The Mark Arum Show 08-13-26 HR 3

No, I'll run this town to be near you. 1104 on an extremely busy Newsday Thursday. Welcome back, friends, Mark Aram and crew with you till noon. Coming up in 30 minutes, how diesel prices are impacting us all. 30 minutes around, Deborah's got a pair of tickets to give away to see Sugar Land. But right now, you've got a pair of tickets to give away to see Blackberry Smoke. Blackberry Smoke at the Tabernacle on November 27th. The tabby to those that know. Let's do the eighth caller to Dees. Eighth caller to 404-872-0-750. Caller number 8 to 404-872-0-750 wins a pair of tickets to see Blackberry Smoke at the Tabernacle, courtesy of the Mark Arab Show at 95-5. WSP. Continue our team coverage of the war in Iran, joining us from the nation's capital from News Nation, Corey Smith. Corey, good morning. Hope you're doing well, my friend. It would be doing better if I was taller number eight, I guess. If you want to come down to the tabernacle and see Blackberry Smoke, Corey, we will hook you up with a pair of tickets, my friend. You probably need a vacation because the news cycle is just, it's downright abusive to folks like me and you. There's so many headlines we have to talk about, especially covering the Iran War and President Trump saying, hey, we just might keep the straight of Hormuz. I'm sure that raised a number of eyebrows around the globe. It does raise a number of eyebrows and it raised the number of eyebrows when he said it a few months ago, when the battle over the Strait of Ramuz, which is ongoing, began. He offered no specifics. Obviously, from a military standpoint, it would take a whole heck of a lot of commitment, time, resources. to do something like this to have this permanent sort of presence in the straight of four moves, something the president floated a few months ago when traffic slowed to a halt and he floated this idea of sort of a constant protection circuit through the straight of form moves offered by U.S. forces to commercial ships who were a little bit hesitant to move through it. Fortunately, if the president is being facetious here, or if he is serious, the White House has offered no specifics whatsoever on what it means to keep the straight. And there's the stone that where the president says the straight is open, Iran says it's blocked and the truth is somewhere in the middle. There are safe routes through the street of Hormuz on the southern portion on the off the coast of Oman. Alon says ships can come through on the northern section closer to their post line. Those are the protected routes. And as we have seen, shifts that try to go through those non-protected routes get fired upon. So that's, that's where we are. You know, it's interesting. I was going back through the Twitter or X time machine. And tomorrow is two months to the day when President Trump posted on true social that.

The MOU had been agreed to. Wow. The straight was going to be fully reopened to start letting the oil flow. Here we are. I think traffic is down some 90%. Usually, you know, before the war was about 130, 140 shifts going through per day. I think on Monday, like six to eight ships went through. So it's a dramatic drop off. Of course, we see that reflected in higher oil prices. And here at home, higher gas prices at the pop. And relatedly, Corey, we heard from the International Energy Agency warning that global oil stockpiles are rapidly dwindling, which is not good news. I mean, we're pretty much self-sufficient when it comes to oil here in the United States. But globally, there's a panic. And it doesn't matter if we have enough oil here, the price of oil. globally continue, could continue to rise. Yeah, look, and it's not just oil, it's natural gas. You know, I heard you teasing a segment coming up about fertilizer prices. I mean, all of this stuff transits through the straight-of-form moves, and regardless of how much or how little oil and energy resources for America's use comes through there, the downwind impacts are felt here at home, at the grocery store. in your energy bills at the pump, obviously, your medicine, a lot of the precursors for the vaccines that we use, those come through the straight before moves. So it's a global economy. And so if you take. If you put up an obstacle and a place where 20% of the world's oil comes through every single day, of course, there's going to be downwind impacts. And there's really no way around it, which is why not just U.S. consumers, even those who support the president want to see this conflict come to some sort of resolution or at the very least a concrete agreement to fully reopen the strait. Iran, of course, doesn't want to see that happen. They want to be able to make money off of it, charge tolls and things like that. So around and around we go, Mark. It's just really hard to see how this ultimately comes to an end. The president is trying this low-key economic warfare approach. We'll see if it pays dividends. Corey Smith from News Nation joining us live on the Mark Airb show. And, you know, exhausting the munitions in the region, right? That has been a headline. But what pop this morning is very concerning, I think, especially to folks that have family members or friends that are in the military, concerns about the USS Abraham Lincoln and some struggles that the soldiers are dealing with there. Is that something you're hearing about buzzing around Capitol Hill this morning? Yes, absolutely. So this was, I believe I want to say it was a military times that that reported that they had spoken to some family members of service members on the USS Lincoln who had gone overboard due to the conditions on the ship, the prolonged deployments. You now have multiple senators, many of them on the Democratic side, calling for an investigation, calling for a briefing.

on what is going on. Again, this is something the president said was going to take four to six weeks. Of course, in the buildup to the war, he shifted a lot of U.S. resources, a lot of U.S. service members over to the Middle East. And they have been there, what, almost six months at this point, if not more. So, yeah, I think you're really going to start to see some pressure mount. from lawmakers on the hill, bipartisan pressure for sure, not just on the White House, but also on the Pentagon to sort of let them know what is going on. And I believe I want to say it was Ruben Gallego, Senator Ruben Gallego from Arizona who said that he wanted to lead a bipartisan sort of congressional delegation to go on board. and check it out for themselves to see what was going on, but just a really interesting and frightening, frankly, piece of reporting that this prolonged deployment in the region. has taken a mental health toll on our U.S. service members, not to mention just the physical danger that they are facing being in the region. I think listeners, they either are for this war or against this war can all unite and saying, well, we want our soldiers to be taken care of and have what they need and not go through the stress. So I think that probably should be a bipartisan issue. Finally, Corey, are we expected to hear from the president at all today? He's got a busy schedule, but nothing as of right now open to the press last time I checked. But it's the president. So you never know. We often walk into the press offices, the CA, any chance that he may want to open some of his schedule to the pool. And sometimes they say yes, sometimes they say no. But of course, I've always got truth social on refresh because he's not talking in front of the cameras. He's got a phone in his hand, send it out messages left and right. There you go. That's why we count on your coverage. Corey Smith, News Nation, always appreciate your time, my friend. Thank you so much. Have a great day. He was well. Updates on the Iran War throughout the day here on 95-5 WSP. The munitions thing is going to be a big story as well, as is this Abraham Lincoln, the USS Abraham Lincoln. We'll probably have updates on both of those stories tomorrow. But I think part of the munition story or the shortage, we heard yesterday after we left during Sabrina's newscast that the Pentagon is asking. U.S. manufacturers of our munitions in arms to, hey, step it up. Step it up, guys. We need you to hurry up production, which is what we called last week on the show that there's, you know, we could see 24-7 production at some of these facilities. Another munition story is popping out of Ukraine this morning. I grabbed this off of CNN.

This is Nick Payton Walsh in Kiev, had a sit-down interview with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky. Yeah, be in no mistake. This is an unprecedented crisis. Really, most felt in the capital, Kiev here, where the Patriot Interceptor system has kept the threat of Russian ballistic missiles at bay for so many years of the war. That moment is now over, and we've seen so many of the waves of Russian missiles not be intercepted here and other cities in past weeks, making July. July, the deadliest month for civilians since April 2022 here in Ukraine, simply because there's a global shortage of Patriot Interceptors, partly because of the US war with Iran and how many were used there. An impassioned, startling plea here from Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky and an insight really into what he has to go through every single morning just to try and beg allies for more of these vital life-saving missiles. Here's what he said. Are you out of interceptors now? Do you have none left? No. I will explain you how it works. So this year we have two and a half times less interceptors than we had in 2025. First, Russia has two times more ballistic missiles per month than they had before. pay 100% to Americans. I have the package from the United States and then my personal involvement, it doesn't work other way. It's my personal talks, meetings and phones, phone calls, EJ. With everybody, I try to exchange something to missiles. This year, I'm masking American partners. to sell me 5% of missiles what they have in their stocks. If they sell us 5% we will go through the winter and save people life. If they can sell us 10% We will destroy all the Russians ballistic missiles. And has that request been answered yet? Have you had a clear indication of the weather? The answer is for today is next. I have 1%. This is in what I live each day. From 1% to 5% I... I have some, you know, some months and a million phone calls and anything else, what can I do? I do some things which I can't even share. It's not, it doesn't mean that it's out of the law, no, but it's, I can't speak about it.

This is where those US stocks are so urgently needed. This city's really changed. People used to walk calmly through air raid, Simons, like nothing was about to happen. Now they run to the subway for shelter. Every night, deep anxiety that the missiles will yet again get through many days waiting for yet another Russian massive assault here that's yet to come. And ultimately, it seems a decision in Mrs Volodymyr Zelensky's eyes rests with President Donald Trump as to whether he's going to give more. of US stocks to Ukraine where every night they could save lives. Nick Payton Wallace and Kiev this morning. So the big takeaway for me in that interview is Volodymyr Zelensky saying, hey, if I had 10% interceptors, we'd win this war right now. They're not available, obviously. He's like, I'll buy them. I want to. We just don't have them. And obviously, they're very important for us. I would say the first priority for the United States is protecting our servicemen and women right now in the Gulf region, obviously. And I don't think Volodymyr Zelensky would deny us that. But this war has prevented Ukraine from defending themselves against these inbound missiles from Russia. Missiles. Excuse me. Missiles. Deborah's new pronunciation for us on the show. I think that's the way it's supposed to pronounce. Yeah, you're right. Missiles. It's going to take a long time for me to get that. I'll stick with missiles for this segment. But you heard Nick Payton Walsh, like a year ago, two years ago, they would hear the missiles coming in and people in Kiva would be like, oh, don't worry, the interceptors are going to get them. They're not getting them anymore. Can we ramp up production enough to cover our needs in the Gulf and get Volodymyr Zelensky and Ukraine to that 10% number where they, he said it, 10% we win this war with Russia. Got to feel for those Ukrainians. So many. And the Russian soldiers that are having to deal with this and just, you know, talk about an unnecessary war. That is an unnecessary war that has been raging on. And I don't even know what the death toll is going to be at the end of this, if there is an end of this. 1124 on the Mark Ames show. Happy 53rd birthday, country singer Andy Griggs.

A little slow moving country. Happy birthday, Mr. Griggs. Joining us now on the broadcast correspondent Rory O'Neill, Rory, going back to the start of the war on February 28th. We've been covering the extreme gas price swings here at the pump for regular gas folks. But the diesel folks, I feel extra, extra sad for because, you know, north of $5 a gallon, that is a lot. But it's not just diesel drivers that are feeling the high price of diesel. It's basically impacting all. All of us right now. Oh, yeah. It affects us all because the biggest user of diesel fuel. Industry, all those semis that deliver so many of the goods that we rely on to store shelves. And that's the real issue with diesel, is that it's in everything. Diesel is actually a component in a lot of fertilizers. So a farmer buys it for fertilizer. And then they have it in their tractor. And that's when they plant the crop. And that's when they harvest the crop. And then a semi comes to pick up the crop. brings it to a distributor, they get it out to a supermarket, who then sends it out to the store. It's just truck after truck after truck, and those higher diesel costs are killers because fuel prices are about 20, 25% of a budget for a trucking company. Yeah, and looking now, according to AAA, the average retail price for diesel in the U.S. right now is at 540 a gallon. And you mentioned, you know, what the price was before the war and what it is now. And that is just, you know, that cost is being passed on to us, the consumer. Well, right. I mean, even back in January, it was like $350 a gallon. And as you said, here we are at $5.50 a gallon. So it's a $2 increase over this year. You know, we had some wild swings. Obviously, everything started to spike with the conflict in Iran. Then we sort of had that memorandum of understanding that started to bring prices down. But it's not just about Iran. Remember, Ukraine is getting better and better at all those long, far-reaching drones. Well, they're using those long-range drones to take out. the refinery capacity in Russia. And Russia was the big dog in refining diesel fuel worldwide. Indeed, correspondent Rory O'Neill. I should mention this morning that oil price is actually... Down, Deborah, 1.19% despite the uncertainty in the Strait of Hermouse. Billy Bob Thornton's sweet Texas crew trading at $82.30 a barrel. When we come back, Deborah's got tickets to give away to see Sugar Land. And speaking of flock cameras, we're able to just jump on and grab ABC News, crime and terrorism analyst Brad Garrett in-depth on the flock camera controversies next on the Mark Air Show.

1138 on this Thursday edition of the Mark Aram show in just a second. We're going to hit the latest on the flock camera controversies. But first... Deborah's shooting another missile of a prize pack at you. What do we have today, Deborah? Win it before you can buy him tickets to see Sugar Land at Gas South Arena on November 7th tickets on sale tomorrow 10 a.m. at Ticketmaster.com. All right, D's on the phones today. Let's do the seventh caller before he's shaking his head. 404-8720750. Caller number seven to 404-872-075 wins a pair of tickets to see Sugar Land. Courtesy the Mark Aaron Show at 95-5 WSP. Continue our team coverage of flock cameras. We just talked about it an hour ago on the broadcast. Some controversies bubbling up here in Metro Atlanta. Joining us live from ABC News Crime and Terrorism analyst, Brad Gaird. Brad, good morning. Thanks for jumping on with us, my friend. You're welcome. I mean, I understand the benefit of flock cameras for a law enforcement agency, right? The way they have led to captures and arrests of some notorious criminals. But now on the other side of the coin, we're getting abuse of these flock systems and some community is starting to push back on them. That's right. And, you know, the level of abuse is sort of hard to measure, obviously, because it's sort of department to department. But the typical abuse would be like an officer, detective, whomever, goes into the system to try to track an ex-girlfriend or ex-wife or somebody else. In other words, some personal reason need the person has. And so there is one way at least to reduce or maybe eliminate that, which is what Flock apparently now is implementing is a system where you have to log in and you have to ID who yourself when you log in. It shows what you looked at, how long you looked at it, and how often you look at it. So I think that'll cut down on some of this. But there seems to be on that mark. There seems to be a huge concern by a chunk of the public. that flock cameras are doing something that wasn't already being done, but in a different format. I mean, the short answer is they're high-resolution license plate readers, basically. And what do you see on the back of some Atlanta police cars, but license plate readers? Those two boxes.

on their rear deck next to the east side of the trunk. Those are license plate readers. And so as a result, license plates get caught there. They get caught when you go to a toll booth. They get caught on CCTV. I mean, it's a pretty overwhelming number. The estimates are 85 million plus cameras in this country. Now, that takes into account the camera's in your house, my house, your neighbor's house, all of that. So it's an estimation. But the idea that if you eliminate flock, you now have eliminated whatever privacy concerns you have is just not true. And Atlanta, for a variety of reasons, is one of the most Cambrided cities in the nation. The flock being headquartered in Georgia certainly helps that. Let me play devil's advocate, Brad, about the flock abuses. Obviously, there's some sort of oversight because we keep getting our officers arrested for abusing them. So there is at least something there that is catching people that are using them improperly. Well, no doubt, but I guess the question is timely catching them. Is it something that's not set up, unless you have somebody that's monitoring it every day, you can set up a system mark where it will alert you. In other words, you're the administrator over flock, for lack of better terms. And you get an alert saying, you know, this person went on, you know, tracking this woman and it's not linked to any case. You know, so, and he's been on there 11 times in the past two weeks. That type of stuff, I think is with the system that's out there, they certainly can maybe deploy that. For the uninitiated listener, your host included here, what is the actual purpose of flock cameras and how do they work and how can they be used by law enforcement? So, you know, it's a stationary camera. And if they're strategically placed. Let me give a scenario. Let's say I'm making this up. In southeast Atlanta, a five-year-old gets kidnapped. And, you know, the call goes out. You know, it's a green Toyota with partial tag, whatever. You can throw that into flock. into the flock system and see if it's past a flock camera. Because if they're placed in such a way that it's kind of the direction the bad guy's going, you might be able to actually track in real time where he might be or where he's headed, which obviously in a kidnapping case. You know, time is the element, particularly if it's a child. So it's things like that. And so the short answer from my perspective, Mark, is it's an enhanced version of what's already in the system. If you have it on cars, but it's more coordinated, obviously. To jump into it and pull it up and make it work for you proactively, you know, it's much more reasonable to work with in that regard.

It's just so much more difficult to be a criminal in the 21st century than it was back when we were kids. Brad, great insight as always. Appreciate your time, my friend. You're welcome. Take care, Mike. I understand, you know, civil liberties worries, but obviously these people that are abusing are getting caught, just up that, and they're losing jobs and pensions, and that should be enough to be like, you know what, I don't care what my ex is doing. I don't care if she's going out to Chili's with some dude. I'm not even going to bother. Stop abusing the flock systems. I want to continue this just popped. Continue our team coverage of that Air Force One cloak and dagger move. Questions this morning about the legitimacy of the threats from Iran on Air Force One. Kevin Liptack at the White House moments ago. Well, it was legitimate enough for American officials to muster these fighter jets to escort both the plane that the president was actually on, but also the decoy plane out of the country, which is unusual for a jet without the president on it. What we have understood is that Israeli intelligence came to the U.S. with information that they had about a plot that they had uncovered to assassinate President Trump. that Iran has had this in their minds for quite some time, dating back to the president's first term. American officials viewed that somewhat skeptically. They thought that Israel could perhaps be trying to influence President Trump's decision-making at what was a very sensitive moment in the Iran war. Remember, this is back when the ceasefire was collapsing, President Trump was weighing whether or not to resume the full-scale conflict. After that Israeli intelligence came in, American officials also gathered their own information, and they did come up with what seemed to be a plot by the Iranians to use a shoulder-fired missile to take down Air Force One. It's not precisely clear where that information actually came from. And even that was viewed as somewhat implausible by some security officials. For one, security in Ankara for the summit was extraordinarily tight. You know, I was there. It was unlike any other summit I've ever covered, multiple layers of security, both at the summit site itself, but also around the airport. And so they didn't necessarily think that this was a plausible attempt, but nonetheless, they didn't really have a lot of time to ascertain exactly what was real here. And that is part of why they came up with this plan in a scramble really on that morning to get the president off of. the legacy Air Force One and onto the alternate jet. Of course, now in retrospect, people are questioning just how real this plot was, but at the time, the Secret Service and White House officials just decided the risk was not worth it. There was zero margin for error, and they decided to execute this shell game. Yeah, still trying to get more information about the Cloak and Dagger Air Force One switchrew Kevin Liptack moments ago at the White House. Apparently, Debra, Thursday's Lady's Night.

on the Mark Aram show. Belinda, not our Belinda, different Belinda, won tickets to see Sugar Land. No, Blackberry Smoke. Oh. And then Lauren just want tickets to see Sugar Land. So, congrats, ladies, enjoy the concerts, courtesy of Mark Aram Show, and 955 WSB. 1153 on the Markair show. Bobby Thompson had done it, and Yogi read the comics all the wine. This might be the first time in decades. This song's been played on WSB Radio. Talking baseball. Reason I'm playing it on this date in 1995. Mickey Mantle. Passed away at the age of 63. The man and Bobby Feller, the scooter, the barber and the new. They knew them all from Boston to Dubuque. Where is it? Where is it? Willie Mickey and the Duke. Anyway, I was sad day. I was sad. I still have the New York Daily News. Front page after the Mick passed away, 1995. I was still in college. I remember, I didn't cry or anything, but that was my dad's favorite player. So, you know, always a special thought there. Today is National Filet Mignon Day and National Pro Seco Day. I don't know when National Chicken and Waffle Day is, but we had whispers of this during the show yesterday, Debra, but I couldn't get confirmation. You know me. I'm not going to come out there and pump fake news. I want to get confirmation of a developing story. So I didn't mention that. There were reports that Chick-fil-A was coming out with chicken and waffles. A day later, we can now confirm it. It is confirmed by Chick-fil-A. Starting August 24th, you got the Chick-fil-A chicken and waffle sandwich. So this is how they describe it. A chicken filet between two pillowy, slightly crisp maple-flavored waffles, Applewood smoked bacon. Oh. Right? Yeah, so it's kind of a big sandwich then. So I wonder if you can church it up and get, you know, bacon, egg, and cheese. Or chicken egg and cheese. It doesn't have those options on there. But there's your chicken and waffle sandwich. And then they're also coming up with a smores milkshake and a smores frosted coffee, if that's your thing. Let's focus on the chicken and waffles. Now, I'm going to assume because in order to add waffle makers to every chick filet in the world. I think they're the frozen kind? Yeah. Well, I don't know if they're frozen, but they're going to be pre-made. Slightly crisp maple flavored waffles. Yeah, I don't think you can go to Chick-fil-A and see someone with waffle maker. With the iron. I think that that'd be too much of a cost to buy waffle makers for every, you know what I'm saying? Like you go to a waffle house, you see the waffle makers. Right, it's there. They got a bunch of them. Yeah. I think just logistically and for financial purposes, they probably will have them pre-made. Well, August 24th, you can go check it out and let us know. All right, we're going to have to do that August. So, again, we had whispers of it on social media, but I didn't want to come out and just be like, oh, chicken and waffles, and it'd be wrong. Because there's a lot of AI generated content out there, but we did get confirmation from our friends of Chick-fil-A that chicken and waffles is going to be. I'm, you know, I can predict now.

Smiling, Alex, Ashley. Vinny. Vinny. If you guys are listening, there's going to be big backups around Chick-fil-A's. Is it just, is it breakfast? Is it a 20, is it an all-day item? It doesn't say breakfast, lunch or dinner. It just says starting August 24th. All right, 24th. Mark that on your calendar, traffic, folks. It's going to be a bad day. Traffic-wise around Chick-fil-A's. all over the world. All right, not even close. Just turn that down. We're going to do, Now You Know, on the Mark Aram show, starting with Stephen Portnoy from ABC News. Now you know. Karoline Leavitt will be departing her role at the end of the month, so, quote, she can spend more time with her beautiful young children and family, a decision the president says he totally understands and respect. Big story there, Karoline Leavitt. Perhaps President Trump's best and most favored press secretary announced she is going to be leaving at the end of the month. Now, you know. If you don't check out in the front desk, that room still says unavailable. Oh. And housekeeping doesn't clean the room, and it doesn't get put back in the cycle. And all of a sudden, I go to check in. Mark hasn't checked out officially yet. And now I'm stuck in the lobby. you know, reading brochures I don't want to read. Travel expert Peter Greenberg saying, hey, check out of the hotel just for a number of reasons, but especially to check your bill, make sure you're not overcharged. Now you know. At the moment, we've got the average national home price is around $4,000, but in Grand Rapids, we've got the average home price at about $368,000, which... makes it affordable for young people under 35. Great update there from Bloomberg News. Bucking the trend in the Midwest, first-time homebuyers able to actually buy a first-time home because of declining property values and cheaper housing costs in the Midwest. Now you know because of the Mark Aram Show. Stars of the show. Justin Ovi, filling in for Vinnie Drip, who's feeling under the weather, down South Vinnie, Vinny Booboo, hope you get well soon. So Justin gets a star of the show. Darius, great job as well, combining it covering the phones. You get a star of the show. I don't want to dilute them. We're just going to highlight Ovi and D's. Tomorrow on the show, big stuff, big tickets to give away, big guests, the big local stories. I'll be active on social media throughout today and tomorrow, so give me a follow, please, at Mark Arum, M-A-R-K-A-R-U-M. Stay safe. Have a great Thursday, Atlanta. Going back to find. Ooh, who, what's the left of his world.