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AM six forty Bill Handle here on a Monday morning, October twentieth. Hey, and we had a great time last Friday with Ask Handle Anything, some great questions, and we do that at a thirty every Friday, and I get all kinds of personal questions because people ask me all kinds of personal questions about other hosts and about me. So we started Ask Handle Anything where I answer these humiliating to me questions every Friday. But we need you
to ask the questions. So here's how it's done. During the course of the show during the week from five to nine am, click on the Bill Handle Show and then click on to Well first iHeartRadio app, then the bill Handle Show.
That a microphone in the upper right hand corner. You click on that and.
You've got fifteen seconds, give or take to ask a question. And the I don't care about your opinion about anything that doesn't matter to me. But the questions that humiliate me are a lot of fun. Boy, am I self loathing individual? Don't I? I am soliciting calls and questions that embarrass me. I'll tell you about you. Yeah, you know, I'm going to bring that up with my shrink this week for sure. Okay, why don't we move on? Fair enough?
Interesting story about this live fire exercise that happened at Camp Pendleton over the weekend celebrating two hundred and fifty years of the US Marine Corps, and that included a live simulation of a beach assault by sea and air. I don't know if you've ever seen one of those driving down the Five on Pendleton. I've seen them twice, where the assault vehicles, the helicopters, the amphibious, the zodiacs come aboard the ships.
I mean, it's wonderful to see.
This is when you realize this is America killing people at his best. Just it's fantastic, and we have to have a defence. So there's no issue there. So here's what happened. The plan involved Marines firing high explosive rounds over the freeway. Now, federal officials said it's going to be done with all safety precautions in place, and no public highways would be closed. California official says, live rounds
over Interstate five, we don't think so. So on Friday night, the Marines did a test run without notifying the state and fire artillery rounds over I five. So early Saturday morning, Gavin Newsom announces the closure of Interstate five, a seventeen mile stretch north of San Clemente, south of San Clementy, north of otion Side. About fifteen thousand people attended the event, including a speech by the Vice President. And so, now
was there damage done? You bet the fear that one of these shelves would hit a car or people there, Well, it panned out. A cruiser park on an on ramp on five was hit by falling shrapnel after an artillery shell exploded early right over the freeway. And first of all, and I'll tell you about that, because it was a scratch on the car, And so a very big deal was made about that. A report was circulated that the White House intended to shut down five because they planned
to shoot missiles from Navy warships onto Camp Pendleton. Camp Pendleton is enormous and along the beach where they do these amphibious landings. Literally the five is a few hundred yards from that beach and great fun. So Wednesday night, the Marine Corps posts a statement on X it's going to hold a live fire demonstration on Saturday, and there will be no closures, no public highways or transportation routes.
All training events will occur on approved.
Training ranges read the five Freeway and with established safety protocols. Now, the Marine Corps said, we're not going to fire anything from Navy ship to shore. It's only the firing of high explosive rounds from howitzers artillery shells into designated ranges. Fair enough, Okay, Now howitzer has a range of fifteen to twenty five miles. This is what the Ukraine is using, or Ukraine is using for the most part to fight Russia.
Our arms.
So that afternoon, the federal government directed the cancellation of Amtrak and Metrolink service.
Oooh, does that tell you something? I sure told news some something.
So officials observed State officials that shells were launched over Interstate five from the beach. So howitzers are set up off of ships and then they're landed, they go over the five into the range and then there's a huge acreage there. The state also received a request from event organizers and said that electronic bulletin boards along Interstate five people should be worn and they were live weapons.
Over over the what is it.
Live weapons over freeway was the exact Wordage Border patrols at California Highway Patrol said, we didn't know about this. So Newsom's office and Coltrans they closed the five Freeway. Now the closure was very brief, but at jam freeways, stretching travel time between LA to San Diego an hour longer.
Instead of two hours, it was three hours.
And the White House criticized Newsom for closing the five Freeway. And I want to make a point whenever the federal government does anything in terms of holding up traffic, it is a disaster.
It is a shanda.
There is very little worse in terms of traffic than the vice president the president per twoicularly, president flies in to usually if the Air Force won the Imperial Terminal, the Southwest, the most southern part of Lax Air Force one comes in there.
The entire west side is shut down.
I don't know if you've ever been around when the president or any major event happens. This is when we should secede as a government California, and we should not let the Feds come in. But anyway, so it turned out to be a real mix up between the state and the Feds, fifteen thousand people, a lot of raw, raw military exercises.
And a shell exploding over the five Freeway which caused virtually no damage.
A big story was the protest, the no Kings protest, which true, I don't know, maybe seven million people, right is the number that's being thrown at us. Don't know the figure yet, hasn't really been confirmed one way or the other. But I was there and if you go to our Instagram page at Bill Handle Show, you will see me there on the corner with Lindsay and a huge sigh, well big protest sign, and my sign was
freedom of the press. Everybody else was sort of no Kings and very clever stuff that was done.
And it was a party atmosphere.
People were worrying costumes, there was It was just a fun atmosphere, even though it was a very political statement, it was just kind of neat And so of course I was immediately attacked by people on Instagram, and I was also given kudos for being there at the protests. So why was I there having never ever been to a protest and I probably would never would. Well, my issue was freedom of the press, my personal issue, because
you know, I'm part of the press. We theoretically are part of the press, but we're involved in the news business here, and I kind of like the ability to say whatever the hell I want to say. And to the credit of management, I Heeart and the people before that owned the station group that was Cox. Never once in the history of the broad my broadcasting in radio, have I ever been told what to say and what not to say. However, I have a lot of issue
with President Trump, as you know. I give him credit where credit is due, and he deserves credit in many ways, but I'm not particularly thrilled with the way he's running the presidency, the retribution against his perceived and real enemies, but using the Department of Justice, using the FBI to attack his quote enemies cities in which are Democrat cities in which she views the mayor of those cities as enemies.
The army goes in and the National Guard goes in.
I want you to note that there is not one Republican led city in the United States that has a problem with crime, not one. It's the democratic led city. So it's I mean, it's political. I mean it's crazy stuff. Now, is that dangerous stuff?
Yeah? It is.
But for me, the freedom of the press is the toughest one to just stomach. I have a real hard time when you have a White House that goes to networks, radio and TV stations and say, if you don't toe the line, if you don't agree not to attack us, or if you say a B or C, I'm gonna shut you down. And the FEDS have the ability because the Feds, the government controls the airwaves through the FCC. Can the White House just shut down a network like
Brendan Carr, the head of the SEC, has threatened. Yeah, it's amazing the power the federal government has. And it's amazing the power this president has. And he's stretching the envelope I've said, and it's amazing the latitude that Congress is giving him. As Johnson said, Mike Johnson, our job here in Congress is to further.
The agenda of the president. That's it, Bill.
Yeah, they can't shut down a cable station. No, they can't shut down cable They.
Shut down a network.
They could only shut down the local entities that.
They can show.
But they can shut down a network by shutting down the airwaves from that network.
So everybody would have to switch to cable.
The entire industry would have to switch to cable, and the airwaves would just be done. For example, let's say that iHeart has eight hundred radio stations and someone there because of high profile. I mean, you know, I'm way under the radar. But if I were a national figure, I think I'd be looking iHeart would be looking at some issues. Look what happened to ABC. Look what happened to Jimmy Kimmel.
Look what happened.
Look what happened Well after a few days, but that was the threat, see.
The problem after a few days.
But here's what Brendan Carr said, the head of the SCC says, this is just the.
Start we are going to now. Can you imagine?
That's why I stood with Jimmy Kimmel. But I understand went off the air had lost all of our signals. You could still listen to us in iHeart Radio on the app anywhere in the United States.
Okay, so let's say this.
Now, you have Congress passing a law that says we will control cable.
Can that be done?
Yes, Congress would vote that in because the.
President called for hypotheticals. Yeah, well that's how MU hypothetic.
Look at the power of the president has Look what happened in Texas where they redistricted, where they changed the districting and added five basically added five Republican seats.
You know who said that.
The President told the legislature, this is what I want.
You to do.
And now we're having an extremely expensive ballot for November coming up that going against the Constitution of the California to overturn what people have already voted afore.
So right, but we do that all the time. We do that all the time. You know, the Constitution California is five hundred pages.
We tights do it. They're both discussing, and they both their side to win at all costs. I am not arguing that.
All I'm saying is the President called for Texas to do this. Texas would not have done this without the President saying do this.
The President can tell me that because it was because it.
Was done on I was done on the urging actually the demand of the president.
So maybe it was, But how can you say that it wouldn't have been done without I don't think it.
Would have been done first time. I don't think it would have did it for the day I don't think it.
I don't think it would have been done. But that's not the point here. You and I can argue this all day long. The point is can the president shut down networks?
Yes? I did?
Well, what is the deal in terms of freedom of the press? How about the lawsuits?
I have a real problem with the President suing CBS because during a sixty minute speech they made Kamala Harris look good and.
Somehow that attacks America. CBS caved, caved and gave him sixteen million dollars, where every constitutional expert said, are you crazy a lawsuit based on that? How about against Paramount? How about against ABC? It's a real problem. How about Pete Hegseth telling the Pentagon Press Corps, you print what I tell you to print, or I'm yanking your conventionals from the Pentagon. By the way, all the majors walked out, even not only Fox but Newsmax told them to go
pound sand turned in their credentials and walked out. There is a genuine attack on the media, There's no question about it.
And that part is scary for me.
I have a tough time with I mean, there's a lot of stuff that's scary anyway, you know how I feel, and I've made it very clear I have a problem with the way, for example, the illegal undocumented people who are picked up. Christinoum just said again press conference this morning, we're only going after the worst of the worst, the worst that work at car washes, the worst that work in the feet, those are the worst of the worst. And they keep on doing that. There's video of hundreds
of people being picked up. They're the worst of the worst. I mean, come on, guys, really, So in my case, I was up there, and I want to make a point about the political fallout on this one. These demonstrations were very fun. I mean they had a point, there's no question. But there was a lot of frivolity there. There was a lot of just chanting, and the signs were hilarious, and there were costumes and I looked around and there's a picture of me next to some people in shark outfits.
They just fun stuff.
And here's where I think the Republicans, even the President, blew it. And that is to say this is not representative America.
Of course it is.
You know, just like people who tell me President Trump is not my president, Yes he is.
What are you talking about.
You may not like it, you may disagree, but of course he's your president. The man not only when the electoral college, which I have issues with, but.
He won the popular vote. How could he not be your president.
The point is that either side they hate each other so much. The President said there were very few people there to see the pictures and they're not representative America.
And these were all placards, and you've got.
Mike Johnson saying this was hate America and the word trader was being thrown about. I mean, you know, we're not Can we not demonstrate if we are against the administration without the administration saying you are a bunch of traders? Have we reached that point? Yes we have. We've reached that point. And it's very scary stuff. And I was there for a couple of hours in Dana Point and there were I think six people that were pro Trump that we're going down.
We're all on three corners and were driving up and down.
And so one guy with his pickup truck had the big truck Trump twenty twenty flag in an American flag, and then there was one guy with a Confederate flag and as he was.
Going no one bowed him. No one bowed.
They were all waving and saying we love you too. I mean it was terrific, It really was. Some people were driving by and they were putting thumbs down, and then you had hundreds of people going thumbs up. Have a good day. It was not only was it peaceful, it was fun. And this is, as Neil pointed out,
this is America at its greatest, genuine protests. There were police there, not an insane amount of police there, but there were police, and people were honking the horns as everybody passed on the three corners, hanking horns and putting their thumbs in the air and waving. And in the middle of it, there was in some kind of emergency were a fire truck and an ambulance had there were blaring, uh the the sirens and their horns, and everybody thought
they were screaming in favor of the protests. We even have the fire department uh is honking their horns.
And their sirens. Yeay yay.
And I had to point out to a couple of people, you know, it's probably an emergency. I don't think they're making a political statement, just saying I.
Will tell you the Internet and protests show you that some of the best writers on the planet are just average people.
The oh.
Yeah, I saw someone in a woman in an Indiana Jones costume that said I hate Nazis on her sign.
Yeah, some signs said no on the turd Reich. Uh.
There were just fun fun stuff that's had to do is put a picture up there. So anyway, the protests were there, and what makes them again, what makes America great is I.
Was attacked, vilified.
By KFI listeners and at the same time, good for you, Bill, good for you, and it was it was kind of neat, except those people that were attacking me.
You're fired.
You cannot listen to this radio station anymore. The San Frano Valley, I've lived in the valley most of my life. Bourbank Studios we're in the San Frano Valley. San Frano Valley is a storied area, just so many films, because so many studios are here, movie after movie and TV show after TV show.
I mean, you know about Valley Girls.
There is not a film out there named Peoria Girls. It just doesn't exist. And so the valley is sort of this city within a city. I mean, it has a couple of million people in it, so it's still a major city, and it just has this reputation of being sort of less than it's the outskirts. It has a horrible reputation, Oh, you live in the valley.
Yeah, we live in.
The valley and it's tubular. Man, It's just a place on its own. Derided for years because post World War Two, the valley was the poster child of servicemen coming in because as they were shipped overseas, they came to Los Angeles the valley you could buy property for next to nothing, and it just became You had the many mini malls, you had the sprawling area with the large parking lots, and it became its own country.
If you will.
My parents bought their first house in the valley. It was in North Hollywood and this was the late fifties, and I'll never forget they paid nineteen five hundred dollars for the house, which at that time, I mean, it was still, you know, for a house, but it was so far cheaper than any place else and so I don't understand it. Well, you have Van Eys Boulevard right going down the middle of the valley where people used
to cruise. Uh, and that became movie after movie that became the cruising scene of southern California where people were, Okay, I'll never forget that. I used to cruise down there, and it was it was the guys in the guys in the convertibles, and I would go down there and do what guys did, I go, baby, baby, bit baby, let's get together their baby baby. And it didn't work. None of that worked. It was not impressive that that
sounds pretty good to me. Yeah, no, it was great, but it was just the valley such today it's nothing like it was.
But and it.
Became for some reason this horrible reputations that the pace you don't want to go to less than people on the West Side.
They don't go to the valley. It's another country for them.
Even though it's an eight mile ride up over the hill or five miles.
It's another country.
Uh.
It's literally like going to a third world country.
But wasn't it like the epitome of suburban life. Yeah, it was like all the malls, all of it.
It was the cram all of it, all of it.
It should it should be not only recognized for what it did, but should be celebrated valley girls.
It's it's good. It's a good thing. I grew up there.
Of course, I got out of there as quickly as I could.
But I love the valley. Okay, that's it. I just wanted to share that story. I wanted to share.
You just wanted to dark you on. Hey, the valley has some gorgeous areas too, it does, it does.
I mean I lived in the valley. The Persian Palace was in the valley. I went to a great high school, Birmingham High, which has changed a little bit. I went to visit Birmingham High and Van Eysh a few years later and I went with one of the school teachers been there forever, and we're walking down the hall. And now keep in mind, for example, our stadium which at one point was the best stadium in the country for a high school stadium, with the lights and all that.
And we started and they started raising money. Dick Van Dyke wrote the first check because his daughter was there. The people that graduated Birmingham High are incredible, and it went a little bit downhill. So I went there a few years ago and met with one of the teachers there.
We're walking down.
The Hall, and all of a sudden, on a door down the administration building, I see a seal for the LAPD on a door, and I said, what is this. Why would there be a seal on that door Because this is a substation for the LAPD. There are two cops assigned permanently to this high school.
Oops.
Thinks things have changed. Okay, KF I am six forty. You've been listening to the Bill Handle Show. Catch my show Monday through Friday, six am to nine am, and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app.