You're listening to wake Up Call on demand from kf I AM six forty KFI hand KOST HD two, Los Angeles, Orange County. It's time for your morning wake up call. Here's Amy King. Good morning. This is your wake up call for Thursday, July thirteenth. I may be King. Here's what's ahead on wake Up Call. No deal. The Screen Actors Guild did not reach a contract deal with Hollywood Studios. The union says it'll vote today
on whether to strike. Their contract officially ran out at midnight. Heat warnings and advisories are in effect for millions of people as temperatures in the Southland hit triple digits in some areas again today. Big Mama, the sixteen foot python who's been missing in Chatsworth for more than a week, has been found and is back at home with our owners. At six oh five, it's handle on the news. Bob Biker's going to stick around as Disney CEO for a
couple more years. Let's get started with some of the stories coming out of the twenty four hour KFI newsroom. The union representing film and TV actors could officially vote to strike as early as this morning. ABC's Jason Nathanson says the current sag After contract expired at midnight with no new deal. At an hour after midnight, sag After put out a release saying it's negotiating committee voted unanimously
to recommend to the national board that the union goes on strike. That vote will come later this morning, but it's pretty much a done deal after the group's membership voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike before contract talks even started. The studios say they offered historic pay raises and groundbreaking AI protection and that they're disappointed sag After walked away from the table. Sag After, as president, called
the offers insulting and disrespectful. Disney CEO Bob Eiger gets to keep his job as Topics of the Walt Disney Company for another two years. Iger stepped down as the CEO and chairman in twenty twenty, following fifteen years in the role. He returned in November when Disney removed Bob Chapock from the position. Iger says there's still more to do before his time at Disney is done. Go Bob Go. A lawsuit claims Uber is responsible for leaving a rider on the
ninety one Freeway where he was struck and killed in the fast lane. We're still looking into what Uber's policies and procedures are regarding this sort of situation. Lawyer Peter Corralla says Corey Hunter and some friends responsibly took an Uber home in May after hanging out, but stop so someone could throw up. Mister Hunter had fallen asleep, so they will come up abruptly asked him to get it out of the car, and then mysteriously Uber driver laughed. They never called
the authorities, they never reported him missing. It's a little strange that he would just disappear in that short period of time, so we're not sure exactly how he ended up in the fast lane. Uber could not be reached for comment. Corbin Carson ca if I News police two women and a nine year old girl in Racita have been sexually assaulted by the same homeless man. The
man is accused of breaking into several apartments in the same half hour. LAPD Detective Joseph Hampton says the man broke into one woman's apartment, who screamed and scared the man away. Do you suspect he was attempting to break in for a sexual assault based on what he had done to the other three victims. Yes, the guy was founded a nearby homeless camp several days after the attacks earlier this month. Police are asking any possible additional victims to come forward.
Like Trolley k if I news, the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors has voted to oppose the release of sexual predators from other counties into their county. The board voted unanimously Tuesday night to prohibits sexually violent offenders from being given housing in local neighborhoods. Board chair Don Rowe said her county is not California's dumping ground for these people. A letter from the board will be sent to the
state informing them of the decision. The board had successfully apt predators from Orange and Ventura Counties from being placed in San Bernardino County. LA County Sheriff Luna says a deputy struck two women during a traffic stop last year in Palmdale. The department released bodycamp footage from a traffic stop last July showing a woman sitting on the pavement holding the baby. Deputies try over and over to convince her to hand over the child for its own safety. Luna says the woman was
one of four in the car with three infants. The driver was impaired, had a suspended license, and was driving at night without headlights. No listen, you're making the bag off stars, Luna says. The woman refused to hand over the baby, and at one point, the deputy punches the woman in the face twice while she was still holding the child. Luna says he's turning over the case to the DA's office for criminal consideration. Steve Gregory t
if I News. Mayor Bass calls the video of the deputy's actions enraging and disturbing. She also says subjecting a kid to the child welfare system just because they didn't have a car seat is an abuse of power. The National Weather Services several tornadoes have touched down near Chicago, one close to O'Hare International Airport. Hundreds of flights who were disrupted yesterday and passengers had to take cover. In the town of McCook, Mayor Terry Carr says the workday was just ending
when a tornado touched down, ripping down trees and tearing up buildings. First time I've ever seen something like this. Nobody even knew a storm was coming. All of a sudden, the tornado cyrus going off. The storm moved into Michigan before passing through the state and into Canada. Early this morning, President Biden has given the keynote speech at the NATO summit in Lithuania. The Alliance created a special council to give Ukraine an equal voice on key issues related
to its security. Biden says when Russian President Putin unleashed his brutal war on Ukraine, he was betting NATO would break. He thought our unity would shatter at the first test team. He thought democratic leaders would be weak, but he are wrong. NATO also promised new support and eventual membership for Ukraine, but no timeline was given for membership. We're gonna be talking to ABC's Tom Rivers at five fifty to discuss how Russia has responded to the NATO Sound Summit
and the decisions and declarations made during it. The Hallmark Channel's first ever Holiday at Sea Christmas Cruise is setting sail in twenty twenty four. Officials say the ship will travel from Miami to the Bahamas in November of next year, and we'll offer caroling, cookie decorating ugly sweater contests, Reindeer and more Reindeers on a ship. Interesting. Presale registration is open through July nineteenth. Bookings open
to the public at eleven am July twenty first. I'm a huge Hallmark Finn. Don't know if I want to do that cruise. Coming up at twenty we're going to talk to ABC's crime and terrorism expert Brad Garrett about how ghost guns are becoming a more deadly problem among teens. Right now, let's say good morning to Nick polyo'keine. We've got some slowing in Riverside on the ninety one. First thing this morning, Stokes and making the way westbound from before
Las Sierra, stretches of slowing for you. Continuing beyond the fifteen through the Corona areas, you make great towards the two forty one toll Road. Also seeing a busy one forty first thing coming through Marina Valley nor it's gone side of the two fifteen. From Alisandro, passing the merger of the sixties, you make great toward at UCR and the Riverside interchange, and coming out of
the high desert on the sunp on side of the fifteen. Gonna be busy for you through Hysparia from the merger of the three ninety five, almost as far back as Joshua Street, and you'll see those delays. Continuing through the com Pass towards the one thirty eight. It does get a little easier for you, at least for the moment, as you make way past clay Cord and continuing towards Kenwood and beyond of the fifteen. I rather a two fifteen
split in Devor got an updated something slowing you down Pound two fifteen. Your cell phone keyword is kfy traffic. Can't you make way south on along the fourteen getting through the Actin area not quite as busy as it usually. It's just kind of nice for a change, not seeing delays for you getting out the Palmdale A Jason area from the merge of Para Blossom Highway, but through
Actin starting to see a few delays here and there. It will loosen up for you for the time being past Escanado Canyon as you make way further Sutpo on the fourteen, all the way towards the five and the new Hual Pass. Okay, I find the guy helps get to there faster. I'm Nick folio Keeney. Thanks Nick, it's five h eight on your wake up call. Let's now say good morning to ABC's Caleb Silver. Caleb the Bureau of Labor Statistics says inflation is easing up a bit. Where are we at.
Yeah, we're three percent, almost heading down to two percent, where the Federal Reserve would like to see inflation to be. We've got the consumer Price Index report yesterday for the month of June, and this is as low as we've been in several years, the slowest pace of inflation since March or twenty twenty one, and it's a big relief for memory. A year ago inflation
was nine point one percent. We're down to three percent now, Okay, So when you say that it's three percent, does that that means for the year prices are up three percent or they're three percent? Like, how what's the difference there? Because that's all confusing to me. No, that's right, three percent year over year growth in inflation, which sounds like growth and
it is, but it's the slowest pace of inflation in two years. Inflation has been on a rocket ship up until July of twenty twenty one last year, and then the Federal Reserve started raising interest rates to bring inflation down. It took a while, but we're finally down around three percent. The Fed would like to be around two and a half percent. So we'll probably see the Federals or of hike interest rates when it meets in about two weeks.
Okay, So even though the inflation rate is slowing, it's still going up. What's still going up and what's going down and what are because there's different. What's gone down a lot is gas prices. And gas prices, if you remember last year, we're sky high, especially out where you live. They're always higher out where you live in here country. Yep. That puts pressure on all kinds of other products because you need gas to transport goods,
You need trans gas to transport farm goods, et cetera. So food prices have been high. They're coming down, still a little bit high though, up about seven percent year over year. But things and shelter, which is rent we're talking about mostly, that's still up about seven point eight percent. So food and shelter still weighing on consumers right and hurting our pocketbooks. But
you've seen a real declining gas prices. You've seen a real declining used car and truck prices, and even transportation, especially airline tickets would seem like the high price, they've actually come down in price. So we're seeing some easing in some areas of the economy, but still sticky high when it comes to
food and rent. Okay, yeah, and you say that food prices from last year are up seven percent or is that from the start of this all started on fire exactly, But if you go back three years, they're up some eighteen to twenty percent. So the pace of growth is slowing, and we've seen it in some products like eggs. Remember eggs were so expensive several months ago, not necessarily an inflation result of inflation more than avian fluid,
but egg prices are very high. Beef and pulture prices are very high. Those have all come down significantly. Bread prices and grain still remain pretty elevated, but basically you've seen some relief in some parts of the grocery aisle and definitely at the gas station that's good. And the bread and grain is that
affected by what's going on in Ukraine. Yeah, that's where about ten percent of the world's grain as produced, so that's definitely been impacted by that, But there's also demand you see in this time of year, and some drought in several parts of the country in several parts of the world, that's affecting grain production in the future prices. So that's what's impacting bread and grain prices. On the other hand, as I said, you've seen some relief finally
in some beef, poultry, and other produce prices. Okay, And then I know that you mentioned that the used car prices they're coming down. They were crazy high for a while and then demand was high and supply was low. Yeah, definitely an impact of the pandemic, right and the supply chain issues, especially microchips, which we need to produce a lot of cars. But there was hot demand for new and used cars coming out of the pandemic
when we were doing some spending. That has weighed significantly, some of that as prices, some of that as interest rates. The cost of finance a new or used car is very high right now, and that's back a lot of buyers away from the car market. Same things happened in the housing market, where those interest rates, especially for the thirty year fixed mortgage, those who've been north of six percent, that has definitely put a cold blanket all
over the housing market for the past year plus. Yeah, So the interest rates, I was just going to ask you about where are they right now? Do we have like a definitive number. Yeah, they're between five and
five and a quarter percent. The Federal Reserve is going to meet again in about thirteen fourteen days and they're probably going to raise interest rates another quarter of a point, but that's probably going to be it for the year, and then we expect interest rates to come down towards the end of this year and into the next two years. But right now they're going to be higher for longer. So consumers and your listeners should expect that credit card aprs are going
to remain high. Thirty or fixed mortgage rates and refinancing rates are going to remain high and per and new car loans are also going to remain very high. So high interest rates for a while, but they eventually subside. Okay. And when you say it's at five percent, you can't get a home loan for five percent now or five and a half percent can absolutely not. That's the Fed Funds rate, and all interest rates are set off the Fed
Funds. Right This is what the Federal Reserve changes when it meets on interest rates, and then everything from credit cards to home loans to car loans is set off of the Fed funds rate that's between five and five and a quarter percent. If you have terrific credit right now, walking in to buy a new car, you can maybe get financing for six point eight or seven percent.
That's why it's so confusing to me because when they say, oh, interest rates are five and a half percent, I'm like, I have a home for five and a half percent, and I was, you know, that's an old one that I thought was okay, but you can't get the loan for that, And I think it's confusing with all the numbers. So thank you for clarifyings, right, But that's why a lot of people aren't
selling them home because they have low interest rates like you doing. If you're going to go buy a new one, you got to get an interest right north of six percent. You don't want to do that, okay, But we and you mentioned we are expecting another interest rate. When might that happen? Hike that comes on a July twenty first, The Fed meets in about fourteen days and about six hours and not that I'm counting that. That's when
we hear from the FED again, and that's what the expectation is. One quarter of a percent hike, and that's probably going to be at for the year. Okay, let's hope. So all right, Caleb Silver, thank you so much for the information and the clarification helps my little brain a lot. Thank you. Yeah, Okay, we're gonna be talking with ABC's crime and terrorism analyst Brad Garrett in just a couple of minutes. In fact, we have him right now. Brad, let's get started with the FBI.
Since Director Christopher Ray was on the hot seat yesterday testifying before a congressional committee, Republican law makers went after him. And how is that damaging not only
to the FBI, but to other law enforcement. So when you make sweeping statements about that the FBI has been politically weaponized and are doing things at the direction of politicians or people outside the Department of Justice, you can really create a corrosive effect on the public's perception of the FBI and maybe the law enforcement in general. You know, law enforcement is only as good as the public help them. Another word, solving homicides or a national security a terrorist threat
situation, it's many times human intelligence or people coming forward. If they don't think that you are legitimate or honest or trustworthy, they may not contact you and you will miss information. So you can make basically by making sort of these statements that are very inflammatory, and you know, we have enough inflammation going on in this country anyway, it just adds to that. I'm really concerned about it, and they're not using good choices of words, and it's
going to have I think, potentially a corrosive effect. And you say, it's not only going to affect like the FBI, but it's also going to
trickle down to other law enforcement. We'll think about it this way that over the last few years, through Black Lives Matters and George Floyd, the people's perception or at least some people's perception of law enforcement has diminished greatly since then continuation and I'm not suggesting that things didn't need to be addressed, because they did, but I think sort of globalizing ones the sort of position and maybe for I'm only going to guess the you know, Republicans obviously would like to
get President Trump reelected, and so some of this may be driven by that, but the point being, you can't you can't be I suppose this using words inflammatory words like you know, saying that the FBI are calling school board members, you know, terrorists. Now that goes back to investigating where school boards have been threatened over decisions about books or whatever it might be, and
obviously the law enforcement has to investigate those. I mean, it's obviously, in my view of really poor choice of words, and it sends all sorts of signals. So that's an example, okay. But the thing about the threats and that kind of stuff that there there was a lot of talk that school that parents were acting like terrorists. So isn't it be inflammatory in both
directions? I suppose. But all I'm suggesting is that when you make statements and you add a number of them together, which the Republicans have done and they did it yesterday with Director Ray, is it sends a message. It sends a message that this is a bad outfit, that they are sort of rotten to the core, and you shouldn't deal with them when you shouldn't trust them. And that's all I'm suggesting is that's a dangerous road to go down.
Have they made mistakes, of course, they have. They've made a number of them in reference to the twenty twenty election that they shouldn't have pursued to the degree they did. But that doesn't mean that the whole outfit is bad. That's poor decision makers, decisions made by people along the way, and it happens all the time, whether it's in law enforcement or some other
discipline. Right. So, for example, because I was watching hearings for a while yesterday and they were talking about the part that I was watching specifically, it was talking about the classified documents, and so they said, you know, and again like you said, it's all highly politically charged, but talking about how Trump's home and Mara Lago was raided and all lot of stuff, and then trying to compare it to the documents that were found at now
President Biden's home and saying, how can you prosecute one and not the other, you know, And they went on and on about that. So it's okay to point out specific things, but taking a broad brush to the whole organization is where you think that there's real problems. Well, all right, and even calling Marilago a raid because it wasn't, I mean, he had the Secret Service walk them in and that was only done I can tell you
because they had painstakingly try to get these documents. I mean, the former president Trump would never have been prosecuted in this if he hadn't gone through all the concern see woman and movement and so forth and so on. I mean, so he created the crime. In my view. Now they're I guess they're upset that that's being investigated, but wouldn't they want anybody investigated in the other cases. Yes, classified documents were found with Vice President Pence, with
President Biden. They've been found a number of times with former presidents and they just turned them over and nothing ever happened. So again, it's an important point. Making statements without the details to back it up. All that does is make people angry, and all I'm suggesting is that's never productive. Gotcha, Okay, So let's let's switch gears. I want to talk to you about the ghost guns, which are becoming an increasingly deadly problem among teenagers.
So look at it this way. In most states are many states, to buy a hand gun, you have to be twenty one. So if an eighteen year old seventeen year old awards a firearm, he or she cannot go down the street to a gun dealer and buy it, but they can buy a ghost gun online. Because ghost guns are not defined as firearms because they're disassembled, they require some minor alterations with a drill bit to make them into
a functioning firearm. So what happens is an ATF. You use this as an example of you can go down, if you're a seventeen year old, to a convenience store, get a debit card, use the debit card to purchase these firearm components through a ghost gun manufacture, just like you'd order a coffee pot or whatever you might order on Amazon or any place else. It's shifted to you. You do the minor alterations, you put it together. The I think even giving you instructions how to do all that. You now
have a fully functional firearm that has no serial number on it. Nobody knows you have it. In some of these cases, the parents don't even know the kids have them because it just comes through the US mail. And so now you have a weapon out there that nobody knows about. And they get used in crimes, they get used in homicides, and ATF can't trace them. They're trying to change that, but the gun rights people are fighting them.
So why are the gun rights people fighting them? I mean it seems so common sense that if you're going to have a weapon to me anyway, you should have it registered. Then you just will just just like yeah, just like if you or I or anyone else would go down the street to buy a weapon from a license firearm dealer or a gun store, they would do a background check. We would pass it. He picked a weapon up,
it's registered as far as the serial number where it was purchased. ATF then has a record of it. So if it's used, let's say your weapon stolen, that used in a crime, they can trace it. These firearms you can't trace because there's no record of them. And it also goes to how many of them are out there, and we have no idea how many you are out there? Right, No, we don't. I'll give you one quick stat and in ATF would tell you this is big time under
reporter. Between twenty seventeen and twenty twenty one, ATF, you know, local jurisdictions lap D l as would send firearms maybe for ATF to trace them because they're trying to figure out where this gun came from, and those jump by a thousand percent in those years, from like sixteen hundred to like twenty thousand. And that's just they think a drop in the bucket the number of
them that are out there. So to think about that, think about drug cartels, think about terrorist groups could make weapons, either get them as ghost guns, or you can also make weapons if you have the correct three D printer and you make the parts with the printer and then assemble it. And it seems like the law abiding citizens we're going to go purchase a gun, those aren't the ones we're as worried about as the ones like this where they're
doing it kind of behind the scenes so nobody knows they have them. I mean, it seems like more the criminal element is more prone to get and assemble and have the ghost guns. At least people right, people under eighteen, which you may or not be criminally inclined, and obviously people have felowy connections cannot get them. And I think there are just some people that believe, to go to the gun rights folks that you should just be able to
purchase weapons without any record of them. So, yeah, it's a battle that is not going to get settled anytime soon, I would imagine no doubt. All Right, Bred Garrett, thank you so much for the time this morning. Really appreciate it. Okay, So you may or may not know, but I'm a huge Disney fan, as is our traffic guru, Nick Pauli O'KINI. Good morning, Now, good morning, Amy. So Van
Eaton Galleries is presenting the Joel McGee Disney Collection. So Joel McGee is obviously a big Disney fan, and he's been collecting Disney artifacts I guess you can call them for like thirty five years, and now he's decided he's auctioning them off. There are like fifteen hundred items being auctioned, and you can go and see them before the auction in Burbank at the old bed Bath and Beyond. That's next to the old Sears store in the Burbank Town Center. And
Nick and I went yesterday and boy did we see some cool stuff. We saw some amazing things. Have a couple of my favorites were I love the Christmas at the Disneyland Resort, and I've always loved the toy soldiers from the Old Babies and Toyland was an old movie and so you can actually get if you so choose to invest a good several thousand dollars in a really amazing um.
Well, actually, one of the full costumes that was in the parade for a fantasy Christmas Fantasy Parade, and then the other one that I loved was over in the adventure Land area was what you and I talked about would be a great coffee table. They have an amazing imagineering the original creation for
Indiana Jones Adventure. Yeah. So it's like a mini it's a little miniature of of what the Indiana Jones ride is and like where It's so cool because I saw another guy sitting there, like you could watch him kind of going through the path. Okay, you go in there and you go through there, and but it's like a little miniature and it's covered in glass. Yeah, Nick and I like that'd be a cool wealfy no kidding, So we could reimagine it. We could be imagined as ourselves. Yeah, we should
be okay at this point. And they have they have some big items, like they have one of Peter Pans from Peter Pan's flight. They have one of the flying sailing ships. And in fact, we did a little Instagram video. You can check it out it at Amy K King on Instagram. And then also one of the dumboum what is it ride vehicles? Right vehicles? Yeah, yeah, and it's in like perfect condition. Meant, did you go for like four or five hundred thousand dollars? Yeah, And that's
other than the only thing. I'm sorry to step on you, but the coolest thing was for me and I think we both agreed upon this. A lot of these things, just like that the flying ship from Peter Pan and for the Dumbo Flying Adventure or the Dumbo Attraction. You can get on those rides and so you know, it's really cool to be up close and personal
with them. But some of these things you can never get as close as we were able to get to. So that was the coolest thing is to be able to They have a little Small World thing, and there's actually some of the parapets, the toppers from the Small World out like facade were available, like you can see them up close and personal, and some of the dolls from Small World like right there. You can't touch them obviously, but you can. It's close enough that you could reach out and touch them,
something you never get to experience even at Disneyland. Yeah, and then so and they we're talking about like some of the big ticket items, but there's some other stuff that's not super expensive. So if you're if you're interested in some Disney paraphernalia, like they had some really cool like signs you mentioned Christmas. They had a Christmas at Disneyland sign that's expected to go for like two to four hundred dollars. They have like an an estimated value doesn't mean what
it's going to actually go for when it comes to the auction. And it's got some stuff like from the Wayback Machine, what was the Adventure through Innerspace, which was a ride from like thirty or forty years ago, and they have little pieces of that and stuff. So they have really really interesting stuff. And then of course they have a gift shop if you just want to
go buy something, which I did. I mean, let's be real, I bought a really cool you know, I'm the traffic guy, so I bought a traffic cone hats that they had at Disney California Venture shortly after it opened back in two thousand and one. So yeah, pretty pretty cool. And oh and we didn't even talk about the Haunted Mansion. They had some really cool stuff from the Haunted Mansion. So if you are at all a Disney person, and you don't have to be like crazy Disney like like Nick
and I are, but really really cool stuff. And like I said, there's stuff that it's going to go for tens of thousands or in some instances even hundreds of thousands of dollars, but there's also stuff that's going to probably go for hundreds of dollars. And so if you want to have something like maybe tune into the auction, and if you don't want to buy anything,
you could always still go. It's like a little mini museum that's up and again it's at the old bed Bath and Beyond, which is between the cost Plus World Market and the Sears store in the Burbank Town Center. Yeah, and there's a part Stretch garage yeah West Garage. Yeah. Yeah, it's right off the five Freeway and that's going to be open all weekend. And do we I don't know the hours, do you remember the Yeah, eleven
am until seven pm. But the biggest thing that you're you're totally missing it's free to go do this, so like and free ninety nine just like we talked about on this weekend with Nick here on KA Findering Labor with Mo Kelly. Um. Yeah, it's the best thing because it's you're going to a museum, just like Amy said, kind of in a museum adjacent experience, but it's free to go check it out, and so it's totally worth your time, absolutely, and then if you decide you want to try to buy
something. The auction starts on Monday, and we were talking to Joel yesterday and they're gonna do like two hundred items on Monday evening. It starts at five, and then on Tuesday and Wednesday they're going to power through like eight hundred items each day. So there's a lot, a lot to see.
It's great And do you know where they're doing it online? Like you could go to the auction, but they're also doing it online if you don't want to go to the place and you're interested, so you can do it in person at Long Beach Town Center at Burbank Town Center, but you can also visit ka if I am six forty dot com forward slash Nick and the details for how to view the auction online there are there for you as well as if you wanted to register to become a bidder and do virtual bidding from home
and be able to check out the live stream. You can get all those details there perfect. And you know that website that Nick has is what's the KFI website, but it's Nick's page has all kinds of interesting stuff. He does this weekend with Nick with mo while that'll happen tomorrow evening at eight o'clock. And if you want to know what's going on around the South Line, definitely go check that out. It's KFI AM six forty dot com slash Nick. Yeah, okay, and don't forget to go check out my Instagram.
There's some really fun stuff that we got to see ye a good time yesterday. It was really worth it. So if you've not had plans for this weekend, definitely go check it out, especially because the ac is pun bettah. All right, So there you go, Thanks Nick. Right now, let's say good morning to ABC's Tom Rivers. So the NATO summit is wrapped up. NATO's moving forward with accepting Sweden into the Alliance. Finland was admitted in April. They're not taking in Ukraine just yet. How was Russia taking
all of this. Yeah, we've got some reaction now from the Foreign Ministry and Moscow very very predictably. There are a number of threads to this, but they're saying, look, it's pretty negative news if you want to put it in that connotation. With regards to Moscow, as the headline is, they're congratulating the bidendministration for re entering the Cold War. We thought we put
that to bed about thirty two years ago. But Moscow says, nope, it is back, it is front, it is centered once again, so you know, we could be looking at it yet again another arms race, as if there's money for that in this day and age. Other parts of it, they criticize France for the pledge to supply long range missiles to Ukraine.
Moscow says, I've a lonely prolong this conflict. And with regard to as you alluded to Finland and Sweden, um, basically Moscow's line is that Russia will take early and adequate measures in response to that, ie monitoring along for instance, in the in the case of Finland, a very very long border. So it's something else that both sides will have to pour more depends money into in the coming years. Okay, so you just mentioned that Russias
said that it would take early and adequate measures in response. What does that mean, because that's a very big language. Yet it doesn't mean a heck of a lot in and of itself. But they have to monitor those quote unquote NATO countries that are now on their border. And again it's in an old argument. Everybody says, this conflict began seventeen months ago. Um, if you go back further back to the days of the Cold War and the
reunification of Germany. At that time, Gorbachev said, okay, stalking with Secretary of State Baker saying, Okay, you guys can have a reunited Germany and it can be NATO, but don't come close to our border, just like the US didn't like, if you will, Soviet assets in Cuba. Back in those days, there were sixteen countries in the NATO Club. Now with Finland and Sweden, you're doubling that. You're talking about thirty two thirty two countries, and of course Mosto is very very mindful of that, and
they don't like it. That's interesting that you say that, because they hadn't really thought about it that way like we don't get We're not happy when they're in Cuba, and we probably wouldn't be happy if somehow or other they ended up in Mexico because they'd be closer to our borders. But yeah, we're right next to Russia now with NATO, well very much. So look at the bases, look at the maps, hundreds of bases border. So they have reason, if you will to be to be concerned in that agreement between
Gorbachev and Baker Hill. For a few years it was if you will, jumped over, starting with the Clinton administration. Since then, more countries have jumped in, and as I say, the total is out double what it was back when the Berlin Wall fell. So you mentioned the Cold War and that it ended like thirty two years ago, and Russia is now saying, well, we're back in one. What does that mean for for us? Well, for you, it means the tax dollars that can help your schools,
help your hospitals. It means the pious smaller for those kinds of things building bridges or fixing bitch bridges, and more money is you know, plowed into defense expenditures. You know, that is the way it is. That's the stark reality. You either like it or you don't, but that's that's the way this country is going as far as the government goes. So during the Cold War, they there was just lots and lots of military spending.
We were spending a lot, The USSR was spending a lot, and we were building up our are arsenals basically but not actually firing anything and saying hey, if you do that, you know I'm going to make more weapons, and I'm going to make more weapons. But there was no actual conflict.
So that's what the Cold War is, or could potentially be again very much though, And again there's always the issue of an accident taking place and then the tender is struck and then you're off into a realm you don't want even consider. Yeah, but yeah, it is a dangerous, dangerous poker game. There's a lot of people don't want to think about it in this day and age. But if you're of a certain age, you'll remember duck can
cover in school? Uh that if that was going to help you. But yeah, the world has certainly change and it is not a video game. It is it is a real, real, stark reality out there, and it's kind of scary when some experts come forward and say, oh, you can win a nuclear war. As prudent says, nobody. Nobody wins in a nuclear war. So how is there any way to cool things down?
I mean, because it seems like we kind of are not we, but NATO kind of non literally figured literally fired the shot across the bow by taking in Sweden and Finland. Yeah, well exactly, I think you know how to. You could go back and say Minsk too, agreement would have solved this. Nobody would have died and the eastern part of Ukraine would have been U have some self autonomy. Those are all Russian speaking people, and they look to Moscow, they don't look to keep That could have saved a whole
lot in treasure and in blood. But again that did not happen. Eventually, this thing will eventually go around a table. Doesn't look like there's any talk, zero talk of that in Vilnius, and China, for one, says we're here, We're a big player in this day and age. We're willing to mediate and basically hitting a stiff arm from from NATO, from the US saying no, we don't want to hear that. We want to carry
on with more and more weapons. Each and every week, another announcement full in the blank X number of hundreds of millions of dollars with the weapons going to Ukraine. Is anyone talking with Russia about ending this or are they just not talking right now? They're not talking. Moscow says it's it's ready to sit down at the table tomorrow, no preconditions, and the West says, no, we don't want to hear that. Why, there have money to
be made. It's a big world and they'll follow the money. You think about what Julian Assana said about Afghanistan. The US was not looking there to have a decisive, quick, overpowering victory. Asara says that America wanted an endless war. And you're looking at kind of a very similar situation right now developing in Ukraine. Well, that is scary in and of itself. Tom Rivers, thank you so much for the time this morning and the insight you
helped helped us understand some things today. Take care, all right, take care hey. You know we always have all the death and destruction and devastation in Ukraine. So I found this story that I wanted to share because I think it's really kind of it's a little heartbreaking but also heartwarming. During the war and everything that's going on Ukraine, a successful heart transplant has been performed on a six year old girl in Kiev. It was a three three hour
operation. It happened just four days ago on Sunday evening. The girl got the heart of a four year old boy who doctors had declared brain dead after he suffered an aneurysm. It was the first time a heart transplant has been performed in Ukraine on children so young and unique that both the donor and the recipient were, you know, just little kids. The Heart Institute released images
from the operation. The mother of the boy whose heart was donated was standing by the girl's bedside, and I just think that that it's really powerful because you know, it's a little bit of humanity and very inhumane activity that's going on right now. We lead local live from the KFI twenty four hour newsroom. I'm Amy King. This has been your wake up call. Now,
let's you've been listening to wake up call. You know you can always listen live on KFI a M six forty weekdays from five to six am, and anytime on demand on the iHeartRadio app,