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I want you to imagine the future. The year is twenty twenty four. Taylor Swift is head coach of the Kansas City Chiefs. Mitch McConnell has been frozen for four hundred and eighty seven consecutive days, and Joe Biden is up for reelection against a twice impeached, convicted felon. And even though the Paul will show a dead heat right now, Vice President Kamala Harris is feeling pretty confident.
The Biden Harris ticket is running neck and neck with Donald Trump.
Why are you not thirty points ahead when.
The American people are able to take a close look at election time on their options. I think the choice is gonna be clear. Bill, We're gonna win. Let me just tell you that we're gonna win.
Will you, Kamala? Will you? Because I just took a poll of that man's face and it's not looking good. Regardless of what Kamala says. Democrats are clearly nervous about this election, and they should be because, Yeah, Biden has accomplished a lot historic investments in green energy, record breaking job growth, and he even got a black woman on the Supreme Court. Yeah, I mean with a six or three conservative majority, she's powerless there, but she at least
got a free rode. But despite Biden's record as president, it's still close, which is a hell of a thing. You think running against someone who has ninety one felony charges against them, who you already beat, would be a pretty easy victory. So the question is how the actual is Joe Biden losing to Donald Trump. I have a theory and it's something I want to discuss more in tonight's long story short Now, when Joe Biden first ran for president in twenty twenty, it was a lot simpler.
Campaigning is easy. Just make a bunch of promises. It's like when you're about to move into a new building and the landlord is all, nice promise and he'll fix this, paint that. But then you move in and he goes missing, like black news anchors on CNN. Now, I mean they're basically gone. But the point is, once you get the job, you actually have to follow through on those promises and
whatever the reasons. Out of the ninety nine biggest promises Biden made the people, he's only following through on about thirty percent of them. That's a seventy percent rate of letting you down. You can't spit any game with those numbers. Hey, girl, you want to come over, I promise that only seven times out of ten you'll leave unsatisfied. But the other three who is on There's some ladies that will take that deal right now? But yeah, Biden has let people down.
He promised not to drill for oil in Alaska. Now he's doing it. He said he would never build more border wall, but that's exactly what he's doing. And again, all presidents break promises. George H. W. Bush said no new taxes, Obama said fold Gantona mo after y'all said he'd take a stand for the working man, but he was in a wheelchair the whole time. America can forgive all that, but one thing America doesn't forgive is weakness.
They want to see you fighting for your goals, and on some key issues, Biden seems to be waving the white flag.
President Biden today is explaining why he thinks he had no choice but to approve new oil drilling in Alaska.
My strong inclination was to disapprove of it across the board, but the advice I got from counsel was that if that were the case, I may very well lose that case in court to the oil company.
I haven't gone the full extent of my executive authority to do on my own anything about guns, and.
What can you do?
So I can't do anything except Leader of the Congress to act reasonably.
Specific about what you did to try to reappropriate those border funds, especially when Democrats controlled both chambers of Congress.
The wall thing, what you're talking about, Yeah, they passed. Well, I was told that I had no choice.
I was told I have no choice. I was told I have no choice. By who aren't you the president? If someone tells you no, just showed him a picture of a drone and the conversation. Well, see, that's why I think Biden loses so many people. He just looks weak. And I'm not talking about physically. People want to see that president going to the mat to get what he wants. And it doesn't help that anytime Biden does take a strong stand on something, his staff comes out to say he didn't mean it.
The White House was back in cleanup mode over another round of confusing coins made by the president.
Is the pandemic over the pandemic is over. The White House rushed out to walk it back, saying the president's comments do.
Not mark a change in policy toward the administration's handling of the virus.
President Biden delivered a fiery speech Warsaw, perhaps carried away by the moment Biden seemed to call for an end to Vladimir Putin's rule.
For God's sake, this man cannot remain power.
Secretary of State Anthony blink and quickly walked.
Back Biden's words.
We do not have a strategy of regime change in Russia or anywhere.
Else for that matter.
President Biden starting controversy over comments that he made about defending Taiwan.
To be clear, Sir, US forces, US men and women would defend Taiwan in the event of a Chinese invasion.
Yes.
The White House walked that back almost immediately, saying, our policy hasn't changed on Taiwan.
God damn, It's amazing how often Joe Biden has to walk things back, considering he can badly walk forwards. So voters, especially progressive voters, have seen Biden give up or get over rooted to be fan of Biden. Not on everything, though, like student loan relief. The Supreme Court said he couldn't do it, but Biden's been finding he's because that's how much he cares about driving young people to vote for him. But on too many issues he's rolling over. Now, say
what you will about Trump. You might not agree with any of his policies, but you've probably noticed he fights for him. He even fights for the ones that are stupid as.
Out seeks toilets and showers. You don't get any water. I go my people, environmental people. Why are we doing this?
Because when you wash your hands it takes you five times longer get to the Water's I come.
You got soap, you can't get it off. You go into this shower, right, you turn in the water. Drip, drip, drip. People are flushing toilets ten times, fifteen times.
Ten times, right, ten times, bomb Bob, Not me, of course, not me, but you yeh.
He's so dangerous but so entertaining. Trump's the only president to get his daily intelligence briefing from everyone. Poops.
Okay.
The point is that that's why many people like Trump. He fights. He's not gonna let something like congressional red tape or judicial rulings or even the Constitution itself stop him from getting what he wants. The man fought to stay in power after he lost the election.
Who does that? Gainst us?
And America's got a thing for that. Gainst the shit. Now, don't get me wrong, I don't want the president to break the law or stage your cool to get what he wants. But voters are attracted to strength. So long story short, if Biden and the Democrats want to retain power in the next election, stop telling us how much you are not like Trump, and maybe in this one way, just one way, start acting like gainst Us, fight like hell on the things you care about instead of rolling
over and throwing up your hands. America wants the president to fight for them the same way the Alabama Riverboat crew fights for each other. And if you don't understand that the quote President Biden, you ain't black, all right? When we come back, author Doug Melville will be joining me on the show, so don't go anywhere. Welcome back to the Daily Show. My guest tonight is an author whose new book is called Invisible Generals, Rediscovering family legacy
and a quest of honor America's first black generals. Please welcome Doug Melville.
Doug, my guy, how are we doing tonight? How's everything?
Man? Bless Black and Holly Favorite?
How do you feel right? I'm feeling just the same now.
Invisible Generals. This book was partially inspired by you going to see Redtails and you hated it.
Well.
When I went to go see a screening for Redtails, the main character in the movie, who was played by Terrence Howard, is actually like the patriarch and center of our family. So when he came out and his name was changed, really upset about it. I went home and I talked to my dad about it, and he said, Doug, if you think changing the name in a movie is bad, let me tell you the family story to let you know how I lived, and then maybe you could see why that doesn't mean as much to me as it
means to you. And he shared with me the family story of the Invisible Generals, and that's what was the impetus for me to write my books.
Tell us who the Invisible Generals are.
So the Invisible Generals are America's first two black generals, a father and a son, General Benjamin O'Davis Senior and General Benjamin O'Davis Junior, and these two men at the start of World War Two were the only two black officers in the whole United States military out of three hundred and thirty five thousand people, and they worked together to help desegregate the military, create the Tusky Airmen, and
so many more things. But their story had never been told, and it was my passion to go out and write it.
That's right. Going back to else for a second, why do you think a lot of military moves struggle with getting history right.
I think the challenge with Redtaiales is that when people look at it, they feel that it's true American history, but it's actually just the facade of that. It actually is an amalgamation of the stories. And not paying the families and using different fictional names allows you to have a little bit more with the storytelling, But then the families feel a certain way because this is how people
recognize the story. Yet the families aren't compensated, and the stories that are actually happening are never really told.
So just a way to not pay y'all.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a way to not pay us.
Did George Lucas or the writer interview you other family members when crafting the story?
No, some other Tuskegee Airmen were contacted, but my family in particular was not contact, which I thought, you know, as the commander and the creators of the Tuskegee Airmen, I thought that there would be a little bit more you know, effort to go reach out to the family, But that wasn't the case in this.
Why do you think Hollywood likes to gloss over the real stories of African Americans in the military. Like, don't get me wrong, I love movies like Major Pain, but I'm sure it was like I'm sure I have like a real black major story that was ignored.
Yeah.
I think the biggest challenge with this is I think the people that are the decision makers have a certain narrative or a certain formula that works really well for them. But if you ask me, the story of the Tuskegee Airmen and particularly the Invisible Generals, is one of the
greatest American stories ever told. And I think we have to encourage people to go out and actually get their own family stories and talk to the individuals on the couch and say, tell me what happened, and then also take the effort to write the narrative because whoever writes the narrative or photographs, the narrative owns the copyright. So if it's not the family learning and this is what I want to tell all veterans and all family of veterans.
Your stories in the public domain, you don't actually control it or own it. If a journalists tells it what writes it, they take control of the narrative. So it was important for me as a family member to say, I am going to take control of this narrative and I am going to write it so the actual words in history that happen can be told in an accurate way.
Wow, a lot of people, a lot of people think movies and books like this glorify war, but how do the stories of veterans do the opposite.
Actually, the stories of veterans are really stories of leadership and stories of the United States of America. I think we need to look more as what defines an American, not always chop it up into different subsets, but actually look at these as American stories, and then I think when we have that set, then we can look at these stories as a way to unify. I think leadership is an important quality that all veterans have, and many veterans go on to work in the private sector, but
we don't talk about their military service. You know, coach k graduated from West Point, but you think of him as the coach of Duke basketball. You don't look at him as a veteran and.
Why he learned how to be such a disciplinarian.
Exactly, and that's why his leadership was taken from what he learned at the academy. So it's important to realize a lot of veterans aren't, you know, walking around and fatigues. They're actually everyday people, CEOs, people that spent time supporting their country and now is their opportunity to do it in the private sector.
In the book, you tell the story of getting West Point the name the new Barracks after your great uncle Ben, and that happened around the same time people started tearing down Confederate statues. Do you think that movement had an impact on getting the military to honor of it.
I do.
I actually think that was a very unique moment in time where there was a lot of statues coming down, particularly of Lee. So that was the person who was kind of the center point of it, Robert E.
Lee.
And they knew you weren'talking about Lee Daniels. Yeah, Robertie Lee.
Yeah, Lee Daniels. Yeah, of course, but Roberty Lee had the statues. And this was a unique opportunity because West Point at that time had nothing named after a black graduate. So this was a chance for them to They were building their biggest largest barrack. There was three names up for consideration, and when I went and told them the story of the Invisible Generals as I had researched it,
they named the building after him. And it's the largest barracks on the middle center of the West Point Cowege.
Wow wow, wow, wow. Now this is interesting. After your grandfather served, he worked for the Department of Transportation and he basically created the speed limit.
Yeah so yeah, yeah, so actually, this is a great story. So after he left the military in nineteen seventy, he worked for the Department of Transportation, and in that role he created the TSA what became the TSA Airport Security. He created the United States Air Marshall Program to keep the sky safe, and he was so successful that they asked him to do it for transportation, not aviation, and that where he led the creation of the fifty five
mile an hour speed limit. So these were all created by one guy and we don't even know who he is. Is impossible for me to comprehend.
The speed limit and the TSA. Yeah, well, what is now known is the TSA?
What is it all?
Back then? Did they even have a name for it?
Security?
Should they be more outreach the servicemen and women of color now they encourage them to write and tell their own stories to make sure their stories aren't lost.
Yeah, I think every single veteran, and even if you're not a veteran, if there's a veteran in your family, or even if you have someone in your couch who wasn't serving but lived a really different life, we should go and ask our ancestors and our relatives, you know, what did you go through and what are their stories?
Legacy is so important.
We are driven by the generational collateral that our families laid out before us, but we don't even know what that is. The greatest stories in America are sitting on our couches. The greatest stories in America could be from families the veterans I didn't serve. But it's so important that we take this time because we only have so much time and we take the stories from our family. We own the stories from our family, and we put them down on paper so our legacy can be preserved in an accurate way.
What you're saying is so true, man, And you make me think like you make me think that sadly, a lot of our great stories are you know, homeless, you know, sitting on the corner our stories, asking us for change while they're holding up a sign telling us that they fought in the war, which pisses me off. I hate out his country treats his veterans.
Man.
Yeah, and we could do a lot more for the veterans. And it's everyday things, you know, going to read to veterans, donating time, but also money grants. There's so many things we could do, but it starts with first knowing your legacy and knowing the stories of the people in your living room, and then going ahead and saying, how can I now take my generational collateral and add to the narrative and help others like they helped us.
Oh, let's expound on that. Just a little Veterans Day is coming up.
Yep.
Veterans Day comes to eleven eleven, yep, eleven eleven At one to eleven.
How do you think we could best memorialize and celebrate these heroes.
I think the best thing we can do for Veterans' Day to start off, visit a museum, Go support a VA, Go to a VFW, which is a veteran a foreign war outpost. Do something that you can do to lend a helping hand. If you don't have the money, dedicate your time. If you don't have the time, let your staff off so they can spend their time. But there's always something more we can do, and it's the least we can do for people who fought for the United States of America.
That's right, Man.
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