The Demon Lady With the Scarves

Thanks for listening to Chicago's Morning Answer podcast sponsored by Signature, a division of Esquire Bank. Signature takes pride in helping customers grow their business and provide unmatched banking expertise, custom financial solutions, and the industry's best technology. So whether your business is looking for a deposit relationship or needs a ready source of financing, Signature has the solutions for you. Call today at 773-467, 5600 to hear how signature can help your business grow and thrive. Esquire Bank, member FDIC. equal housing lenders. Join Dan Proft, Sean Thompson, and Alex Marlowe, editor of Breitbart News. For Cigar Night on Tuesday, May 19th, tickets are on sell now at 560.com slash cigar. This is Chicago's morning answer with Dan Proft on AM 560, The Answer. The top of the morning, Dan Proff here. Shut her down. Lock it down. Haunta virus. I've been insiduously attempting to avoid this conversation for the last week, hoping that it would dissipate. But again, I shouldn't be so naive knowing the DC Press Corps, as it were, has the opportunity to. manufacture a frenzy over a virus, given our not too distant experience with COVID. What's happening at this point shouldn't surprise me. 17 Americans from Haunted Virus cruise ship arrive in U.S. for quarantine. Now, there thankfully are cooler heads in public health posts in this administration than there were, well, in the previous two, including Trump 1.0. And I'm speaking specifically of someone at the head of NIH, not named Anthony Fauci, but named Batacharya. And this was what he had to say on Jake Tapper's show over the weekend. In touch with the WHO, we're in touch with the international health organizations, including the one in Spain. And we have been providing technical assistance to all of those organizations all the way through. This is not COVID, Jake, and we don't want to treat it like COVID. We don't want to cause a public panic over this. We want to treat it with the hauntavirus protocols that we, again, we're successful in containing outbreaks in the past. And so we followed those protocols. Like we gave health, this health alert is coming out because, again, there's this discreet event of the 17 arriving in the United States very, very soon. And so we just want to make sure that the medical community understands this. We've been communicating the last week as the... as sort of the press attention has picked up more with the public as is appropriate, given the nature of this disease. The key message I want to send to your audience is that this is not COVID. This is not going to have lead to the kind of outbreak. And I'm pleased to hear the opening segment where you emphasize that, because we shouldn't be panicking when the evidence doesn't warrant it. And, of course, the ornithologists have struck again here. Patient Zero for Hanta virus has been identified as a 70-year-old Dutch ornithologist who visited that infamous landfill in Argentina. I wonder if there's a Chinese virology lab near there. Visited a landfill in Argentina containing rodents potentially carrying the Andes strain of the Hanta virus, which is the one that is...

more communicable among humans than the other strains of hantavirus that god is not a unique coronavirus or c t u would already be calling for remote learning three one two six four two fifty six hundred is the alpha wealth group dot com Colin and text line. So they're on this cruise and ornithologists and bird lovers go to this landfill where that's supposed to be a good bird watching site. And apparently, as this can't happen, there are previous cases of this, you know, human infection and transmission. I mean, not to get to graphic. They're certainly in the morning, but. you know, rodent feces if it's dry and dust kicks up and you inhale it, it potentially could be transmitted to a human and then humans in close quarters like, say, on a cruise ship could transmit it amongst themselves through, you know, saliva and whatnot. Usually it requires close contact, sneezing, I guess, you know, so close contact airborne transmission. But it does not have near the... communicability of COVID, although it is potentially lethal. And so, again, a floating incubator like a cruise ship would be ideal for transmission, and that's what's happened a bit. But as Dr. Jay says, no need to lose your mind over this. But for those of you that are still wearing masks, I guess that's probably past post. Probably the first whiff of hanta virus, you've already hermetically sealed yourself in your house and are calling for mandatory PCR testing. Well, that's actually Dr. Deborah Birx, what she essentially intimated. She's re-emerged. Oh, so good to hear from her. Dr. Deborah Birx. The demon lady with the scarfs, you remember her, Anthony Fauci's sidekick. She was on News Nation back to talk about PCR testing. Not willing to use the term mandatory quite yet. She's really learned to be restrained. So the Andes strain is the only strain where we have mapped human to human transmission. And I caution people because when we say human to human transmission, we're talking about people who develop symptoms. But because we're not testing populations with RNAs, we don't really know whether there are subclinical cases. So there could be more human to human transmission than we actually see. It's never good to track viruses through symptoms. We should be tracking viruses through. blood tests like PCR. We've learned that with COVID, extraordinarily helpful. Many universities were able to open and schools were able to open because they provided weekly testing and it really prevented spread. So we know how to deal with these viruses. We just need to move into the 21st century and make testing more widely available to those who need it. Text 247 has CNN started the body count clock yet.

Yeah, no, I'm waiting for that. You know, anything, they'll just give them something. So, you know, the 17 Americans quarantine, maybe they'll start with the count of the quarantined Americans and in other countries, the infected. Yeah, they're going to do their best to make sure this is front and center. I mean, the point has been made by a couple of... of medical professionals you may have seen circulating on social media and podcasts and so forth. I'll tell you what did spread like wildfire, not haunt a virus, but the coverage of it. I mean, completely disproportionate with the newsworthiness of a, frankly, at this juncture and expected, as you heard from Dr. Jay, not truly serving, but a chari, I'm talking. an insular incident outbreak. But, I mean, there have been thousands of articles, and it's not just the one-off like this occurred, who, what, where, when. It's the, what is this mean? Should we be hysterical? How lethal is it? And, you know, all of the whipping, the beginnings, the slow burn of frenzy mania that the media likes to whip up as we so witness, not just with respect to viral outbreaks, but with respect to just about every topic under the sun. And I'm so glad. The demon lady with the scarf says back. Because, you know, as we're talking, as we were last week, a bit about Anthony Fauci and people concerned about the statute of limitations, about to expire against Anthony Fauci for his various crimes against humanity. Explain last week. He's got this blanket pardon. It would have to be a new deposition or state-level charges. But I digress. We revisited it. And also because of some... because of a recent report Ron Johnson did on the algorithms that were used to make claims about those who were vaccine injured under reporting the incidents of vaccine injuries. So COVID was back in the news last week. We talked a bit about it. Now, Dr. Berks is back in the news. And let's make sure that the permanent record of Dr. Burks. isn't lost to history if she tries to rehabilitate her reputation and her relevance. And that's what she's doing when she goes on, you know, a friendly, like News Nation to sound like a medical professional. I go back to this documentary from a couple of years ago by Rob Mon's Good Kid Productions. We had them on the program. It was pretty good. It's short. I think it's only about a 20, 25 minute documentary. It's worth checking out if you haven't seen it or if you don't recall it to go back and review it. It wasn't Anthony Fauci is the name of the documentary. It wasn't Anthony Fauci. Rob Monce, Good Kid Productions. And the thesis of the documentary is that Berks actually was the...

There was an explosion on suicidal ideation. One out of four college age kids were thinking of killing themselves. There was silence, except for one statement by Berks, you're an outlier. I'm an outlier. There was no data to refute what I said. An Atlas on Berks' legacy, Dr. Scott Atlas. They destroyed everybody to stop cases of COVID. And it destroyed millions of people. That is the legacy of the Burke's guidance. And just quickly, I mean, Ron Johnson's report, which I'll post, suggests that upwards of 40,000 people died as a direct result of taking the vaccine. And the number of vaccine injured via VERS is north of 1.4 million, I believe was the number he cited. And, of course, as we know, we talked about quite a bit during the thrust of COVID. You know, VERS estimates their own estimates by public health. officials is that about 1% of vaccine injuries are reported through the voluntary reporting system called bears. Yeah. The reckoning that hasn't come, I know people focused on Anthony Fauci, particularly last week, but it's much bigger than him, isn't it? This is the morning show. More Chicago radio listeners are choosing. This is Chicago's morning answer on AM 560. The answer. Signature, a division of Esquire Bank, offers Chicago businesses' relationship first banking. Signature knows your name and your story because personalized banking still matters. I'm Dan Proft, and I know this because Signature is where I do my business banking. Hi, I'm Tony Patrick, CEO of Total Wall, and a client of Signature. We produce high-performance materials used in exterior insulating finish systems and other stucco applications. Every growing business needs a strong team behind it. Over the years, Signature has been more than a financial partner. They've shared their knowledge, offered guidance, and connected us with trusted professionals who help strengthen our business. Their valuable extension of our team and a true partner. That's why I value my relationship with Signature. Signature helps local businesses succeed. Want to learn how Signature can help turn your business vision into reality? Call Signature, a division of Esquire Bank at 773-467-5600, or visit signature.esquirebank.com. Esquire Bank, member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender. If you're looking for the latest news, insight into what it means, and the sharpest opinion, there's only one station in Chicago where you can turn, and it's this one. We're AM 560, the answer. Top of the morning, Jan Prop, you heard on this show a few weeks ago from former Virginia State Attorney General.

That what happened on Friday was going to happen. The Virginia State Supreme Court overturning the referendum results and that remapping that was done by the Dem Socialists and Abigail Spanberger, who said she had no interest in in pursuing a remap, a redistricting. But she... did anyway, facilitated the gerrymandered map that would have likely moved the congressional delegation split in Virginia from 5-4 Democrat to 10-1 Democrat, so a 4-C pickup for Democrats that was projected. And this was in response to, they say, the left, the cartographers on the left. great practitioners in the dark art of gerrymandering, but came to the table as Pollyanna is just responding to the fire that Greg Abbott delivered in Texas. That's what they said. It's not true, but that's what they said. So it was going to be plus four, and that would have been in response to Texas, and combined with Virginia responding to Texas, and California responding to Texas, and even with Florida responding to Virginia responding to Texas, you still would have had the neo-Marxist party more or less holding their own. Although the Louisiana v. Calus decision changed that calculus significantly as well. Regardless, the net net is that that map in Virginia, she gone. And the net net of this redistricting battle. is Texas is up five seats. That's been upheld in court. Tennessee passed a new map that likely gives them that one seat in the congressional delegation in Texas that the GOP didn't have. The Memphis seat, the black seat held by Stephen Cohen honky, you know, that seat. Florida plus four, we talked about Virginia now goes back to what it was. So that is a sort of a net pickup of four seats. If you're... counting in real time. And then the ending of racially discriminatory maps and the callous decision is, you know, a projected pickup potential of between 15 and 20 seats. So it's significant. So significant that even Jim Clyburn, you know, the Biden whisper, even Jim Clyburn. was, well, felt, I don't know if he was. He felt compelled to admit that it's possible Republicans could maintain the House in the November midterms. However, then he cautioned, be careful. And as they're running around,

decrying the Virginia Supreme Court decision and the remapping in red states, generally speaking, as Jim Crow 2.0 and the gerrymandering maps in blue states, not Jim Crow 2.0. Of course not. Not cheating. Not unfair. When we do it... It's to preserve our democracy. When they do it, it's cheating, it's racist, it's a remnant of white supremacy, it's mock extremism and so forth. You know the rap. But Jim Clyburn, I think, accidentally did a cell phone here when it comes to all of their... overheated rhetoric about Jim Crow 2.0. I do believe that the voters in this country are watching very closely and they are feeling emotionally what the threat is to our future. And I do not believe that the majority of the voters in this country condone and will agree with what President Trump is doing. South Carolina, our delegation, our house, talked with him, the Senate, I guess, on the day before yesterday. But the Supreme Court, two years ago, spoke to this district and said it was not unconstitutional. But the president says he wants them to redraw the lines anyway. All I'm going to say to that is be very careful what you pray for. Because what I do believe is that when they finish with the redistricting, there will be the possibilities of LH3 Democrats getting elected here in South Carolina to the United States Congress. So you think that the redistricting they're doing in South Carolina could help? Could help Democrats prospects win more seats. Okay. Well, then what's the problem? And I'm sorry, what is your argument that the remapping is inherently racist and it's Jim Crow 2.0? But. It could produce more black Democrat representatives or Democrat representatives because it presents for more competitive seats. They're drawing the maps to make, to use the Tennessee example, to give the GOP the likelihood of picking up the Memphis seat, but that necessarily means there'll be some more Democrats, Democrat-leaning voters, put into seats that were. that are perceived to be, say, Republican seats. And so you make both seats more competitive. And it also suggests, as Lauren Underwood herself suggested, suggested, she said it. She's not, you know,

dissuaded from the remapping that's happening state by state in the sense that, well, a black candidate could win a district that's not majority black. You don't say. Really? Thank you for joining the conservative ranks in saying that, yeah, that happens all the time. She should know she is won a black candidate who won in a district that is not majority black. Of course that can happen. But that's not the argument you're advancing. The argument they're advancing is more along the lines of what you hear from the Maxwell Frost of the world. He's a race hustling, Gen Z. neo-Marxists in Florida. My heart is heavy for the country because we see that this is going on all across the south. And it's important for people to realize that this isn't happening in a vacuum. This isn't a plan that just came up because Donald Trump said to go redistrict. This is the product of a 60-plus year plan to bring this country into Jim Crow 2.0. An era where they've traded in the hoods. for suits and ties, an era where they are trying to use our democracy against us to take away, not just our right to vote, but our right to protest, our right to privacy, our right to health care, a right to be able to actually have life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness in this country. And they see the South as a threat. And that is the reason why some of the worst voter suppression tactics we see are in the South.

312-642-2-5600 alphawealthgroup.com calling and text line. Those who were ready to concede the midterm elections, are you interested in revisiting that at this juncture? I think you should be. I'm not saying it's a... Feta complete, in fact, I'm saying quite the opposite. I still think Republicans are in the underdog role in the House in particular. But these redistricting results, as well as that Supreme Court decision, have materially changed the balance of power. And the betting markets reflected because it's obvious. the neo-Marxist party's chances have diminished. And this is why they're going Jim Crow 2.0 is because they have to try to whip voters into a frenzy. You know, when reason won't win the day, not that this is their particular strong suit, you go with inducement of hysteria. You go with mania. You can't. allow people to think through these things logically, you have to get them focused on a boogeyman that they must slay in order to save our democracy because our rights are being taken away from us somehow, some way. Hakeem Jeffries, the trash-talking House Minority Leader. who may talk himself right into maintaining his position as a minority leader. Well, actually, if he loses, I don't think he'll maintain his position, but he'll maintain his membership in the minority. A new generation of Americans have to show up, stand up, speak up, fight, get into good trouble to usher in an era of progress. We went from the progress of emancipation to the backlash of Jim Crow. The progress of the civil rights movement to the backlash of mass incarceration, the progress of electing Barack Obama to the backlash that has resulted in the elevation of Donald Trump, mega extremism, and this behavior that we're seeing coming out of the Supreme Court of the United States to throw the American South back into the Jim Crow era. So it's going to take an all-hands-on-deck effort. Yeah. Remapping. And the callous decision is, you know, separate water fountains are right around the corner. Give me a break. Give me a break. This is all they got, though. And just on the Virginia case, I mentioned former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cucinelli, detail this for us a few weeks ago. So you had the heads up on Chicago's morning answer of what was to come. And... Don't forget the Virginia State Supreme Court is 4-3 Republican majority, and it was essentially a party-line vote, if you will, but the legal reasoning is very strong for the majority because it's set forward in the Virginia Constitution. And they violated the strictures of their state constitution, and it's not close.

Virginia's Constitution gives redistricting to a bipartisan commission. Proposed amendments have to go through the legislature twice with an election in between giving voters another chance to be heard on constitutional rewrites. In the case, the Supreme Court ruled upon on Friday, state lawmakers first approved the gerrymandering amendment on October 31st shortly before Election Day. By that date, as... the justice writing for majority notes, more than 1.3 million votes had been cast, which was approximately 40% of the total vote for that election cycle. The idea this satisfied the requirement for an intervening election would be unprecedented. Under this theory, as the justice notes, Virginians who cast early ballots in 2025, something that the left champions, right, hoist by their own pittard here, Virginia's who cast early ballots in 2025 under the theory they're now advancing, quote, unknowingly forfeited their constitutionally protected opportunity to vote for or against delegates who favor or disfavor amending the Constitution. Since that makes no sense, the court ruled that the gerrymandering amendment wasn't properly proposed, and so the April referendum is void. It really is straightforward, and it's exactly what Ken Cuccinelli laid out a few weeks back on this show. But again, you know, that sort of sober review of the facts is not something that the left is going to be encouraging. Frankly, probably something that conservatives won't be talking about enough. They should be, as opposed to worrying about spiking the football and what the balance of power is. We should be explaining, explainers, what occurred and why it occurred and why it's legitimate and why the left position was legitimate on the front end, legitimate, illegitimate in the front end, illegitimate in the middle, and illegitimate at the end. And so now they're papering over it with this Jim Crow 2.0 rap and this phony moral indignation of well-documented fraudsters who frankly shouldn't be officers of the court like attorney Mark Elias, who was essentially the facilitator of the Russian collusion hoax. Like, look, I mean, in the end, here's why I'm angry. In the end, Democrats are still going to take control of the House. That's the good news, right? In the end, I think Democrats still could win the Senate. In the end, like, politics will be politics. But the reason why I am so angry is because the Supreme Court of the United States chose to strike down a law that was passed in 1965. that Congress was in dialogue with the court, okay, over in the 1970s and 1980s. And for the last 40 years, we have lived under a set of principles that all players have accepted as a fair level playing field. And then a group of white Louisianaans decided to challenge a map, and the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the parties to argue a case that none of the parties wanted, which to argue, which was whether the Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act was still in effect under the right time.

And then the parties did it. And they chose to issue an opinion in the middle of May while primers were going on. And then the U.S. Supreme Court thought, you know what? Sure, we let black voters wait two years and vote under illegal maps. But God forbid, these white voters have to do the same in Louisiana. That would be a constitutional crisis. And against all of that backdrop, have we learned nothing? I mean, have we learned nothing? Has the broader legal community not learned anything? Have the, have the, other than the civil rights groups, have people not learned that when you do this to black voters, it turns out bad for democracy for everybody? So yeah, I'm angry. I'm angry because of the appalling silence that's going on right now around this case and the aftermath. Yeah, he is a complete bottom feeder. He's a disgusting human being, as all these race hustlers are, really. But especially Elias, because he knows what he's saying is untrue. It doesn't matter. It's just a scam. It's the old row is settled law so it can't be revisited, even though it was a terribly decided decision. It was settled. Says who? We've been debating it every year until Dobbs and we're still debating it and we will still debate it. But we were debating it every year since 1973 up to Dobbs and we're still debating it. What do you mean it's settled? It's not settled. There's bad law. It's a terrible opinion by Blackman. And so the 60 years of racist maps.

that are violative of the norms for mat-making, the Supreme Court has promulgated compactness, contiguousness, respect for municipal borders, has been wrong, just like race quotas were wrong. And the Harvard admissions case addressed that. We've had a bad law. and bad judicial decisions, including at the Supreme Court level, many times throughout our history. It took 56 years to overturn separate but equal, the terribly decided plus E. v. Ferguson case that was overturned by Brown v. Board of Education. This is not unprecedented in our history. You know, fallible human beings in the Supreme Court that sometimes are captured by the time in which they live rather than the principles they said they would abide. And it takes a long time to get a case that another court will take up to address the wrong that was committed. This is not new. And by the way, I should hasten to mention. And what is the reaction from the neo-Marxists after this Virginia Supreme Court case, the Supreme Court decision on the map? It wasn't just the Jim Crow 2.0 stories all weekend that there is an idea afoot to declare, in Virginia, declare the existing redistricting commission unconstitutional. I so declare force all seven sitting Supreme Court justice out via reducing the retirement age from mandatory retirement age, Supreme Court in Virginia, 75, reduce it to 54. And then with the justices out of the way and the commission out of the way, they can ram through the map that they ram through in that referendum. I mean, do you get a sense? of the naked pursuit of power that these revolutionary leftists have committed themselves to? I don't think this is going to go anywhere because it's just too obvious. It's too on the nose. But this is the attitude of so many on the left. We'll just get rid of everybody. We'll rewrite the rules ex post facto. Get rid of everybody and we'll get what we want. However, we get it because the ends justify the means. And they're the saviors of our democracy. These are a bunch of revolutionary thugs. Lawless revolutionary thugs. And even if they don't pursue this against the Virginia State Supreme Court, even to suggest it. is revealing, isn't it? By the way, the cook and the justices, yeah, they're all 54 to 70 are the ages, which is why they conveniently came up with that number. I mean, it's wild. By the way, the Cook report basically has House and Senate.

lean and solid Democrat and Republican even with the toss of a Bayteen seats. So outcome still very much hangs in the balance. There's only one radio show in Chicago talking about today's biggest stories and telling you what they really mean. That show is this one. Chicago's morning answer on AM 560, The Answer. Signature, a division of Esquire Bank, offers Chicago businesses relationship first banking. Signature knows your name and your story because personalized banking still matters. I'm Dan Proft, and I know this because Signature is where I do my business banking. Hi, I'm Tony Patrick, CEO of Total Wall and a client of Signature. We produced high-performance materials used in exterior insulating finish systems and other stucco applications. Every growing business needs a strong team behind it. Over the years, Signature has been more than a financial partner. They've shared their knowledge, offered guidance, and connected us with trusted professionals who help strengthen our business. They're a valuable extension of our team and a true partner. That's why I value my relationship with Signature. Signature helps local businesses succeed. Want to learn how Signature can help turn your business vision into reality? Call Signature a division of Esquire Bank at 773-467-5600 or visit Signature.orgate.com. Esquire Bank, member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender. This is Chicago's morning answer with Dan Proft on AM 560. The answer.

Top of the morning, Dan Proft here. I don't know yet if Spencer Pratt can be the next mayor of L.A. can be that candidate I've been talking about generically for the last couple of years. Somewhere in some big blue city that's disintegrating, somebody is going to win an election that they shouldn't win. Somebody is going to tap into... the revolt bubbling below the surface in such a way that it makes it comfortable for enough people, even if their politics is somewhat desperate to coalesce around that candidate and pull off an upset because people are tired of living the way that so many of them are living in big blue city America. And the all roads lead to Trump argument. The blame shifting that's offered by these big blue city neo-Marxists, I think is wearing thin, not everywhere, but perhaps in enough quarters for this surprise to take place. And Spencer Pratt is doing a better job than anybody's done to date in tapping into that. And the angle he's taking. Pretty good, pretty simple. I mean, you see some of the memes. Basically, other people are sort of echoing what he's putting out in different and entertaining ways, but very straightforward, very simple. So one, in response to one of the many ads and songs, he's going to have to release a Spencer Pratt campaign album in the near term because there are so many ditties surrounding his candidacy. But one of the memes was, They burned down his house. Vote Pratt. Yeah. As is as good a reason as any. It's a better reason than any than Karen Bass, Karen Basilar or Nithya Raman is offering. Pratt was on the all-end podcast, you know, with all the tech impresarios.

And this is how he described himself and essentially the value proposition of his candidacy. It's always good to have one. Something else a lot of candidates could learn from this guy. I keep trying to tell everyone that, you know, they try to put me in a box. I didn't run for to be a political party. I didn't run to be a politician. I ran because I experienced what city leadership failure at the ultimate level is. That's why I stepped up. That's what cuts through. So the media and everyone wants to jump on and be like, oh, Spencer's our guy. No, I'm the citizen. I'm the angry taxpayer. You can be a Democrat and love me. You can be a Republican and love me. The only people that don't love me are... Communists and socialists, and I don't want them. Mr. Smith goes to Sacramento. Well, no, he's not ready for government. Mr. Smith goes to the L.A. governor's, L.A. mayor's office, I should say. 312, 6442-5600 is the AlphaWealth Group.com answer line and text line. Mr. Smith for the mayor of L.A. What do you think? The angry taxpayer. Something else he said in that. All in podcast interview when he was asked about how he does debate prep after his, by all accounts, resounding victory in the debate last week where he really had Karen Bass and Nithya Raman bailing water. I mean, they are just not prepared to think critically, speak like a human being. They are not quick on their feet. He is everything they are not. And the contrast is stark. But this is another for you kids out there who want to be candidates someday. They don't want me to get into the machine. So every interview I do, unlike these politicians, it's opposition. It's arguing, arguing, arguing. When these, you know, Bay or Bass or Councilman talk to the media, they can just lie. And then the media people go, Oh, thank you. Thank you, Karen Bass. Thank you, councilman. If I say anything, I got to have who was there, what they were wearing, what they have for breakfast. I have to have my information so fact-based and be bulletproof to beat this machine that I debate. All I do is debate people all day long. You're held to a higher standard. Exactly. It's challenged all day. And all I live in is facts and the truth. he's got to be bulletproof he's got to know his stuff he's got to be ready to go and he's not thinking about what to say he's bringing the knowledge he's acquired and the attitude that he genuinely has to the table to deliver in the moment it's very different trying to remember what to say or trying to convey a point to what i'm doing

And one of the things he's doing, as I'm sure you've seen on making the rounds on social media. Very simple. It's sort of the same thing Nick Shirley is doing, for example. Keep it very straightforward. What does Nick Shirley do? I've got these lists of all these so-called hospice providers in L.A. I'm going to go knock on the door and see if anybody's there. See if it looks like a real business. I've got their billing. accounts. I've got some profile on their ownership. Same thing Luke Roziak, investigative reporter did for the Daily Wire. We were talking about his expose yesterday. Last week, I should say. What's Spencer Pratt doing? Filming places around L.A. and that don't work. Filming the devastation that has been inflicted upon L.A. residents. Whether it's the malfeasance in terms of the response to the Palisades fire, or it's the general homelessness and lawlessness on the streets, or something as simple as this, the 6th Street Bridge. We're here at the 6th Street Bridge in downtown Los Angeles. It is beautiful. If only you can see it. But all the lights have been allowed to be stolen from our taxpayer money because Mayor Basura and Nithya Raman and her DSA City Council let criminals run the streets. But don't worry, Mayor Basura is planning to take $200 more million of our tax money to get solar power lights. Oh, because the criminals won't steal those. But don't worry, Nithya Raman has suggested putting cages around. The lights. That's right. Cages. That'll stop them. So if you're sick of your tax money getting burned by these criminals, you better vote for Mayor Pratt. The ballots drop May Ford. Turn them in. Go get your grandma out of vote. Get everyone to vote. We're going to get rid of the DSA. We're going to get rid of Mayor Basura. And we're going to save LA so we can see this beautiful city. Well, one thing is clear at this juncture. You know, they, the machine, such as it is, essentially the government unions and the politicians, they control the apparatchiks. They elevate like Karen Bissoudra or B.L.M. Brandon. Storm Mammie. The DSA, the public sector unions, they're, you know, that blob. they will try to ignore you because they have such institutional advantage or such overwhelming resources. You know, Spencer Pratt, I know some people remember him as a reality star, but particularly after his $3 million house burned down, this is not a guy like the real estate developer that ran against Karen Basildra four years ago, Rick Caruso, you know, who's some sort of billionaire. He can't self-finance this campaign.

So it's very different. And by the way, just as a point of order in terms of people that poo-poo this and say, pun intended, talking about the streets of L.A., that Pratt can't win. It's L.A. Well, I mean, Rick Caruso is a very different candidate. Got 44% of the vote against Basura four years ago. And this is a very different candidate. This is a very different candidacy. It's a very different context after the fire. After the embarrassment of Basura being in Ghana during the fire, all that's transpired, the continued disintegration of the city. And it's not just Pratt that's coming up to meet the moment. It's the energy behind him. Very interesting. I would... Keep a close eye on this. There's a lot to learn, win, lose, or draw. But back to my point, they can no longer ignore him, not after the attention that he's generated and the debate performance he had. So now it's time to hit him. Now they have to treat him like he is, which is a real threat. So the AFL-CIO and the government unions, I repeat myself, got together and came up with this hit ad. Listen to this. You know, from our perspective, conservatives are precisely listening to this or just a commonsensical perspective, you almost wonder, I was wondering when watching is, is this a hit ad or an endorsement ad? But, you know, that should give you pause. Republican Spencer Pratt is the last thing Los Angeles needs for mayor. Pratt opposes using taxpayer money to build brand new houses for our unhoused neighbors, saying it's time for the homeless to get help or get out. Pratt thinks L.A. needs thousands more police officers rather than more social workers, and Republican Spencer Pratt thinks public employee unions should have less power, not more. L.A. is on the right track and needs to stay the course. Vote no on Republican Spencer Pratt. I don't know. I mean, I don't know L.A. well enough to know. I'd love to see some numbers, like right track, wrong track, to see if the FLCIO, all those government union goons that are usually decent at the political operative business, could possibly be that tone deaf? I would think a majority of L.A. residents Angelinos think the city's on the wrong track. But maybe not in the numbers that we might otherwise think. Just like the other week, I mentioned a Harvard Harris poll that found Brandon Johnson's numbers are not nearly as underwater as you might think they were, particularly after that half-ass crane survey from a year earlier that had his approval rating at 6% or whatever, not nearly as underwater as you might think. So you have to remember the landscape on which you're operating. But that's just a very interesting approach to me. You know, the Republican. I'm surprised Trump wasn't mentioned. The Republican, that's the way they're going to, you can't vote for a Republican. You can't vote for a Trump supporter. The Trump attachment will come. But the thing that they have missed, the opportunity they've missed, I'm talking about the blob, the Marxist blob that controls L.A. Well, they missed the opportunity to.

not to be graphic, but sort of a political saying, to strangle the baby in the crib. They needed to get him before he established his own brand, but they didn't take him seriously. Now he's on All In, his CBS this morning, they're comparing him to Zohran Mamdani, not that his politics are the same, but in terms of the quote-unquote it factor and the excitement he's generating. And so now he can, he's in a much better position. to overcome any of the customary. You can't vote for a Republican. He's MAGA extremist, all that business. Not to mention, I think that label's losing some currency over the last, as it's been overused over the last decade and misapplied. So I think they've got a problem on their hands, the powers that be in L.A. Chris in Rogers Park. And Spencer Pratt just say that as a white man, he has to work 10 times as hard as a woman of color to get the job. Yeah. Yeah. Right. That is debate prep comment where he gets challenged and they just get, oh, thank you so much for Daining to talk to us from the local press. Yeah. Thanks for the call, Chris. Tina and Joliet. Hey, good morning. I just want to point out how speckless, the Illinois GOP is that the most exciting race that we're talking about in Illinois is Spencer Pratt race in L.A. 100%. Nobody, we don't have any of that here. Juxtapose his campaign videos with what we've seen here, with candidates in front of the bean and slapping ketchup packets out of each other hands. It's ridiculous. You know, one of his, the best points Spencer Pratt has made is... We've heard for 30 years that we're in late stage capitalism. And the truth of the matter is, this is what socialism has given us. That's why our cities are deteriorating. That point needs to be hammered home constantly. We've got to go back. This isn't capitalism. We're not failing. We're not living with crimes and drugs and failing cities because of capitalism. This is what democratic policies, socialism has brought us. Thanks for the call, Tina. You're right. And the other thing is Spencer Pratt is having fun. And this is what he had to say to CBS mornings about the Zohran Mamdani comparison. You know, the one thing I connect with is I know he promised his voters, like the subway will be free. And I'm promising my voters. The metro buses, the metro trains, they will be free from urine, feces, stabbing, attacks. So that's kind of similar. We both had free things for public transportation. But, you know, I think.

He connected with people because they felt like change. They wanted change. That message would never connect here because we've already been doing the socialist experiment pretty much for six plus years and it's failed here in Los Angeles. So I think my message is why it's resonating on social media is it's the truth. It's authentic. It's from my heart. I didn't want to be a politician. I'm standing in what happened because of failed politicians. That's why I'm here. I don't want to be. I want to go in. and change LA so that this never happens to anybody. A lot of people are like, oh, he only cares about Palisades. This isn't coming back for a long time, not fighting for other communities. This is going to happen to a lot of people in the next four years. There's less firefighters now than January 7. There's 45 less firefighters. We are not prepared. Don't listen to Karen Bass if you live in the Hollywood Hills, Sunland, Tahunga, Bel Air, the Valley. The Dead Brush is already growing back in the Palisades. Everyone is in danger. Not to mention, forget fire danger. We're not ready for a mass casualty event if there was an earthquake. We don't even have a helicopter. We don't have one Chinook that could come in and take 40 people if there was an earthquake and the freeway crash and all these people need to be rescued. We don't have a plan for this. We are so under-prepared for everything. So I'm excited, actually, because once you get in this, you're like... Oh, my God. This is a red alert. Let's change. Yeah. And I'll give you another comparison, too, to Pratt, not in exactly the same way, but some similar aspects to it. He is on offense, and he's got his opponents on defense, backpedaling. And he's done so in such a way that others are jumping in and essentially forcing. Karen Basulah and Nithya Raman to backpedal as well from the things they've done in the positions they previously had. It's wild. For example, Nithya Raman was on CNN. You know, this is not a question you want to be answering when you're running for a big city, even if the, you know, even if it's three to one, your party. And you've got some insurgent you're dealing with. So the numbers are with you if you can make it to the runoff. But you don't want to be answering this question. So you no longer believe in defunding the police? No. And what caused you to change your mind? You know, I think we need to be able to ensure that the city can respond to calls for service. And we have to make sure that we are able to respond to calls for help around public safety issues. And I think in order to do that at this moment, with our response system, we need to be able to maintain the size of our police force. Right, because Nithya Raman previously posted on X, there is no more urgent or possible moment to end the racial, environmental, and moral crisis that is homelessness in L.A. Our leaders have finally been forced to listen. The path is not complicated. Fund services, fun housing, fun care, defund the police. But nope, I don't believe that anymore. Sounds like you believed it passionately. But not anymore. Okay. Man.

And Karen Bass is out saying the Pacific Palisades fire, hey, the buck stops with me, but we have to acknowledge climate change. Really? That's your out? Even the New York Times is declaring climate change dead. Not Karen Bass. So either the AFLCIO and their, you know, associated government union goons are. finally attuned to what's going on, and they know the constituency they need to deliver for Bass, probably in a runoff. And you've got a big enough cohort of the electorate that has been properly ideologically entranced, such as no common sense shall be heard. Maybe. or maybe they are in heap big trouble. And it just keeps going. Like I said, I mean, I got to play some of the ditties. California freedom off of California Dreaming.

There's something else about that, too. I mean, as much as he is torching, no pun intended, Karen Bass and her record, and Nithiaramit for that matter, there is an optimistic streak here. This is one of the messages of Pratt is L.A. is worth saving. He's not just, you know, describing. L.A. as this dystopian hellhole. I mean, he is describing it that way. But he's saying, you know, like he does with a video at the 6th Street Bridge, this is what is going on, but I'm going to fix it. It's, you know, make L.A. great again. His version of it. L.A.'s we're saving. Yeah, and there's a rap song to California Fried. Hills to the streets. These people do not want a bed. They want fentanyl or supermen. It's all to see. California pride, right, right, right. Hoostates a scam. Homeless funds vanish. They don't give a galifornia. Right, right, right. Host, they're scam. Homeless funds vanished. Don't give a california.

The truth hurt. Clean it up. I watch it burn. I will go below the Harbor Freeway tomorrow with her, and we can find some of these people she's going to offer treatment for. She's going to get stabbed in the neck. I love it. Of course, I played this last week. This is very catchy. Latinos for Pratt. June 2nd is the primary election. A Pratt said he thinks he's going to win with 50% plus one of the vote in the primary. I don't know about that. But I think he's going to be in the runoff the way this is tracking. It's only three weeks away. So as he says, let's make it a Pratt summer. Turns out it's a lot easier to fight fires when there's water in the reservoirs. We're even allowed to arrest criminals now with handcuffs and everything. I don't have to wonder anymore whether I just stepped in human shit or dog shit. So that's nice.

I only see needles in the hospital now. Who knew it could be this way? I love going to the park now that it's not an open drug market. Okay. Who here is willing to admit that common sense actually turned out to be good? I feel safe walking her. She's definitely having a Pratt summer. Who's having a Pratt summer? You're just hoping L.A. has a Pratt summer. Hear about the big stories of the day. Then talk about them. Right here on Chicago's morning answer. On AM 560, the answer. Only the biggest stories. Only the biggest guests. And only the biggest opinions. This is AM 560, the answer. Top of the morning. Dan Propped here. I want to continue on this. Spencer Pratt candidate, see, broaden it a little bit, but it's really illustrative of, I think, a watershed moment in politics, particularly in big blue cities. And maybe in terms of what the left is going to need to do to be competitive. even where they have a numerical advantage. And as we have seen, some of those numerical advantages were rigged because of counting non-citizens of the census, because of gerrymandered maps and so on and so forth. But it's going to be very interesting to see if the very sort of stodgy... There's nothing to see here while the fireworks factory is blowing up behind you approach that the AFLCIO took with their hit ad. L.A. is on the right track. Can you imagine Spencer Pratt doesn't want to build housing for the homeless at $250,000 a bed? Can you imagine? Can you imagine he wants to hire more police? Isn't that terrible? It can be very interesting to see if they can get away with that one more time with the kind of energy and enthusiasm that is behind Pratt right now. Maybe they can. But I think that's going the way of the dodo bird. And so are things like this. The celebrity endorsement. I mean, this has been diminishing for a while in terms of import and impact. But it just comes across as, at least to me, as terribly anachronistic. Magic Johnson endorsing Karen Bass. And, you know, she's off stage left and then she brings on, she's brought on to have a organic conversation with magic. These I'm supporting Karen Bass. First of all, I go back with her probably 30 years. She sustained the first ever consecutive decrease in homelessness. Homicide rate is down. New housing units, 40,000. I mean, she's doing a tremendous job. Karen Bass has to have a second turn, and I'm excited.

to say that. Oh, right. Thank you so much. Oh, are you here? Well, you know, listen, you took on a tough job here. Yeah. And you've done a fabulous job. And all of us appreciate that and we look forward to helping you continue your mission. and the things that you have, I restore your vision for the city. And I'm on board. You just tell me what I need to do. Well, you know what, Magic, you are so important to Los Angeles. When people think of Los Angeles, they think of Magic Johnson. You are such a bright light to our city. We've always stood with me. We have stood together. We're accomplishing great things for Los Angeles. And I look forward to all that we can do. Well, thank you. Creating jobs for the people here in Los Angeles. That's what she's doing. Amazing. 312-644-2-5600 to give us AlphaWealthgroup.com, call in a text line if you want to address the thesis that I offered about that sort of thing, like the FLCIO ad. It may be enough. to get Karen Bass across the, Karen Bass across the finish line one more time, but it's going away and not just for Bass, for all these old-time Reds like her. I'm not saying that these neo-Marxists are going away, and they're not. But that approach is not going to fly in very many places for very much longer. And two, I mean, against the backdrop of what's actually happening in L.A., And as they're saying, there's nothing to see here, L.A's on the right track. You have an L.A.'s counsel human, not named Nithya Raman, but with the same position she has. Hugo Soto Martinez, who wants to put, wants to allow illegal aliens. to vote in local elections. Of course, that's maybe the only thing that saves Bass. We recognize that we have folks living in this country who've been here 20 years. They've started a family. They pay their taxes. Many of them are homeowners, but they don't have a say over the policies that affect their children and their families on any given day. The motion only asks to seek to explore whether we want to head in that direction. I think the details of who's going to be involved, how we're going to do it, all that needs to get stressed out. Uh-huh. And, I mean, that's just fodder for Pratt. He's going to take that and has taken that and just run with it. They're just shoving it down your throat. And what he said about the debate, his debate performance that has gotten so much attention, is right on the mark.

It finally felt like truth was forced on to power. And after the debate, this high school kid that was in the crowd, he came up and he shook my hand. He couldn't have been older than 14 years old. He said, thank you, sir, so much for being the only one up there speaking the truth. You can tell when somebody's telling the truth. And I said, thank you, God, because that was my only goal is to just be true and authentic. People are tired with politicians lying about what we see every day in L.A. And if Pratt doesn't win... If I don't win, I can always say, yep, now you have communists. The city's destroyed. Good luck, everybody. I tried. I warned you. I told you what I found out and learned in a year of doing this all day long, every day talking to people in the federal government, people in the IRS, criminal investigation. Everything I've learned, I'm telling you, this is a red alert. And if you want to choose to go that way, then I can end up moving to Bentonville one day and looking back and saying, yeah, I tried to save L.A. It's done. Hmm. And sort of what I felt like after I ran, but I stayed for another decade. I was a slow learner. Text from 847, how many decades before we get an election this entertaining here as soon as I come back and run? As far as I can tell when that'll happen, based on what I see out there. Michael Sasside. Dan, good morning, and I was very touched by, you know, last week's show about your mother. So best wishes to you and your family. Thank you. Did Karen Bass not learn anything from Kamala Harris' use of celebrities two years ago? Right. Yeah. It comes across as really tinier, doesn't it? Thanks for the call, Michael. I just, I think that has, I just don't think that has any currency. I wasn't going to vote for Karen Bass, but now that Magic endorsed her. She can't be all bad. Magic says she's built 40,000 housing units, although it's not my, one of, you know, my house or one of my 5,000 neighbors' houses in Pacific Palisades that hasn't been rebuilt. That's the AFLCIO ad. You know, listen to, it's the same thing. Don't believe your lying eyes. And they get away with it. They get away with it with the beautiful lies instead of the uncomfortable truths. But the way Pratt is telling those uncomfortable truths with specificity, with video evidence. with an energy that says we can save this, but we have to address this. And I know this, I see the same things you see. And I'm not an ideological guy. I'm a commonsensical guy. I'm a solutionist. There's no question. That's the appeal. And also, the people in power are deserving of ridicule. And the more ridicule they endure, the more incapable they appear. Isn't that interesting?

This is, I mean, what he's doing is essentially exposing the emperors as having no clothes. Ron's outside. Hey, good morning, Dan. I agree with you about those celebrity endorsements, man. That's just waste of time and silly. But, but, for him to say that she's doing a great job, these people try to tell you what you see doesn't exist. The quality of your life. You know, what you look around and see. I mean, I just don't get it. You don't have any credibility to say that garbage, man. So it just gets you upset. But hopefully people will make the right decisions based on the facts. Have a good thing. Thanks for the call. Thanks for the call, Ron. You know, it happened across the pond, too, and the more is coming. I say that there's this attitude in the West that's coming, even among places that have otherwise embraced a soft form of socialism, but aren't liking so much the consequences.

As predicted on this show, which wasn't much of a prediction, but I mean, Dominic Green has his finger on the pulse. In the local elections, two-tier Keir Starmer and Labor Party was going to take a beating. Oh, and they took a beating. They took a beating. And it wasn't necessarily to the Conservative Party's benefit. It was to Nigel Farage's benefit, the third way. Because the conservatives had so failed so recently, too, under Sunakken. But it's, I mean, what's going on in the UK is very similar to what's going on in big city America. Also, havens of soft socialism, that will be tolerated. Lawlessness and violence and depravity in your face will not be. Not for long. A presenter for G.B. News is quite entertaining. And the British accent makes it even more entertaining. Patrick Christus with the local election results for labor. May night, Keir Starmer, has got the kind of spanking that you'd expect to see in 50 shades of grey. As I speak, as I speak, Labour has lost more than 1,300 seats, apparently. They have lost Wales for the first time in 100 years. The Labour First Minister in Wales lost her seat. People just didn't like 20 mile an hour speed limits, becoming a nation of sanctuary for the third world and terrible health care, did they? So there you go. Sunderland's gone. Newcastle gone, they've lost control of Camden, they've lost Westminster, and I can't think why.

Oh, yeah, maybe it's because they kept advertising free stuff to foreigners who didn't speak our language. And people decided they didn't really fancy any more of that. In Birmingham, they've lost seats to this lot. Only one independent you know that, that's Asim Khan. We don't want people who have been with the Labour Party previously been campaigning against Ayup Khan, now standing as independent. No, we don't want people like that. Gosh, Labour losing because of mass immigration of people from various different Muslim countries. I mean, why else might Labour have lost out in Birmingham? Coming to the butchers with me. Door open. Rubbish, oh, hello, sir. You work in the butchers, obviously, or you're just carrying around a sheep? Looks like a goat. Yeah. It's the bin strike as well, isn't it? The bin strike everywhere. Labor has lost control of now, I think, it's 11 councils, including Thameside and Labor stronghold for 47 years. And what had cursed armor said recently about, well, what Christus was talking about, which is the influx, the open borders. Same as here. The influx. The influx. approach of making no distinction between citizens and non-citizens, including non-citizens, and especially non-citizens in the country illegally. We must be defiled because the British Muslim community is not defined by this. It is defined by the success, the brilliance, and the creativity in rooms like this, by contribution that Muslims make to Britain's story and to our national life. That is how it's defined. And it's, you know, it's fine to appreciate the contributions that different people make to your community, your country, people of all walks of life and so on and so forth. But it's always the obsequious approach with the mascots of the moment. The identitarians use. And they go so far as we've seen here with Pramila Jayapal, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Omar, Pick one, anyone, Michelle Wu, the mayor of Boston to attempt to rewrite history. You know, the UK would, I mean, he didn't exactly say this, but he came close. The UK was built by Muslims, just as the America was built by Somalis. I mean, come on. Interestingly. Once upon a time, not so long ago, Keir Starmer had this to say about a PM and a party that loses elections. Shall we just remind ourselves of what Keir Starmer said before previous elections? When you lose an election in a democracy, you deserve to. You don't look at the electorate and ask them, what were you thinking?

You look at yourself and ask, what were we doing? Well. Well, yes, but those were empty words uttered at that point. There was not supposed to be any meaning attached to them. And so writing in The Guardian about the election results. Keir Starmer, these election results don't mean tacking left or right, but delivering for the whole country. You know, he's properly chastened, but there's no indication of a course correction. Because they don't believe the words that they say in those moments when they're victorious and they're chastising the other party and they're casting themselves in this sort of phony. populist, civil, adult-oriented leadership capacity that they never fulfill. I mean, Keir Starmer could be the mayor of any of these big cities that are currently disintegrating in the United States and vice versa. Karen Bass could be the PM of the UK, at least Labor Party PM. Look at any of these other mayors. I mean, is Sadiq Khan, the mayor of London, that much different than Zohran Mamdani? Not at all. Actually, you may be slightly right of Zohran Mamdani. That's how bad it is. It's very interesting because I think, as I said, that that sort of old Soviet model is going away. But it doesn't mean that the neo-Marxist revolutionaries underneath them are going away. The AOCs and the Ayana Presley's, they're not going away. But I think they have much less appeal. And there's the opportunity for. Well, the Republican Party, but if the Republican Party can see its way fit to seize it, then you'll have Nigel Farage. You'll have a Spencer Pratt and candidates like them that will chart a course, chart a third way course. The one thing I agree that David Brooks said over the weekend is that sort of in 26 and particularly in 28, there's a vibe shift coming. I think that's right. And so it's up to thoughtful people to start trying to get a handle on it and corral it to drive it in a positive direction. Because the perils are still afoot. The stories you need to know to start your day. This is Chicago's morning answer. An AM 560, the answer. This is Chicago's morning answer with Dan Proft on AM 560. The answer. Top of the morning, Dan Proff here. So President Trump rejected the Iranian's response to a proposed framework for a deal to end hostilities.

Of course he did. The reporting is they demanded things like war reparations and sovereignty over the Strait of Hormuz, the unfreezing of seized assets. I mean, of course that's not going to happen. But we've been doing the, of course, that's not going to be happened for three weeks now. Trump posting, I have just read the response from around so-called representatives, quote-unquote. I don't like it. Totally unacceptable. Thank you for your attention to this matter. Okay. Well, what are you going to do to accomplish the objectives you set forward, including obtaining what he calls nuclear dust, the enriched uranium? Trump sat down for an extended interview with our friend Cheryl Ackison for her program, full measure. He was asked about that, and he said this. Well, we'll get that at some point, whatever we want. We'll have it surveilled. I did a thing called Space Force, and they are watching that. If somebody walked in, they can tell you his name, his address, the number of his badge. No, we have that very well surveilled. If anybody got near the place, we will know about it. And we'll blow them up. We'll blow them up. And as we were talking about for much of last week, there are still other targets that have been identified that have not been taken out yet. And that could happen. So is it accurate to say you think the combat operations are over and done? No, I didn't say that. I said they are defeated, but that doesn't mean they're done. We could go in for two more weeks and do every single target. We have certain targets that we wanted to do, and we've done probably 70% of them. But we have other targets that we could conceivably hit. But even if we didn't do that, you know, that would just be final touches. But even if we didn't do that, it would take them many years to rebuild. Mm-hmm. Benjamin Netanyahu sat down for an interview with Major Garrett for 60 minutes, Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli PM. And essentially on the same question is the war over. Beebe offered this. I think it accomplished a great deal, but it's not over because there's still nuclear material enriched uranium that has to be taken out of Iran. There is still enrichment sites that have to be dismantled. There are still proxies that Iran supports. There are ballistic missiles that they still want to produce. Now, we've degraded a lot of it, but all of that is still there. and there's work to be done. How do you envision the highly enriched uranium will be removed from Iran? You go in and you take it out. With what? Special forces from Israel, special forces of the United States. Well, I'm not going to talk about military means, but what President Trump has said to me, I want to go in there. And I think it can be done physically. That's not the problem. If you have an agreement and you go in and you take it out, why not? That's the best way.

What if there isn't an agreement? Can it be taken out by force? Well, you're going to ask me these questions. I'm going to dodge them because I'm not going to talk about our military possibilities, plans, or anything of the kind. And I'm just trying to get at how long is it going to take to achieve that aim? I'm not going to give a timetable to it, but I'm going to say that's a terrifically important. Terrifically important initiative, mission. Well, of course, this three weeks of dithering with the Mullahs in Tehran has allowed the skeptics and naysayers to amplify their skepticism in naysaying. For example, Gregory Brew writing in foreign affairs. Iran has demonstrated that can enclose the Strait of Hormuz and keep it closed, even in the face of the full force of a global superpower. There is no returning to the status quo ante. Robert Elena Kagan, Mr. Victoria Newland of Harvard, checkmate in Iran. Washington can't reverse or control the consequences of losing this war. It's over. Lieutenant General Mark Hurtling, who is a regular over at MSNBC, MS Now. USSR, whatever it is, the best we can do is a draw. What I'll say is from about three weeks ago, there are many people saying, and I'm one of them, that the best we can achieve by this action in Iran is a draw. And every day that passes, if we go more toward military action, the same questions are out there. What are your end state? Are you just, what are your end states? What are you trying to do? bully and intimidate, that hasn't worked yet. And again, I go back to the time aspect of this. All indicators are that, truthfully, Iran can outlast us with, as the CIA has said recently, months' worth of new weapons, the ability to sustain time, institutions that are still holding up within Iran, whereas the president... Again, I returned to once immediate responses and urgent action. You know, as I once heard an Iraqi general said, General, you may have the watch, but we have the time. And that's kind of the same situation we're facing with Iran. For more on this, Stephen Bucci joins us. He served America for three decades as an Army Special Forces officer and top Pentagon official, now visiting Felon the Heritage Foundation's Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies. Stephen, thanks for joining us. It's my pleasure. Thank you for having me back as this conversation continues. Yeah, so what say you to the Lieutenant General Hurtlings, the Robert Elena Kagan's, the Foreign Affairs, internationalists, to the skepticism you heard? First of all, Mark Hurtling's got a good thing going there with all of the liberal press. It wasn't like he was known to be a strategic genius when he was in a Pentagon. So with respect, he finished as a lieutenant general, but most of what he says has been wrong ever since. But they keep paying him because...

his wrong conclusions are generally aimed at trying to tear down anything President Trump wants to do. Yeah, wrong conclusions with the right targets, yeah. Yeah, to say that the best we could do against Iran would be a draw and that they've got more stuff and can last longer than we can is a ludicrous position to hold. And Elena Kagan's worse. Elena Kagan's out, we already lost. We're done. The Iranians win. Okay, you know, if we just walk away and surrender, you know, if we take the President Obama, President Biden view of negotiations with them, we probably would lose. I don't think there's a chance in, heck, that President Trump is going to ever accede to the demands that Iran is now ridiculously throwing back at them. They are hoping against hope. Look, I'm with you. I don't know why we were waiting three weeks. We should have given them a couple of days. When they didn't give up, we should have started bombing the snod at them again. That is the only thing that the IRGC and the Mullahs will understand. They are not good faith negotiating partners. Anybody who thinks they ever will be is, you know, kind of a Pollyanna. We need to start hitting them and hitting them hard again until the Iranian people can rise up and kick these bums out. It's the answer, and we can help them do that. We don't have to send in our troops. But we have plenty of capability and plenty of intel and targets to hit that are still available. This idea that we're, oh, my gosh, we can't do anything else. I mean, after all, CNN is saying bad things about the president. He can't last much longer. He'll have to collapse. Yeah, that's not happening. Admiral William McCraven was on this week with Martha Raditz. And his advice to the president unsolicited was that he should end the blockade as the means to get Iran to the negotiating table in some sort of good faith. I'm a little unclear how that would accomplish what he suggests. But he posed this question. You know, sort of the old Reagan question, are we better off than we were before this? Take a listen. Yeah, I think what the American people have to ask themselves, Martha, is, you know, are we better off now than we were before February 28th? And I think that's open for some serious debate. The fact is, before February 28th. The straits were open. You had a, you know, not a moderate regime, but the regime, you know, right now is much more hardline than before February 28th. And I get my guess is that they were moving towards an enrichment. I don't think they had a nuclear weapon. I don't think it was, you know, coming about imminently, but the fact of the matter is...

We're not really that much better off now than we were before February 28th. Yes, we have sunk their Navy. Yes, we have destroyed their Air Force. Yes, we have taken out a lot of their leadership. But I'm not sure we're a lot better off. What do you think, Steve? I have a lot of respect for Bill McRaven, a lot more than I do for Hurtland, for sure. But it's, look, I think he's wrong. You know, taking down the blockade now. would be exactly what the Iranians want. They do this all the time. They push back when they really have very little means to push back, and they get everybody, oh, if the gas prices are going up, we better do something. Oh, what can we give them to mollify them? We can't give them anything to mollify them. They want to own... international waters through which we are supposed to have freedom of navigation. We are not going to allow them to do that. We need to take out more and more targets, more and more specific targets, individuals. capabilities that in any way, shape, reform can interfere with the straits, can interfere with the people rising up. We need to bring the hammer down. If we don't do that, well, then maybe the Iranians could win. But I just don't see that President Trump is going to go, oh, well, never mind and just go home. I just don't think that's him. Yeah, it seems to me that if he wanted to... to get a Pyrrhic victory, he could have already had that, right? Yeah, absolutely. I wanted to get your reaction to another topic, too, since President Trump is jetting off to Beijing on Wednesday to sit down with Xi Jinping. The investigative journalist Lee Smith, who's written a book about the China Matrix. I think that's the title of it, actually, was on Maria Bart Romah over the weekend, and he had this to say. I think Xi Jinping is concerned. Xi Jinping is not reading the Washington Post and the New York Times to find out what's happening in Iran. He's looking at Iran directly, and he sees that President Donald Trump is dug in. No matter what they're saying, he knows that gas has gone up, he knows their midterms, and Donald Trump is dug in. So all everyone says the president is worrying, he's concerned, he wants to get a deal, he wants out, he hasn't taken a deal. There's a whole bunch of deals he could take that would make him look like a genius, but it would still leave the... Iranians with the ability to make a nuclear weapons to rebuild their program. Instead, he's dug in. That's what's going to worry Xi Jinping this week. So do you think Xi Jinping is worried about what he's seeing from Trump and America in Iran in the Middle East? Or do you think, as some argue, that the current status of the situation has strengthened she's hand? I don't see how anybody can say it's strength. I mean, he's not getting oil from Venezuela anymore. He's not getting oil from Iran. He's got issues here. They have been shown, I mean, go back to just a military level, all of the equipment the Chinese have sent to the Iranians, all of their capabilities has proved to be.

completely useless against the American military. That, you know, that's something that she is looking out. And I'll bet there's some people from his industrial base that he's saying, what the heck is going on? You told me this stuff was unstoppable, even if the Iranians running it, not us. And look what's happening. The Americans embarrass them. What's the deal here? I think that worries him. I think his oil worries him. I think Xi Jinping recognizes his economy is way more fragile than America's economy. He wants this stuff to stop. We've shown... that America is not going to allow a country to take over a strategic choke point like the Straits of Formuz, like the Straits of Taiwan. We're not going to let anybody do that. It's against the law of international relations and the freedom of navigation. All of that affects Xi Jinping's policies. Is she like, you know, messing his pants because President Trump's coming to visit him? Probably not. She's a pretty tough and cool character. But if anybody who thinks he's sitting there rubbing his hands together like, oh, we got another mutton head like Biden coming to visit, this is going to be fun. That is not going to be his thought process for this visit. Yeah, and it's interesting, you know, you're getting to put one of the other arguments in the direction of Trump. This was even made by Newt Gingrich, but it wasn't what wasn't meant to be pointed. But it's like, you know, thinking about China and China's designs on Taiwan, what we've learned from Iran is that the U.S. can only handle one war at a time. And I'm not banging the drums of war here. But I don't think we've learned that from Iran. This has been particularly restrained and involved, you know, no ground operations effectively. And so. You know, the idea that we couldn't do more than we're doing because we've chosen to use our resources as we've chosen to use them over the last 60 days doesn't strike me as supported by the evidence. No, it's totally not. There are lots and lots of options that America still has. And the Iranians and the Chinese and the Russians all know America has other options. And they're going to use the intel element of power or informational element of power to try and pile on with the useful idiots here in the United States to derail Trump electorally and from a popular support standpoint by... making as much hay as they can with their version of the stories. And, you know, we have people, I mean, the number of folks on X who immediately, every time one of these wounds says something, and it's negative about America and about Trump, it's like, oh, breaking news, giant bombshell. You know, Nancy Pelosi really doesn't like Trump.

Yeah, that's a big surprise. And it's stuff of that level. But unfortunately, there's people in America who are lapping that kind of nonsense up with big spoons. Well, what about what Senator Mark Kelly said on Face the Nation, which is now potentially the subject of another DOD investigation in Mark Kelly. I don't know if that's warranted. But he essentially talking specifically about briefings he got. where our munitions levels are, and it's going to take years for our defense industrial base to replenish the necessary munitions for national security reasons. I mean, are you worried about our weapons stockpiles at this point? I'm not worried about it. Do we need bigger weapons stockpiles? Absolutely. Heritage has been saying that for years because Obama. Let it all fizzle down, stop spending money on it. Trump tried to restart it and made some progress. Biden came in, turned it all off again. It's a problem more because of American policy choices by Democrat presidents than it is about that we used it all up in Iran. We haven't used up all of our stocks in Iran. And we're already, as president's had meetings with several of the big arms manufacturers. To say, look, we need you guys to speed up production on some of this stuff. And they said, big thumbs up. We got it. And we'll start doing it. Also, Kelly needs to remember things like when you get a classified briefing, you're not supposed to immediately wheel out to the podium and start talking about it with your liberal media friends. Yeah, do you think he crossed the line with the comments that he made about the state of our weapon supply? Yeah, I think you did. I don't know if you could, you know. take him to jail for it. But I tell you what, I would definitely say, we're not giving this guy briefings about any of this stuff anymore because he leaks like a sieve. Yeah, that's fair. Before I let you go, Vladimir Putin's saying the Ukraine war will soon end. This was after a prisoner release by Belarus, you know, which is a Vladimir Putin stooge, headed by his Vladimir Putin stooge, of the release of a Polish prisoner that I guess the U.S. was instrumental in negotiating. What's your handle on what's going on with Russia and Ukraine and the possibility of an end to that war? You know, I hope that's true.

You know, I'm as suspicious of Vladimir Putin's ability to tell the truth as I am of the IRGC and the Mullah's ability to do that. So let's wait and see. Hopefully they're moving in that direction. I mean, Vladimir Putin is, he is running out of Shulets, and he is having problems. keeping the military going and having a military that might actually win a battle. They're not there anymore and haven't been for a long time. So it would be in his interest to end it, but I don't think he's, you know, he's so dug in in the negative sense. I'm not sure that that's really true. It may just be another negotiating ploy on his part. I hope that's not the case. Stephen Bucci served America for three decades as an Army Special Forces officer and top Pentagon official, now a visiting fellow in the Heritage Foundation's Allison Center for Foreign Policy Study. Stephen, thank you as always. It's my pleasure. Thanks for having me. We'll talk to you next week. All right, and Stephen joined us on the AlphaWealthgroup.com, answerline. This is the morning show. More Chicago radio listeners are choosing. This is Chicago's morning answer. An AM 560, The Answer. It's time for Dan Prop's parenting tips. Whoa. Dan Proff's parenting tips. Whoa. Tell your kids to shut up and listen to him. You're a child. It's up of the morning. Yeah, it's been a while since a parenting tip. But Caitlin Flanagan's piece in the free press had me thinking about one over the weekend. So we're going to pour over that. But before we do, speaking of Mother's Day, I hope everybody had a lovely Mother's Day. Spencer Pratt, just to go back to him, and one of the reasons I'm impressed with this candidacy, some of it is actually organic, it's not actually coming from his campaign. There's one of the ads that everybody likes so much, sort of the Gotham meets French Revolution ad was done by a Hollywood guy, who I don't think is affiliated with the campaign. There's no paid for designation. I think some of this is just coming from outside the campaign in. But, you know, what he's doing is sparking that sort of interest and creative people coming to the campaign to chip in where they can, even informally and not directly, you know, under the campaign's umbrella. So it's cool. But what's what you see happening because Spencer Pratt is. done his homework, he knows why he's doing this, and he is unabashed in explaining the why as well as the how and what. He's presenting himself as an actual three-dimensional human being. So there's the fun stuff, there's the snarky stuff, there's the combative stuff on a debate stage, and then there's also a spot like this that brings home his why. As I said earlier in the program when we started talking about the developments in that race. One of the memes, they burned down in his house, vote Pratt. Well, this Mother's Day ad he did, tribute to his wife, Heidi. It has them with their two sons in a trailer on the site of where a three and a half million, three, three and a half million dollar house, one stood, their house.

Heidi and I have been through hell together. My dad. Oh, I'm pulling up the covers. No mom should ever have to go through what she's gone through. This is the first case. It's been here. Let's see him. Mom! Mommy for three! You see them right here? This was where your bedroom was. Remember? Is this not my bedroom right here. Are you okay? No. I think that they're trying to have a good attitude about it, but I didn't see her like almost crying up there, but they're so happy to be home. I am constantly in awe of hiding. She's the most incredible mom to our boys. She's why I fight. Hmm. So to Kaitlan Collins is Caitlin Flanagan's piece, excuse me. The biggest event in the history of women, bigger even than suffrage, was the invention of the birth control pill, which became available in the U.S. in 1960. For the first time, women had the ability to decide if, when, and how many children they were going to have. When that was combined with the first stirrings of modern feminism, women were finally able to do what men had been doing through the ages, break into factions and tear each other apart. There's a good level of snark in this piece, which is generally speaking over the right targets. Break into factions and tear each other apart. The Mommy Wars will bury us all. And Flanagan goes on to describe the Mommy Wars of the 80s were whether or not moms should work outside the home. But at this point, with 70% of American moms either working or looking for work, The question is moot, I suppose. That's what she argues. So the question now is not whether or not mom should work outside the home, but whether or not a woman should be a mom in the first place. A much more consequential division between young women has quietly and then loudly emerged, the one between mothers and women who are, quote, child free by choice, unquote, as they often put it. I know many such women, you probably do too. You can attest that they don't seem torn up by the decision. In fact, they made it exactly the way men beg women to make decisions, logically and on the merits. They know that having a baby would unmoor them from many things they cherished about their lives, the freedom to do what they want, untethered by around the clock responsibility. They have hopes and dreams about their futures and they want their earnings to go towards fulfilling them, not toward parenthood. Most of all, they know that babies are a lot of work and women do most of it. They want to sleep on their old schedules, not on baby time. And she goes on Flanagan in that description. By the way, I mean, if you agree, especially if you're a younger woman, that that is a sort of quote, quote, you know, war going on. The new mommy wars, not outside the home, but whether or not to have kids at all. She writes this Flanagan. Not only these women write.

even though she wants to correct each and every one of their bonkers assertions, she says. They don't know the half of it. When my twin sons were infants, she writes, I would literally dream about sleeping. Once they were down for their morning nap, I walked purposely down the hall like a woman headed to work, or maybe more like a dreamer, turned into my bedroom and put my pajamas on. I was just zipping up my bathrobe when I realized it wasn't my bedtime. It was 10.30 in the morning, and there were hours to go before I slept. In many ways, the whole experience was a shocking parade of indignities. In one hideous episode, the boys, maybe 18 months old, contracted some kind of gastroenteritis that struck just as we were wheels up on a flight from the Midwest of California. We went through the diapers before the fasten seatbelt sign was turned off. Those events turned into funny stories soon enough that happened because who cares about the miserable moments? They were my sons. And one of the world could be better than having those two little boys around. I knew having children would be the best part of my life, and it was the best part of my life, just as I knew that the time when they were little would run through my hands like water and never come back again. But for millions of young women, it's as though the intense joy that only motherhood can provide has been wiped off the balance books entirely, leaving behind only the stark truth of the fastened seatbelt sign and the sleepwalking mother. 312-642-5600. It's the alphawealthgroup.com. Call in and textline. And, of course, we've talked about this before. This is getting more attention, the demography of Western countries when it comes to families. You have to maintain 2.1 children for women, 2.1 children, poor woman to reach replacement rate for the population. In 1990, America had 2.08 children per woman. In 2024, the lowest it's ever been, 1.63. In Italy, it's 1.2. In Australia, 1.4. In South Korea, it's 0.8. What unifies the phenomena across countries is the fact that the drop began relatively recently and has been unrelenting in its downward trend. And she talks about the governments who have gotten involved, including Trump, to promote.

You know, child, having to promote having children. And the policies that have proposed, you know, tax relief and even cash payments and so on and so forth. But it's not working. And by the way, as I'm not reading the entire piece, but as you, as I'm recounting this, see if there's something that you're picking up on that Caitlin Flanagan doesn't really address, that she's glossing over. She's describing these so-called mommy wars. the consequences of them. She is, I think, I mean, I think she's fairly critical of the fact that both the left and the right are promoting more childbirth except for, you know, sort of ZPG nuts like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. You know, and the whole, like, I'm not having children because of climate change. That's dissipating. The real push from both the left and the right is for manpower among certain, you know, cross sections of the left and the right. The left wants more kids for support the welfare state and their blank checkbook spending and the right for the... workforce, the AI revolution. Trump had considered $5,000 bonuses for each birth, but that hasn't come to pass at this point. He's also been presented with the idea of creating a national medal of motherhood for women who have six or more children. There's something, you know, she's talking about their sort of incentives, and yes, people respond to incentives, but... They have to be properly aligned. And I don't think these governments from Hungary to the United States are quite putting their finger on it. She writes about all of these government policies trying to encourage people to get together and have kids. None of it's worked. It seems the problem is more complicated than simple policy. The Nordic countries are hailed as having the most expansive social welfare programs and the greatest gender equity. But they've been busy depopulating themselves off the map. Finland replacement rate, 1.3. Norway, 1.48. Sweden, 1.4. She goes on to write, the people I worry about are the young women who want babies or who are interested in babies, but all they get is the accurate howl of the mommy wars. Well, and from these second and third wave feminists, too, especially the third wave. But if you need a justification, how's this for one? The reason women chose to have babies is that they know on as deep a level as it's possible to know anything, there's no human emotion as powerful as the love between a mother and a child. Across time and place, it's recognized as the strongest, by far, bond between people. Women don't owe anybody a baby, writes Caitlin Flanagan, and they're not, quote, unquote, selfish if they plan a different life for themselves. They would be selfish if they had a child and put their own needs above his, but they're not selfish to not have one. Being a mother is an experience that will hand you plenty of sleepwalking mornings and endless nights, but you can listen to a mother, cataloging all of her complaints and then in a very different tone, and with no awareness she's just undermined the argument, she will suddenly slip into one of the great unifying topics of motherhood, that her children are growing up too fast, that every morning when she lifts them up,

lifts him up from his crib. He seems a tiny bit bigger that the photographs of just a month ago already looked so different from the photographs of this morning. Flanagan adds, here's the absolute truth of the thing. One day you drop your children off for the first day of kindergarten, and by the time you drive back to pick them up, they're finishing sixth grade. It didn't seem to go that fast for me on the other side of that equation. She talked about going to a... sixth grade graduation. I don't know, I guess going on to junior high, grade school to junior. I don't know. It's weird. Anyway, it was held in the morning. Everyone came back at night for a big party and dinner. But she was on the cleanup crew. And by the time she finished, the boys and I were some of the last people in the school. When one of the boys was, one of the boys were standing by the front door. He looked out the window. He saw the playground. That was completely empty, the playground where they play every day. Let's walk around it, he said. He had no sense of a valedictory. He just wanted to see what it was like in the nighttime when we had it to ourselves. So we did, and I was, she writes, I was filled with the kind of emotion that hits you so powerfully and so unexpectedly that you think you might break down crying. He was in high spirits because he didn't know yet the story of life. Didn't understand that doors are always closing and parts of yourself are left behind forever. We walked around the playground that one time, and then we found his brother, and the three of us got in the car and drove home and never went back there again. 312-642-2-5600 to give us a call or text on the alpha wealth group.com call in our text line. I mean, it's a very good piece, and as I said, it's... properly snarky in certain parts and with the right targets, the second and third way feminists, the so-called mommy wars. The only thing I would say here is there's sort of a seeding of the faith component. There's a seating of America being particularly secularized, and I don't mean from a government perspective, I mean from a cultural one. And it would be interesting to track, although I think it's fairly straightforward, the decline in religiosity with the decline in birth rate. And the propaganda war, if you will, that those second and third wave feminists have largely one, but to the great detriment of, I think, women in general and the country as an extension. I mean, she gets to it as Flanagan when she talks a bit about that bond, that unique bond, that sort of recognize across the entirety of humanity. But she just doesn't want to go there and talk about those cultural changes and the promises that were made that, you know, many other commentators have talked about, sort of the Erica Commissar. You can have it all, but just not at the same time. The bills of goods that have been sold by second and third wave feminists that have both unmoored women and men from the idea family.

You know, in a classic, this is, and for me, this is the classic case of, you know, those who can't teach, very much like my golf game. And so, Dan Proff Parenting Tip, read this Caitlin Flanagan piece, really internalize it. If, particularly if you're, you or somebody you know is involved in this so-called 21st century version of the Mommy War. and pay particular attention to how Caitlin Flanagan talks about motherhood. That's all I'll say. Dan Proff, Chicago's morning answer. It's like a hot, steaming cup of information. To start your day, it's Chicago's morning answer on AM 560, The Answer. This is Chicago's Morning Answer with Dan Proft, an AM 560, The Answer. Top of the morning, Dan Proft here. Interesting discussion on acts between David Sachs and a couple of other people's responding to what he posted. You know, David Sachs is a billionaire tech founder, investor. He's part of the all-end podcast with other billionaire tech bros.

Anyway, talking about data centers. Back of the envelope numbers for a one gigawatt data center. All-in capax approximately $50 billion. Enterprise revenue generated $25 to $30 billion a year. Electricity costs $1 to $2 billion a year. So you have a two-year payback. And he writes, the boom is real. Others who know something about that space more than me agree with them, and some do not. one response, your CAP-X number does not account for the fact that GPUs are obsolete in two to three years. A lot of what you're calling CAP-AX is actually OPEX operating expenses. The respondent goes on to say there's no evidence of $25 to $30 billion year revenue, no demand except bubble stocks needing other bubble stocks. Even Anthropic is only paying Elon Musk half your number for Colossus, and that's a performative deal. He also suggests the electricity cost is wrong and it omits every other cost of running the business, debt service interest rates, cooling, networking, maintenance, taxes, staffing, downtime, utilization risk, and so on and so forth. Well, it was back of the envelope. It wasn't a pro forma. But the reason I highlight that, and it's unnecessarily technical, perhaps. But one of the things driving investor confidence is that statement that David Sachs made at the end of his little back of the envelope financial explanation of data centers, which is the boom is real. Is it? or as some were predicting sort of concurrent with when it was happening, I must add, that there's going to be an AI correction and thus a market correction associated with that. Well, let's get somebody who is well versed on these matters into the discussion. James Perry is the founder and CEO of Perry International Capital Partners. He joins us now. Jim, thanks for joining us. Appreciate it. Good morning, Dan. Thank you. So is, as David Sachs said, the AI boom, as so indicated by data center economics, is it real? The data center boom is real. I think there's a lot of moving parts to the whole process of... getting one up and then actually having it make revenue, right? It's really about what goes in and what goes out. What I will tell you is that the funding component for data centers is very strong. We talked a lot about the circular finance, you know, sort of six months ago where, you know, NVIDIA was selling clips to Oracle, and Oracle was... getting commitments from data centers, and then data centers were buying tips from NVIDIA, and it all seems a little bit circular and curious. But I think even in some of that argument, you know, the key component that is never discussed in that circular finance sort of idea is that underneath all that there's a leverage loan, right? And Wall Street's setting them up. And these leverage loans...

And a leverage loan, private credit is really nothing but a bank loan that is not at a bank, right? It's just a private credit outside the banking system. The point is that the investors that are looking to add fixed income to their portfolios, these are routinely insurance companies, pensions, foundations, endowments, sovereign wealth funds, that sort of stuff, their demand. For the financing component, you know, give me my 8% for 10 years and give me my money back, the demand is off the charts, right? Just about every one of these deals has gone out, and they're oversubscribed by 3 and 4 and 5 to 1. So I look at the numbers first, and, you know, maybe David Sachs is right and maybe he's wrong, and maybe there's some people that disagree with him. But the bottom line is that investors are very willing. to add risk to their portfolios with future cash flows from data centers. And I think that part of it is real. I think the data center build out is only part of the AI revolution. There's all kinds of numbers out there. But I saw an internal document from Microsoft about 18 months ago. And it showed that... businesses spent $350 billion on AI development. That includes data centers. It also includes your, you know, subscription to Microsoft co-pilot on your laptop, right? But that number was $350 billion in 2024. It doubled to $750 billion in 25. And in 26, it's going to be $2 trillion. And Microsoft estimates, and by the way, $1.7 trillion is about 6% of GDP, right? GDP being $33 trillion. But Microsoft says that the AI spend from U.S. businesses by 2030 is going to be 25% of GDP. And right now it's 10. So is it real that can keep going? Smart guys in the space believe it's true. And I do too. So they're going to continue to drive the market up. basically unabated unless there is some sort of military escalation that extends beyond Iran at this point? Right. I think unabated is kind of too big of a word, I would say that. No market goes up straight and, you know, forever. But, you know, as it stands from the March 30th low, the S&P 500 is up 17%. But companies like Google are up 45 percent, and NVIDI is up 32 percent. And, of course, these semiconductor stocks are up more than that. So I do believe that, you know, when you look at a valuation of the stock, it's a price earnings multiple. It's the market price of the stock divided by the earnings. And the S&P 500 is selling right now for about 24, 25 times earnings. But future earnings, future P.E. multiples are down to 21. And that's because the denominator of the ratio, the earnings number is going up so much. And I wrote a piece last week, excuse me, last night. And it's really about the earnings that are coming through.

in the indices and whatnot. The earnings growth rate, Dan, I don't know if all of your investors really understand this yet, but they're going to come in, and we're about 90% reported already, NVIDIA reports on May 20th, so we've got a few more to go here. The point is, the growth rate and earnings of the S&P 500 and Q1 is at 27.1%, right? And it was at 13% last quarter, and it was expected to be 15 this year. twice as high. And if you look at the gross stocks, the real go-go stocks, the MAG-7 growth rate so far in 2-1, is it 61%. And... The 493 other stocks in the S&P are actually rising in a growth rate of 16.4%. So, you know, everybody was worried about the revenues coming in for these guys that are spending all this money. The revenues are for real, and they're booming. So I think that the AI revolution is for real. I think it's going to continue to be a larger piece of GDP. And I think that you're seeing revisions economically and market-wise earnings constantly being revised. About a month ago, just to kind of put it in here before I send it back to you, GDP and Q1 was expected to be negative by the mainstream media, right? Because the government was closed and they're worried about government layoffs and all this sort of stuff. First quarter GDP came in at 2%, right? And if you look at the Atlanta Fed, which has an index, it's updated every day. It's called GDP now. GDP for Q2 is going to be over 4%, right? And this is with a war going on and all kinds of troubles with Trump and, you know, a new ballroom and all this sort of stuff. The fact is that the economy is doing really well, you know. So I don't think the market's going to go straight up. Nothing ever does. This has been a really big move. I think we stabilized in here to find out if there's going to be some bombs flying into Iran again anytime soon. But generally speaking, it's a buy dips in market in the technology sector. And so, okay, that's good. That's good bottom line to have. Right. Okay, but so clearly the market is indicating, too, that inflation is not. a general concern. Recession is not a general concern. But what about, since Trump is over in Beijing or en route, what about if China, which has a debt problem, that's 3x the United States is? Right. What if China, you know, can't get the energy that it needs to power its economy and starts to slip? I mean, obviously that has ripple effects. The same thing with Western Europe's malaise has ripple effects. So is that at all a concern or correspondingly, what would you like to hear coming out of Xi Jinping and Trump sit down? Right.

That's a good question, and it's a big question. It covers a lot of ground here. Let's start with China. The Chinese economy is a mess, right? The mortgage problem that we had here at 07 and 08 and 09, that's probably knocked off about... Oh, gosh. What are the numbers on that? I would say it probably knocked off about... 10% of GDP for three years, right, very concentrated in the mortgage market for homes. In China, that number is about 40%, right? 40% of the Chinese output is going to have to be written off because nobody's moved into all these buildings. They've built all over the country. They're still standing empty. So the write-off on the Chinese real estate market will be... 25% of GDP over the next three to five years. So they're in a big, deep hole, and they are really, I would say, you know, on paper. They're insolvent, right? Now, you have a central bank that controls everything, so you don't have a market rate, you don't have a Fed. If the Chinese government says spend money, they just print it. So the biggest issue in China is that they're printing money, left, right, and center, global money supply is also at 350% of GDP, and about 50% of that's coming from China. So China is the profligate son. They're the ones that are spending all this money and printing all this money. I think that the big picture, kind of getting back to your question, you know, do we worry about a Chinese economy? The bottom line is the Communist Party can maintain and control that economy for as long as they want, you know, ultimately, if things get bad enough, they can just murder 100,000 people or something like that. So it's going to keep going to. I mean, honestly, yeah, yeah. It's a little harsh, but I mean, you know, they've got things that they can do that, you know, Western civilization government cannot do. And that's a command society and say, well, we're going to put, you know, 50 million people in the army, go, you know, pound sand somewhere. But I think the Chinese economy is in trouble from an energy standpoint, Dan, and getting really back to your bigger question. They really do have a big problem with energy. And they're building a lot of solar, and they're building a lot of nuclear, and they've got a lot of dams that are producing a lot of power and all that. But they need diesel fuel. They need jet fuel. They need gasoline. And they've got a storage of probably a year, you know, maybe a year and a half. They're smart that way they store a ton of copper and nickel and all kinds of stuff like that.

But this, don't kid yourself, this straight being shut, you know, China by 95% of Iran's oil, 95% from Karg Island, right? And 50% of the oil coming out of the Gulf goes to China. And about 70 of it goes to other Asian countries, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Korea, places like that. So this is a really big problem. This Gulf story is a really big problem for Asia, way bigger than Europe and certainly bigger than here. And I think this summit in Beijing, and Trump is flying out on Wednesday, I guess, or Tuesday night, they're going to talk about getting this straight open. And I think, you know, the Iranians, I don't think they realize how much trouble they're in. It's not just, you know, the U.S. I mean, China needs it open, India needs it open, you know, Indonesia, Korea, Taiwan, and all of Europe needs it open. So the most insulated from this whole mess is us. Although our goals there are as powerful and as strong as anybody else, we want to maintain a hegemony over the, you know, sort of petro dollar. So we're doing all we can there. But the point is that if we don't get this Gulf oil flowing through the straight freely within the next month or so, you're going to have a global recession, right? And it's going to start in Asia and then it's going to go to Europe and then the knock on effect here will blow us down too. Another issue I wanted to raise, and I sent you this piece from our friend, Chris Whalen, at the Institutional Risk Analyst. He looked at the, you mentioned mortgages. He looked at the non-bank mortgage sector as the prospect for lower interest rates is fading fast. He writes, on the one hand, a number of large issuers are continuing to thrive even in a difficult interest rate market. Second lead mortgages and non-agency jumbo loans are growing as a percentage of overall production volumes. On the other hand, the aggressive behavior of some issues is distorting pricing for loans in the secondary market and maybe creating circumstances for the next systemic, quote unquote, surprise in the non-bank sector. Basically, he's saying we're looking at the prospect of a countrywide two. And his top candidate for a non-bank default. is Ishpias, United Wholesale Mortgage, which would be really bad because then they'd probably ask taxpayers to fund that new White Sox stadium. But the larger point, the larger point about the Ishpia is in their company, these billionaires, this is what he writes. The basic issue with the United Wholesale Mortgage business model is they pay too much for loans in order to protect their dominant market share, 40%. in wholesale lending. Rocket companies is second at less than 10. Penny Mack is third around five. When mortgage rates were falling in Q1, you would see UMC Partners United Wholesale. Quoting way below market rates, these brokers quote below market rates and hope the market gets there, but United Wholesale mortgage has been buying down low coupon rates for years. And so, I mean, He goes through this in more technical detail, but basically said, look, two decades ago, another extremely aggressive lender, country had financial, utilized similar lending practices to boost volumes. Countrywide was a thrift that had meager core deposits and habitually overpaid for loans to her competitors, forcing down profits for the entire industry. And then it became a race to the bottom. And obviously, Angelo Mozilla and Countrywide got caught with their pants down.

And he thinks, and he's saying that this could happen again. And you want to talk about something that would be a negative contagion in our domestic economy, something like what he's talking about. So I don't want to overhype it. And I don't pretend to have the understanding of it that you do. But I wanted to raise the prospect because Chris Whalen's a pretty, you know, sensible guy. And he's raising the prospect. Yeah, Chris Rowland's a smart guy. And I think this analysis is probably correct. I disagree with him in his conclusion that this will be an issue that is going to be large enough to create a systemic liquidity event that hurts. financial system, right? That's what we're really talking about at its core. And in the mortgage crisis, you know, 07, 08, the biggest problem was that, well, there's several problems, but the biggest problem was that liquidity in the financial system went down, right? And when that happens, banks stop lending, and then people can't roll over loans, and they probably shouldn't have gotten a mortgage in the first place, and everybody goes bankrupt, and the mortgage lenders, you know, have to close their doors. That happened then. I don't think that's going to happen this time, Dan. And I'll tell you why. Again, back to this money supply story. You know, money supply is growing. And the financial system is more liquid today than it has ever been, right? And I think balance seats at the corporate level are much better.com, boom. Everybody tries to compare this. sort of rally in the markets in the dot-com room. They couldn't have been more different, right? At that time, most of those companies weren't even making money, right? And the fact is, pretty much all of them are making money right now. So you've got a labor force. It's $170 million, which has never been making more money. The cash flow through the system is strong. And if you look at, you know, the housing market, it's a little bit tricky. People try to... make one statement about it and kind of cover the whole country. But the real estate market in this country is really about 30 or 40 or 50 different real estate market. You know, San Francisco is different than San Diego and Boston's different than Philadelphia. And Philadelphia is different than Atlanta and Austin and Miami and Chicago. The bottom line is there's a lot of houses out there that people would like to sell because they've gone up, but people don't want to buy them and get a new mortgage for something. because the house prices are too expensive, right? But if you look at the new home sales market, right? New home sales are probably 15 to 20 percent of the market. The new home sales market in the United States, the last couple of numbers, we got some last week. February new home sales were up 8.9 percent, and March new home sales were up 7.4 percent. Right? So back in the dot-com boom and back in the last mortgage market, you know, there was no growth in new home sales, right? None. It was all about what you can buy. So I think that there are pockets of weakness clearly, but I think broadly speaking, if you look at the U.S. housing market, it's growing. The prices are at all-time highs. There may be 5% below that.

And then if you go to the Sun Belt, I mean, I don't know, the last time you've been to some place like Orlando or someplace like that or Phoenix, you know, but I've been to both places in the last sort of three weeks. And there's construction cranes and the belt that's going up all over the place in just about every city. And, you know, Miami, Miami looks like Hong Kong did when I was living there 20 years ago. There must be 50 cranes in Miami going up. So broadly speaking, I think there are risks to the economy. I don't believe that despite how smart and correct Chris Whalen is on his numbers on this particular component of it, broadly speaking, the U.S. housing market is going to track GDP growth. It's not going to bring it down. All right. There you have it. It's going to be the roaring 20s all over again, or at least the remainder of the 20s are going to be roaring. It sounds like, according to James Perry. Well, I don't know how long it's going to keep going on, Dan. But, you know, it's clearly an industrial revolution based on technology. And I think what a lot of people forget, and your listeners should understand this because it's really a big component of it. The corporate America is behind it, right? You know, the Googles and the Microsofts and the Metas and the Amazon, these guys are spending big, big money. But, you know, so are all the smaller companies, too, right? Yeah. And the fact is that the growth rates are continuing to be there. And I think that if you look at the real big issue, it's all kind of... a result of this de-globalization from, you know, a few years ago, the COVID lockdown. But the United States government is spending a ton of money supporting this expansion, right? I mean, I don't know if people remember this, but, you know, the government bought 10% of Intel. Yeah, well. Yeah, I remember it. 20 and a half bucks a share. It's in 125 now, right? So it's going up by that. The government's got a $55 billion profit in an Intel share, right? Yeah, well, good. So get out of it and don't ever do that again. Jim Perry, founder, CIO, founder, CIO, Perry Capital, Perry International Capital Partners, of course. Jim, thank you, as always. Appreciate it. Thanks, Dan. Have a good week. You too, and Jim joined us on the alphawealthgroup.com answer line. There's only one radio show in Chicago talking about today's biggest stories and telling you what they really mean. That show is this one. Chicago's morning answer on AM 560, The Answer. Only the biggest stories. Only the biggest guests. And only the biggest opinions. This is AM 560. The answer. Top of the morning, Dan Proft here. So, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the front woman for the socialist spice girls in the house. You've heard of her.

She was featured at David Axelrod's Institute for Political Skull Duggery at the University of Chicago. And boy, what a turnout she got. Disturbing. Disturbing that UFC undergrads and grads and professors could be responding to her rank ignorance with applause and enthusiasm. But that's exactly what you heard. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's take on the American Revolution, just to give you an example before I get to the thrust of my point of raising her comments. The American Revolution was against the billionaires of their time. And we're declaring independence from such an extreme marriage of wealth and power and the state. As some noted online. Robert Morris, who was the richest man in America at the time of the revolution, used his own personal wealth to finance much of it. He was effectively a billionaire financing the American Revolution, not to mention the legions of stories about the founders and what they sacrificed to get out from underneath King George. But okay. There's an advertisement to not send your kid to Boston University, apparently. But then it turned to the question of on everybody's mind. Are you going to run in 28? Are you thinking about it? Please say yes. And she didn't say no. But this is sort of what you're up against next generation as we talked about how tired and stayed and unworkable. in the near term, and maybe the near term is June 2nd in L.A. or November in L.A. with respect to the mayor's race, that that Karen Bass Act is not going to fly for much longer in places that are disintegrating. And maybe Spencer Pratt is perfectly positioned, has perfectly positioned himself. to be that surprise win. But this is what you're actually up against. It's not Karen Bass. It's representatives of a neo-Marxist revolutionary party that offer things like this. Would like you to run for president in 2028. They applause. It's not the rabble. They're dressed up in suits and stuff. Apparently, some of them are here. And there are people who, there are others who would like you to run for the United States Senate. Chuck Schumer's up in 2028.

I don't know. It sounded like even more. Should we do it? Do you all look to New York or to other parts of the country? How many would like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to stay in Congress? See? Get to the question, Axelrod. Good grief. What say you about all of this? You know, it's funny because in this op-ed that Jeff Bezos paid for in the Washington Post. There was this line that you even mentioned earlier about, well, as a potential 2028 contender, XYZ. And in the context of that, it was very clear this was a veiled threat, right? So the elite saying, if you want this job, you just stepped out of line. And we want you to know where the real power is. And it's in the modern-day barons who own the post and own the algorithms, and we're going to, we'll make an example out of you. And what's funny about that is that they assume that my ambition is positional. They assume that my ambition is a title or a seat. And my ambition is way bigger than that. My ambition is to change this country. And presidents, come and go. Senate, House seats, elected officials, come and go. But. Single payer health care is forever. A living wage is forever. Workers' rights are forever, women's rights, all of that. That's great to know. She doesn't need to be Robs Pierre necessarily. Joy Pullman, Executive Editor of the Federalist and author of False Flag, Why Queer Politics Mean the End of America, joins us. Joy, thanks for being with us again. Appreciate it. Thank you for having me. So if that's the future of what they call the Democrat Party, what should the future of the Republican Party be post-Trump, do you think? Well, I actually think it's very interesting that Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is saying a lot of things that really we've seen before in terms of the number of voters who were open to both Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump. And the answer, I mean, so what this really reveals is, look, the normal person in America. And again, not the billionaires. The billionaires are really not popular on both sides of the party. And I don't have any problem with people who earned their wealth honestly, but a lot of people. Americans are aware how basically earn their wealth by corruption, by being close to the levers of power. And the Republican Party is very much a part of that. They're kind of a junior partner in being able to extract rents from the government for their people, while the Democrats are really superstars at that kind of corruption. But, you know, the people who vote for Republicans are really looking for Republicans to act on their priorities.

are really looking for Republicans who were able to win, who were not just staying in power to keep their campaign donors and big business happy. And so we saw this, of course, recently in the primary elections in Indiana, you know, where, you know, voters really, really did respond to the idea of not just kicking out state senators who voted against redistricting, but that was really a proxy war for this idea of not being able to use power on behalf of your voters. While, you know, the daily life in America gets harder and harder, inflation continues to rise, gas prices continue to rise. You know, our kids are still having, you know, queer ideology put on them in school, especially, you know, at all levels, but especially the college level. And Republicans, in some states, such as Florida, at the federal level under Trump, are doing the good job of this. You know, but they, in many states, they're really, really not doing that, and they're voters. I've learned that we should be able to get more out of them. And that's really why not only Trump is popular, but people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Yeah, your piece about the Indiana primary, I mean, tracked with what I said the day after that election a couple weeks ago, which is that this, you know, of course the D.C. Press Corps wants to make it a referent on Trump. They were hoping all those incumbent senators who voted against redistricting would win and it would indicate Trump has lost his influence in the Republican Party. Or they win and Trump dominates the Republican Party and it's, you know, requires Maga Orthodoxy. And I agree with what you said. And it said at the time is that this was about voters looking and saying these guys who didn't want to be inconvenience with redrawn Senate districts because they're perfectly comfortable in the Senate districts they have put themselves above my interests and above the party's interests. And by extension. the country's interest with an eye towards the midterms. And I see Republicans putting in the fight in Florida and Texas and now in a bunch of other states too. And these guys are going to take a pass because it's inconvenient for them and they're nice little sinecure. So the hell with that. Well, exactly. I mean, Republicans are just content, really, to just kind of be seat warmers too often. And that, especially when you have this existential crisis, you know, this threat from the left. I mean, so Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, right, she's using talking points that are absolutely popular with people, but you know, you know, she is an out and proud socialist. In socialist regimes, which is really the kind of deliberate preface to communism, you know, what that does is actually concentrates more wealth and power in a few elite. then impoverishes the people more. What is an acceleration of the trend we already have of the gap between the rich and the middle class in this country. The middle class is getting hollowed out. And so we really need Republicans to be an effective counterweight to the stalking horses of socialism and communism in our country and working on behalf of expanding that middle class. making home ownership, health care. Health care is a killer for people. You know, we already have, you know, we have majority single payer in this country. The majority of people in this country are using government subsidies in order to get health care. That is killing the economy. It's killing the young families who are having to pay $25,000, $30,000 a year, you know, half of a full-time salary just to have insurance and get no benefits out of it. Republicans have got to have a fire lit under the behind to actually solve these sorts of problems for their voters.

Or we are, or the volley others delivering election victories to a very energized, straight-up socialist communist left. Yeah. And another, yet another example of that ongoing right now, of course, is the Save America Act. Trump's sitting down in doing an interview with Cheryl Ackison for her full measure program and said. basically said, look, they need to blow up the filibuster because it's very clear that the other side is going to do it. So we have these recalcit Republicans. And if you're against voter ID or if you're against doing the things necessary and within your legitimate power to do, then you're not for, you know, election integrity. And this is craziness. And so what people see from John Thune and from and the failure to call out. the recalcitrant Republicans and that Senate Republicans that we know are the recalcitrant ones, it just seems like more shady, mealy-mouth bulgai from people that don't want to act in furtherance of who they said they would be. And this is after Dobbs and, oh, we can't talk about abortion or we're going to get killed because, and this is after now, you know, so many decisions, callous now. Oh, well, you know, they, there are. You have these institutional or these establishment of Republicans that are so afraid to press the issue even when they're victorious or on the precipice of victory with public support. Well, and every one of the things that they bring up, you know, for example, such as the filibuster is just a fake excuse, right? They actually don't need to get rid of the filibuster in order to pass the Save Act. You know, all it requires is doing a, you know, talking filibuster, you know, just basically requiring people in the Senate to work more than two and a half days a week and to stay up there talking for a time to tire out, you know, the opposition. You know, our Senate is full of geriatric people who are not competent to execute their duties. And for me, it's not an age issue. It's like a body decomposition and mental issue, right? You know, so if you require them to just do their job. more than two and a half days a week, you get to say that passed, right? So the filibuster whole situation is just like a fake because I understand the president's kind of trying to neutralize it as an issue. But the real underlying issue is what you pointed out. Republicans, especially in the Senate, but in many, many parts of the party all the way from the local level, all the way up to the highest level. They don't want to adopt the Trump model of delivering on their promises to their voters, and their voters see through that, and they're beyond sick of it. You know, we're talking, you know, the Tea Party Revolution under Obama was initiated in response to the lack of Republicans to really use the power that voters give them to defend our interests, right? That's more than 10 years ago that that's happening. And so we've been stuck in this dynamic, and voters are getting matter and matter, and they're having what's more important, less and less faith. that the people they elect are, like, that elections really have consequences, especially for Republican voters. Elections have consequences for Democrats, but they don't for Republicans. And that creates a very dangerous, unstable social situation with a lack of trust in our systems of government. And Republicans, I mean, I think these, the primary results.

absolutely have motivated some Republicans to kind of see, you know, oh, wow, okay, we do have to follow the Trump model of delivering for our voters. But we need a lot more of that, a lot faster because the stakes are very, very high at this point. We're not playing tiddly winks. We're talking about the erasure of the country here. Right. And I mean, again, the juxtaposition, you have Democrats in Virginia trying to usurp power they don't have to draw the map. And even after the state Supreme Court's decision, rumors about, you know, disbanding the, you know, changing the retirement age, disbanding. I mean, they will, they will use power they don't have. And then you watch Republicans unwilling to use power they legitimately do have. That's the thing I think that really rubs people. That's right. I mean, that's the dynamics that voters are just completely sick of. And look, Republicans are almost like Republicans want to lose the midterms just the way that they're acting. In fact, it does seem that they're more comfortable being on the losing side, right? Because then they can fundraise without having to do all the duties and responsibilities and difficulties of wielding power. But again, you know, voters are not going to put up with that. And they're clearly the primary situation is very interesting. And it's not just, you know, the Indiana. We're talking about all the way across the country. We're seeing this happen, for example, the Texas Senate situation between, you know, John Cornyn, the Attorney Ken Paxton over there. There's a number of other situations that this is going on. And I do think that President Trump's team really should be thinking about that. Because his track record of endorsing in primaries is very uneven. And so really they need to be thinking about that as part of their strategy when their endorsements happen and really not continue to endorse the same people who are spiking, knifing in the back all of the Trump coalition and voters' priorities in the Senate and elsewhere. Joy Pullman, executive editor of the Federalist, Federalist.com, and author of False Flag, Why Queer Politics Mean the End of America. Joy, thanks for joining us again. Appreciate it. Thank you. And she joined us on the alphawealthgroup.com, Anseline. This is the morning show. More Chicago radio listeners are choosing. This is Chicago's Morning Answer. Anm. 560, The Answer. Thanks for listening to Chicago's Morning Answer podcast sponsored by Signature, a division of Esquire Bank. Signature takes pride in helping customers grow their business and provide unmatched banking expertise, custom financial solutions, and the industry's best technology. So whether your business is looking for a deposit relationship or needs a ready source of financing, Signature has the solutions for you. Call today at 773-467, 5600 to hear how signature can help your business grow and thrive. Esquire Bank, member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender.