud what I should have been celebrating the whole time. Even if she didn't get there. She was the first woman on a ticket, and for the first woman on a presidential ticket to be a black woman of Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority in corporation from a coward university Nellwood.
See right.
So for the first woman in the history of this country to be that woman, to be a black woman, to be a Southeast Asian woman, that's so incredible.
Why is that incredible?
No one had to blaze the path for her? Tell them everyone prior to her in her position specifically right, because Barack has blazed his own trail, but that trail had to be blazed by white men before him, him being not the first man, just the first black man. She's the first woman, period, Meaning she didn't follow a white woman, she didn't follow another woman.
So that means the period all women who ever function in that capacity at some point in the future will follow the pale the trath of the path that she blazed.
Yes, correct, So I sat holding my mixed daughter, my black and Mexican daughter, my black and Mexican and Filipino daughter watching this woman who she might look like one day celebrate a successful campaign, and it hit me for the first time because you and I have been texting, we've been on the phone, we've been in sending each
other messages. I have not yet exhaled or celebrated what most of the country is calling a victory for the president elect and Vice President elect Joe Biden and Kamala Harris because of the play that the other side is running, and as ineffective as sound logical people might think that play is, you have to remind yourself they've never depended on logic to make their points or to further their cause. If they had at any point, he wouldn't have ever
got elected. And so you're thinking, logically, it doesn't make any sense and it's baseless, and you know he's not going to bear any fruit. But he's been very, very strategic, if nothing else. You know, look at his appointments, look at his Supreme Court justices. The whole point for a lot of these appointments and people that he's put into positions of power were to shield him from defeat. Well, if it doesn't go my way, you know, I've kind
of hedged my bet on myself. But again, let's not, like you said, dedicate too much of the show to.
I know, I said, let's not dedicate a bunch of the show to him. But I like how you said that, and I think I learned something. Took me this long, but I learned something. Follow me here. When you said that he was being strategic, you know, prior to this point, I might have said, yeah, strategic in the way that you're as strategic as you can be in that capacity.
Like there's there's literally people whose job it is to make sure that you have a strategic advantage over every situation that comes your way, or at least you have information so that you can be as strategic as possible when approaching, you know, an issue or whatever your duties entail. But you know, largely, strategy is not a word that I would associate with Donald Trump up until I guess for the whole time. Now, how about this, to recall
the example that we talked about earlier. You're sitting down. Follow me here, You're sitting down and you're playing a video game. Now, what's your game that you grew up playing that you're really good at? Doesn't matter. Pick one street Fighter, street Fighter, great game. Okay, so you have mastered street Fighter. You put in the out, you know all the moves, you know your favorite character, you know how to win, what their advantage over other characters. You
got it all down, right, street Fighter. If you're too young to know what Street Fighter is, google it if you're listening. But now, let's say that you have a cousin, right, and your cousin has never played Street Fight. Matter of fact, your cousin has never played a video game before. And this cousin of yours iss very entitled personality type, right, And he comes in and he's just not used to dealing with people with any like a modicum of compassion
or integrity or whatever. So he's not your favorite cousin. We'll just you know, he's my least favorite cousin. There we go, least favorite cousin. Okay, But somehow you and him end up playing the same video game. And while you have definitely skill experience, you knowategy, foresight, et cetera, he comes in and mashes all the buttons and somehow he wins the game. It's hard to go back and say that's a strategy, but based on what you just said, I do think that that's pretty much what it is.
He throws everything at the wall, and whatever sticks sticks and whatever doesn't stick. He says that it was taken out of context or explains it away or whatever. But we've seen him was he was I think it might have been Dave Chappelle did said this. He got on stage and tried to guess the cure for COVID in real time by should we shine a beam of light inside of our body or should we you know, drink
bleach or whatever. And then people went and tried to do these things, you know, and then when they did it, he a joke, right exactly. And it's not just that there's you know, tons of example, Yeah, him just rambling or rattling off nonsense or whatever. And that's part of the reason why they cut the cameras off on this guy the last time that he spoke from the White House trying to allege voter fraud without any claim, because again, it undermines the the democracy.
But Kamala Harris, yeah, so so caught up in the possible negative outcomes, right, and.
Just trying not to try not to give myself too much hope, so that I'm let down harder when something that he alleges with no with no evidence is taking is taken seriously, right, because people that I know that are people who have studied law, who practice law, even people that I know who have studied in practice in the political realm have told me all of his claims are baseless, like he has zero to go on. Sure, but these are people who are thinking logically. Once again,
they don't mash all the buttons. Yeah right, So in the in the in the wake of his presidency, I've just been sitting waiting for the other shooter drop right, Like you know, Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh was appointed immediately after a sexual assault case whereas he was the perpetrator being accused, Like can you imagine a lifelong appointment to the highest court our country has was in court
being credibly accused by a doctor of sexual assault. They made sure that he was not convicted of anything and rushed to his appointment, And most recently they did it again. Yeah, things like this that he put in place to be
able to get over on us. So I have not been able to bring myself to the point of celebration yet or just exhaling and celebrating that he's not going to be our president anymore, because it's not it's not beyond the scope of reality that he just will decide he's not leaving, and then what it's not like we have a plan for that. It's never happened, and a.
Lot of things during this presidency have never happened.
Never happened, and there are things that we assume our law that are not They're just how things are done because people are decent. Ultimately, there's been tons of presidents that each side didn't agree with, but there was some level of dignity. There was some level of country before a party or country before a person. That does not exist anymore. So lost in all that negativity and all of that that's clouded the last four years, I just forgot to give her a standing ovation. I forgot to
applaud the trail that she was blazing. Sure, and I sat there holding my daughter, watching her speed, and it hit me right. My mother was born in nineteen forty five, so when she turned eighteen in nineteen sixty three, so this is before nineteen sixty five, she wasn't able to just go to the ballot and cast her vote for president.
My mother.
Strong, beautiful, powerful woman. So when I became old enough to vote, I got to vote for the first black president. And my first thought, because I was the first person at the ballot in this county, the first person at the polls, I'm sorry in Maricopa County was me.
I slept there. That's how That's how deturned.
I was for Obama's first first election, and I played Gez, my president is black the whole next day on super repeat. Speakers don't get much louder this and Bro, I have not had that same hope and excitement this time around, because I just figured they figure out a way to cheat us, to scam us, and they're still trying every day in front of everybody. What she's just done is historic, but it's surrounded by so much muck that people still
aren't properly celebrating what just happened. The vice president is a woman, hard stop. We should be going crazy just for that. But the first woman to ever be president or vice president is a black woman. And AKA and AKA from Howard because I've heard people questioning her blackness.
If you will, and you know the decisions that you make when you're not sure of your blackness, are different than pledging Alpha Kappa Alpha and attending Howard University, because that's not just questioning her blackness, but questioning how she identifies her blackness, like she just decided to do that now for this campaign. No, people, you don't pick Howard and AKA if you haven't decided whether or not you're black or not. That's just not the direction you go.
So something the small about, something to celebrate, something to be proud of. She's it. She'll never hear this, But my apologies for not giving that the attention and the gravity that it deserved, because it's really a monumental accomplishment for her and for every woman on earth. And even by her words, she didn't just shout out black women. She spoke to every woman who could hear her voice. Massive, massive step forward. As as much as it might be covered in clouds now, I do want.
To make sure that I talk about what it took for all this to happen. Right, but before I get there and before I finish with Vice President elect Harris rolls off the tongue a little bit. We'll get rid of that elected, definitely. Do you know what we'll really roll off the tongue, President Harris, and for me, based on what I see, based on how the future looks, and if this train stays close enough to the track,
that is not beyond the realm of possibilities. Because this nation has shown that they can rally behind a black person, This nation has shown that the majority of folks can rally behind a woman.
Yes, indeed, let's not forget that and this nation twenty sixteen exactly.
And you know, I do believe that Joe Biden was just the right man at the right time. He was the sort of person that could get enough Republican that's important to say, yeah, because he said, everybody's not.
Excited about Joe being the perfect candidate, but he was the right candidate for now.
Got the law.
It needed to be someone who people would actually vote for it not just someone people would like. That was important and that can't be stressed enough. It had to be someone that would actually get the votes, whether they were perfect or not, because we had a much larger problem and repudiation was absolutely necessary. Absolutely and I'm not being hyperbolic.
So this is why the UH I was very and I will always be very sad that Bernie Sanders didn't cross the finish line. But I recognize, unlike a lot of folks, a lot of my countrymen, that while his ideas are.
Vastly superior, he didn't have a shot.
Everybody needs to get behind somebody in order to get him cross the finish line. And Joe Biden, Joe Biden, was that guy. He didn't. He wasn't off putting, you didn't scare folks that he didn't wasn't talking about changing the way the world is, just inching it forward. And that was comfortable enough for more people to get behind him. And so here we are. But you know my prediction, I'm calling it here. Uh, Kamala Harris is going to be uh the forty seventh president.
That would be tight.
Yeah, so uh you know. And and again there's a lot of things that she stands for that I don't know. She she comes from a law enforcement background. She has very good for stood for. Okay, she comes from a law enforcement background. So my assumption will be that she tends to side with law enforcement, which we know that system to be flawed, not speaking about the humans that operated, but the system in and of itself is and flawed,
is not the wrong word is the wrong word. It's doing exactly what it was designed to do, but it was designed poorly and it was design functioning perfectly. Yeah, there you go. That's a great way to say it. But you know, those that those and other things really have plagued the black community and the brown community, Hispanic folks, especially in as part of the country where we live
in the southwest and on the West coast. And so I'm hopeful that you know, after her time as Everyone's vice president, that she will adopt a more inclusive approach.
So I'm looking at our GPS, and our GPS says in seven hundred and fifty feet make it right, I need your permission to make a left because I have a destination that we did not plan. But then I just feel compelled to speak to just based on where we are in this conversation right now. Sure, SHO, A lot of people were very, very disappointed in what the
Democratic Party gave us in a candidate. Black people in particular are starting to get to a point where we're fed up of getting nothing in exchange for our vote and getting nothing in exchange for our loyalty. A lot of my woke brethren, we're really really into the idea of voting for via writing Kanye Kanye West, how about that one and unapologetically because he's black, and in their mind that was enough. Now you and I know that
that's not the case. But for a lot of people, the lack of representation, you know, for the entire existence of the office, having won, the idea that there were underrepresentatives on his face obvious, except and I listened to very very well thought out, very passionate arguments from people who felt like he was the decision that we needed
to make. The problem was none of their rhetoric had anything to do with him, but everything to do with the flaws in the system, everything to do with us not having proper representation, everything to do with us not getting anything in exchange for our loyalty, our patronage, and our vote. All very very well constructed points, but again, nothing to do with the candidate that they chose to back.
With regard to him specifically, I wish he was as passionate about being the president as the people who wanted to vote for him. You know, I would always remind them, you know, your boy didn't campaign right, Like if the idea was for him to actually win, he would have ran a campaign. Yeah, it was grossly irresponsible for him to interject himself into the conversation when he did, when there was nothing he could do to win. There was no platform, there was no policy, there was just I'm me.
I'm famous. I know I couldn't at least get you guys attention. So this is what I'm going to say. I'm doing now. And there's a long laundry list of things that mister West has done that make me scratch my head at best, make me want to have a very stern conversation with him. At worse, the conversation that you guys just started to have have when Kanye West
interjected his name into this. You guys need to start having now for the next election, because it's irresponsible to wait until five months ago to talk about all that we're not getting and don't have with regard to who we're gonna back as president, from Ice Cube to fifty Cent to Kanye West, to all of the people that I know that I've been just kind of disappointed with because you guys are too intelligent.
To use that excuse to make that mistake, to.
Miss the point. So massively right now right, The timing is just awful. You guys aren't saying things that are wrong. You aren't saying things that I don't agree with. But don't be so blind. I can't even say shortsighted. Don't be so blind. That's to think that now is the time to make a greater point That won't give you any result except that guy running this country for four more years. For a lot of people, it is a life or death thing for over six hundred immigrant children
who can't find their parents. Now, it's almost hard to keep talking after you say that, because that in and of itself should be enough. But there's so much more things that as a human we shouldn't be okay with that we've somehow gotten so used to that we just sweep it under the rug and keep moving, and I guess keep our head on the swivel to see when is the next thing gonna happen that's deplorable and inhumane
and disgusting. On our last show, I spoke about my children because my children are half Mexican and his rhetoric with regards to their mother's home country is insane. Seventy million people backed it. There is so much wrong. But let's start having the conversation. Now, say that four years from now or three years from now, we're prepared to back who we think is a great candidate. Let's not wait until twenty twenty three to start complaining about all
we should have been doing. Now, get involved, get educated, Ramsey says on every episode. Google is free. If you don't trust Google, do some actual academic research. Go to a library. Those are mostly free too. But educate yourself, be informed and take proper steps. Get involved. Vote in your local elections. Hell, run for office. But to sit back and do nothing, and to wait to a moment like now to express your anger and withhold your vote
and encourage others to do the same. Yeah, that's very, very very hard for me to accept, very very hard for me to not speak out against. Wasn't that you guys were wrong, You were just going about it all wrong.
Now let's talk about some of the things that were done right. I think it's important. I know that lots of folks have celebrated and silver because there's such a sense of relief. But to your point, there was a lot of things that took place in the last four years that really led to the reality that we're living in now. One of them, I have to say it is black women. As soon as Donald Trump got elected, they all got to work, and and women in general too, but black women especially because that is.
Black women specifically specifically.
Yeah, but Donald Trump. The election of Donald Trump to the American presidency is an insult of the highest order to black women. Now, obviously there are people who can go and find one and two examples and try to, you know, throw them in my face.
It should be an insult to all decent humans period to that too.
But my impression, you know, I so doctor Westernberg, who's a guest on the show from time to time, Doctor Kimilla Westenberg. You know, please look her up. She's a and I think she's one of the vice presidents of the NAACP. She's a champion some sort of something she does. I couldn't, you know, run down her laundry list of accomplishments. But she's my teacher, and she's somebody that I just have known for twenty years, and she has lived under a dark cloud. I've known her twenty years. In the
past four lived under a dark cloud. She was so worried she did not want to leave this planet, leave her granddaughter behind in a world that is deteriorating morally or otherwise. You know, and her granddaughter obviously is a black woman too, and there is, you know, if there's a societal hierarchy. You know, you could make an argument that at least in this country, black women are at the very bottom of that in terms of how they've been treated in terms, you know whatever. And that's obviously
a terrible thing. But a Trump presidency has been, in my estimation, particularly hurtful and harmful to black women. And so black women got to work very early on. If you don't know this, the Black Lives Matter movement was founded by black women in twenty twelve after tray Von Martin lost his life in Florida, one of whom is
good friends with doctor Westernberg. And so what I do want to applaud, what I do think got us together and got us mobilized in the same direction is perhaps a perfect storm, but it's something that we can duplicate going forward as black folks. The perfect storm is we had COVID and unfortunately I have to say this, the death of George Floyd and the social climate, the scary truth.
About this pandemic and the death of George Floyd. Is that minus those two things happening, the Republicans are likely celebrating the re election of Donald Trump.
To say, sure, and this is why I said, it's a perfect storm.
Wow.
Now, let me let me make this point. You know, there's I call it a silver lining. You know, we had to watch this human being's life get snuffed out on camera, tortured before he died, wailing, handcuffed on the sidewalk.
It's his killer in prison. I'm pretty sure.
No, yeah, I think there's I'd have to do the research. I don't want to answer that right now. But you know that, plus the the protest that followed with people being cooped up in the house, people not being able to work, you know, people took to the streets and that shifted the narrative, the national dialogue in the direction of.
Social justice, international dialogue.
That too for black people. And what we did very well was well it was on many levels, but some of those levels was young people with young energy hitting the streets. Allies to black people, all my brown brothers and sisters that are listening to my voice right now, I love you, and when you need me, I will be there for you. My name is rameses Jah Rudy King Taylor the Second. I will be there for you. All of my Native brothers and sisters, my Sikh brothers
and sisters, my Muslim brothers and sisters. I saw you out there marching with us, my white brothers and sisters. I'd be at a protest and you can google that too. I was at all of them. In the thick of it. I still go out, but man, it's probably if I'm being generous, ten percent black people in the city where I live in Phoenix, ten percent black people at a Black Lives Matter protest. I printed the banners, took them out there, waved them. Arele with my kids, you know.
And if you look back, this is not a black event. This is a human event because there's barely any black people out here. This is human beings coming together. And we did that very well, and our voices were heard. And so as black people to maintain those relationships with our allies, to be present. It is our duty to be present. We rise in solidarity when they need us.
We need to be there too. At this show. You hearing my voice right now is because people many of whom did not look like me, felt like it was important for you to hear my voice. And that cannot be, that cannot go unnoticed. And we're all in this together. But we need to remember that. And when it comes time to move the whole entire political agenda forward, we need to recognize what we did right this time around, which has come together. We were not being divisive. We
all rallied behind the same cause. There was no time for bickering, there was no time for ego, none of that stuff. And we got out there and we made it happen. And at the same time as we're protesting, you know, police brutality and injustice, and we recognized that there were systemic problems in place, we also it for some reason, the light clicked we probably should vote too.
And we're knocking on another election. And you know, the person who's really responsible for this climate we're living in is Donald Trump. And again we don't have to love Joe Biden. He just has to be not Donald Trump. And again, the right man in the right place at the right time. And so these are the sorts of actions that will lead to long term progress. Incremental though
it may be, it's still progress us. What we had under a Trump presidency was in my definition, a regression, not progression, and I think it's very important that that is said now. I do want to say this, in my city, that wasn't the only that wasn't the only
place where that happened. And because it was a national effort, and because there was such a massive reaction to the death of George Floyd, and because people were largely unemployed and folks took to the street coast to coast, it set the tone for what would become the black vote. And what what I've read is that there is a nine ten split for the black vote, ninety percent for Joe Biden, ten percent for Republicans. And I think it's
actually higher. I think that that was just the language that was used there, because ninety and ten just kind of lend themselves. But I think it's actually higher than ninety percent for black people because black women voted at ninety three percent ninety four percent for Joe Biden. But all those battleground states, as we now know, the difference was absolutely the black vote. Cities like Detroit, cities like.
Or Sorry, Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Atlanta exactly, Detroit, exactly talk to him, and so black folks coming together.
Unfortunately, it was you know, we voted out of pain. We voted out. We weren't voting to be as happy as we could be. We were voting to not be as sad as we could be. And those are two very different things. But the fact is we came together. And it's the coming together that again pushes is the nation forward. It pushes our agenda forward and the agendas of our brothers and sisters, so that we all can have a more dignified human experience. You know, I don't
think anybody's asking for too much more than that. And so even though this doesn't look the way that you know, this doesn't look like paradise, it does look like progress, and that progress was due to all of us. But obviously this show exists to, you know, speak to black issues. Perhaps you're listening to this program on a radio station or some other platform that plays black music, or you know, somehow there's a connection with your station to black music.
And so I want to speak to black people and I want all allies to listen to this, to this message. We can use these tactics not to avoid feeling bad, but to actually pursue the happiness that the Constitution suggests that we are able to pursue. And again, for those who are not as familiar with civics, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is kind of what's written into
the documents of this nation. And I do believe that with this formula and this format and this approach, we absolutely can pursue happiness.
And maybe they didn't have us in mind when those words were written, but you brought us here boom, You made us citizens of this land boom, and we are entitled to those words that shouldn't ring hollow to large sectors of your citizenship.
Now, before I get out of here, I want to shout out somebody who is from my hometown. For those of you that know, I was born in Compton, California, moved to Phoenix, Arizona in nineteen ninety. I'm very proud of Phoenix. I love Phoenix. God willing, this is where I will spend the rest of my life. But I was born in Compton, California. There is one person from Compton, California who dose two people. Indeed, well the other person is not necessarily from Compton, but two people are on
for today's topic. One of them is not with us anymore. But just because I can do it, really, I want to take the you know, the last couple of moments and shout out somebody who was an unlikely hero, you know, young gangster you know.
Uh.
For those who don't know, are not familiar with who I'm talking about YG, Uh, YG if you're if you're not familiar, He's a rapper from Compton, California. He has a song. Uh. The initials are F D T. The DT stands for Donald Trump. The F stands for the f work.
The F stands for f Yeah.
There you go. And Uh, I know you've heard the song.
Rest in Peace Nipsey Hustle.
Yeah, Rest in Peace Nipsey Hustle. I was just going to get there. But what happened on that song is you have a a person from Slosson, you know, UH, grew up in a neighborhood rolling sixties. Uh, and it's a crip neighborhood. And then you have a person from a blood neighborhood. UH and YG came together. They made a song. They've collaborated a lot, of course, their collaborations are really all about unity and kind of ending gang violence,
violence and advancing that culture beyond its limited scope. But you know, that song, although it was released four and a half years ago, recently shot back up to number one on iTunes and it's being played from coast to coast and other countries.
A four hundred percent streaming increase.
There you go, boom. So the young gangster back in business. And that's important too. While I got you, and I might say this again maybe I've said it before, just so you know, gangs were born out of They were the leftovers from the Black Panther Party, which the government
interfered with so that it could be dismantled. The government obviously introduced drugs into the black community in the West Coast, and what was remain what remained from the Panthers ended up being a group called the Community Revolution in Progress c r I P or CRYPT and the Black Liberation Organization of Defense. That's blood bloods. Introduce uh drugs into the community, give weapons to the kids, and then you corrupt them and they turned into street gangs and then
we have what we have today. But we know that, and we're obviously working toward, you know, uh, dealing with that. But that's a show for another time. Today we're celebrating, and so shout out to YG.
You gotta celebrate for me. I can't yet.
Well, we're celebrating the election, not the inauguration just yet. We'll wait for that to happen. But once again, this is Civic Cipher. I'm your host, Ramsay's joh they called me q Ward. If you got any questions, if you've got any topics you want us to cover, anybody you want to sit down and talk to. If you want to make a donation, we would appreciate it. You can hit civiccipher dot com or follow us at Civic Cipher on all our social media until next week. Peace