Vicki Mckenna Show - MAHA is Making Huge Splashes

Happy birthday, America. It's time to celebrate and play your favorite Las Vegas casino games by American-owned SpinQuest.com. What's better than fireworks than American Pie? Hitting a blackjack in the palm of your hand, and you won't lose your fingers. Over a thousand games, including slots and live dealers. And $30 point packs are on sale for 10. SpinQuest.com. Buy American players for American players. SpendQuest is a free-to-play social casino. Avoid where prohibited. This is SpendQuest.com for more details. Saturday, July 25th. I know I will be the best walks away in the world. An undefeated phenom. Batman is a rising star. And a frightening force. What's a win! For Shemiel Musayev. Descend on the nation's capital to fight for gold. Thad, the silverback gene. Silverback nation makes them noise. Versus Shemil Moussiav. All it's over! For the PFL welterweight world title. On real. Saturday, July 25th and 10 p.m. Eastern on ESPN. Hey, it's Bubba Wallace from 2311 racing. You know what feels like forever? crew sitting on a plane waiting for takeoff. Good thing, I've got Jumba Casino. With daily boost and social casino games on tap, this is a kind of fun that makes time fly. Why not turbocharge your downtime? Play now at Jumbacasino.com. Let's Jumba. Sponsored by Chumba Casino. No purchase necessary. VGW Group, Ford where prohibited by law, 21 plus, terms and conditions apply. The best skaters, BMX riders, and moto athletes in the world don't compete in leagues. Until now. The X-Games League Championship is live from New Orleans, July 24th through 26th. Three days of elite action sports, plus performances from Metro Boomin, J-D, Subtronics, and Bunt. Watch on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2. Stream on the ESPN app, Roku, Kik, Amazon, and X-Games YouTube. The inaugural champion gets crowned this July. Good morning and welcome to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna Show. That would be me. I'm Vicki McKenna. We're going to talk about the violence that broke out over the weekend because, you know, nothing says, Merry Christmas, quite like a tree lighting ceremony mass public shooting. You know what I'm saying? And I can make these kinds of flippant comments about it. Because already the press has moved on. So clearly they don't care about what happened in Chicago over the weekend. Or Concord, North Carolina. Not to be outdone. North Carolina also had a tree lighting ceremony erupt into violence with four people shot. In Chicago, I think, I've lost count. I think it's 12 shot, one dead. seven critically hospitalized, all kids, by the way, all teenagers. We'll get more into that. Coming up in the program. I mean, who really cares, right? Brandon Johnson said, it's no big deal. It's a one-off. It's just a one-off. J.B. Pritzker said Chicago's perfectly safe. By the way, where was this? Was this in some lousy neighborhood in Chicago? No. This was...

Right in front of the Chicago theater where Cirque de Soleil was doing a Christmas performance. It was right after the tree lighting ceremony in Chicago, in the loop, in the area where tourists go and the fancy people populate. It sounds like, yeah, you're, that's what's going to happen. No, this was not that area. where violence is routine. So anyway, we'll talk a bit more about this as there's no sign of reflection among municipal leaders or state leaders that have adopted, which is now 10 years old and growing mold, the progressive demand that they resist the police. All right, but we'll get more into that on the program. So that's coming up on the show. Also, Maha is making some huge splashes. Kind of surprisingly, honestly, we'll talk about sort of the health movement. This just did, and this surprised me because it's now a major story. The vice president of Campbell's. who was caught on tape, caught on a recording, a surreptitious recording, admitting that they put fake meat into their food, that their food is garbage, that they promote this stuff mostly to poor people, they don't care about poor people. Anyway, we'll get into that coming up in the program as well. A little bit later on this show, more on the funding. of an ever an ever increasing amount of money going to an ever diminishing return on proficiency reading things like that what does that mean for wisconsin if a i is our future anyway all that's coming up on the show hey i've got a quick um request From anyone out there who might just share my problem. I'm just going to do one of these, hey, help Vicky on a personal problem that she has been dealing with for two days. My dogs went from being perfect puppies to hoodlums in 48 hours. So in 48 hours, my dogs went from being, you know, totally fine to be left alone for four to six hours. We had them in crates for a while and then let them out of their crates and then let them sort of have some free access to the house. And over time, they've gotten to about four to six hours and they're fine. Now you leave for a half an hour. And let's see, yesterday the dog, one of them, I don't know which one's guilty. They both. actually acted like they were confessing to it. One of them destroyed my dresser, totally destroyed a dresser. They both, I think, dragged a can of hard cider into the living room, managed to pop two cans. I mean, if you take a look at these cans, it looked like my dogs were trying to shotgun cider. They only slurped it. They didn't, most of it wound up on the rug, ate through a printer box.

You know, this is just chewed on the legs of a bed frame, chewed on the legs of the chair in the living room. So, you know, this is just in two days. Anyway, so if you have, I mean, they're adolescents, but still, if you've got some behavioral advice, they're going back in the crates. That's the only thing I can think of. So if you've got some suggestions on that, I'd be all ears. Two paws up, if you could help me out on that dog people, please. Yeah, the drinking, it was, it's not, nothing bad happened. That's why I can laugh about this, but like they dragged a box of hearts. We bought it for our Thanksgiving. They dragged the whole box into the living room, cracked it open, and managed to get into two cans of it. I just don't. I mean, like, I've had Siberian huskies, and they've never done that. So anyway, help me out, if you don't mind. We are going to take a break, though, and get more serious. But it is serious for me. I mean, I've got to replace a dresser. They destroyed it. They pulled the drawers out, even. I got pictures of it. I should put him on Facebook. I was so embarrassed that I thought maybe I shouldn't put this one on Facebook. All right. Anyway, we're going to take a break in the Vicki McKenna show. Please reach out and email me, Vicki McKenna at iHeartMedia.com. We'll be right back. And welcome back to the program. So somebody said, you know, get your dogs, those toys that are complicated to open. I bought those for my dogs. They crunched through them. Okay, they're made of plastic. I have pit bull mixes. They crunched right through them. They actually, I used to freeze peanut butter and congs and black congs, the extreme congs. They can chew through the rubber. And so they've taken chunks out of those. And I don't want to have a dog swallow a piece of that because I actually had that happen and it required veterinary intervention. So, yeah. So, I mean, I've. I mean, they're good dogs. Just in the last two days, they become total hoodlums. Seriously, like just delinquents. They need reform school. They need something. These dogs have been trained. They're trained dogs. They're very good dogs. Until recently, trying to shotgun cider. I mean, all right, back to the... situation at hand here, which is violence. And I wanted to talk to John Lott about kind of an alarming lawsuit. Maybe we'll have time to get to that. But John, I want to start with Chicago and North Carolina. And the responses from... the people who lead these municipalities. Brandon Johnson, I don't know the name of Concord, North Carolina. I don't know the name of the mayor. The responses were similar, which was, well, this doesn't happen very often. Tree letting ceremonies erupt in gunfire. It's always teenagers, it seems, not always, but a lot of times it's teenagers. Everybody shrugs their shoulders in Chicago, John.

I'm not sure if you're familiar with Chicago. This is where the tourists go. Right in front of the Chicago Theater, a block and a half away from the Chicago Symphony, not far away from Trump Tower, the loop. It's a place where lots of I would go there. And a tree lighting ceremony with Cirque de Soleil performing their Christmas performance. And yeah, now I think seven kids are in the hospital. A police officer has been attacked. One person's dead. And the response from J.B. Pritzker and Brandon Johnson's A Shrug of the shoulders. No amount of violence can get people off the ideology that defund the police. And, quote, criminal justice reform is the way to go. I don't think there's any amount of violence. violence that can talk people off of this right no yeah yeah thanks for me on look it's pretty sad i i used to live in chicago i used to teach at the university you're very familiar then yeah and uh And I was back just a couple weeks ago to downtown Chicago. And one of the things that was striking to me was just how empty downtown was on a Wednesday. It was just crazy. And I was talking to some lawyers down there. And they were saying, yeah, you know, this is Wednesday is like the most crowded day. It was empty. And it's basically because of the crime type problem that people have just abandoned the city there, and the restaurants are closing. You walk down some of the, you know, kind of what used to be the priciest real estate areas there, and you have empty storefront. And, you know, so there are real consequences, whether the... mayor and the governor want to go and, you know, address this properly or not. But, I mean, as you know, I've talked about, this is a rocket science. If you want to go and reduce crime, you have to make it riskier for criminals to commit crime. And you do that with things like higher arrest rates, higher conviction rights, longer prison sentences, making it easier for victims to be able to go and defend themselves. And all those things make it riskier for criminals to commit crime. And yet, you know, they're not willing to do those types of things. You have these huge numbers of criminals that just circulate, you know, through the criminal justice system over and over and over. Yeah. We just had a guy with 79 arrests, 79 arrests. We thought it was 49, but it's actually 79 arrests, got into a verbal spat with a woman on the L and doused her and lit her on fire. She's in critical condition. She may die. He had 79 arrests. This is routine. This is what we know. I mean, every time we see something like this, John, we say.

How many arrests did the guy have? You can't even, like, why aren't these, I guess I'm trying to figure this out. There's no amount of outrage, it seems, that moves the political machine to change. the direction that it has decided to go down. And it's irrelevant whether the people want something different. The people of Milwaukee want safe streets. That's irrelevant. They're not going to hire new police officers. The judges are not going to sentence. I mean, we changed the Constitution in Wisconsin so that you didn't have an excuse to set high bail to keep people off the streets. They're still letting people go on signature bonds. It's still happening. They're still not charging 50% of felonies. That blew my mind. I looked up the the data in the U.S., 59% of violent crimes go unsolved. In Wisconsin, in the big cities, 50% of felonies are uncharged. I mean, I can't even imagine what it must look like in Chicago. It's got to be worse. Right. No, I... You know, you had this huge drop in arrest rates for different crimes, you know, since COVID. In 2022, it was down to 20% of violent crimes in cities over a million resulted in arrest. And that's for reported crimes. If you look at for total violent crimes, it was down to 8%. And if you look at total property crimes, only 1% of total property crimes resulted in arrest. And, you know, that's partly, as you say, a lot of people just don't even bother reporting the crimes that are there because they know. Nothing's going to happen. So why even take the time to go and report the crime if you know the people aren't going to be caught and punished? Exactly. We've talked about that before. When you compare the actual reported crimes that the police are reporting, assuming the police report, and I don't know if Chicago is on the list of police departments that change categories that try to underreport on certain categories. They are. Okay. So they are also reporting incorrect information by altering categories when they do report, not reporting. They have to report homicides, but not reporting the way they ought to be to the FBI. When you actually survey people, see that people have just stopped bothering to call the police. I mean, in Chicago, you know, when you have a mayor who's saying, ah, it's a one-off, when you have a prosecuting attorney who says, you know, let the gang, let the gang bangers, you know, settle it themselves, which he said when, when there was violence right around the Jesse Smollett time. You know, here's my answer. I have two answers to this. Since nobody wants to hire cops, it's get a CCL.

and stay the hell out of cities. I mean, that's, you know, what else? If no one will do anything in government to imply, you know, to impose peace and order, why shouldn't the answer be get a CCL and get out of the city if you can? Right. Well, you know, but even in Illinois, they make it difficult for people to get a concealed carry permit. You have, you know, they issue them, but it costs about $450 to go through the process to do that. So it's not too surprising if you compare Illinois to neighboring Indiana, and Indiana about 23% of the adult population is a concealed carry permit. In Illinois, it's about 4%. And it's basically people, well-to-do individuals in the suburbs that have the permit in Illinois. In Indiana, you have a lot more permits in those zip codes. which are heavily minority and poor. You know, it doesn't do you a lot of good in terms of reducing crime if you're not having it so that the buried people who are the most likely victims of violent crime are the ones who have a permit to carry. You know, I saw a survey. I'm sorry. I saw a survey recently for Chicago asking people whether they supported Trump kind of moving in law enforcement, federal law enforcement, into the city to help produce crime. And black and Hispanic individuals in the poll supported it. Hispanics by a large margin. The people who opposed it were white. and basically wealthy white, those with like graduate degrees and stuff like that were the ones who are most strongly opposed to it. So the people who, you know, generally aren't victims of the crimes, you know, were happy with the way things were going. The people who were most likely victims of the crimes were the ones who were the ones who... Said, yeah, you know, we got to go and do something. What's working? Right. What's going on here isn't working. You saw that. So every time there, I know that President Trump has moved the National Guard, he's, you know, he's moving from city to city. So now apparently they're going to be targeting New Orleans. But Chicago, I mean, they're on bended knee in Chicago and saying, help us in Chicago. You've got J.B. Pritzker, you've got federal judges in Chicago that are making it very difficult. Federal judge just very recently told ICE about six weeks ago, you have to meet with me every single day. That was one of the federal judges there to the operations, the command operator or command officer on ICE. You have to meet with me every single day, which, of course, that person couldn't do because he's all over the country. You have to release 615 criminal illegal aliens have already been...

arrested. You've got this kind of stuff. So you've got the mayor of the city. You've got the governor of the state. It's like they do not care because those black and Hispanic people who are the ones who are going to be disproportionately victims of crime, whether it's illegal aliens, whether it's gang members, whether it's gun violence. I mean, you would think that because they are a voting block, you'd pay attention to their concerns. I mean, I need someone to do the analysis of the cognitive dissonance there. Why wouldn't you respond, except that they're so poor and so dependent at this point that anything the government does is going to be fine? You know, it's not just crime issue, which is the puzzle that you're pointing to, but things like education. I mean, the quality of public schools in Chicago is just abysmal. And, you know, even the public school teachers don't send their kids to the public schools there in Chicago. And so, you know, if you're a wealthy person there, you send your kids to private schools. But, you know, if you're relatively poor, you're stuck with it. And so I look at it's a puzzle to me. I mean, I can understand why the teachers union vote for... you know, the Democrats there. And obviously, Brandon Johnson was somebody who worked in the public school system there for a while. He was their candidate in this last election that they had. But, you know, at some point, you look at... things that you think would matter to people in terms of crime, in terms of things like the quality of education that are there, and they would stop voting for it. But they do. But they do. But they do. Cities are emptying out. Chicago's one of them. You mentioned you saw there, and it was, you know, very empty in an area that's normally quite lively, ordinarily during a business day. Cities are emptying out. We're seeing that across the United States. What's being left behind are people who don't have the resources to, you know, to push back. Apparently their votes don't matter. And even if their votes do matter, they're voting for the same idiocy. You know, so I saw that President Trump had put out a demand that the city allow him to go in and secure it. And the city's just saying no. So that's where we are. And here's the thing that a story that you sent me actually made me think about this is a story about a woman who was fired because she defended herself with her CCL in Oklahoma of all places. She was fired by 7-Eleven. But imagine if the companies instead of firing employees for doing that.

Imagine if they instead said, you know, we want to make sure that you're trained. We want to make sure that you can defend yourself. We want to make sure that you're safe. Imagine if they said in Chicago at a 7-Eleven or whatever they're using, you know, I don't know, open pantry, white hen, something like that. Imagine if they said, we're going to send you guys a CCL class. We're going to make sure that you are tactically aware so that you at least can, you know, protect yourself from the, you know, the violence that the police cannot stop. Instead of having every company default, I don't know why the lawyers tell them this, to default to ban guns, fire employees who defend themselves. How would instead say, we're going to train these employees and as long as they can part with our training, we'll defend them? Right. No, I mean, you think everybody understands that if you make it easy for criminals to commit crime and make it so that they don't have to worry about anything, you just tell your employees to behave passively and give the criminals whatever they want, you're going to end more crime. Unfortunately, a lot of companies have kind of followed the gun control line and think that having people behave passively is safer for the employees. And that's simply a lie. I mean, if you compare passive behavior to all forms of active resistance lump together, passive behavior is indeed slightly safer. But it's very misleading because some of those forms of active resistance are much more dangerous than past behavior. But one, in particular, having a gun, particularly for women, is much safer. And so, you know, by lumping them all together, you're kind of missing those differences that are there. And, you know, the story that I sent you from this woman in Oklahoma City. She clearly would have been killed if she hadn't had a gun. Yep. The guy had chased her. He was choking her. He was choking her. Right. It was on top of her. And it was only at that point that she pulled out her permanent concealed handgun and shot the individual there. She's lucky. If she had followed company policy, there should be dead. Yeah. By the way, the company policy that she did follow was not allowing the guy to pass a phony $100 bill. Then the company policy she didn't follow allowed her to escape the reaction to the company policy she did follow. This is nuts. I don't, this is. Cities have, we've allowed cities to be taken over. All the high ground in the cities has been taken over. It's been colonized by insanity. It's been colonized by violence. It's been colonized by progressive lunacy that inverts the meaning of reality itself. And the only person, you know, at least in the main that seems to want to push back against that is President Trump. I do appreciate the time, John. Thank you so much for joining me.

Well, thanks for being there, Vicki. And thank you to Middleton Ford for sponsoring our hotline, family-owned and your good neighbor for a dealership for nearly 75 years. Welcome back to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna Show. And I've got Congressman Glenn Grossman standing by. Something I wanted to get into as we were, you know, in the existential crisis of the shutdown. There was really no time to pay attention to this stuff. But now that the shutdown has passed us and you've guys got another couple of wax at reconciliation, can we look at federal employment, federal payroll, and the fact that it looks like we have got, that we have just simply become a place for people to be put on a payroll without ever having to prove they do anything valuable? Open the Books has an astonishing eye-opening report. that has federal payroll exploding, and we don't even know what these people do? It's a problem they're having. Of course, the big agency that we look at is the Department of Defense, where they still have approximately 700,000 employees who don't wear a uniform. And as you pointed out, Vicki, the cost per employee skyrocketed under the Biden administration as well. In Washington, of course, we all know people who know people who work in these agencies. Maybe they're former employees. Maybe there are people you go to church with. Maybe there are people in your condominium, whatever. But the anecdotal evidence is stunning the degree to which we have a lot of employees doing almost or absolutely nothing. And it's just as stunning that the Republicans don't seem interested in digging into this. Here's what opened the book sound, a 24% increase in payroll for the civilian, so non-uniformed, for the civilian federal employees, the federal workforce grew by 5%. Payroll grew by 24%. And we don't even know if they're in buildings, Glenn. We don't know, you know, are they remote employees? We don't have any idea because there's no way to get it through FOIA. Any idea what they do, but I tell you one thing, we didn't get 24% better service from the government. No, you are right. And by the way, you touched on another issue. We're not going to mention a lot today, but that is the excess of number of buildings around here. I recently did talk to someone in the Department of Defense. It's not unusual to find buildings around here that are over half empty, and nobody cares about. But you are right. These are well-paid employees. I would guess you could get rid of easily 200,000 employees in the Department of Defense and not miss them. Now, the Trump administration has been to look at that, but Congress should look at it as well. We are right now working on the budget, which is the reason why we had this shutdown for the year beginning last October 1st. And we are nowhere near in taking out the number of employees we should. Trump is trying.

You know, in his first year, he got rid of about 70,000 employees in Department of Defense, in part just by not replacing people who retired, and in part because some people took buyouts. But we still have about 700,000. And given anecdotal evidence, plus what Doge uncovered, it's hard to imagine you couldn't get rid of another 200,000. Why our Armed Services Committee does not do this is beyond me. And you've got... You've got particular information about defense. I've got more general. I've got a little bit about defense from the Open the Books report. In general, I just want to share this with you. There are over 31,000 federal employees who make more than the most well-compensated governor in the United States. And that's Kathy Hochul. She's making $250,000 a year. There are 31,000 federal employees making in excess of that. Glenn, why are we paying CEO level salaries to anybody working in an executive agency? Pentagon, Department of Energy, I don't care where. Why would you, why is anybody making that kind of money working in government? Well, you're right. And you've got to remember under normal circumstances, it's almost impossible to get rid of them. And sadly, a lot of apparently Republican congressmen are anxious to do that as well. But you're right. There is also plenty of anecdotal evidence around here in which people are making more than, say, $150,000 a year and not doing a whole lot of work. Yep. Yep. That's the problem. So we don't know what they're doing. But just if you're not running a state. then you shouldn't be making $250,000 as a government employee. I mean, Kathy Hochul, I don't think she does a good job, but she's running an entire state and she's making $250,000 for that effort. No one's close to running an entire state, knocking back executive, private sector executive level salaries. All right, back to the Pentagon. What are 700,000 civilian employees doing? They're trying to determine that right now. I talk to, I won't say, one of the top people, the guys in the Pentagon, he just got there about seven months ago. He's trying to dig into it and find it what they are. But like I said, anecdotal evidence from the mouths of these employees themselves is they're doing very little. And, you know, they've got their cubicle. You can see how this would happen. A lot of times you have bosses who are not that. enthusiastic about their jobs as well. And you just have a floor full of people working not very hard. I can't even, I don't even know why we're the employment. Why is the Pentagon the employment agency, it seems like the largest employment agency in the federal government for civilians who don't, we don't even know what they do. Again, maybe some of them are really important. I'm not sure, because what we did find out, this was during the George W. Bush administration, they were using private contractors, and I don't know if those are, and in fact, open the book says those are not actually included, that if you do include private contractors, it's larger, in order to manage some cost savings. So we also have private contractors, presumably, you know, working on, I don't know what, but maybe tech or something like that.

Yeah, I mean, I'm not for people losing their jobs, Glenn. But when we're $37 trillion in debt, maybe we shouldn't be floating the pensions of all of these people into their 60s, 70s and 80s. Well, you're absolutely right. And this has been going on for many years. I think a lot of these people have jobs in which they've done very little for 20 or 30 years. And that's just like I said, stories you hear around here and which Doja uncovered and which Congress itself is not reducing the budgets of these agencies to reflect the appropriate amount of people who ought to be working here. That is a problem. And you might say why. I believe there are sadly just too many Republicans who don't want to lose a vote and are afraid if we did reduce government employment by, if the Department of Defense, you could do $200,000 by itself. I think they're afraid they might get somebody upset. And like I said, it should be low-hanging fruit. Trump people are digging into it. The overall budgets of all these agencies ought to be falling. We ought not have to increase defense for, you know, new drones and such because we should be getting rid of a lot of the nine-uniform personnel hanging out at the Pentagon and hanging out around the country. By the way, I mean anecdotal. Yeah, and they're not of the Pentagon. They're not all there. Traffic would be way worse than it already is. They're not there. They're they're remoting in. What's what's become of Doge? What exciting, fascinating, exciting, exciting stuff. I think when Elon Musk left, it was kind of the end of Doge. And it was never as formal as the public thought. But I would have hoped we could replace. Elon Musk with somebody else who's going to dig into this further because, you know, President Trump only has four years. I wish he had 12 years. But we are working on right now these budgets for all the different agencies beginning October 1st, and which is really President Trump's first full year. And there's no reason why we shouldn't have massive reductions here. Right. By the way, I ran into somebody. I just want to say this. I want to throw this out there. How about you just keep their budgets? This would be a miracle. Keep their budgets exactly the same. Well, that's what we are really trying to do other than the Department of Defense. And they're talking big about being able to do that. And that's kind of what they did a year ago as well. But given the massive increases in government budgets during COVID, we really should be reducing spending. Agreed. Holding it even isn't enough. Agreed. We should be reducing it, but I think it would be a miracle if we just held it flat. And then truly began to get in there and say, you know, we're eliminating whole categories of employment. The people who are employed, if, you know, if they're nearing enough to retirement, they're going to be able to be fine on their pensions. Everybody else should, if they're not nearing retirement, should be young enough to get another job.

Well, you're right. And hopefully we will be. We will. This is not just a goal. I do believe of the Department of Defense, we are not going to have increase in spending in any of these departments. But for the reasons we're talking about, there really should be reductions. And President Trump, you know, four years has gone like that. We should aggressively be looking for reductions in the other agencies as well. I want to shift gears here real quickly before we run out of time. USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins came out a couple of days ago and said, everybody is going to have to reapply for their food benefits, Glenn. Is she just, you know, is she just grabbing attention? I'm sure. Or is that possible? Because that could be a remarkable reform. She's dead serious. I think we're even more aggressive with our safety net programs, but they are going to be aggressive. I believe on SNAP. And I think we have so many people here who are looking to reduce what you can buy with your EBT card. I think we're going to make maybe a little progress there as well. I wish they would look at the low-income housing because I think as far as an inducement to inappropriate lifestyle, low-income housing is even worse than SNAP. 100%. By the way, we just saw data that had, and I think this was in New York City, 50% of EBT usage was fast food, fast food slash junk food. So also like, you know, packaged snacks and things like that. 50%. You know, if you're starving and you're trying to stretch your budget, you're not plunking down money for fast food and packaged snacks. You're buying, go ahead. Right. And you have to realize why that is. I have toured my food banks. Food banks have none of that junk. Nope. Snap is all that junk. And why is because we're not just operating the snap for the benefit of the so-called poor. We're operating it for the benefit of the food processors. you know, the soft drink companies. Thank you for saying it. You know, they give a lot of money to the politicians to keep the gravy train going. And that's one of the reasons why our poor population are, quite frankly, so overweight. I think you're exactly right, and I appreciate finally having someone say it out loud. This is a snap is not for people. It's for the food processors. It's for the grocery stores. It's for the lobbyists. It's not for us. Otherwise, nobody would be fighting to get soft drinks and fast food and, you know, prepackaged snacks off EBT because it's not healthy. Last thing, you mentioned low income housing, and I literally have a minute and a half here, Glenn. Stop. Right. Can you stop with a low income housing grants? Well, you know, the horrible, the horrible, yeah, the horrible Republican Party decided to build more low income housing in this budget, which is just, to me, the most inexcusable of many inexcusable things in the big, beautiful bill. But we're doing what we can to fight it up here. And I think a lot of Republicans don't get white people voted Republican.

You know what? I mean, it doesn't do anything except make it even harder for people to afford their first home or afford rent. Subsidized housing is not for the people who are in the housing affordability crisis right now. It does not help them at all. It only lines the pockets of developers and it makes it more expensive for the rest of us. I do appreciate the time on the program. We covered a lot of territory here, though. Thanks, Glenn. And we'll take a quick break on the Vicki McKenna Show. Welcome back to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna show. I'm going to talk a lot about health, health insurance, getting healthy, coming up in the next hour-ish on the program. This just in, nobody knows what to do about Obamacare. Not the Democrats, not the Republicans. They're just spinning their wheels. So the Obamacare insurance policies are skyrocketing. I do it. I am the endorser of a company that's an insurance brokerage that talks about this. The whole ad is what I'm talking about, Obamacare insurance price is exploding. You can, by the way, if you're not stuck on Obamacare. Some people get stuck on Obamacare. If you have a preexisting condition, for instance, you might have a harder time of it. But if you're not in that category, get the hell out of the exchanges. Just call my friends at American Medical and just get a cheaper policy. One that doesn't have a million things packed into it, mandated insurance coverage. Like if you're a 65-year-old guy, do you need maternity coverage? No. You sure don't. You don't need birth control coverage. You don't need that kind of garbage. Anyway, so just do that. You hear the ads all the time. Just call those guys. But the Obamacare policies are exploding because they are subsidized. Because they are subsidized. Because the subsidies are going into a black hole. They're not going to people. They are going to the insurance companies. The insurance companies are taking those subsidies and they're banking them to profit. That's what they're doing. They're not taking the subsidies and saying, how can we cover this person with a preexisting condition? That's not what they're doing. How can we make it affordable for them? That's not happening. And now that the idiots in the Democratic Party have decided that there is no income limit on the subsidies and you don't have to present ID, there are scam artists out there signing up fake people for Obamacare policies just so that they can collect the subsidies. Because the subsidies don't go to the person. They go to the company. This is the stupidest thing you could have ever done. How did you not see it coming? Right? And the Republicans are like, oh, geez, what are we going to do? Here's the thing. Cut off the subsidies to the companies. President Trump has said this. Just do it. Say, if we are going to subsidize, I don't like subsidies, by the way, in any form. But if we're going to subsidize people, we're going to subsidize them directly. To the person, not to the company. You just heard Ron Johnson last week talk about United Healthcare. United Healthcare, by the way, just out today or last week with an unbelievable story about denying anesthesia for a woman undergoing a procedure that requires anesthesia. They told her to take Advil. I am crapping you negative. United Health Care is an 1177% profit.

In the last 15 years, 1177%. They never had a profit like that before Obamacare. What are they doing? They're taking the subsidies, banking it to the bottom line, and then they're saying things like, geez, I'm not sure you really need the anesthesia for the procedure. You might be able to get by just on some Advil. Why not just recommend a couple of shots of vodka? while you're at it as a chaser. But that's how bad it's gotten. The companies are exploding in profit. These are publicly traded companies. So the shareholders are happy, happy, happy. But that's because the idiots in government decided to print money and hand it over to the insurance companies. It's like printing money for solar subsidies. And then handing it over to companies that form just to collect the subsidies. We don't get anything out of it. No one's getting anything out of this. And the Republicans are in Capitol Hill saying, well, geez, I don't know if I like President Trump's idea about direct subsidies. Look, it's not great, but it's better than what we have. And you could take those subsidies, hand them to people. Most of the people who are in the exchanges are not in the exchanges because they have a preexisting condition. They're in the exchanges because their employer threw them out of their insurance. Again, I highly recommend you simply go to the non-exchange marketplace, call it American Medical. Call them. If you can, because you're going to save money overnight. But how about that's how you're going to induce people to actually shop around? By the way, if you go into the non-exchange policies, there's price transparency, a lot of price transparency. In the meantime, all we've got our politicians who have responded to the media lies about the enhanced Obamacare subsidies going away and how that's going to be responsible for everybody's insurance premiums going up. No. The insurance premiums are going up because subsidies exist, period. The more subsidies you give them, the more they will cut you off at the knees so that they can bank even more money to the bottom line. They only care about their shareholders. They do not care about whether or not they're offering up a product that anybody would buy without a gun to their head. They have a captive market. This is really frustrating. Here's Trump's just like, look. First thing we're going to do is we're just going to flip the subsidies. We're not getting rid of the subsidies. We're just going to flip them. The insurance companies can get bent. Give the money to people. And then the people say, hey, man, I don't really think $1,000 a month and a $10,000 deductible makes a lot of sense for me. I think I'm going to make some phone calls. Overnight you would see more insurance brokerages. Overnight, companies would bail out of the exchanges and go into the non-exchange private marketplace and sell policies cheap that you could afford. It's just, it's maddening to me. The media took the Democrats' talking points and lied. And now the Republicans.

are worried about the media lying to everybody. And if they don't do something about those enhanced subsidies, are you kidding me? The enhanced subsidies, by the way, are for people with no income limit. There's no income limit. Rich people, non-existent people, fake people. Nobody's checking IDs. Nobody's checking for any of this. No one's policing the fraud. It's just unbelievable. that they cannot figure out how to just do an issue. President Trump's figured it out. He's doing it, you know, by truth social posts. A lot of people are looking at his true social post saying, yeah, do that. Just do that. Anyway, I'm going to come back and talk a little bit more about this. I've got a woman who's been working from the patient end. It's not like, well, geez, if we don't do this, then people with preexisting conditions aren't going to be able to afford health insurance. Guess what? They already can't. This has done nothing to make it cheaper for those people. Anyway, more on that when we come back. I'll be right back. And welcome back to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna Show. I've talked to policymakers. I've talked to politicians. I've talked to experts. I've talked to people who are insurance brokers. I've talked to, you know, people who are pharmacy or pharmacists and people who have to get their drugs through them. And, you know, we never just sit down on health care and see what people need and how it works best for the actual people who need to use the services. Everything is... Some constituency and no one asks the patients. That's why I like this group that I just found out about called Patience Rising. It's based out of Texas. And it's the group that as I'm looking at this and going, yeah, you're talking to the patients. You're talking to the people who use the services and need the services. And they are begging for help. And nobody seems to want to listen to what they need. Terry Wilcox is the co-founder of this group. Welcome to the program, Terry. Good to have you. Thank you, Vicki. Thank you so much for having me today. I appreciate it. All right. So. In the entire process from the ACA Obamacare until now, no one's talking to patients. No one's, everyone's talking to insurance companies and pharmacy benefit managers and how can we best maximize the providers. They're talking to the hospital lobbyists, the health system consolidation, cheerleaders. And no one's saying, how do we get Terry Wilcox from, you know, from where she is?

to access to health care in ways that don't make her mortgage your house. That's not hard, but why don't we doing that? Well, because we're stuck in a system. We're stuck in this, you know, we're stuck in a place where we're just. filling, you know, putting band-aids on things, right? And all we do is every time the pressure builds in Washington, Washington reaches for the same answers. They, subsidies and patches, and let's pour more money into it, and let's do this, and let's buckle it here, and let's try to fix it there. And it's all starting to crumble under their own failures. I mean, there's a band-aid on a gaping wound. And here we are still sitting there going, oh, let's extend the subsidies. Let's, like, keep going. Let's do this. And meanwhile, the patients with pre-existing conditions with which, you know, the ACA Obamacare was created for initially, right? I mean, that's why we had to have that because of the pre-existing condition denials. Look, millions of patients, I represent them. Millions of patients are still facing barriers to access and denials of care. Medical debt soaring. People are rationing medicines and skipping basic treatment. Healthcare spending is ridiculous. It's crushing employers. It's crushing families. And what are we going to do about it? What exactly are we going to do about it? Well, I don't think continuing to give money to the middlemen and to insurers and, you know, all the fraud that's come with that. I mean, there's tons of fraud reports and things like that that have come out of these subsidies happening is we have to start to fund the patient. Yeah, maybe the subsidy. Trump is talking about this. Maybe we should take those subsidies and give them directly to the patients. Let them have a health savings account, force price transparency. Enough of these proprietary contract agreements. I mean, that's radical. It's radical what he's saying, but it's so common sense. Isn't it insane in America that common sense is radical? Look, exactly. I mean, the president is right. He's spot on. Instead of offering a framework, you know, instead of throwing more subsidies at everything, he's offering the framework for the future. A future where patients and not the bureaucracies and bloated intermediaries and all of these things, a future where patients have a choice. The people who need care. are calling the shots and not the entities that go for it, right? So what are the people, you talk, the patients rising. So your whole group is representing people, little, literal patients who have been worked over. These are the patients, I always say, the patients who need their health care to work. They don't, they need their health care, they use it monthly. These people, they need their health care work. They're either on expensive medications or they have treatments or they're going through cancer. All of these things. And those people, we must figure out how to cover those people and how to take care of those people. But just kind of shoving everyone in this.

block system that was created Obamacare and saying, you're all going to row together and we're going to figure this out. It's been a colossal disaster, really. It's killing everybody. You know, from a fiscal. Yeah. And everybody, you know, I have friends, obviously, in the patient advocacy space, and they're all like, oh, if this doesn't happen, everybody will die. You know, patients will die. And not if we do it right. And not if we. continuing to fund insurance companies and continuing to fund that behemot is not going to help the patient. Because like I said, patients are still getting denied, even with Obamacare. And their deductibles are sometimes way out of reach. You know, the premiums are out of reach. The deductibles are out of reach. They're, you know, drowning under this thing. We need to take care of those people and we need to allow. other people to shop and they know what they need the best. Patients know what they need. Well, here's the thing. And I'm really tired of the assumption. Yeah. We had all these lobbyists who said we need to have X number of coverages. We need to have these kinds of coverage mandates. You know, and we actually saw in state to state experiments the difference between mandating lobbyist demands and not. And Wisconsin and New York are a great example of that. Wisconsin had the highest functioning. health insurance, high risk insurance sharing pool in the country. We had preexisting conditions covered. We had low insurance costs. We had outstanding high quality health care versus New York, which had a ton of mandates. We didn't have a lot of mandates. We had very few mandates in our insurance coverage. You could get bare bones coverage, but if you had a preexisting condition, you had a high risk pool you could tap into. And healthy people paid into the pool and medium sick people paid into the pool so that. Really sick people could be helped without all of our costs exploding. New York did it the other way, and their costs of insurance were five times the price of Wisconsin. Obamacare comes along and says, everybody's got to be New York. Instead of everybody's got to be Wisconsin, everybody's got to be New York. And here's how we're going to do it. We're going to give the companies the money. They've captured 100% of the subsidies, preexisting conditions, and you're paying $14,000 in a deductible. That is immoral. It should be illegal, but that's where we are in the United States. And Trump's got this idea, hey, let's subsidize people, give them health savings accounts, price transparency. And by the way, for you healthy people, DPCs are a really good idea. Exactly. I mean, President Trump's vision embraces this shift. It's directing resources to patients through portable accounts and cash-based insurance vouchers and protected funds for the most vulnerable, like you're talking about with Wisconsin. I mean, the state should be able to manage that, right? Those with cancer, rare diseases and chronic conditions, they should, you know, the states and the federal government and the state should be able to figure something out with that. And it's not dismantling, you know, supporting the preexisting condition, both and the people with chronic and rare conditions. It's an expansion of agency and flexibility and value.

For heaven's sake, we could do this. In Wisconsin, we had a very small number of people who ever fell through the cracks just in terms of insurance. So pre-existing conditions, you were fine. They blew it up. Obamacare made us blow it up in Wisconsin. It was crazy. But we had a few people who would fall through the cracks who. honestly could have afforded to purchase insurance, but they weren't insured. So we would call them falling through the cracks. They chose not to purchase insurance. They were typically younger. They were typically healthier. Not on me, you know, to care about that. DPCs, again, direct primary care providers, APRN nurse clinics, very good options for young families, kids. The money that you could have simply used a fraction of the dollars and covered 100% of people with chronic conditions and 100% of people with preexisting conditions if you funded them, not the companies, right? Terry, that's the thing that makes you so mad is that we would spend a small fraction of what we're spending on health care. If all we did was take money and set it aside and say this is the nationwide high risk insurance pool option for people who are in really desperate conditions. Good grief. It would have been simple. Yeah, it would have been. It's so, and that's what we should be doing. Every patient, every family in this country should be in control of their health care choices. Absolutely. Every, they should be, we should be in control of our health care choices as part of our mission at patients driving with, you know, funded portable health accounts. Shopping for health. I mean, you know this. You've tried to go to the doctor and figure out what something costs. You know, I don't even know until like three weeks after my son has a major surgery on his ear, what the heck it costs. I had no idea, right? Multiple service billing too. Hey, it's going to cost me. We give you an estimate. Don't hold us to the estimate. We'll give you an estimate that it'll cost you, you know, $790 out of pocket. Don't hold us to it. Oh, but then there's the anesthesiologist fee. That's not included in that estimate. Then there's the other potential service fee. That's not included in the estimate. I've told this story before. I was supposed to have a $0 obligation for basic screenings of like mammogram, stuff like that, Terry. I got a $2,400 bill. And that's against the law. But I didn't, you know, they kept hounding me until I fought through. It took me six months to fight that and get that corrected. But it's why should I have to fight it? But that's how they, that's how they roll. And we are. At their mercy. We're at their mercy. We definitely are, and we need not be. We need not be. And that's why this moment is so important. You know, we can't go back. We must. Look, I always say the Democrats had every opportunity if they wanted to make these subsidies permanent to do so. And they didn't. And here we are. Thank God they didn't make them permanent.

Hey, welcome back to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna Show. So I'm really psyched, and you're going to hear us on WIBA. You're going to hear us talking about this more and more and more about the launch of the Healthy Place Clinic. You've heard Tim O'Brien every single week on Sean Preble. And now there is an integrative medical clinic that is being opened up on January 5th. by the Healthy Place and Tim O'Brien and his team. And I've got Tim and Dr. Ashley Nelson in the studio to talk about this. You guys have no idea how excited I am. You have no idea how excited I am. Right? Because, good, because I have been, and I've thrown this on Facebook or on X, probably 25 times. Somebody please give me the name of a really good integrative medical clinic. I want integrative medicine. I don't just want system medicine. I don't want a pat on the back and a pill. That's not what I want. I want something I can do and someone who knows how to make me healthier. And system medicine isn't for that anymore. It's if you're sick. That's when you go to the doctor. I want someone who will make an effort to help me be healthier as a 57-year-old menopausal woman with sleep issues, spine issues, knee issues, and a whole host of other. So that's, when I said this to you in the hallway, you said, well, that's what the Healthy Place Clinic is going to be. Yeah, I mean, it's why Becky and I built it because. To be quite honest, I've been increasingly frustrated with my inability to help the community in the way that I set out to help them in 2010. The mission statement at the Healthy Place is impact, empower, and educate every customer to learn, grow, create this lifelong foundation of health and wellness. And so when I have somebody coming in, you know, like Vicki, you know, when I was talking to you in the store, like, okay, sleep. issues so then i do my best like okay uh well triptophan really helps and uh you know thionine works great and little melatonin cbd tchc have you tried that yet and so you work with these people for years to try to solve something like insomnia And there might be an issue that's completely separated from that insomnia where we're trying to treat this issue with some great medicinals, right? And, you know, we pride ourselves in having, like, the best supplements in the world. We want to be in that category. You know, there's three tiers and supplements, you know, crappy, good, and then great. And we try to be in that top great category. And so then, Vicki, here's his years later, you know, five years later from when we talked, and you're still battling insomnia. And that's the story that plays out all the time. in our community and so 2021 becky and i were like i wonder if we could build some sort of like foundational care clinic that can really go after the root of issues and that's data driven and using like all the smart devices available like person patient driven where it's up to them they're the CEO of their own health and they're the best doctor in the room when it comes to their own health so

Praise God, like here it is January, 2006, January 5th, we open. You can book an appointment now, the Healthy Place Clinic.com, for an intake. And it's like a 45-minute conversation you'll have in January with one of the practitioners. If you're lucky, you'll get Dr. Ashley. Just, you know, side point. She's my doctor. You know, and it's a 45-minute intake. And then you have a battle plan. That battle plan could increase. include lab work, which will be able to help you with, or IVs, which would be able to help you with, or a follow-up appointment. So it's all about getting after the root of the issue, to your point, Vicki. That's like why we created this clinic. And I could not be more excited to introduce Dr. Ashley Nelson. You know, Dr. Ashley, we've known you, for goodness, our family, for going on 15 years, darn near close from when baby Rosie was born. She's 14 now. And you have been in our lives as somebody that we've respected in the community for years, customers your way, you sending patients our way over to the healthy place. We've been able to see your story unfold, your talents, your giftings, your passion to help people. And the fact that you stepped onto our ship to be our clinic director obviously means the world of Becky and I. And thanks for being a part of that and for being part of the show. Thank you so much, Tim. And I'm just so excited because our current system right now is set up as a name it, blame it, tame it. I mean, throw pills at something, you know, a symptom. But why is your body telling you that? Like, when somebody walks into our clinic, we want Vicky's story. We want you to tell your full story. When was the last time you felt well? I mean, I don't think that's ever asked of anybody anymore. What are you eating? What's your diet like? Are you sleeping? Are you moving your body? Are you supported by a good community? Are there, are all of those things in place? There are so many free things that can be done to enhance your life. What's really going to get you to that point? And it is our job to be a catalyst for you because it's really your body that does the healing. We just need to set up that roadmap for you. So I'm just so excited to bring this new paradigm to the... community here's what we do when we're frustrated we go online and we look things up and then some people like me go you know head first into the integrated health space I don't know how else to describe it there's lots of people talking And we just don't know where to go. We're like, okay, I have mild COPD. I want to try nebulized glutathione because I've read about it. It works. I have no idea how to do it and nobody else talk to will. Yes, absolutely. So it's stuff like that where you say, okay, I've been reading this. I don't know if I should try this or I don't know how to do it. And so now you have a team of specialists. who can help you do that. And then you guys talk to each other as well. It's not like, okay, I'm going to see Dr. Ashley. And then Dr. Ashley never talks to Dr. Bob or whatever. No. I mean, we need to collaborate. We all have our areas of expertise, but there are things that we don't know about. And I think part of that curiosity is to ask other practitioners that specialize in those areas so that we can truly come together and create that specialized plan. And this is data-driven.

evidence-based stuff. This is not like, hey, let's do you need. Right. It's not like, let's light incense. This is about data. That's why I think it's so cool, too, because even at the healthy place, like, folks come in, we have them on these great supplement plans because we're going for impact and make a difference. And there's times like, well, what if, you know, you get somebody vitamin D? Like, oh, I read the, everyone needs vitamin D. So they come to the healthy place. We get them vitamin D. Well, hey, what if you get a blood test and you don't need vitamin D? It's like, well, then you don't need vitamin D. And then, you know, maybe your immune problems you've been struggling is actually connected to your sleep problems, you know? Right, right, right. You have to get to the root of the problem. Do I have inflammatory markers? That's another thing. We've all been hearing about inflammation. The first, I mean, inflammation five years ago is the, that's the word in health. It caused the four horsemen, dementia, you know, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and cancer. And then what creates that inflammation? Glucose. So how's your glucose levels and how's your spikes? You know, you can be... And stress. I mean, stress is huge. Stress does incredible things to our body in a very negative way. So I, this is why I really, I don't mean interrupt, but I didn't manage stress or sleep or hydration well until this year. because I ended up in the hospital. And I'm the healthy place guy. Yeah. And I'm taking my supplements, right? And you're fit, too. Right? I'm active. I got five kids, you know, but I was not. So if I was seeing like someone like Dr. Ashley on just even an annual basis getting some lab work done, like there, I mean, my mind is blown. I'm, it's, yeah. Back to what you were saying, Vicki. So back to what you were saying, Vicki. So, yeah, but I mean, you are a better spokesman. I mean, I'm excited for that. I'm excited for the appointment. I haven't even had my appointment yet because the clinic doesn't open until January 5th. But, you know, talk about run, not walk. I was so excited to hear because I quite honestly have been begging for someone to say, hey, who's a good person to go see? And it will always be one person. And now there is a team. A team. So now talk about some of the issues that you can deal with. So I'm a 57-year-old woman, so I'm going to be dealing with estrogen depletion and sleep disruptions. You already know I've got a couple. completely cranked up neck. You know, I have no idea. Oh, there's issues, Ricky. I won't even tell you what my diet looks like, although I'm making an effort to read labels now. But, you know, what about, let's say, a 65-year-old guy or a 45-year-old man or woman? I mean, you know, who are we dealing with here? I mean, really, pediatrics all the way up to elderly. Like, we just have so many different people on our team that can look at things in different ways. So it's just what's... test does that person need? What is your gut health like? What are your genetic markers? Like what does that whole picture look like? And then we can guide you to whatever labs you need based on... what it is we hear from you when you walk in. Listening to your story is going to be the biggest thing that drives us to tell you what to do next. Yeah, everyone's like, okay, I've heard about gut microbiome. I've heard how important that is. There's too many things. I've heard about, you know, inflammatory markers. I don't know if I have any. I've heard about this or that. Everybody's trying to sell me something. Exactly. Everyone's got a service. They want to sell me. Everyone's got, this is.

You don't know what services you need yet. What they're lacking is a plan. So, you know, I had a customer on Wednesday. It's a battle plan. It's a battle plan. You know, I was talking to a customer on Wednesday, and she has some health issues that she's been trying to nail down, and then she has three kids. Each one of them kind of has a story, one with a significant story. And she's been, you know, seven years that we've been talking on some sort of regular basis. And what has been lacking that I haven't been able to give her and no one else in her life has given her is a battle plan. And so that's the point of the Healthy Place Clinic is you make an appointment. You have a 45-minute conversation based off all the data that you supply. And it can be as much as you want. The practitioners are always like more better. 45-minute conversation. You have a battle plan for 200 bucks. Becky and I tried to make that hurdle as low as possible so that you can get to that damn battle plan, you know, because the battle plan is what's been lacking. And it's still hard to execute the, or can be hard to execute them, right? There's change that's needed. It's a collaborative approach. But people are ready to make a change in their life. They're ready to take the first step. And this is what helps them make this first step. And if it's not the Healthy Place Clinic, you know, you can book now for January. Do it somewhere else. The point is your life matters, health matters. They're both the gift. They're worth fighting for. And if you don't do it, you're the CEO of your own health. It won't happen. So people are suffering in Madison. They keep suffering. They're not living quality of life. They have to change. something and so we're going to be like wedding bells you know i'll figure out some better analogy all across dane county to be like hey your health matters and if you invest in that guess what it's not just about you it's about all the people you love in your life and you're not going to help them or care about them or be there 20 years from now and the way you want to be if you don't take a step 100% true gosh um and health Health, real good health has become a movement. That's incredible. I never thought. You can totally feel it. You can totally feel it. The ground is trembling. There's like horses. I am now, I mean, I'm like. totally normal. I'm in the Costco and I'm flipping over bags of things and saying, high fructose cone strip, I think you're going to go back on the shelf. They don't have much of that, by the way. They're actually really good in terms of offering up some options. But it's on Junction Road, so it's West Side. And let's make it so overwhelmingly popular that then you open one on the east side. Yes. And other people in the community are like, maybe I should do something too, right? I want to stimulate that as well. Yeah, absolutely. And it takes a team. It takes our whole community to do this. I think COVID opened so many people's eyes because we were just foreclosed. I mean, even the sick people were told, no, you're not going to, you're not allowed to come in. Well, wait a minute. I'm sick. You know, I'd like to be healthy. Sorry. Sorry. You know, unless it was a crisis, you weren't coming in. And so I think that made people take health into their own hands. I think they started to read. There's a just. oceans of material out there about diet, about gut microbiome. And if you went down that hole like I did, you're just like, I just want someone like you, Ashley, just to like put it together for me. And that's, I mean, and that's my job. I'm scatterbrain. But there's just, there is, there's so much education that needs to happen for people. And then to know, like, okay, this is what you need to do. This is what you need to focus on and go from there. I think that's huge. So I would say, what you do, Dr. Ashley, for me, because you're my doctor, is you.

take what vicky just said you know she used the word scatterbrae and i like to joke that i'm a d you know and like you take the pieces and you draw them together into a step-by-step program like a plan and you can do parts of it or not parts of it because you're the CEO of your own health and it's about the patient you know what i i'm gonna i like how you said that we have make america healthy again i like Make Madison healthy. Come on, man. Amha. Love it. Emha. It's not as catchy. Emma. I'm going to be saying that everywhere now. Dr. Ashley Nelson, Dr. Ashley Nelson, who is the clinic director of the Healthy Place Clinic. I wish I had to be in two hours with you guys. Dr. Ashley Nelson is the clinic of the Healthy Place Clinic, the Healthy Place Clinic.com. Tim O'Brien is the brains behind it. No, no, no, no, no, Dr. Ashley. I just work here. But you can book an appointment now. Yeah, do it right now. I did. It's how easy. It's super easy. It's just click, click, click. And then there's this nice narrative part where you can just like, what are your issues? And I'm like, do you people have enough space? There's not enough characters, yeah. Let's solve. Let's see if we can solve. It's on the table, man. Sleep is my first one. So we'll see. I'm excited for your story. I'm totally excited. And thanks for having us on the show to talk about this because people are awakening. I think we should do it every month. I think we should pick an issue. And I think we should just do this because I'm very, very psyched about it. And yes, as an older person, as an elderly person, you can be healthy. You can. You can be healthy. Yes, absolutely. We need to empower people to do that. They're giving me the hook, you guys. They're saying we've got to bounce. Thank you so much. I'm bringing back that old boomer word, bounce. We've got to bounce people. Thanks so much. We're going to take a break in the Vicki McKenna show, and I'll be right back. Hey, welcome back to the program. We've got 30 seconds left, and I'm going to be taking a break. We'll come back here at 2 o'clock for our number three of the Vicki McKenna show. And coming up, we're going to talk about how ignorance is a virtue. Yes. How proud. And this is in school. These are college-educated people, how proud they are not to know things. I mean, you think I'm joking and I'm not. I wish I could make this stuff up. But Duke Pesto will join me on the program. Also, more scandals coming out of Wisconsin Public Schools. We'll get to some of that on the show as well. We'll be right back. Good afternoon and welcome to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna Show. We've got a lot to get to on education on the program coming up. But I want to start with something that is nothing to do with education. And it's the breaking news that an Obama appointed judge appointed a Clinton judge in the Southern District of Washington, D.C. And that judge just. dismiss the indictments for James Comey and Letitia James. Yeah, funny how that works.

So let's walk through this. James Comey, for those of you playing along at home, was accused of and indicted for lying to Congress multiple times. He was lying about the crossfire hurricane investigation. And there is, in the indictment, the evidence is laid out, the actual evidence is laid out, that James Comey testified to Congress that the crossfire hurricane investigation was open because of George Papadopoulos. Not the steel dossier. It was all George Papadopoulos. And the only reason Crossfire Hurricane was opened up was because George Papadopoulos made them think that Russia was buying Trump. Now, for those of you who forgot, George Papadopoulos met a guy in a bar in London, got hammered with the guy, and they start popping off the two of them about getting Trump an audience with some Russian diplomat. George Papadopoulos, who actually did federal prison time one month in Wisconsin, had no connection to the Trump campaign. beyond just being a low-level campaign assistant. He was not in direct contact with any major figure in the Trump campaign. But this is what James Comey told. Congress, the Crossfire Hurricane investigation, was predicated upon. We come to find out that it was predicated entirely on the steel dossier, which the FBI, CIA, and NSA knew was bunk, made up garbage. It was entirely predicated on that phony steel dossier. The steel dossier, of course, we know, was commissioned by the Hillary Clinton campaign because the Hillary Clinton campaign intended to tie Trump to Russia in order to evade scrutiny on her email scandal. Sometimes you've got to blow the dust off short-term memory loss. That's what I'm doing here. James Comey, we learned just a few months ago. was involved in email chains and text messages indicating he knew exactly what Hillary Clinton was doing. He was participating in helping her dodge and evade culpability in her email scandal, where she used a private server and exposed enormous amounts of material, including classified information, to our sworn enemies. and that he knew she was in going to or had hired someone to try to tie trump to russia the sealed dossier he knew it and he was helping her but he was asked about it before congress and he lied and that's what he's being charged with and he's guilty i mean this is the evidence he lied to congress that's a crime The judge just said, no. Lindsey Halligan's appointment, the U.S. attorney who brought the indictment, her appointment's illegitimate. So the whole case is going to be dismissed. Oh, she adds the judge adds. And you're not going to be able to, quote, toll.

the statute of limitations for James Comey if you choose to appeal my ruling. So it's dismissed without prejudice, which makes you think, aha, we can appeal this. But she explicitly says in a ruling that the statute of limitations will not be, quote, told. It will not be put on hold. So James Comey, you're free to go. You're free to go. Letitia James. There are records of her committing mortgage fraud. Records. Her mortgage applications, there were more than one. She was committing mortgage fraud. This is what she accused President Trump of. And she was committing bank fraud, which is what she accused President Trump of. And this exact same judge said the same thing. The indictment of Letitia James. is dismissed without prejudice, but she's reinstated fully and the statute of limitations does not toll for her either. Now, the statute of limitations isn't closing quickly enough for her to be out of the woods. But for James Comey, this judge fully intended to basically get out of jail free card. Now, obviously the administration is going to appeal. They're obviously going to try to get this before the United States Supreme Court. Every single element of this decision, including his statute of limitations, has now expired and so you can't bring charges against him again. But this is what you do when you mess around in the Senate. You don't get nominees confirmed. You don't get off your butt and start impeaching these judges. This is what you get. Now we're going to take a break. I want to come back and talk about education. That's what I originally had intended to open this show with, but this just broke. So I thought I'd share that since we have short attention spans in politics, modern politics. I just wanted to walk people through it. We do need to take a break on the Vicki McKenna show, and I'll be right back. Welcome back to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna Show. And I've got Congressman Glenn Grossman standing by. Something I wanted to get into as we were, you know, in the existential crisis of the shutdown. There was really no time to pay attention to this stuff. But now that the shutdown has passed us and you've guys got another couple of wax at reconciliation, can we look at federal employment, federal payroll, and the fact that it looks like we have got, that we have just simply become a place for people to be put on a payroll without ever having to prove they do anything valuable? Open the Books has an astonishing eye-opening report. that has federal payroll exploding, and we don't even know what these people do? It's a problem they're having. Of course, the big agency that we look at is the Department of Defense, where they still have approximately 700,000 employees who don't wear a uniform. And as you pointed out, Vicki, the cost per employee skyrocketed under the Biden administration as well. In Washington, of course, we all know people who know people who work in these agencies. Maybe they're former employees. Maybe there are people you go to church with. Maybe there are people in your condominium, whatever. But the anecdotal evidence is stunning the degree to which we have a lot of employees doing almost or absolutely nothing. And it's just as stunning that the Republicans don't seem interested in digging into this.

Here's what opened the book Sunday, 24% increase in payroll for the civilian, so non-uniformed, for the civilian federal employees, the federal workforce grew by 5%. Payroll grew by 24%. And we don't even know if they're in buildings, Glenn. We don't know, you know, are they remote employees? We don't have any idea because there's no way to get it through FOIA. Any idea what they do, but I tell you one thing, we didn't get 24% better service from the government. No, you are right. And by the way, you touched on another issue. We're not going to mention a lot today, but that is the excess of number of buildings around here. I recently did talk to someone in the Department of Defense. It's not unusual to find buildings around here that are over half empty, and nobody cares about. But you are right. These are well-paid employees. I would guess you could get rid of easily 200,000 employees in the Department of Defense and not miss them. Now, the Trump administration has been to look at that, but Congress should look at it as well. We are right now working on the budget, which is the reason why we had this shutdown for the year beginning last October 1st. And we are nowhere near in taking out the number of employees we should. Trump is trying. You know, in his first year, he got rid of about 70,000 employees in Department of Defense, in part just by not replacing people who retired, and in part because some people took buyouts. But we still have about 700,000. And given anecdotal evidence, plus what Doge uncovered, it's hard to imagine you couldn't get rid of another 200,000. Why our Armed Services Committee does not do this is beyond me. And you've got... You've got particular information about defense. I've got more general. I've got a little bit about defense from the Open the Books report. In general, I just want to share this with you. There are over 31,000 federal employees who make more than the most well-compensated governor in the United States. And that's Kathy Hochul. She's making $250,000 a year. There are 31,000 federal employees making in excess of that. Glenn, why are we paying CEO level salaries to anybody working in an executive agency? Pentagon, Department of Energy, I don't care where. Why would you, why is anybody making that kind of money working in government? Well, you're right. And you've got to remember under normal circumstances, it's almost impossible to get rid of them. And sadly, a lot of apparently Republican congressmen are anxious to do that as well. But you're right. There is also plenty of anecdotal evidence around here in which people are making more than, say, $150,000 a year and not doing a whole lot of work. Yep. Yep. That's the problem. So we don't know what they're doing. But just if you're not running a state.

then you shouldn't be making $250,000 as a government employee. I mean, Kathy Hochul, I don't think she does a good job, but she's running an entire state and she's making $250,000 for that effort. No one's close to running an entire state, knocking back executive, private sector executive level salaries. All right, back to the Pentagon. What are 700,000 civilian employees doing? They're trying to determine that right now. I talk to, I won't say to one of the top people, the guys in the Pentagon. He just got there about seven months ago. He's trying to dig into it and find it what they are. But like I said, anecdotal evidence from the mouths of these employees themselves is they're doing very little. And, you know, they've got their cubicle. You can see how this would happen. A lot of times you have bosses who are not that. enthusiastic about their jobs as well, and you just have a floor full of people working not very hard. I can't even, I don't even know why we're the employment, why is the Pentagon, the employment agency, it seems like the largest employment agency in the federal government for civilians who don't, we don't even know what they do. Again, maybe some of them are really important. I'm not sure because what we did find out, this was during the George W. Bush administration, they were using private contractors, and I don't know if those are. And in fact, open the book says those are not actually included, that if you do include private contractors, it's larger, in order to manage some cost savings. So we also have private contractors, presumably, you know, working on, I don't know what, but maybe tech or something like that. Yeah, I mean, I'm not for people losing their jobs, Glenn. But when we're $37 trillion in debt, maybe we shouldn't be floating the pensions of all of these people into their 60s, 70s and 80s. Well, you're absolutely right. And this has been going on for many years. I think a lot of these people have jobs in which they've done very little for 20 or 30 years. And that's just like I said, stories you hear around here, and which Dojan covered and which Congress itself is not reducing the budgets of these agencies to reflect the appropriate amount of people who ought to be working here. That is a problem. And you might say why. I believe there are sadly just too many Republicans who don't want to lose a vote and are afraid if we did reduce government employment by, if the Department of Defense, you could do $200,000 by itself. I think they're afraid they might get somebody upset. And like I said, it should be low-hanging fruit. Trump's people are digging into it. The overall budgets of all these agencies ought to be falling. We ought not have to increase defense for, you know, new drones and such because we should be getting rid of a lot of the non-uniform personnel hanging out at the Pentagon and hanging out around the country. By the way, I mean anecdotal.

Yeah, and they're not of the Pentagon. They're not all there. Traffic would be way worse than it already is. They're not there. They're they're remoting in. What's what's become of Doge? What exciting, fascinating, exciting, exciting stuff. I think when Elon Musk left, it was kind of the end of Doge. And it was never as formal as the public thought. But I would have hoped we could replace. Elon Musk with somebody else who's going to dig into this further because, you know, President Trump only has four years. I wish he had 12 years. But we are working on right now these budgets for all the different agencies beginning October 1st, and which is really President Trump's first full year. And there's no reason why we shouldn't have massive reductions here. Right. By the way, I ran to somebody. I just want to say this. I want to throw this out there. How about you just keep their budgets? This would be a miracle. Keep their budgets exactly the same. Well, that's what we are really trying to do other than the Department of Defense. And they are talking big about being able to do that. And that's kind of what they did a year ago as well. But given the massive increases in government budgets during COVID, we really should be reducing spending. Agreed. Holding it even isn't enough. Agreed. We should be reducing it, but I think it would be a miracle if we just held it flat. And then truly began to get in there and say, you know, we're eliminating whole categories of employment. The people who are employed, if, you know, if they're nearing enough to retirement, they're going to be able to be fine on their pensions. Everybody else should, if they're not nearing retirement, should be young enough to get another job. Well, you're right. And hopefully we will be. We will. This is not just a goal. I do believe of an Department of Defense, we are not going to have increase in spending in any of these departments. But for the reasons we're talking about, there really should be reductions. And President Trump, you know, four years has gone like that. We should aggressively be looking for reductions in the other agencies as well. I want to shift gears here real quickly before we run out of time. USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins came out a couple of days ago and said everybody is going to have to reapply for their food benefits, Glenn. Is she just, you know, is she just grabbing attention? I'm sure. Or is that possible? Because that could be a remarkable reform. She's dead serious. I think we've been more aggressive with our safety net programs, but they are going to be aggressive. I believe on SNAP. And I think we have so many people here who are looking to reduce what you can buy with your EBT card. I think we're going to make maybe a little progress there as well. I wish they would look at the low-income housing because I think as far as an inducement to inappropriate lifestyle, low-income housing is even worse than SNAP. 100%. By the way, we just saw data that had, and I think this was in New York City, 50% of EBT usage was fast food, fast food slash junk food. So also like, you know, packaged snacks and things like that. 50%. You know, if you're starving and you're trying to stretch your budget, you're not plunking down money for fast food and packaged snacks. You're buying, go ahead.

Right. And you have to realize why that is. I have toured my food banks. Food banks have none of that junk. Nope. Snap is all that junk. And why is because we're not just operating the snap for the benefit of the so-called poor. We're operating it for the benefit of the food processors. you know, the soft drink companies. Thank you for saying it. You know, they give a lot of money to the politicians to keep the gravy train going. And that's one of the reasons why our poor population are, quite frankly, so overweight. I think you're exactly right, and I appreciate finally having someone say it out loud. This is a snap is not for people. It's for the food processors. It's for the grocery stores. It's for the lobbyists. It's not for us. Otherwise, nobody would be fighting to get soft drinks and fast food and, you know, prepackaged snacks off EBT because it's not healthy. Last thing, you mentioned low income housing, and I literally have a minute and a half here, Glenn. Stop. Right. Can you stop with a low income housing grants? Well, you know, the horrible, the horrible, yeah, the horrible Republican Party decided to build more low income housing in this budget, which is just, to me, the most inexcusable of many inexcusable things in the big, beautiful bill. But we're doing what we can to fight it up here. And I think a lot of Republicans don't get white people voted Republican. You know what? I mean, it doesn't do anything except make it even harder for people to afford their first home or afford rent. Subsidized housing is not for the people who are in the housing affordability crisis right now. It does not help them at all. It only lines the pockets of developers and it makes it more expensive for the rest of us. I do appreciate the time on the program. We covered a lot of tears here, though. Thanks, Glenn. And we'll take a quick break on the Vicki McKenna Show. Welcome back to the program. It's the Vicki McKenna show. And I've got our friend, Dr. Duke Pesta, standing by. And Duke, you and I are going to talk about stupidity. Stupidity. Not, you know, something specifically stupid, but stupidity as a virtue. Did you know that it was a virtue? I'm going to read this. I'm going to read this to you. This is from New York Magazine. It's an actual issue on stupidity. The stigma that was once attached to ignorance has disappeared. Quote, the world is dumber, and we all know it. Lately, it feels like the culture-wide upgrade to our mental operating systems has been rolled back to an older and buggyer version. Stupidity-like intelligence is a nebulous thing. Hard to define, but easy to spot. It's not just that children have been bombing on standardized tests. ACT scores are at the lowest in 30 years. High school seniors average math scores and the national exam were the lowest since 2005. or that more than a quarter of U.S. adults now read at the lowest proficiency level. It's also that in nearly every aspect of life, we opt for routines, entertainment, and entire belief systems that ask less of our brains, the stigma that was once attached to ignorance has disappeared, and the loudest and least informed voices now shaped the conversation, forcing everyone to learn to speak their language. It goes on to describe that, in some respects, being stupid,

is the virtue in if you are being confronted with someone who is not. So from my perspective, I think the better word is ignorant. Ignorance is a choice. Stupidity is something that you're born with or not. So stupid people are stupid largely because they don't learn much of anything. Ignorant people are people who choose to be ignorant. And I would say, don't blame the kids. I see it every day in the university. Universities are full of ignorant kids. And the reason they are is because the professors are ignorant too. At least when they might be good at math or science or history. But when it comes to pedagogy and how you teach kids, they're ignorant. This has been done by public school teachers unions and educators and up until recently the Department of Education. It is the argument that because not every person can be smart or accomplished or even literate, that what we have to do is. promote ignorance. We've got to keep people stupid ignorant because that's the only way you can make them equal. Ignorance is the lowest common denominator, right? It's the only thing we can have all in common. And I think I said to you on your show last week, one of the big problems we have is that moms and dads now open their doors and windows. and they realize that their own kids are ignorant, willfully ignorant. They don't want to learn things. But then they realize when they have play dates or soccer practice, they realize that all the other kids are ignorant too. And once everybody's ignorant, we all agree with that's okay. And it's amazing how many people would actually say, I'd rather have a nation of ignorant kids than a culture country. when only 20% or 30% were really gifted. We can't have that. It's not fair. You're right. And this is Common Core, by the way. We could go back to Common Core on this again because it was the idea that it wasn't fair to have talented and gifted kids, separated from kids who were not so smart. So we were going to put them all in the same classroom, in the same environment. And we were going to bring them down to the lowest common denominator. You shouldn't be allowed to be advanced or accelerate. That's Common Core. That's what the ideology behind it. But it's that not knowing the ignorance, now it's okay. But in some cases, it's actually better to not know. And we've seen this in these men on the street interviews where you walk up to someone and ask them, you know, if they've got a sign that says, you know, free Gaza. If they even know what they're talking about, not knowing is the virtue. It's abundantly clear that that's what they're, that's how they believe, that their mantras, their ideology is all that matters to them. And even with when confronted with facts, they reject the facts.

for the ideology. And that's something a little bit different. That's actually now raising ignorance to the level of virtue. Well, the way I discuss it with my own university kids is that they have come to believe they've been taught by their elders that it's not what you know, it's what you feel. I can't tell you, 99 times out of 100, when a kid says something in my class, she will begin by saying, I feel. I'm at the point now where I stop them right there. I said, with all due respect, I don't care what you feel. This is not a therapy group. I want to know what you think. And they can't do it. And the idea is what you just said a moment ago, that we've convinced them. And this is where you get transgenderism. That's where you get it from, right? This is where you get furries from, right? People identifying as aliens. This is where you get. Or people believing that Donald Trump is literally Hitler who peed on Russian prostitutes. This is where they get it from. They've been told now for 25 years that what they feel is who they are. And the nice thing about that for the younger generations, they don't have to defend themselves anymore. They don't have to come up with a rationale for what they feel. They are immune. And in fact, everybody's immune. Whatever you feel is the truth. And because of that, science itself now. is being shuttled out the door because there's too many things about science that are unarguable. So let's just stop arguing and pretend to be whatever it is that we want to be. Yes, I think that's exactly it. We used to laugh about there was an old Common Core math lesson. This was 12, 15 years ago when you and I first started talking. It was 2 plus 2 equals orange. What flavor do you feel like math is? Not what flavor do you think math is because you can't think it as a flavor, right? What flavor do you feel like math is? And there was a literally a set of equations, two plus two, seven plus nine equals what? Something not mathematical equals in one of the kids answered orange. Two plus two equals orange. So that was a joke. We were laughing. Nobody thought that would ever take, you know, catch on. Not realizing that nearly 100% of kids are in these environments for eight hours a day. what they are being fed, that their feelings are the only thing that matters. So we're not joking about ignorance here. We're not joking about stupidity. Ignorance has become a virtue, and you are the only one who has explained it well. That is because to be ignorant is to have completely channeled 100% of your self-worth into your feelings. Not your knowledge. And what replaced Common Core was social, emotional learning. As I've said, every time I've been on your show, when you hear teachers teaching social, emotional learning, you don't have any room in that phrase for math, reading, science, or history. It is your emotions and making you feel that whatever you feel is the right thing. Go back to what you just said about Common Core. There's even a better example. The most one that's most famous is two plus two can be five.

And the argument is that if you say as a kid in middle school that 2 plus 2 is 4, you are actually overriding the feelings of your other kids in the classroom who don't understand that. So the kid who says, according to Common Core and social emotional learning, the kid who says 2 plus 2 is 5, that's what he feels. If you as the teacher or me as the kid sitting next to her says, hey, wait, wait, wait, here it's demonstrable, right? Here is two plus two equals four. We are actually persecuting that kid because they feel something different. This is crazy. That is where we are. This is crazy but true. You cannot override somebody's feelings. That explains everything. You cannot override somebody's feelings. When Jasmine Crockett was just busted for lying about Jeffrey Epstein making contributions to Republicans, she deflected it by suggesting that. You know, her ignorance is totally fine because people are mad about Jeffrey Epstein. I mean, she essentially said, I never said it was the Jeffrey Epstein. But so what? People are mad about him. And these Republicans X, Y, or Z. She telegraphed a statement that was designed to enrage people, to get them to feel a certain way. So from politicians to CEOs, I mean, look. You know, you've seen whole brands destroyed based on the concept that you cannot override somebody's feelings, even if that is one-tenth of one percent of a marketplace. Do you notice, Vicki, even in the conversation we're just having right now, what Jasmine Crockett did is she lied. Do you notice that in public when politics, no one, no one is ever allowed to call anybody a liar because if you feel it, you feel it. No one called her a liar. I'm calling her a liar. I'm the first person. Trump called her a liar. I have ever heard who said that she lied to the American people because that's what she did. Because that's a fact. And she did it. And she thought she could get away. And she really did get away with the lie. Because she feels that Donald Trump is just that bad. Or Lee Zeldin, if he didn't take money from Epstein, he would have because he's that kind of guy. I feel that way, so I can lie about them. And notice again, who, they had a vote. Remember when they, that, I forget that woman's name, the one who was texting during the Epstein. Yes, I can't remember the name. The Virginia Islands rep, yes. Yep. Stacey Plaskett. enough yeah that's her enough republicans teamed up with the democrats so that she wouldn't even be censured for doing it there's your republican party right there when it's it's Because of what we've been talking about, that you had four Republicans that were willing to stop the century. Yes, of the woman who was texting Jeffrey Epstein. And then within days, Jasmine Crockett goes out and lies about Lee Zeldin and lies about other Republicans. And you're exactly right. By the way, Trump called her a liar. I wanted to bring this up. Because he's blunt like that. Because when someone says 2 plus 2 equals 5, he says, that's stupid.

No, it doesn't because he's like that, because he's like that on a national scale and on a global scale. It's one of the reasons why he's as powerful as he is as a global leader, but also one of the reasons why people can't tolerate him. They lose their minds because every single time they read what he says or listens to what he says, he's busting lies. I saw a story about... You know, maybe Derek Chauvin can get a new trial. You know, and I'm thinking he probably can't because if he does, how many lies that make people feel righteous go up in flames like the city of Minneapolis after the George Floyd riots? He's in prison, not on the basis of evidence. He's there to make people feel better. That's why he's there. And you will stay there to make the same people who felt good putting him there feel good now. for the rest of his life and i'll tell you what you said is exactly right don't trump's super super power is the fact that he doesn't give two blanks about your feelings he doesn't care i mean think that one more example about this they've called him hitler nazi every word under the sun fascist and then he uses the word piggy with a reporter who is also lying by the way the reporter now suddenly that's what How dare Republicans not censor him? I'll take piggy over fascist anytime. So will I anytime. And by the way, it's totally fine for you to malign and make other people who are conservative feel bad. That's fine. If it makes you feel bad to make me feel good to make me feel bad, that's great because I have already been dehumanized. So it's totally fine. This feeling, we'll have to do that next time. This feelings culture has been weaponized as well. Duke Pesta, thank you very much for jumping on the show today. Thanks, Vicki. Great to have you. And we will take a break on the Vicki McKenna show. I'll be right back. That is going to do it for me on the program. Coming up on tomorrow's program, furries. Keep hearing about furies, right? These are people who have a kink, a sexual kink about dressing up and faux fur anime animal costumes and pretending that they are alt species so they can have weird sex. Well. A Milwaukee television station has been trying to promote furries. Like, they're just like Packers fans. We'll talk about that on the program tomorrow. Everybody, have a great night. Hey everybody, Lady Luck here, and we're celebrating America's 250th birthday. Now, all summer long, I'm going to be celebrating by playing on SpinQuest.com, which is an American-owned social casino. It obviously features over a thousand slot games and live blackjack, live craps, live bubble craps. Head on over to SpinQuest.com. Get yourself a $30 coin pack for just $10.00.

SpenQuest is a free-to-play social casino. Avoid where prohibited. Visit SpenQuest.com for more details. Saturday, July 25th. I know I will be the best walk away in the world. An undefeated phenom. Batman is a rising star. And a frightening force. What a win for Shemiel Musayor. Descend on the nation's capital to fight for gold. Thad, the silverback gene. Silverback nation makes them noise. Versus Shemil Musayev. Oh, it's over! for the PFL welterweight world title. I'm real. Saturday, July 25th and 10 p.m. Eastern on ESPN. Hey, this is Ryan Sechrest here, and I have discovered a fun to escape from the daily grind. Chumba Casino. Chumba Casino has hundreds of social casino-style games. It's all free to play anytime, anywhere, with daily bonuses. So get to chumbacasino.com. No purchase necessary. VGW room. Boy, we're prohibited by loss. See, terms and conditions, 21 plus. The first ever X-Games League Championship is going down live, and New Orleans has the call. Three days of elite action sports, a season's worth of competition, coming down to one final weekend. Watch July 24th through 26th on ABC, ESPN, and ESPN 2. Or stream on the ESPN app, X Games YouTube, Kick, Roku Sports Channel, and Amazon. The championship starts July 24th. Don't miss the moment it becomes history. These days, it's getting harder and harder to trust what you're seeing. Who made it? Is it real? But with iHeart, everything you hear is guaranteed human. That's why 78% of listeners trust their favorite radio hosts product recommendations. And if you own or manage a business here or need to drive sales, that trust goes a long way in creating your future customers. Make iHeart media a part of your 2026 plan today. Call 844-844-I-Hart. Again, that's 844-844-I-Hart.