Jason Belcher 7-31-26

Good morning. Welcome. This is hashtag Lex. I'm Jack Patty. And we're glad you with us this morning. We have our friend Jason Belcher. Jason has worn a lot of hats over the years. He wore an Air Force hat for 10. And he also has a son that's in the Marines now, by the way. And has written several books, even a history book. He's a historian. He is just a really nice and interesting individual as far as I'm concerned. Jason, good morning. Good morning. How's it going up there? I'm good. What's up in Marine Land? Yeah, well, actually, it's pretty nice today. It's only going to be about 95, which after the past two weeks of heat index above 110, 115 feels pretty nice. You're in Florida. That's why he's in Jacksonville. Oh, yeah. It's quite steamy. We're going to be coming down to St. Augustine and August 1st of September, so we won't be too far away from you. Maybe I'll buy you a beer or something if we can get together. Yeah, it's actually not like 30, 40 minutes down the road. It's not that far. Yeah. Or, yeah, maybe I'll call you as we're passing through. But anyway, it's good to have you. When I said Marine Land, I was actually thinking of your son. What's going on in the world of the Marines? Well, he has that, what they call it EAS now, which is an end of active service date. We used to call it a DOS, date of separation. Yeah. So this time next year, he will be a veteran. No kidding. Yeah. How wild is that? Yeah, I bet that makes you happy, doesn't it? Well, it does, and that's pretty normal for the Marine Corps. I think even back in my day, this has been pretty consistent. Their retention rate's always been fairly low. They like to recruit a new group of folks quite frequently. So I think probably maybe 25% of the folks that enlist stay beyond their first enlistment of the rest had for the back to civilian life after their first tour. That's pretty normal. Is it the first two or four years? It can be. You can do a six-year enlistment. My son did a four-year enlistment, and his four years will come to an end on July 9th next year. So after that, we're taking him to Hawaii. Good for you. Good for you, man. That's nice. Okay, now the war is warming up here. What's going on? What's the latest? Well, actually, there's been quite a bit in the past. Talking about the Iranian one, you have to be specific. Yeah, that's true. That's a good point. There's been quite a bit of expansion. The drone strike on an Egyptian port, I think it was Damietta, which is near the Suez Canal. That's probably one of the most concerning things to me. You know, Egypt is the largest, most populous, and I think the most important Arab country in the Middle East. If they were to be drawn into direct conflict with Iran, that would significantly escalate both the scale and the intensity of the conflict. I don't want that to happen. I don't think it will right now. I don't think one drone strike will do that. But it's a worrying sign that the Iranians can target ships that close to the Suez Canal that may be able to target ships in the Suez Canal itself. That's something that retired Admiral Stravetus warned about last week, and it looks like he was spot on. Those Navy guys, they know their stuff.

when it comes to shipping, and that's definitely a problem. Then you've got the Houthi trying to block the Red Seaport access for the Saudi oil shipments, and I've seen a couple of reports that suggest. I can't confirm that, but a couple reports in LeMond and a couple of other years... The Saudis are about to launch a major ground operation against the Houthi and Yemen, and that would expand the conflict as well. So all around, you know, you've had over the past couple of weeks some expansions and intensifications of the war in Iran, and it's pretty much a regional war now. That's what I would call it. And last night we learned that there was a potential problem with water up in Minneapolis or in the Minnesota area. that may have been contaminated and intentionally so. Do you know anything about that story? Oh, I haven't heard that one. I have to ask my wife is from Minneapolis. Her family is from the St. Paul area. Yeah, they think that it might be, it might be, let's hope not, because that would be the start of World War III, I would guess, if they're trying to poison us through our water system. No, that would be bad. Well, in the break, I'll let you get online there and take a look at it because that's a pretty, you know, it seemed like a very important story when I read it last night and then I haven't heard a whole lot on Fox this morning. And that's, of course, kind of my connection to the world after I get on the air. So. Gotcha. Yeah. So 859-253-59-59-59 is our phone line. It is also our Stuttgart Motors text line, if you would like to get in on this conversation. It doesn't matter if it's something other than what we have already discussed. That's perfectly okay. I did see a story this morning to talk about sailors, people who randomly have a room in their home decorated with, you know, nautical theme. Now there's something else to put in a real-life sailor. The military is planning to do some major repairs and renovations to Navy barracks across the country, and they're not sure where they're going to put all the people, all the sailors while that's happening. So it's a major overhaul that could take years to accomplish, but Navy expects that they're going to need between 8,000 and 12,000 beds and are considering several options. They could put them up in apartments or hotels. But they're also thinking about utilizing extra space that people might have in their RVs or houseboats, looking at prefab modular units. temporary man camps, whatever the heck that is. The Navy says the comprehensive upgrades and significant structural work require the entire barracks to be vacated. So it's not like they just need a place to crash while things are being repainted. And apparently all of them will need to be done exactly at the same time. I don't know why. I know they, a few years ago, they renovated our place and they tore up both bathrooms at the same time.

So we had no access to a bathroom except on another floor. An ingenious. Anyway, it's unclear if they will actually end up appealing to private citizens to have, you know, space in their RVs or houseboats or spare bedrooms or tree houses or whatever. But on top of figuring out where the sailors will stay, there's also the cost. Oh, yeah, there's that. because they, you know, they have a lack of funding. Military's budget about a trillion included in that is billion specifically for facility sustainment and restoration and modernization. But according to a recent watchdog report, that money has been diverted to support southern border operations. So I don't know. There's roughly 10 locations where this housing would need to be located. One of them, the most pressing area, Pensacola, Florida, just up the road from you. I've stayed at Pensacola before, and it was a long time ago, but I thought their facilities were quite nice, although my Navy friends, and this is their comments, not mine, because I'm an Air Force guy, but they said, hey, you know, the thing you need to know about the Navy is we sink all our money into our boats or land facilities sometimes. That's much, huh? Don't get the attention they need, so this could be the same thing kind of continued from then. All right, well, let's see what we got here. 859-253. Ready to experience something new. All trails helps you find your next hike. Whether you're looking for something nearby or planning a trip. Read reviews from real people like you to choose your trail and know what to expect. You can also download the map in case service gets spotty. Plan and experience your next hike with all trails. The app for exploring the outdoors. Download it today and find you outside. Mike Drop, hosted by former Navy CEO, Mike Ridland. What is your take? Was it what you expected? Oh, it was the best thing ever. It was something I always wanted to do. If you show me a clear goal, I'm like, okay, I can do that. Master Chief. He's like, you realize there's about 1% chance that you're making a 3%. That's all I need Master Chief. My platoon went home early, and I just went up to my chief, and I was like, I'm not going home. Turns out I'm staying. That's when we go to war. Yeah, I was like, okay, I could get used to this. Mike Drop, follow and listen on your favorite platform. 5959. That is our phone line. It's also our Stuttgart Motors text line. And if you have a question or comment, we would like to hear it. Now, we had U.S. Senator Rand Paul on with us day before yesterday. Yesterday was the day of the hearings, right? And they, you know, Rand Paul pled the fifth on every question over 100 times. And do you understand why it is so important for us to find out about, you know, where this thing started, this pandemic started? Because clearly, as far as those represented in this hearing, including Senator Paul.

We got to get something out of Anthony Fauci admitting that he lied to us. I don't know if you've had a chance to look at it or not, but the World Health Organization, the WHO issued a report from their Sago group as their scientific advisory group. They had created a specific one to look at the origins of the COVID-19 virus. And what they found was, you know, science doesn't have an answer for this yet. They don't know conclusively. There's no conclusive scientific proof that it came from anywhere yet. We don't know. There's all possibilities are still open. So they are upfront about that. We don't know what the answer is yet from a science perspective. But they did say that based on the initial cases that were found, because the first ones appeared there in Wuhan, China, and the way the clusters of those cases appear, they've modeled it. You know, we've been doing this for a while. I mean, it's not the first time there's been an outbreak of a new pathogen somewhere. So modeling and the way they appear has been to study for quite some time. One of the key findings in there was it's almost mathematically impossible that a single person caused that outbreak to happen based on the way the clusters were first identified. So what that means is... It's very unlikely, almost impossible, that somebody who, let's say, worked at a lab who got infected and didn't know it, went to the market and affected everybody. That's not the way the disease spread. So I think that's a pretty important finding, and it undercuts the claim by many that it came from a human-made lab. That's still a possibility. I'm not ruling anything out. I'm simply saying that the preponderance of the evidence right now points in the other direction. Well, you know, there's this diary that was made public by Senator Paul that the doctor had. And, you know, I'm thinking, diary? But he did. He wrote very religiously on it. And he knew early on that it didn't come from the market, but didn't tell anybody. and took advantage of the situation and apparently, I don't know, made a lot of money in the process. So, you know, Rand Paul's been on a rant since then to bring him to justice. You know, I know he, I, one would assume he wants to get to the bottom of how we deal with a disease like this if it happens again. But I also feel like he wants to see this sucker behind bars because he lied to us.

We have on the line with Jason Belcher from Florida. Emily Will Hoyt in the studio with me. Jason Belcher is on the line, and we also have James. Hey, James, good morning. Thanks for holding. Well, I know I've got two minutes. I'll just make it quick. Okay. You guys look up Josh Hawley questioning Fawsey at that hearing the other day, and you'll hear what. I guess they're accusing him of doing because, you know, I don't have it all in my head to say right now, but he was a former prosecuting attorney, Senator from Missouri, and Fossey's face was getting red. Okay. I appreciate it. Let's see, let's get a comment here. What do you say? Actually, well, I may want to save this for another time because I read the transcripts of it. I didn't watch all of it in person, so I don't know if there was any visible part. I'll believe you if you looked uncomfortable, that's certainly, you know, one of those things you want to pay attention to, but I just went through the transcript, but I didn't watch it. Okay. Well, we got a bunch of texts, and it's very clear reading our text that it's a very sensitive. matter. You're either, you know, think Paul's the devil. Or you think Anthony Fauci is the devil. I mean, it really is. So we got to kind of be handled this with kid gloves. Obviously, you can be disagree. You can disagree. Just don't be disagreeable. And I'm going to read as many of these as I can. 859-253-559 as our phone line. It's also our Stuttgart Motors text line. And boy, I tell you, I don't know what I'd do without this guy. Mike. He just, he'll stay on hold as long as you ask him to. Thank you, Mike. You're welcome, Jack. Mr. Belcher, there was a pretty famous slogan during the early days of COVID that said, trust the science. Well, now it appears, I know that scientists can make mistakes, they're human too, but when you've been proven wrong, and it's been that way for several years now, and you won't admit your mistake. I'm sorry. I'm never going to trust the science again. Actually, I was hoping to get a chance to talk about this. So bear with me for just a second. There is a new book that was just, there's a new book that was just published on Tuesday by Ann Jacobson, and it's called Biological Warfare. And the book actually traces the history of the Soviet weapons program back during the Cold War days.

And one of the things that she found in interviews and stuff that was declassified now that we can read about from the Soviet side, they had engineered or were trying to engineer a plague virus, and they wanted it to infect the population, and they designed it so that the people that got infected with it would not feel sick immediately. They were trying to add features to the virus to make people feel euphoric, so they would want to go out and party and socialize so they would spread it further. But the secondary effect, and they were very specific about this, they said, because we've engineered this virus or trying to so that it won't respond to normal treatments, trust in the government and health systems in the United States will collapse. And trust between the citizens and the government will collapse. And that was one of their objectives. So it just seems to me that's a very timely piece of research to come out right when this is happening. When we are seeing a decline in trust in science and in the health and the government in general, well, sometimes I guess your enemy knows you better than you know yourself. You're kind of responding. You're kind of reacting with a pretty big reaction there. Yeah, that hits real hard because then your health care system is called into question. And next thing you know, you know, institutes are questioning institutes. If the scientists can't trust each other, then that becomes a real problem. Mike, I appreciate the call. Thank you. Go ahead. Jason. Yeah, and that's why I kept, that's why I wanted to focus on it because I think that's a very, he brings up a very important point and it's understandable. And, you know, trust is something that's that's fragile. And once it's lost, it could be really hard to get back. And. That's going to be a problem for science going forward. You know, the country that we live in today, we have such a great economy. We're so prosperous that we have wonderful technology because science helped us achieve all of those things. It can again, but it's important that we work on rebuilding that trust because people deserve to know the facts. They deserve to be taught to truthfully. And if that doesn't happen, you know, those that are responsible for it should be held accountable. This is from Allen. He's a good regular listener and contributor. He says, disappointed that you would have a Anthony Fauci apologist as a guest. The Chinese were behind this virus and all parties responsible should be held accountable. What do you say? Well, that's what I'm talking about. So there you have certainty where it isn't justified. You have people making these kinds of absoluteist claims that they know for a fact when you don't know it for a fact. You don't. Science does not have that answer yet. And people who claim that it does are either wrong or lying. I'm sorry, that's just the way it is. This is pretty funny. This is another text. It's pretty funny that Jason is using the WHO for his source. They consistently showed that they were lying and controlled by China.

That's why the United States is no longer a member of the WHO next time maybe use Alex Jay Jones as a source. Let's not do that. I assume he's being humorous. Yeah, on that part. Right, right. This one says Senator Ann Paul is also an MD, aka scientist. Maybe he knew that Dr. Anthony Fauci was wrong. It just kind of goes to the heart of the point your previous caller brought up. You know, what do we do when the experts disagree? I mean, we live in a society that's kind of dominated by expertise, right? I mean, when we get on a plane, we trust that that pilot knows what they're doing and that they're going to, you know, fly safely. When we go to the doctor's office, we trust that that physician knows what they're doing when they prescribe us a medication. So we trust our experts. every day. Right. But what do we do, but what happens when those experts disagree? What happens when the experts don't know the answer? And that happened in 2020. With the emergence of a new virus, the experts did not know. They had theories. They had beliefs. They had some evidence that could take an argument so far. But in an absolute sense, they did not know the answers. And they disagreed very strongly. And so that kind of left everybody else in alert. So, well, now what do we do? The experts don't understand it. The experts don't agree. What are we supposed to do? And we're kind of still there, I think. Another text never seems like Anthony Fauci could tell the truth even if exonerated, which Biden did. Biden gave him some sort of a pardon, didn't he? That sounds right, actually. I think he did, although I'd have to look up the exact terms of it, but I believe that is correct, yeah. If the origin of COVID was natural being so highly contagious, why is there no trail of infections between Wuhan? and the cave where the virus was allegedly to have originated some 1,500 miles away. How could it possibly travel all that distance and infect nobody along the way? What we're looking for, if I understand the virologist correctly, there's several different times. I mean, coronavirus is a huge family of viruses, right? There's all kinds of them. I mean, if you look at it under a microscope, close enough, it looks like a little crown, which is another word for corona, so that's why they call it that. But it's also a zoonotic virus. And sorry to throw a 50-cent word around, but all that means is, all that means is it can jump from one species to another. And so what we're really missing in this chain of evidence is the intermediary animal. There's tons of viruses just like this one in bats. There's some that have a 97% identical genome to this virus. That's pretty close. So the theory is, and again, this is not a conclusive thing that's been proven, but it's on solid ground because it's happened before. Where is that intermediate species that carried the mutated version before it jumped into humans? So the answer to your question is,

The bat bites an animal. The animal gets transported to the market. And then when the animal gets cut up and the blood gets splattered everywhere, that's when it infects a human for the first time. So that's how it made all that transported all that distance without affecting anybody. Here's another text. Says Senator Paul is a hero. Why are you degrading him? Are you degrading him? I don't think anybody's degraded anybody. I don't think so either. I actually like Senator Paul. have never, I don't like anybody all the time. I don't agree with anybody all the time, and I've certainly had my disagreements with him, but, uh, no, I've got nothing against him. The experts did disagree, but this is, I'm sorry, go ahead. Yes, it disagreeing with someone is not degrading them. Right. Challenging their arguments is not a personal attack. Right. Um, we're just having a discussion about, about a very important topic and that nobody knows the answer to you. Yeah. And we weren't going to get it from Anthony Fauci. The experts did disagree, and all those that disagreed with Dr. Anthony Fauci were canceled and shut down by the Biden administration. Do you believe that? I think there was some of that that happened in 2020, and I think that's something that I hope that future generations will learn from when it comes to, you know, crisis communications. You can lose trust real quick, and don't do that. Exactly. 859-253-559. 5959. Let's see. Dr. Anthony Fauci took the fifth. Let's see. Paul was questioning. Well, I don't know what that means. Oh, here's this. Actually, I'm not going to read this. This is one of those. Somebody is very angry and name calling. And like you just said, let's agree to disagree, but let's be, you know, civil about it. And some of our, I'm afraid some of our listeners aren't. But the good thing about texts and the good thing about delays is those things don't have to get on the air. Okay, here's another one. Regarding experts, although Dr. Anthony Fauci has shown himself to be self-absorbed, he does have a decades-long career as an infectious disease expert. Senator Paul is a medical doctor in the optometrist. I think he's an ophthalmologist, I believe, which is more education than an optometrist. I think I will trust the expert in infectious disease. Mike Drop, hosted by former Navy CEO, Mike Ridland. What is your take? Was it what you expected? Oh, it was the best thing ever. It was something I always wanted to do. If you show me a clear goal, I'm like, okay, I can do that. Master Chief. He's like, you realize there's about 1% chance that you're making a 3%. That's all I need Master Chief. My platoon went home early, and I just went up to my chief, and I was like, I'm not going home. Turns out I'm staying. That's when we go to war. Yeah, I was like, okay, I could get used to this. Mike Drop, follow and listen on your favorite platform. diseases. What do you say to that? Any comment from you? Yeah, it is its own field. I mean, the way I understand it, the infectious disease folks and the infectious disease doctors, you know, they, in a hospital setting, they tend to get the patients that internal medicine can't figure out.

So when the internal benefit folks, we don't know what's going on with this patient, they send them over to infectious diseases. So they get some of the really tough cases. But yes, that is a very distinct specialty from eye care. And so it would make sense to listen to someone who has a career built on the specialty of studying infectious diseases versus just a general MB. I'm not saying you should just discount someone because they're not an infectious disease specialist. I'm simply saying that someone who is has a lot more experience in that area. There was no intermediate species. The experts have testified that the virus was manipulated, aka gain of function. The evidence is in that the virus, everyone who has looked at it admits that there is a Chinese scientist who defected and testified for Congress that she worked on it in the Wuhan lab. Do we ever define what gain of function means? I think people have used that expression a lot. Have we ever, like, offered a definition? Do you know what it is? Well, I registered nurse does. Well, it is. I just read what it means. Genetic engineering is what they're referring to. Yeah, making the virus more virulent and giving it more transmissibility and making more dangerous to try to head it off in the future if it ever got to be that bad. Okay. So that's what that is. And there are. And there are scientists, scientists who believe that that is the case here, but there are also scientists who think that is not the case. So again, our experts disagree. So that's incorrect to say that everyone agrees. Everyone does not agree with that. Everyone in the scientific community does not agree with that. So that is not a correct statement. You want to be civil with someone that removed our civil liberties? Okay. Who removed our civil liberties? Yeah, I know. I don't know. And I think that was directed at me, not at you. A-59-253-559 is our phone line and our Stuttgart Motors text line. There's nothing more dangerous than a highly educated person with lack of a moral compass and no common sense. Okay. Two, um, uh, see, I'm sorry. Lou. Hello? Luke. Luke. Luke. Hey, Lou. You know, here's what bothered me about the whole thing. Okay. You know, at first when Dr. Anthony Fauci came on the scene, he was talking sense. He said, well, the best thing that could happen, the most protected people we have is the people that got COVID-19 and then got over it. Those people are safe. And then politics got involved. And he never said that again. All he said was everybody needs vaccinated, even the people that have recovered from COVID-19. And as serious as COVID-19 was, politics got involved and it was used to attack Donald Trump. And that's the whole problem. Politics got involved with Dr. Anthony Fauci, who probably knows right from wrong with it, but politics got involved and he began to be influenced and not giving scientific information withholding it. That's what corrupts true science, politics, and that's what happened. And it was used to get Donald Trump out of office. And it came back to haunt him because if they wouldn't have done that, he would have been done at the end of the last term.

and we wouldn't have to deal with Donald Trump for two more years, even though that's what everybody is going to get. Thank you so much. All right. Thank you, Luke. What do you say to that? So I 100% agree politics is involved, and it's distorting the discussion around it. It's obscuring the science, and it's leading people to take sides in different factions, and when none of them really have the scientific answer yet. Yeah, this thing, you know, Emily, it really amazes me how, how this strikes such a nerve all these years later. Does that surprise you, Jason? No, I don't think it's, I don't think so. It was a, we all, those of us that we all lived through, you know, the pandemic, it was a very traumatic event. It was a once in a, you know, a century almost kind of thing. And there may never be a conclusive answer. Yeah, there might not. Right. But we might not get there. Dallas, I think it's Dallas or Darren, Dallas, wait a minute. D-A-L-L I don't know what that name is. Anyway, civil liberties were abused. Andy Beshear sent police to churches. I think it was one church, but maybe there were more, I don't know. Businesses shut down. Andy Beshear set up an 800 number so neighbors could report on neighbors. You were ashamed and fired if you didn't take the vaccine shot. What do you say to that? I don't remember any police going to churches, but... Yeah, they did one. They did one. Did they? Okay. Yeah, I know they did one. I do remember that he left the liquor stores open, and I thought that was pretty important at the time. Well, yeah, yeah. You make a good point, Dr. Anthony Fauci has a much greater understanding of values than Rand Paul would ever have. The problem is Dr. Anthony Fauci manipulated the total understanding of the COVID outbreak and virus for personal gain and political gain. Why would... Why would you take his side on all of this when the facts show different understanding of what happened? I don't know if that's to you or to me, but what is your reaction to that? I would simply say that the facts are still being determined. We haven't reached a point where we know what the facts are, all of them. We know some of them, but not all of them. And we don't have a specific, you know, conclusive origin for the virus yet. Well, that's interesting. I'm sorry. Yeah, until we do, until we do, all the politics that are being thrown around, you should have a big asterisk by them, and that asterisk would say these are not substantiated. They're just beliefs. They are not facts. Okay, and this is interesting. The very next text that came in said, everyone agrees it started in Wuhan, China. There is a viral lab in Wuhan, China. That's all you need to know. It is definitely not all you need to know. That small-minded nonsense. Sorry.

I just thought it was a great way to end the show, though. It is always good to have you. Jason, I hope you have a good weekend and try to stay cool, okay? Okay, thanks. Jason Belcher. And I hope you all have a good, safe weekend. What are you got going on this weekend? Ooh, Ballet Under the Stars. You go out of that or are you dancing in it? No, I'm going to it. Oh, okay. I'd love to be able to dance like that. Oh, we know somebody who can. Yeah, we do. Yeah. This is the story of the one. The one who keeps multiple buildings running smoothly day after day. Plumbing that flows, HVAC that hums, cleaning supplies that keep surfaces sparkling. That's why she counts on Granger. With easy reordering online and 24-7 support, Granger helps her keep the product she needs on hand. So shells stay stocked, and buildings stay ready. Call 1,800 Granger, click Granger.com, or just stop by. Granger. For the ones who get it done.