You're listening to KFI AM sixty on demand.
Six more stimulating talk, Chris Marylyn.
Imagine that you have the unthinkable happen and you lose a child. That did happen to a couple in Texas. They did not get their kids vaccinated there. Their kids got measles, and you've probably heard that measles has claimed the life of one person.
It was their kid.
They live in a Mennonite community and they speak the Mennonite German, which is a kind of a it's Germanish. Anyway, this is what they were saying through a translator. Let me see if this audio comes.
Through well enough.
They think that it's not as bad as the media is making it out to be. And it was her time on earth. They believe that she's better off where she is now versus all the negative many and all the stuff going on.
Was that loud enough, CONO, I know it was kind of quiet there. It was good enough, all right? Thanks, so they say, well it was time. That would be tough for me to reconcile. Joining us right now is our ABC News correspondent to in Texas, Jim Ryan.
Jim, good talk to you again.
They're my friend what a bizarre and sad story. This is when yeah, you lose, you lose a child, and then we run into this ethical and moral quandary between parenting and religion.
Yeah, well, you're right.
There are Mennonites. This is a deeply religious community out there in West Texas Gaines County. Parents who came originally from Germany, I assume, or from that part of Europe. And yes, this is a part of their culture.
Now.
The leadership in the Mennonite church out there, he says that the main pastor there says that he doesn't preach against getting your kids vaccinated or for getting your kids vaccinated. He says he leaves it to the parents. But it seems to be at least based on what these parents have had, the parents of the child who died, that they leave God's hands. That there are other ways of treating or preventing measles, cod lit oil, vitamins, supplements, name.
Traditional health community out there in West Texas and elsewhere says that just doesn't work. Vaccination is the best way to protect your kids.
Yeah, there seem to be a lot of these old wives.
Tales type remedies, right, These home remedies and nothing seems to back that up. Are they getting any support that you know of, Jim? Are they getting other people that are rallying behind them and saying that's right, don't get your kids vaccinated even if you lose one, because they still have other kids, right.
For other kids, And all of them had measles. They were treated by a doctor out there who's kind of gaining a name in West Texas for his defiance against the call to vaccinate children. They also have the backing of something called the Children's Health Defense, which they posted the interview conducted and then posted this inn you with the parents on their website. On its website, this group CHD Children's Health Defense was founded in two thousand and
seven by Robert F. Kennedy Junior. It's somehow it's a nonprofit organization and was founded long before the pandemic, long before this. Certain this measle.
Outbreak, certainly, but this is Robert F.
Kennedy's group, and it's the one who has these parents out and front doesn't identify them by name, but does do this interview with the parents of the child to die.
So this is interesting because RFK Junior sat in front of the Senate confirmation hearing and said that he was not going to discourage vaccinations.
Right, but here his.
Whole books, right, Well, that's true, He personally isn't isn't discouraging vaccination.
In fact, you know, he's he's.
Now saying that it's a good idea to get your kids vaccinated. But that's not a complete endorsement. It's not urging parents please go get your kid vaccinated. It's not that at all. These kind of hedged a little bit here in the last couple of weeks, and this I thought was fascinating.
Chris.
So, these Children's Health Defense on its website posted a page which mimicked the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention the CDC. This page looked, you know, the same font, same logo, same everything, except that it talks on this page about vaccines and a connection to autism, which is something that Kennedy has talked about for a long time. So this page was posted there and Robert F. Kennedy Junior saw it and called the Children's Health Defends and said, hey,
you got to take that down. So maybe his position is changing somewhat now that he's held in Human Service as Secretary who knows, but even that was too much for Kennedy.
But am I mistaken Jim? It seems that Jim ryaner Abyceniors correspondent didn't. I see that the CDC is now going to be investigating whether or not there's any link between vaccines and autism.
It is the research which has been done since the nineteen nineties has shown that there is no link between this. But we're talking about a Health and Human Services secretary who's kind of directing that show others changes in staffing at CDC, and so they will spend some other time and some of your money, Chris, to determine whether there's any link between autism and vaccination. In the past, there's been no link established at all.
All Right, Jim, let's go back to this couple in West Texas that lost the young one and say that they still wouldn't get their kids vaccinated and that, as you said, they believed it was their child's time to go.
That I guess basically God called this kid home.
Is there a response by others in the community, because I know there are pockets in Texas, especially in West Texas, with very very low vaccination rates. In fact, I was just reading an article last week about one school was bragging about having the lowest vaccination rate in the state. Only fourteen percent of their students were vaccinated, which to me seems like a really strange brag, not the flex
they think it is, but they're doing it. Are we seeing some other parents that are that are heating the warning and going, Okay, you know, in principle, I was all for this before, but maybe now that now that it's here, I bought it.
I better get my kid vaccinated. Yeah.
So, despite you know what's being said in the in the Mennonine community, out there other places, Yes, the health department in Lubbock, for example, out out in West Texas and other state health departments have set up vaccination clinics.
They offer them free.
They park a VANA or RV outside the hospital and they say come on. And yes, they've had lines of people who were bringing their kids in and saying, you know what, I better get this kid vaccinated because people are getting sick, people are dying. So yes, you are seeing that people are getting their kids vaccinated, such that.
Distribution was getting a little tight for.
The vaccine out there to West Texas. That's kind of a good thing the Health Department wants to see that. At the same time, you're seeing shortages essentially of things like cod.
Live oil supplements in some of the drug stores out there.
Yeah, and uh, what's that? Uh, what's that Crackpot Jones? That's he's selling supplements at his website right.
Uh.
Uh are a radio guy there, the Sandy Hook.
Alex Jones.
Alex, He's got a supplement.
I'm sure he's got something that's gonna cure everything for everyone. It sounds like something my sister in law will get into. She just loves to push u you know, healing crystals and and uh, the essential oils sounds perfect.
Yeah, well it's I mean, the people put a lot of faith in that stuff. And uh, and there is this deep suspicion. I think, more than anything else, Chris, it tells us how deeply divided on principle the country is, you know, on science and on things that we used to take for granted. You know, I've got everybody got the MLR shot before they went off to school. But now you have this this suspicion about that. And I don't know if it's going to get better or gonna get worse.
It is so strange to me though, Jim, because once we.
All say I don't trust him, I don't trust him, I don't trust him. But then of course once it's in the community and we have a child who loses their lives, then people are lining up to get their kids vaccinated. So how deeply do their principles really run?
Right?
Of course that's what we're yeah, that's what we're watching from from a farm, all right, Jim, always great talking to you, my friend.
Thank you so much.
Jim Ryan Aby, Seniors correspondent who is in Texas. They're great talking with Jim.
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
Meryl I AM six forty more stimulating talk and on demand anytime the iHeartRadio Act if you missed it. Last week, President Trump signed an order saying get rid of the Department of Education, which is kind of tough to do because it's not a president department, but it is under the executive branch, which means he can just about decimate it anytime he wants.
President Trump signing yet another executive order today, this one directing his Education secretary to dismantle the Department of Education. We're going to be returning education very simply back to the states where it belongs to the administration, arguing US schools are failing, but the Department of Education does not administer a curriculum, create lessons, or set requirements for enrollment and graduation.
So what do they do if the Department of Education doesn't oversee education.
What are they?
Critics arguing this move will gut public education funding and hurt millions of low income students and those with disabilities.
Oh, follow the money.
What we find is when we give block grants to states a lot of times, that hurts students in need that help. That hurts brown and black children, and that gives states opportunity to leave students out.
But the White House saying the department will not totally shut down, but when it comes to student loans and pelgrants, those will still be run out of the Department of Education.
But we don't need to be spending more than three trillion.
Dollars over the course of a few decades on a department that's clearly failing in its initial intention to educate our students.
All right, so three trillion dollars over decades.
You notice how they kind of cut they go we don't need to be spending three trillion dollars over decades.
Here are these numbers thrown around.
For instance, they talk about the budget and the you know, the Republicans passing the continuing Resolution, and they want to extend the tax cuts, and they say, well, the tax cuts are going to cost four point five trillion dollars, and then they want to cut more, and they want to cut another two trillion dollars.
That's not that's not per year.
So I think I always think that we tend to throw a bunch of numbers around, but we don't really give those numbers con text. It is tough enough to fathom what a trillion dollars is anyway, it's even harder to fathom when we don't give it any sort of context. We say it's trillions of dollars over ten years, or in this case, three trillion dollars since its inception back in the seventies.
Right, listen, But.
We don't need to be spending more than three trillion dollars over the course of a few decades. On three trillion dollars over the course of a few decades, it's been like forty five years. I'm not saying that it's a good use of money, but context context.
Come on, official, saying a smaller agency will help carry out some of the critical functions that the department focuses on, like enforcing laws against discrimination and providing funding for low income students and special education.
I don't believe that those funds will still be there if this department is closed.
Head of the American Federation of Teachers, Randy Weingarten saying on social media, mister President, we will see you in court.
Yeah, of course.
We're a group of Democratic senators has written a letter to Education Secretary Linda McMahon urging her to reinstate those former employees, warning if not, student loan borrowers will suffer dire consequences. Queena Roy, ABC News, New York.
Yeah, something like forty percent of the student loans that are out there are past due. And a lot of this has to do with the confusion from the last administration with the on again, off.
Again student loan forgiveness. So who's it going to affect?
Low income rural schools and students with disabilities mostly going to be affected. Your student loans are now going to have to be paid back to the small Business the administration and Mostet Association Small Business Administration.
That's who's going to take over that.
As far as what your kids are learning, and we talk about schools aren't educating well enough. Our education level is dropping. The United States has falling behind. Department of Education doesn't see anything that has to do with curriculum that's still set at state levels. But we are likely to see a bunch of cuts to the workforce at the Department of Education. I think they're getting doged. You're gonna get doged right out of here. They're gonna have
the workforce cut it right off. By the way, they said that, well, they want to make sure they protect that Office for Civil Rights. Actually, that's one of the officers that they say is going to be hit the hardest. So the ones that make sure that schools are not violating kids, the civil rights, protecting against things like anti Semitism, that office is being thrashed, thrashed.
You're listening to KFI AM six forty on demand.
On demand any time, the iHeartRadio app. Imagine you open your wallet, it is empty.
You don't get paid un till Friday, but you are hungry right now, Boy, you really want.
A pizza or a delicious burrito or talk whatever it is.
You just don't have the money, and Lord knows you're not going to eat whatever that can of mystery food is in the pantry.
So what do you do?
Well, it's really easy. You take out a loan.
By now pay later service. Klarna is partnering with door dash to allow you to defer payments for delivery services. The aim is to give consumers more flexibility when it comes to their spending power. Finance experts say this could be bad news for the economy, real bad news. Nation's Alicia Yeavis has been following the story at Leasta. So many questions, first, breakdown, how this will work?
Break it down?
Interesting?
And we know that you know a few companies are doing this. It's coming kind of in the headlines because Klarna just this week announced that partnership with DoorDash. And basically what's happening here is listen, if you want to buy lunch today, and if your bank account's running a little bit low, you can buy that lunch today on door dash and then you'll split the payments for that
maybe over the next couple of weeks or months. They haven't really outlined exactly, you know, the payment arrangement, because I'm.
Going to take out a loan and split my payments up for a burrito. Well, I'm assuming that most people using this are not going to be people ordering a burrito or a sushi.
Role it's probably dinner for the whole family.
Still because it hasn't launched yet. But I look at another company that's doing this called ZIP. That company you could actually buy, you know, a big batch of groceries we call it compra in Spanish, at at costcos or shopwrite and then make eight payments over eight months for that batch of groceries.
Eight months to pay for this month's grocery. It's all, well, I don't see this not ending well at all.
Now, I said, this is interesting because typically with buy now pay later, it's usually for a one time major purchase like a furniture set or a computer, and that's a one time debt accumulation. Food and groceries that's a daily, sometimes weekly potential accumulation.
So is this going to hurt consumers?
Yes, On one.
Hand, this is better than put you know, your groceries on your credit card if you can't afford those groceries right. Because credit cards charge anywhere from like seventeen percent to upwards a thirty percent interest on these payment services. The consumer doesn't get hit with any interests, right. The merchant actually pays a fee for that. As the saying of business that I love, it's you know, there's no such
thing as a free lunch. Someone's paying for that lunch, and because they're getting a benefit, the merchant is willing to pay that. Because on average, people who use buy now, Pay Later spend thirty to fifty percent more than they would have if they had that money on hand that much thirty to thirty to fifty percent more. And those who wouldn't have been able to make a purse at all,
they're able, you know, to make that purchase now. So that is concerning when you think that if you don't have that money on hand, you're spending even more than you have. Some are calling this predatory lending. We've seen the CFPV, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau investigate these companies in the past, they've warned for more oversight. But under the current administration under Doge, and we've talked about that
a lot. Yeah, that organization has been gutted. So you're having this increase in buy now, pay later with less oversight.
Okay, so we all right, So we've got companies that are saying, yeah, you can borrow to pay for your kid's dinner. It'll take you just eight months to pay it off, but don't worry. It's better than using your credit card. Oh and while you're getting your dinner, don't you think that you ought to have extra dessert? And don't you think those kids they want the chicky nuggets, but they also, you know, they want that extra toy on the side, and they're gonna want dessert as well.
And so you spend fifty percent more and we don't have everybody watching this. There's no oversight. We've cut the oversight. Now who benefits you know who benefits? Door Dash is benefiting as they normally do. But Clarin is making the money, which means that you're taking people who don't have money and you are getting them into a payment plan to give money that they don't have to somebody else who has money.
This is the cycle.
This is why she says it's a Some are calling it predatory lending.
Friends, I'll tell you what this is. It is.
It is a reflection on how bad our education system instructs young people on money, and as someone who got into some really bad credit card debt, really bad. In fact, Ann and I were talking before the show that things a few years back. I was in a lot of debt and then I lost my gig and my wife was making okay money, but things got real tight. We had two car payments, we had a mortgage payment, and we had this credit card debt that was mounting, and
so we said forget it. We sold off a bunch of stuff and we went and lived quite literally in a van down by the river for two years in order to pay off all of our debt.
And we did.
We buck down and we paid it off. And it was a lesson that I never want to have to repeat again. And if there's anything I can offer you, it's a warning. Don't put yourself in that position. And by god, if you are taking out short term loans effectively lay away on a burrito, you are putting yourself in a bad spot. And we are so bad in this country about making decisions, impulse decisions that are going We're gonna pay for him later, and we always go, well, yeah, but that's later.
Yeah. But here's what I learned is I got and I hate man.
I got old, and remember when you got old and he started realizing that later comes, you know, yeah, answers Yeah, yeah, because when you're younger, you go, well, later's down the road and don't have to worry about that.
But here's what you learn.
The longer you're around, you realize later is coming, and everything I put off until later, I'm gonna have.
To deal with later. And it doesn't get easier when you put it off.
So just figure out a way to not borrow money for takeout food.
I mean I eat at home. Quit eating out, buy groceries. Do that? Do that?
You're listening to KFI AM six on demand, six.
On demand anytime, the iHeartRadio app. Number of people continue to protest elon Musk, and they're doing it by attacking teslas.
This is counterproductive because you're making yourself look like a lunatic. Fact, if you.
Are attacking someone's car because you're mad about the car manufacturer and what they're doing in Washington, DC, that's a stretch because they don't own that car any longer. The person who purchased that car owns it, and what good are you really doing? Are you teaching them a lesson? If if you see a Tesla on the road, do you instantly assume that person supports Elon Musk. I mean, we've got to the point where people have to put bumper stickers on the cars now that say I bought
this before Elon went crazy. But what about the people that are selling their Teslas right now because somebody's buying it. I mean, they're getting good deals on use Tesla's right now because so many people want out because other people keep attacking their cars. So you're talking about people who are the second or third or even fourth owner of a Tesla, and you're attacking them for what fascism? It
doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Now, I do know that we have people that are attacking Tesla dealerships. Why why you're not attacking Trump Tower. You're not smashing old bottles of Trump wine. You're not buying up make America Great and then burning them an effigy. You're not buying those sweet Trump tennis shoes. Man, those don't look anything like a pair of old converts that have been spray painted with gold paint at all. You're not doing
that why are you attacking these cars? Doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Now, I understand not wanting to support the business. I get that that's a boycott. That's that's as old as America itself. I mean, for Pete's sake, we're here because we boycotted Tea, So I get the whole boycott thing.
But maybe we don't attack.
Car owners because I don't think that that car owner, who may or may not have been aligned with your political ideology, before you attack their car. I don't think they're gonna say, oh my gosh. You know, I didn't really pay attention to Elon Musk before I bought this car because I wanted an electric vehicle and this was one of the good ones on the market, so that's why I bought it. But now that you've spray painted it with a swastika.
Oh, I see the error of my ways.
Now, I know I want to make sure I vote for whomever you tell me to. You're not winning people over that way. On the other hand, Elon Musk is also not really getting the He's not really getting the message either.
So if you're Elon Musk, do you.
Decide that you're going to start a new business in California of all places.
I mean, you pulled.
Your headquarters out of California, you went to Texas, but now you want to start a new business in California. That's exactly what's happening, as we can now go to the Tesla diner.
Elon Musk visited the Pentagon today. He reportedly had meetings with senior US military leaders as an advisor to President Trump. Today, the president said war plans should not be shared with Musk because.
Of its get ahead of the diner partitz.
Now, Musk is about to roll out a new business, Ventuereio in Hollywood. It's a twenty four hour diner and drive in theater where Tesla drivers can charge their car as well eating a burger. Well must be welcome given all the controversy that he's creating In Washington, Wholly asked kay Cal News reporter Nicole coomb Stock to find out, Nicole, to find out what tonight? Okay, that's here.
Nicole, Nicole, Well, Pat, you have to admit it looks a lot like a UFO.
I mean I can't see it because radio. But that's typically not thought of as a great design.
But some people say, even though they love that signature Tesla style, they don't want to take this ride with Elon Musk anymore now that he's involved with Doge. But other people say, you know what, Tesla makes great products and experiences and everything in life doesn't always have to be about politics.
Yeah, it really doesn't, although Elon kind of invited that in h real quick before we continue with the report, as far as making great products, did you see that almost all the cyber trucks just got recalled? Oh, first of all, I was a big fan of the models. I think it is a great car. It needs to be revamped. It's been like ten plus years. They need to put out a new model.
You know. It's guys, we've got to revamp, right. You can't.
All cars go through a revamp about every eight to ten years. So you got to get on that. But the cyber truck, I just can't figure out the market for the cyber truck. If you are a truck driver, because you need a truck, you don't get the cyber truck. You want to pick up you want something that's got a gas engine in it.
You want something that's not going.
To deplete the battery right away when you start towing heavy stuff. It's not better in any utilitarian way than a traditional pickup truck.
What is it marketed to.
It's marketed to city dwellers that want to feel tough and drive a truck, and you see them on the freeways. Maybe you're one of them. You know exactly what I'm talking about. So it's marketed to those people. But did those people want to spend on hundred and twenty five thousand dollars on the electric truck Because honestly, if you're trying to feel tough on the freeway, nothing says I'm tough like we When you sound like a golf cart,
you don't sound macho. And if you have an extra one hundred and twenty five thousand dollars, I don't think you're spending it on something that sounds that way.
I just don't. I don't, So I don't know who the market is.
But for the forty some one thousand that have been sold, they're being recalled. Cyber Truck's first recall of twenty twenty five was announced last week. I guess because the trim paan is attached with glue and falls off. I thought this truck was supposed to be indestructible. That is, unless I guess you have solvent and then it all falls apart. All right, continue here. What do we know about the diner.
It's a new concept dinner in a drive in movie while you charge your car. The Tesla Diner is coming sometime soon to Santa Monica Boulevard. But is Hollywood hungry for another Elon Musk business now that he's also running Doge.
I don't want to say anything.
I'm sorry because it's.
All I love that they took somebody that didn't want to comment. Let's put this in the story. I have nothing to say. Good, we're going to use that.
The cause the passes the politics. I'm neutral. I'm gonna say neutral, and I leave it up to people to decide.
A lot of them.
Yeah, I leave enough for people to decide to do whatever you want. I do think that we're going to see more of these sorts of concepts, not necessarily from Elon Musk, but as more and more people buy electric vehicles, and as more and more charging stations become available, I think we're going to see more traditional gas stations adding electric charging stations to their parking lot, which should be
relatively simple to do. It's not like you have to have all this the different pump infrastructure like you do now. You don't have to have these massive tanks. And you can line the outside of your gas station parking lot with charging stations where you already have parking for your convenience store. You can put charging stations right in front of those and plug cars in. Now, how do you
get people to spend more time there? Because the more time they spend in your your service station or your gas station, whatever it is, your convenience store, the more money they're going to spend. And we know that it might take twenty or thirty minutes to charge that car at least to get up to your eighty percent charge to get on the road and get on your way. So how do you get people to spend more time there?
I think we're going to see some more imaginative development, some innovation at some of the these gas stations where they want to keep people around. Could be could be a some sort of a movie theater or a lounge, could be a could be a little casino type games. I guess you're gonna see more and more of this. Just watch for it, k if I Am six forty Chris Merrill live everywhere in the iHeartRadio app, k if I
Am six forty on demand