You Could Not Do Worse If You Did Nothing

Thanks for listening to Chicago's Morning Answer podcast sponsored by Signature, a division of Esquire Bank. Signature takes pride in helping customers grow their business and provide unmatched banking expertise, custom financial solutions, and the industry's best technology. So whether your business is looking for a deposit relationship or needs a ready source of financing, Signature has the solutions for you. Call today at 773-467, 5600 to hear how signature can help your business grow and thrive. Esquire Bank, member FDIC. equal housing lenders. This is Chicago's morning answer with Dan Proft on AM 560. The answer. Top of the morning, Dan Profft here. So yesterday, importantly, an indictment against one of the higher ups at the Southern Poverty Law Center. Following up on that wide-ranging investigation that was launched per uncovering that SPLC, this hate watchdog as they fashioned themselves for so many years, was actually financing the hate they were supposedly interdicting to provide rationale for their existence, you know, when there is less hate. And hate is your business identifying it, frankly perpetrating it. You better engineer it. And that's exactly what they did. But it turns out that runs a follow of the law when you set up fraudulent businesses and you make fraudulent transactions against fraudulent, you know, in pursuit of a fraudulent boogeyman. Their former CFO and director of intelligence, there's an oxymoron, director of intelligence at the SPLC. Heidi Byrick picked off, indicted on Monterey laundering, wire fraud charges. Todd Blanche, the now newly minted Attorney General commenting yesterday. Yes, today, my understanding is today there was an arrest made and there is a new indictment that includes the former CFO of SPLC. I don't have any comments about whether we've said from the beginning, everybody, not just me, but anybody who's talked about this case, like virtually every criminal case, the fact that an indictment is returned doesn't end the investigation. It's just part of the investigation in most cases, which is certainly true in this case. I think as alleged in the indictment, this individual participated in the scheme, as alleged, I believe she. was part of the effort to open bank accounts and completely fictitious companies' names and make payments to individuals for reasons that were not, that they were not accurate as described. So wire fraud conspiracy, conspiracy to submit false statements to federally insured bank, conspiracy to commit concealment, money laundering, and Ms. Byrick, I mean, the clips from her. are just so rich back in 2016. By taking their money away, they can't function anymore. And that was successful. Yes, every single one of them has been successful. Obviously, when these groups don't have money, that means there's less violence that they can perpetrate. You know, the whole idea is to not allow them to function. Right. And so by not allowing them to function and taking their money away, she funneled $1.2 million into neo-Nazi organizations, allegedly.

take their money away so that we can put it in to prop them up and manufacture their existence and, you know, relevant presence. She testified back in 2020 in a congressional hearing about alleged white supremacy in the military. You know, it's everywhere when money's on the line. So I think that there's a big problem here in trying to figure out how many investigations go on of this, who is identifying extremists, how is this being reported? There is supposedly a report the Pentagon does every year internally on white supremacy in the military. Is that happening? What is it indicating? I mean, it's very hard to answer your question because there's no transparency and no data. Yeah, right. But we'll insinuate the assertion. because it's great for the next fundraising missive we set up. By the way, we also find out that, according to the indictment, Ms. Bayreck was in a relationship with F9, F9, Federal Informant 9, an informant in the neo-Nazi group National Alliance. During the relationship, Byrick and F-9 shared a house and two bank accounts. Well, isn't that cozy? And if you've seen Heidi Byrick, how desperate is F-9? I'd like to see what F9 looks like. The important thing here, though, is the follow-up. This is not an inconsequential organization. This is an organization that was, frankly, sanctioned by federal government agencies to go after conservative groups. their hate map, their targeting of pro-life organizations, of Turning Point USA. Basically, they used hate as a synonym for conservative, and they got not just the usual suspects on the left to finance them to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars, but they were incorporated in gaslighting and politicizing federal law enforcement agencies. Don't forget. Chris Wright invited SPLC in to help his agents at the time when he was FBI director. You know, better understand this greatest domestic threat facing America, which was allegedly white supremacy, the white supremacy that SPLC was manufacturing. Ersatz, every which way. There's only one radio show in Chicago talking about today's biggest stories and telling you what they really mean. That show is this one. Chicago's morning answer on AM 560, The Answer. Signature, a division of Esquire Bank, offers Chicago businesses relationship first banking. Signature knows your name and your story because personalized banking still matters. I'm Dan Proft, and I know this because Signature is where I do my business banking. That's Phil Silverman, CFO of Chicago Atlantic, and a client of signature. We provide capital solutions in markets where risk is often fundamentally misprice and traditional financing can be limited. Ahead of an important and complex transaction closing, Signature promptly assisted us in addressing a wire issue through their monitoring and verbal verification process, helping us administer the closing on time while maintaining best-in-class control oversight. That kind of hands-on attention is hard to find, and that's why we value our relationship with Signature. Signature helps local businesses succeed.

Want to learn how Signature can help turn your business vision into reality? Call Signature, a division of Esquire Bank, at 773-467-5600, or visit Signature.com. Esquire Bank, member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender. Sean Fest returns on August 28 at the Western Chicago, Northwest, and Itasca. Registration is free. Go to 560 The Answer.com slash S-H-A-U-N-Fest. Top of the morning, Dan Proff here. So finally somebody on the inside of one of these big government school systems and an urban center has been brought to tears. Wheatley High School teacher Darius Williams a couple days into the term took to social media. to explain why he broke down in class while breaking down on social media. How are his seniors doing when it comes to, you know, reading and writing? I literally broke down in the middle of class because I'm teaching seniors. These kids are leaving. high school and going to college, hopefully after they finished. We had two paragraphs to read one sentence complete to write. I gave them the sentence stems. I basically completed the sentence for them in the model.

These are 17 and 18 year old kids. And they couldn't fill in four words. Four words. I gave them the scenario. We annotated together. I gave them the answers before we even had the problem. and they couldn't do it. I don't know. I simply don't know where the problem is. This is only day two. And I have seniors who simply cannot read and seniors who cannot write. They cannot write. They can reason. They have the ability to defend their reasoning if it's talking to their homeboy, but applying that to a written text, two paragraphs that they couldn't do it. Our young black men, our young brown men, our young black girls, and our young. Proud girl. Oh, God. Anybody want to help Gerius Williams out in terms of why that situation is what it is, since he doesn't know the source of the problem? I wonder how long he's been holding that in because I can't imagine this is the first senior class where the dynamic has been, as he just described. 312-4-2-5600 alphawealthgroup.com call and text line. Maybe somebody in Houston will listen when nobody in Chicago will. Maybe if it comes from a black teacher as opposed to, you know, a honky radio talk show host or a political candidate, maybe somebody will listen. Not here. but maybe in Houston or somewhere else since all these metropolitan Politburo-styled government school systems operate the same and produce roughly the same results. The only variance really comes from the extent that school choice is a presence dynamic in the system. You know, more charter schools that are received better, perhaps, in places like New York than in places like, well, Chicago. 312-642-2-5600 alphawealthgroup.com call and tax line. No idea where this comes from. I mean, it's not really his job to, you know, get to root causes, although an understanding of root causes is always advantageous.

And it may create more of a sense of urgency to intervene earlier on in a child's development than when they're seniors in high school. Chris on the Dan Ryan around Chicago's morning answer. I'm on the Dan Ryan, Dan. Yeah. Yeah. Here's the problem, Dan. That guy says, I just don't know. I just don't know. He knows. He's part of the system. He knows exactly how the system works. He knows exactly how the kids are being routed through there. It's not like a surprise to him. So how can he say that while he's crying? Now, I get his concern and I understand his grief because it is a sad saying that these people are going to be out in the real world there and they're going to be struggling hard for. But the problem is, is that the problem is that, first off, COVID feeling kind of screw everybody over on everybody else on this situation. And second off, the system is set for these kids to slide through. Get them out the door as fast as possible. Let us collect our check. That's my comment. Thank you. Thanks for the call, Chris. George in Naperville. Yes, I hope those students choose a party school when they pick a college. Hi, oh, yeah, thanks for the call, George. I mean, it would have been nice. I mean, he's emotional about it. At least he cares. That's more than many in the system. But, yeah, it would have been nice for him to sort of raise the obvious question, both in terms of how did we get here and where are these kids going? And how is it exactly these kids are choosing a college at this point when they... cannot read or write according to their teacher. And in spectacular fashion, according to the exercise that he described. Well, that speaks to how we have set up free K through post-secondary education writ large and the identity and poison that has infected the system from the outset to completion, whatever completion looks like. You really don't know, though. I mean, I don't want to really pounce on him because I don't think it's productive. Maybe he's a guy who truly is just in search of answers, and he's open-minded, and he's willing to be a force, a disruptive force in a positive way in the Houston Independent School District. So, you know, you take those who are willing to battle in a sensible way with you. Before Lyndon Johnson signed the Great Society legislation, one in five black children lived in single-parent homes. By 1980, it was half. By 1995, it was 7 and 10. As Thomas Sol and Walter Williams, Sol we've never had on this show, unfortunately, not a big fan of doing media, but one of the most important economists of the last half century. I would put him right there under Milton Friedman and Hayek. I mean, the scholarship there and the acolytes of the freedmen's and the souls and the Williamses who've done the research, our friend Bob Woodson, dearly departed. Larry Elder has been talking about this long before I was ever on the air.

And nobody wants to listen until they're confronted with the end result. So 22% of black children lived in a single-parent home in 1960. By 90, excuse me, by 80, it was half. By 95, it was 7 and 10. It's probably hovering around 8 and 10 right now. As those great intellects point out the obvious, slavery didn't produce those numbers. Oh, the vestiges of? Well, how did the vestige of slavery produce those numbers when those numbers were a fraction of what they are today back in 1960? That's the logical trap that the left can't get out of if it was pointed out more regularly. The federal welfare apparatus that penalized marriage, rewarded dependency, treated fathers as financial abilities. AFDC made a man's presence in the home a disqualifying factor for benefits. DC set up great society programs that literally paid women to be unmarried and paid them more for each additional child. Incentives. Reactions. But Souls. Deeper look at this. Black family stability was actually improving before federal intervention accelerated. In fact, black poverty rates fell sharply between 1940 and 1960 before the Great Society existed. Black entrepreneurship, fraternal organizations, and two parent households were all trending in the right direction. The war on poverty didn't rescue a broken community. It interrupted a recovery. from the ravages of slavery and Jim Crow. Nobody's denying those noxious institutions or what America did under the color of the law under government to black Americans. But it's so obsessed with perpetuating the victim narrative, generations removed. They interrupted improvement. They interrupted the climb out. They interrupted, as Bob Woodson used to say, blacks being at their best when whites were at their worst. Urban renewal projects bulldozed black business districts in places like Cincinnati and Atlanta. The school assignment systems trapped poor children in failing institutions, all compounded by the welfare trap. And this happened systematically. Each intervention generated a problem that justified the next intervention. And, of course, as we have seen now for the better part, I mean, going back to just a great society, we could go back farther than that. Government failure. What does it require? More government. What's the problem with CPS? It's not big enough. Not enough money. Does it matter that kids are leaving? Enrollments declining? No. So the poverty programs, as Bob Woodson used to point out, don't support families. Don't facilitate independence. They support the poverty.

bureaucracy that is self-sustaining because what are the incentives for the bureaucrats in those agencies to wean people off to have fewer clients fewer dependents really or more dependents what are the incentive for the politicians to have people that are independent and don't need them or the people dependent on the programs that they perpetuate And they come and say, don't vote for that other guy because he's going to take the benefits I confer to you away. You just stay on the plantation. Thomas Sol also pointed out something else about these programs. No, what the government is trying to do, what is to set up programs justified on the assumption that they are equalizing. I think the crucial thing is that when you try to create this equality, you don't create the equality, you create something else. I've been doing studies now for 20 years of programs designed to increase equality. They increase inequality because even when the programs are designed for disadvantaged groups, they help the affluent members of disadvantaged groups. while the lower members of those groups fall further behind than ever before. And not just in the United States, in India, to some extent, in Malaysia, the very same thing has happened. Yeah, because people aren't that different, and they respond to incentives. And you can institutionalize these cancers and buffalo enough people such that they go untreated. Generation after generation after generation. I mean, what Darius Williams, that Houston teacher is describing, we have this, we talk about this all the time. We have kids in CPS schools. I know it's just data points. It's just statistics. So it doesn't have the same emotional quotient. But, I mean, there's schools where not a single kid is reading or doing math at grade level. Not a single one. The odds against that are astronomical. As I've said for literally decades now, you could remove, you could shut down CPS, distribute the $11 billion equally to every CPS family. Fine, whatever. It's a better way to spend the money than the way we're spending it now. But even if you shut it down and you provided no funding. You would produce better results than CPS produces for $11 billion because there's enough parents that are going to find a way for their kids because they care about their kids' social and intellectual development. You could not do worse if you did nothing. Tina and Joliet. Hi, Dan. This is one of the things that, you know, Republicans have to get sharper at. When we get accused of systemic racism, when Brandon Johnson gets up there, when Stacey Davis Bill Gates talks about systemic racism, agree with them. Absolutely, it exists. And then point to the Chicago public school system that has churned out uneducated and miseducated youth for decades now. That's your perfect example and you can dunk on them. It is the, it is a, it encapsulates.

everything that they talk about, about systemic racism, it's all right there. It's at your fingertips. And it exists in our public school system. Thanks for the call, Tina. That's right. Remember when Bill Bennett was the Secretary of Education under Reagan and he came to visit Chicago? And it's just, this is in the 80s. And it's been going on for generations before this, of course. He came to visit the city of Chicago and he said, The Ku Klux Klan could not design a system more destructive to minority children than the Chicago public school system. And it was as true back then as it is today. Right. The white supremacists, ostensibly, are those who are systemically racist against black and brown people. Our name, Stacey Davis Bill Gates and Brandon Johnson and Tony Preckwinkle and J.B. Pritzker and Chris Welch and Don Harmon and the entire power structure, political power structure of the state, particularly on the left, including some quizzling Republicans. That's the fact if Darius Williams is now interested in the facts. Maybe he'll inspire some CPS teachers to break from the Pollock Bureau here and start at least looking for the why and the how we got here. which indicates what we need to do if we're going to do something other than what we've been doing. Before you see it on TV, share it on Facebook or read about it in the paper. Hear it here first. This is Chicago's morning answer on AM 560. The answer. Signature, a division of Esquire Bank, offers Chicago businesses relationship first banking. Signature knows your name and your story because personalized banking still matters. I'm Dan Proft, and I know this because Signature is where I do my business banking. Hi, I'm Phil Silverman, CFO of Chicago Atlantic, and a client of signature. We provide capital solutions in markets where risk is often fundamentally mispriced and traditional financing can be limited. Chicago Atlantic, success depends on experience, responsiveness, attention to detail, and an entrepreneurial mindset. That's exactly what we found with Signature. Their team understands how we operate, supports our growth, and delivers the kind of personal service that's increasingly rare in banking today. And that's exactly why we bank with Signature. Signature helps local businesses succeed. Want to learn how Signature can help turn your business vision into reality? Call Signature, a division of Esquire Bank, at 773-467, 5600. or visit signature.esquirebank.com. Esquire Bank, member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender. This is Chicago's morning answer with Dan Proft on AM 560. The answer.

Top of the morning, Dan Proft, here is that what residents of Dallas will be waking up to next? Like residents of Dearborn Michigan do at present? That's literally from Dearborn Michigan, the call to prayer. The Dallas airport is now installing dedicated Islamic wudu foot washing stations inside bathrooms. Natalie Winters from the Steve Bannon's podcast, among others, have the receipts on this posted online if you haven't seen. That voodoo or woodoo that they do down in Dallas. What is going on in Dallas? And apparently it's not just Dallas. McKinney, Texas, a community there. recently debating whether or not to green light the construction of an Islamic center or mosque. And this was interesting to hear from a Christian of Middle Eastern extraction, Eddie Issa. who took to the podium during public comment section, the public comment section of the community meeting in McKinney, Texas to offer this. Hello, my name is Eddie Issa. I'm a Sharia law survivor from Iran. And I'm here to tell you, this is a dangerous ideology you're along in their country. Every country that is Islamic now, it used to be a Christian country. And we were soft Christians, and we allowed these people to come in, bring their Sharia law into their countries, and slowly kill us off left and right. Let me make it very clear to you. Christianity is a personal relationship with God, where it says... But render on to Caesar's what is Caesar's, render on to God what is God. Islam is Sharia law. Dean Wadawa, religion and states, which is not even compatible with the American thing. And when these people will use Takia to lie to you, to manipulate you, because whenever Islam is little, they will lie to you and tell you they come in peace. This is a bad idea, and you're going to regret not listening to people like us who lived under Sharia law.

And then the city council voted 7-0 to Greenlight the mosque. But to be honest, I mean, just as a point of order, it's very difficult for a city council to restrict the development of a center of faith, a church, a synagogue, a mosque. You can't use zoning laws as the means to... sideline somebody's expression of their faith. And there's Supreme Court case law on this that I'm sure the city was subject to here. And this is why the vote was what it was. So it's a little bit more complicated when it's just talking about. erecting a place of worship so long as the zoning law is previously provided for it. You can't rezone. You can't manipulate the law because you don't like the particular place of worship or the particular faith tradition, which I support generally. So that's not the issue. The issue is like doing these major developments sui generis like we've talked about previously, the Islamic City that... there was an effort to erect down in Texas. And the larger point is in even a particular mosque or a particular Islamic center. The issue is Islamists and what has been facilitated by open borders leftists and some complicity with Republicans too. And you see this in places like Dearborn, Michigan. in places like Hamtramack, Michigan, where they're debating issues like animal sacrifices in your backyard. Yes or no? Seriously. Debates raged on for at least three hours at Hamtramack City Hall over the new ordinance of sacrificing animals. Really ridiculous, catastrophic resolution. If it's not passed, then we are ready to take it to the court for the religious rights because it is its constitution. This was the second debate of the new ordinance, and there was a crowd outside of the city hall chambers filling out cards to speak, and they were watching it on closed circuit TV. No, it's not safe. or sane or humane, because basements or kitchens or backyards are not suitable places for live animal slaughter. Many people, including Muslim residents, were against it, citing sanitary concerns if the animals are sacrificed in a home and not in a sterile environment, especially in the tight-knit neighborhoods of Hamtramic. Uh-huh. And the other thing that's the concern here is the identitarianism that is being directed in places dominated by the left to facilitate the rise of Islamists. I mean, you have this at the highest levels of government in places like Minnesota, where the lieutenant governor and nominee for Senate now, Peggy Flanagan. Oh, boy. She is a loon.

set up to benefit or service the Muslim immigrants. Massachusetts moves to create a Muslim commission to help Muslims in government and shapes state policy. This is legislation. The bill orders the government to, quote, identify and recommend qualified American Muslims to appointees positions at all levels of government. Why do you need direction? You have people in government looking for qualified people. If they turn out to be of Muslim extraction, you know, fine. If I had the opportunity to appoint our friend Dr. Zudi Jasser to an important post, I would do it because I know Dr. Zudi Jasser and he's a great American. But not everybody is. And this is where that distinction and a little bit of due diligence. are required. It's really not that complicated. We have to step back, though, and not fall into the left's trap of playing their game from the other side. But this, you know, it is worth noting the alliance between these dilettantes like Peggy Flanagan and these virulent Islamists of which there are many. We've played eclips, not just Ilhan Omar, imams in Minneapolis, St. Paul, too. The alliance between the two. Well, what connects the two? Especially when they sort of posture, when you have Islamist posturing for trans rights, or Peggy Flanagan turning a blind eye to animal sacrifice. How do they sort of all look past those things over which they otherwise disagree where the cultures do not intersect, the nihilistic sort of secular humanist or, I don't know what Peggy Flanagan, maybe Wiccan culture and the Islamist culture? They don't intersect. So where there's divergence, why does it still work? Maybe because they're both oriented towards totalitarianism, as Mr. Issa testifying at that community meeting in McKinney, Texas mentioned. It is all encompassing. There is no aspect of life that is private or secular. It is either the state religion of secular humanism or the state religion of Islam or some hybrid of the two. But the point is they share a desire to dominate people's lives in the totalitarian sense of the world, the political sense of that word. Woodoo stations at the Dallas at DFW, a Muslim commission in Massachusetts. Louisville, Kentucky. Rewriting its small business lending program to accommodate Islamic financing, announcing that the Economic Development Agency will now offer a Sharia-compliant modification option. Minneapolis. City-backed business financing that, quote, conforms with Islamic law, unquote. Lewiston, Maine, the city and its economic development agency.

will provide Islamic law compatible commercial financing through, quote, interest-free loans with service charges. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, housing plan calls on the city to, quote, develop a Sharia-compliant financing product, unquote. That's a specific, explicit municipal housing policy objective. Seattle, Washington, no surprise here, Katie Wilsonland. The mayoral housing plan created an official action item titled, quote, housing tools for Sharia compliant lending, unquote. Ian Herssey-A-Lee has a really good piece at her substack. I won't get into here, but about how the sort of the three-stage process for these rapacious... expansionist Islamists, and that's not characterizing every Muslim, that's just characterizing the rapacious expansionist Islamist that I'm talking about. It's a subset. They're three-stage process for domination. There is something afoot there. And frankly, you're seeing it on display. I think a case study is on display in the form of El Sharia or Abdul El-Sayed as he goes by... the Michigan Senate candidate, who's, by the way, we're finding out every single day. Big fan of Louis Farrakhan, Nation of Islam in Chicago. Gee, what a surprise. Kevin and Joe Lombardo. Hey, Dan. I've been a resident of Joe Lombardo for over 25 years, and you don't need to go to Dearborn or Dallas or any other city. Take a drive-through Joe Lombardo. Go right down Roosevelt Road, and you'll see storefront after storefront. It's either shawarma, halal, smoke shop, or Middle Eastern grocery store. It's happening in real time here in Chicago suburbs. I don't know if you know. My wife is a kindergarten teacher, and the only suburb of Chicago where the second language is not Spanish is in Joe Lombardo. It's Urdu. It's happening here. Take a drive-through, and let's open our eyes to our backyard. Yeah, thanks for the call, Kevin. We've talked about Bridgeview. We've talked about Arlen Park. I saw video online of Halal Fest in St. Charles. Look like a pretty big turnout. I mean, you know, it's not just happening in Dearborn and Hamtramck in Michigan either. I saw Michigan State University has, you know, on the website, you can have the copy on the website translated into Arabic. What does that tell you? So again, there is no sort of reflexive opposition to... Muslim Americans, certainly, or even Muslim immigrants, not categorically. That's my position. I'm just offering mine. But the way we've done it is wildly irresponsible and detrimental. And you're saying it play out. You do things. You do irresponsible things. Usually there are consequences that you're not going to enjoy.

Greg and Schomburg. So to answer your question, Dan, what is the distinction that we have not addressed that causes all of these implementations, if you would have it, be it footwashings, etc., to be manifest in our society today? And I'd like to, you know, proffer this. And that is the fact that our country has not really come to groups with the underlying philosophy under which it has been formed. And when Christians announced to the world that, you know, this country was founded on a Christian basis, they get ridiculed. And actually, that's a very key distinction. Because what we're seeing prelude out in the Middle East right now, particularly within the negotiations, is Trump in the Western world is approaching this with the vantage point that there is a benefit to negotiations to be able to better society and better humanity. You get the feeling, and there's a lot of documentation and scholastic work on this, that the Iranians are not, because their underlying distinctive process is one of domination, which goes back to their religion. So I would tee up and just say that this distinction is something that really needs to be addressed and not to elongate any more. But one of the things that's really disappointing in this whole process is the fact that the Christian world is really caving on it, particularly Pope Leo. You don't see Pope Leo standing up for this in any way. You see the accommodation, and what he's leaving in the wake is all of the hassles that are being... you know, manifest within the lombards of the world. Thanks. Thanks for the call, Greg. Well, I mean, I think that Eddie Issa, who testified or spoke at the city council meeting in McKinney, Texas, said it well. I mean, just let him say it again. He provided the distinction, Sharia law survivor, as he describes himself. Hello, my name is Eddie Issa. I'm a Sharia law survivor from Iran. And I'm here to tell you, this is a dangerous ideology you're along in their country. Every country that is Islamic now, it used to be a Christian country. And we were soft Christians, and we allowed these people to come in, bring their Sharia law into their countries, and slowly kill us off left and right. Let me make it very clear to you. Christianity is a personal relationship with God, where it says... render on to Caesars what is Caesars. Render on to God what is God. Islam is Sharia Allah. Dean Wadawa, religion and states, which is not even compatible with the American thing. And when these people... Yeah, so I think that's a nice, quick distillation. Render on to Caesar, what is Caesar? It's not to God, what is gods. It's a personal relationship that provides for peaceful pluralism. Christianity, Judaism. And so does Islam if you believe in peaceful pluralism, like our friend Dr. Zudi Jasser, the Muslim Reform Movement. But if you don't, and many do not, including nominees of the DSA party, and they start getting control of the reins of power, well, then you start to scale what's happening in Dearborn. And that's a problem, isn't it?

Hear about the big stories of the day, then talk about them right here on Chicago's morning answer, on AM 560, The Answer. Only the biggest stories, only the biggest guests, and only the biggest opinions. This is AM560, The Answer. Trust the experts, trust the experts. Trust the science, trust the science. CDC, CDC. Dr. Anthony Fauci, Dr. Anthony Fauci. Mask on, mask off, two shots, one shot, mask on, two masks. Comply, comply. What's in the shot? It's safe. Don't worry. Don't worry. Good day.

You really have to see Jim Brewer do that performance visually because he's such a physical comedian. It's more entertaining. But I think you get the gist. And this was five years ago. Jim Brewer, Saturday Night Live alum, I think offering some much needed satire at the time. You may have forgotten that. That may have been memory hole, too. But there were people. that were unafraid to challenge the experts even to the point of satirizing them, and not inappropriately. And so in the last two weeks between... The invocation of the Fifth Amendment, right, against self-incrimination by that sad little man, Anthony Fauci. And the revelations from his diary plus text messages and emails and voicemails. One of the things, of course, that we've been discussing this week is the question about Vax mandates for pregnant women or even just advising pregnant women to get the VACs. And the science has been unclear on this, which is okay. It just should have been presented that way. And that was the point that Dr. Jay, then newly installed NIH director under this president, has been making since the weekend. Do we know if the vaccine caused adverse effects that could have led to miscarriages in that time period? I mean, Martha, it's certainly possible. You saw that reflected in Anthony Fauci's text. The debate regarding that question rages on to this day. I mean, I can tell you, like, I wrote a draft paper that we never able to get published, where we found a slight increase in miscarriage of the first semester. Whether that's right or not, it depends on peer review and all that, which we didn't finish going through because it became director. Other people have published papers that say that there has not been a rise. Now, that debate then rages on in the scientific literature. For me, it's even beyond that. The key question is, when you are recommending something for pregnant women, you have to be pretty certain because they're very vulnerable population, especially the baby that they have inside of them is vulnerable. We are usually very careful as doctors to say, well, we even say don't eat sushi. We think we take a balance toward the risks don't generally outweigh the benefits from products. Instead of using that normal sort of common sense kind of approach to recommendations for pregnant women at the time. What they were saying at the time was just ignore all those harms. Forget about the possibility, forget about the scientific debate, forget about all that nuance, and just say you must take it. Or else you lose your job or else you lose your ability to go into society. I think that was a tremendous mistake and we're paying the price as a result in the loss of trust in public health. Former CDC director. Dr. Robert Redfield was on News Nation. He took it one step further saying it was a mistake to even encourage, much less mandate, the Vax for pregnant women. But from a different perspective, because there's a lot of suggestion that there's no evidence, very little evidence, that the Vax causes miscarriages or the fax harms the fetus. But there's no benefit. The point is there was no benefit to the adult.

Because getting the vax didn't prevent you from getting the virus. Well, I can say, having looked at the New England Journal paper that came out in April, they reported 827 pregnancies in individuals that had received the COVID vaccine. And in that report... they reported 115 miscarriages or spontaneous abortions. Now, it doesn't mean that the COVID vaccine caused those because there's no control group. So you can't see what the general miscarriage rate was or spontaneous abortion rate in the population that they were doing the study in. But obviously, it's disconcerning when you see a rate of... almost 14% of a miscarriage. I never thought we should vaccinate pregnant women. I was not in favor of that policy recommendation because the COVID vaccine did not prevent infection. So the argument that some people had, that you had to vaccinate pregnant women to protect the onborn baby because it would protect mommy from getting infected, that was not a true statement because it doesn't prevent, it doesn't prevent infection. And so I was of the view that the only thing the vaccine really accomplished, which was important, was it prevented serious illness and death and people that were at high risk for serious illness and death. And those are people largely over the age of 65, of which obviously that doesn't include the pregnant women population. So I think it was a mistake to vaccinate pregnant women. But I think it was more a mistake, you know, Jay Bartichari and I think the real mistake related to the recent. text messages was that there was not an open, transparent discussion of this for the public. So the public could make their own decisions about whether they thought they should take the vaccine when they were pregnant or not. For more on this, please be joined by Dr. Jonathan Allen, primary care pediatrician, epidemiologist, and former CEO of Johns Hopkins, All Children's Hospital. Dr. Ellen, thanks for being with us. Again, good to talk to you. Good to talk to you. So what's your reaction to what Dr. Jay and Dr. Redfield had to say? I think the discussion you and I've had unfortunately for too long, which is this idea of risk benefit and policy and science. And what we thought was happening at some point where this idea that science, whatever that was, was everything. we started to believe that it was getting in the way of really a good risk benefit in a policy position. And so what that means in sort of simple terms is this idea that that we were going to put out these very explicit statements about mandates and not think about the consequences of those mandates. was problematic and really under now at this point has really undermined everybody's belief in any science that that's that is substantive so i think uh the idea that we were mandating pregnant women to get um vaccinated was ridiculous yeah well and it's interesting too just to that point the point that you just made and and has been made like we're still wrestling with just exactly

what the risk was to pregnant women. with the COVID vaccine. You know, we're still wrestling with the science of it right now, as Dr. Jay, with humility said, is like I did a paper, but we didn't, we didn't finish the research, so we don't really know. You know, there are some studies that suggest one thing. There's other evidence, including from people who are pretty good watchdogs on this, like Alex Berenson, looking at UK data that showed fewer still births and premature births and low birth rates for COVID jabbed women in 21 and 22. So it doesn't mean the jabs are protective, but. It's a sign that they aren't dangerous to fetuses. But, but I mean, but other people, you know, are now resharing their anecdotes of like Bill Ackman of the number of miscarriages his wife had and they think there's a connection. And all this confusion and supposition because of the dishonesty, the lack of disclosure for so long at the height of the pandemic. Yeah, I think that's, you know, that's an issue. And then not, so that's the issue around risk communication that we also talked about, which is that people did not trust the public to give them where we were sure and where we were not sure. Yeah. And so now when we tell people we're sure or something, they're like, well, last time we told you're sure, it turns out you weren't sure. And that, and that really does, that undercuts everything that that's important to us in terms of how we can use science to drive policy. Is there anything that you've seen or read in the last couple of weeks since the Anthony Fauci hearings started and the revelations that were made that surprised you or particularly unnerved you more than you had already been unnerved during the process? I still am upset about the Lab League issue that while it probably didn't have a lot of impact on what we were doing in terms of... policy and and efforts to try to control the spread and protect people. I still felt that that just underlies the idea that and it's what Rand so pissed off about is that that there really was a, a, there should have been a concern and a real investigation and the fact. that Anthony Fauci even recognized that there could have been a lab leak, but that we had to slam it down because someone thought that that would make us sound xenophobic really was that, not the exact facts, but the fact that that debate, which was slammed down so hard and beaten up so much and which could have been, and still there's a lot of arguments for it being true. I felt that that really undermined everything else. Do you think the reaction to that dishonesty to really go hard against gain of function research to really end gain of function research? Is that an overreaction or is that the right response? Is that part of at least the right response? Well, I don't know personally whether what

How much we have gained from gain of function research. I just don't know the field well enough to know whether something that is positive that we're all very supportive of came out of gain of function research. So I can't speak to that. I think what the issue we keep coming back to is that the fact that we, that, A, forget whether NIH funded it or not and whether that was stupid to fund in the first place. The fact that the discussion and the dialogue showed that there was a dishonesty about it and that there was a self-serving aspect to how it was slammed down and then used the media to make anyone who came up with a lab leak hypothesis seem stupid. And that really was, and to me that just undermines everything else that we were told. So it's that kind of. dishonesty that then makes what I think are honest, honest recommendations or honest ideas or honest discussions. They're all, they're all being looked at with a lot of skepticism now because you look at somebody who came out and said, I believe that there's no way it was a lab leak. And then you find out, well, yeah, he thought maybe there was. Yeah, poisons everything else. Are you, you know, one of the things that strikes me about all that the, the, the, the, diary entries and communications that were revealed is the lack of presence of Deborah Birx and Francis Susan Collins, the NIH director at the time, as well as frankly the guy we just heard from in part Redfield. It seems like it was a Anthony Fauci show and he was deciding who would be in the circle of trust and who wouldn't be. And I just wonder if you think the same and if perhaps it wouldn't be judicious for Arand and Ron Johnson to whistle Deborah Birx and Redfield. Francis Susan Collins, if he can take time away from writing folk music ditties before Congress and ask them some questions. I think there should be real. I mean, we have not had a real investigation that was that was not, the goal was not to just take what I think was a man with a lot of hubris and which I've always felt that Anthony Fauci had. And. you know, taking that center stage and not putting enough humility into it, even if he thought that that, you know, he could have argued that any, any type of hedging would have been a problem. But I think there should be a full, a much fuller investigation. The same way the air traffic associates here, the traffic boards and all those in air traffic issues, we do big dive downs. They rebuild the whole thing. And there should be, you know, a truth thing. And therefore, Redfield, Burke, Susan Collins should all be up there talking. Before we let you go, do you have any particular opinion on Trump's announcement this week of the revised, recommended vaccine schedule for kids? Yeah, I'm disgusted by it. Really? Yeah, I don't, unless.

Unless worked up about what was dropped and what was not, I was very bothered by the press conference where there was the idea that as they were talking about it, it made it sound like there was no science behind anything and that we were pouring tons of liquid into babies. at one time when we're not. And so it gave, it just can further undermine any value there are for the vaccines that there's no debate around. And I, and so it bothered me a lot. You know, whether we debate, whether you need hepe, hep B, rotavirus, you know, as a child, as an infant, we can debate that. But undermine what has been a proven effective strategy around months, measles, and bellow. And the theory of tetanus and pertussis is just problematic. It's less the substance of the matter and more the imprecision of the discussion of it. Yes, yes. Because that then again gets to our whole point where this debate between policy and science tips into the wrong direction again. And now we're going the other way, where we're not even looking at what is reality. We're just talking off the top of our heads. And this is the problem that you and I had a problem with back when the mandates were happening, which was there for the policy was beating what we really knew. And they kept screaming science, science, science. And we were like, well, but the implications. on the policy side. So, you know, where the pendulum keeps swimming back and forth, and this is a case where the pendulum, because of the miscommunication, because of the dishonesty around the communication and the policies during COVID, we're now sitting here listening to the same thing happening on the other side. Dr. Jonathan Allen, primary care pediatrician, epidemiologist, and former CEO of Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital. Dr. Ellen, thanks for joining us, as always, appreciate it. Have a great day. You too. And he joined us on the AlphaWealthgroup.com answer. It's news, opinion, insight. This is Chicago's morning answer. An AM 560, The Answer. This is Chicago's Morning Answer with Dan Proft on AM 560, The Answer. Time now for another reason why Dan Proft is single. At the top of the morning, Dan Proft here. Gentlemen, if this happens to you on your wedding day, then run, don't walk to get an annulment hopefully you're in a position where something like that could be obtained, just relegated to a... Terrible error in judgment. This video of a couple's nuptials is making the rounds. The announcement of the couple after the ceremony has been completed. You know the drill. That's how that went for... This is how that went for the couple in question.

Ladies and gentlemen, it is my honor to present the newly married couple, Mr. and Mrs. Brandon Key. Mr. Brandon Key and his wife, Regina, Aloui. You did not tell me that. I thought you knew. You didn't tell me that. So the officiant announced the couple, Mr. Mrs. Brandon Key, she turns to him and says, no, I'm Regina Liu, or whatever her name is. And you should see the look on his face. So then he has to re-announce. Mr. Brandon Key and Regina Alloo. And then you heard the, you know, you didn't tell me that like I didn't know I was supposed to do that. And she said she did. So, you know, it's bad enough to do the hyphenated thing. I mean, seriously, do you know, just as an aside, because I was thinking about this. And I don't. Maybe they're out there. Do you know a woman with a hyphenated name based on not wanting to take her husband's name that is not an awful or rawful? Do you know one? 312-642-2-5600 alpha wealth group.com. Are there any three-named conservative women out there? I'm just curious because I was thinking about this ever having to watch this painful video and none jumped to mind. But also the announcement of the couple. And then she feels the need at that moment. She can't let it go. She turns to him and then she has to have this sort of awkward follow-up announcement declaring her independence from her husband. How do you think that marriage is going to work out? Now, he might be one of these male impersonators that you find in downtown Hinsdale. So, you know, maybe he will just allow himself to be rolled over sort of sounded like that way. Like I think he's the one who said, oh, no, I loved it. Of course you did. Anyway, that is, I mean, you're dating someone like that or something like that happens. Somebody should have objected. If the male impersonator doesn't have. The stones to say, you know, why don't you tamp this down? Don't do that. If he doesn't have, a friend, does he have no male friends? Needs to intervene in that moment. That's just, I mean, just incredible. Glenn in Orlando, you're on Chicago's morning answer. Yeah, good morning, Dan. You know, with the recent breakup of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her fiancé, I was thinking, now is your chance, Dan. But then I thought, no, you've got to spare Dan a life of misery, spare him that. So maybe your next gig, you can do the new dating game with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. You'd be the moderator and interview the three lucky bachelors for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. I could see a show like that. Thanks for the call, Glenn. It's a good idea.

My transition. I don't know if this is true. I haven't verified the statistic, but Matt Walsh commenting on this, marriages where the woman keeps her maiden name are 50% more likely to end in divorce. There's a reason for that. The indication is that it's a leading indicator of where this thing is going because, well. Oh, a text 815, yes me. I assume that's yes me, a conservative woman. who's got a hyphenated last name or kept her last name or maybe had her husband take her name. I don't know. I'd love for 815 to call in. 708. Kimberly Guilfoyle Gavin Newsom. Yeah, that worked out well. Kimberly Gifoyle Gavin Newsom. Oh, we got one. Melody and Woodridge. Hey, Dan, how's it going? Good. How are you? I'm good. All right. Tell me about it. I hyphenated my name. I had Lynn for the middle name, and I decided I didn't like it because my last name is Kim. And so I decided I wanted to keep my maiden name and just hyphenated. Not in the intention of, oh, if I ever get divorced, I want to go ahead and drop my name. Just keep the tradition of my last name. Okay. And your husband is not a male impersonator? No. No, he's not. He's a full of red-buddy male. He sure is. And he was not offended or he didn't take, he didn't think, oh, my God, you know, what are you doing? He wasn't crazy or anything saying, oh, don't do that. What are you're going to do divorce me? But we've been married for 36 years now. Okay. All right. All right. I mean, you know, there's, you know, there's always diamonds in the rough out there, I suppose. There's always contraindicators. Okay. No, and I think during the time when I got married, it was one of the things to do. I think our play... we were going to end in divorce. I mean, I had a couple other friends that did the same thing, too. And so they've kept their names hyphenated. I don't always write my name hyphenated either. It's not like a run around, say, oh, I got my name, abandoned, or, you know, I'm trying to be edge cutting, but definitely not a liberal. Let me, let me ask you this. When the officiant at your wedding announced, I now give you Mr. and Mrs. How did that go? Oh, so here's the deal. I didn't get married in church. I went to the JP, and so it was low key. And so I didn't have the shock. I mean, if there was no announcement. No, there was no announcement. I mean, the family knew about it that we did. I didn't name or name, but it wasn't. All right. Well, that was, you know what? Actually, I respect that. Just go to the JP. I mean, you're doing the church, too. But the JP, like, let's not, like, waste money on the pomp and circumstance. Let's just get this done and get on with our lives. I do respect that. That's good.

So I'll tell you the truth with that. I mean, the choice was either my parents are you can, we can give you money for a wedding or you can take the money and put it towards the house. And we couldn't afford it. I mean, it was 21 years old. We couldn't afford to have that big deal. And plus two, I, you know, I've got a lot of friends now that have been divorced and $30,000 they spent. Totally. Totally. Nothing. You made the right call. Yeah. 100%. I completely agree. Thanks for the call. Melody. Appreciate it. All right. All right. So we found at least one. Mike in Plainfield. Hey, good morning, Dan. So I actually literally just had this conversation with my 21-year-old daughter last night. She leans conservative. She is a lesbian and plans on marrying her woman or whatever. She said that she stated that she wants to have the hyphenated name, and I was just kind of like, here we go. And then when she explained how she wants to keep, like, the lineage going and talk about how my grandfather and, you know, her grandpa and then her dad and everybody, we have the name, and she's like, you know, what if, you know, God forbid, something happens deep in the family, we want to keep that name going. So I kind of understood that a little bit more, but... It's not really a traditional value or role for her anyway because she's a lesbian. Oh, well. Okay. All right. Okay. All right. Thanks for the call, Mike. I get it. Oh, look at this. I got a text from Amy Jacobson. I assume she could let me read this on the air. I would have read it if she was here. She sent it to me. All right. Here's Amy Jacobson's comment on this. I never changed my name. I gave that, I give that marriage six months, so she agrees with me. So I must be in the right direction here. My first marriage ended a divorce. Of course, we all know this. The pastor at my wedding said, I now pronounce you man and wife. Yeah. Well, I mean, but where was, I mean, I don't know where she, her first marriage, where she got married, maybe she'll call in and tell us. But, you know, she goes to that, that coven in Lakeview that pretends to be a church. So if it was there, of course. I'm surprised you could even get man and wife out of any, you know, officiant at that church. But if it was somewhere else, I don't know. And I think, I mean, I, you know, I don't want to speak out of school, but I think Amy married a beta, the first go-round. Second go-round much better. Her husband, Chris, is a great guy and like a man. So, you know, you live and you learn, I suppose. Matt in Birmingham, Alabama. Well, yes, my wife actually kept her maiden a very conservative woman. We've been married for 35 going on 36 years. And what had happened is my mom shared the same name as my wife's first name as my wife does. So my mom early on in our dating wrote her letter and said, you might be a Carol.

Henry, but I'll always be the Carol Henry. So my liberal, 70th feminist mother, poisoned that well. And my wife is like, look, I don't want to deal with this for the rest of our married life. I said, I don't either. She said, I think I'm just going to keep my maiden name. I said, perfect. So 35, 1, 36 years of marriage, no issues at all. I love her. And we love each other. And my mom's passed away. That's all done, but she's going to keep her maiden name. All right. So she got the last laugh, sort of speak. Yeah. Yes, she did. Thanks, Matt. Sorry for the gallows humor there. Amy Jacobson from Chicago? Yes, sir. West Lakeview. How are you? The bad signal has been admitted. I'm responding, sir. First time caller, long time listener. Exactly. How did you know? What do I win a T-shirt? Woo! All right. So did you hear my characterization of your first effort? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Go ahead. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I was going to hyphenate my name and be Amy Jacobson. But I was on TV at the time, and my news director at the time said, I don't think you can pass yourself off in a Puerto Rican, a Buriqua. So I just decided to keep Jacobson. Of course, the marriage didn't work, yada, yada. But I have a lot of friends who have hyphenated names, and I can't stand that. Like, just pick a name and stick with it, you know? Are any of your friends with hyphenated names married to men, though? One's an impersonator. One kind of mannish, if you know what I mean. The other one has been completely demasconized by his wife because she does all the chores and he does nothing. So yeah, it's been fun to watch, that's for sure. But all my nieces, I tell them, when you do get married, just take your husband's last name. Does the friend who does all the chores and the husband does nothing, does she have a sister? Stop it. I'm going to mark it. Yeah. Just don't change your last name, Dan, okay? And when you get married, I want to be your flower girl. Yeah. All right. Thanks, Amy. Go prep for your show already. All right. Thank you. Bye. Bye. Chris in Hampshire. Hey. How are you? Good. How are you? Good. So when I got married, I did not change my last name. I got married in my early 30s. And the main reason was because there were already two Mrs. Walshs out there. Oh, there were too many, as you said? Is that what Walsh? Is that it? No, there were two. Oh, there were two? Literally two. Yeah, I'm number three. Oh, I see. I see. I see. I see. Okay. So you wanted a little bit of a distinction from the crowd. Yeah. Exactly. Okay. All right. All right. Very good. Thanks for the call, Chris. Somebody texted in Sarah Mike Huckabee Bernie Sanders. Yeah, but that's sort of like the Amy keeping her name for professional reasons. You hear Sarah Bernie Sanders a lot, too. I think she was using the Mike Huckabee for a while because, you know.

She was on a Mike Huckabee on the ballot in Arkansas is a helpful name. So I think she's pretty traditional in that way. Matt's outside. Hey, maybe these chuggler women, they aren't changed for their last name because they're a friend. They won't be able to get a new ID to vote. Yeah, right. Yeah, thanks, man. They bought into the SAVE Act propaganda voting rights are under assault. Oh, brother. Steve and Downers Grove. Yeah, two very quick comments. Dan, they both kind of related. Some people think, what do you mean? Sarah Mike Huckabee Bernie Sanders will be the next Republican nominee for president in 2028. So that'd be kind of cool. Plus, what I really called about was the WNBA seems to have a new national anthem. Shania Twain's song, man, I feel like a woman. There you go. I just want to do listeners. There you go. Well done, Steve. Yeah, it's very good. Deborah Arlington Heights. Hey, Dan. You know, when it was popular to hyphenate your name, I didn't do it. I changed my name. I got married in church, which at the time, they would always say I now pronounce you man and wife. I did get divorced, unfortunately, but I do not recommend getting married by the justice of the peace at the courthouse because it's extremely impersonal. When I got remarried, we got, we did it at the courthouse. And I had this whole thing that I wrote. And the guy's like, we don't have time for that. And I'm like, what? Yeah, it's an assembly line here. Yeah, I got to turn these things in two minutes or less. It's fast food to drive-through marriages. He's like, what do you want for 20 bucks after I said that? I'm like, what? Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, this is where, this is where, yeah, well, you do the private ceremony at the house or something if you want to do things, you know, in a cost-effective way. Yeah, I agree. But, you know, Our friend from Woodridge was, you know, 21. They were just crazy kids wanting to get that down payment from mom and dad for the house and get on with their lives. I understand. Frank, Board of Trade, this should be good. My best man from my wedding changed his name to his wife's name. after they got married. And that was because he had a usual name and he was a convicted felon. Of course. Yeah. Right. Stay one step out of the law. That's legitimate. I'll buy that for changing your name to the wife's name. Yeah. Smart. Bill Northwest Side. Yeah, Dan, just your opinion. Why on earth do you think guys date and or marry women like that? Is it low self-esteem, low testosterone? What's your opinion on that? Why do you think they set themselves up like this for failure? Yeah, thanks for the call. I mean, I don't crawl in the mind of the beta male. It's tough. I think it's, you know, probably there's a lot of guys that can't be alone.

So they're holding on to whoever they think they can get. You know, they're afraid of the unknown if they, you know, if they do this or there has to be somebody better out there for me. I don't want to. I put all this work in on this one, maybe. I don't know. They, or, you know, a lot of guys just want, they want a woman to run the household and run over them and just be told what to do. They're, you know, they're not equipped for one reason or the other to. Be men. You know, you have a lot of grown-up adolescents, both sexes, but a lot of grown-up adolescents, including men, you know. I'm not here always to blame the distaff side. Barb and the Grange. Yes, hi, Dan. I've been listening to you for a long time, so really excited. Thank you. But I just wanted, you're welcome. I just wanted to mention my best friend, Laura, and my sister-in-law, Mary Jen, who both kept their maiden names, and they've been married for over 40 years and are very conservative, traditional. And what was, why did they keep their maiden names? Well, I have a really awful Polish name. God bless my father. He's not listening anymore. But my sister-in-law didn't want to take that name. And I think my best friend, it was for professional reasons. Okay. All right. Very good. Thanks for the call. As I said, there are exceptions to the rule. But I think overwhelmingly, I'm on pretty solid footing there. Gosh, do we have time for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez? We'll make time. You know, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, we found out, has split. You know, now she made a big performative thing about taking hormone treatments to freeze her eggs. And there's a good piece by Caitlin Flanagan and free press about women. of a particular age like 36 or older freezing their eggs and like you think that's buying you time and maybe maybe it is but the success rates are not as high as many women think with respect to freezing eggs and then being able to you know have a child But anyway, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez broke up with the beta male that she had been dating for a decade or something. But she doesn't want to talk about her private life. She only wants to put her midriff on display while she's in the process of freezing her eggs. Like that's her public life. Just wondering, are you and Riley John Roberts still together? I don't comment on my private life, but thank you. Yeah, right. Your mother once said she loves Riley and wants to see you guys get married. Is she going to get her wish? Again, I don't comment on my private life, but thank you. Is there anything at all you can tell us about the relationship? No, I'm sorry, thank you. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is shoeing the paparazzi. Well, this is the type of male. I mean, for people that are trying to understand this, that takes their wife, I mean, that has the wife with a hyphenated name, or maybe even goes so far as to take the wife's name.

And he's not a convicted felon, unlike Frank from the Board of Trades, buddy. This is Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Riley John Roberts in happier times. So, Riley, what has been helpful to you in combating racism? I think it's helpful and important to talk to other white people about racism. And I think a lot of people... They don't want to be racist. They don't think that they're racist. But they also don't know some of the things that they believe or say are and can be racist. And I think one of the, like, effective ways is just to talk and kind of help teach them about why some of the things they believe or say or think are wrong. Not necessarily racist, but that they're wrong. And that'll sort of, like, chip away. you know, contribute to some development in this area, but not necessarily take somebody from, like, being a racist to not being a racist in one conversation. And it's just always being open to learning about racist things that we may have said or done without judgment and defensiveness. What a bitch that Riley was. And the funny thing about it is, you know, she has no respect for him. It was inevitable. And she'll run over him for a while until it gets problematic or she doesn't need his financial underwriting anymore since, you know, he didn't have to disclose his economic particulars because they weren't married. So maybe that was one of the reasons they were in this stasis for so long. But anyway, that Riley John Roberts. You know the profile. And you know how it ends. The stories you need to know to start your day. This is Chicago's morning answer on AM 560 The Answer. Sean Fest returns on August 28 at the Western Chicago Northwest in Itasca. Registration is free. Go to 560 The Answer.com slash S-H-A-U-N-Fest.

Top of the morning, Dan Prop's here. The fall of Jason Ardei, the celebrated sociology professor, University of Cambridge. It's another cautionary tale about higher education in the West, like the essay we poured over in the Atlantic yesterday by that Bates College comparative lit professor. Really good. The Ardae story in some. I'm Professor of Sociology of Education at the University of Cambridge. Three years ago, Jason Rade became the youngest ever black professor appointed at Cambridge University, an 800-year-old institution. Professor Jason Rade joins us now. He was interviewed about the achievement on CBS News. If I'm being absolutely candid and honest, not many teachers at school have any belief in me. Now Ardei has fallen from grace, accused of plagiarising some of his academic writing and lying about claims he ran 600 miles in six days to raise money for charity. The scandal's front page news here in the UK and the former professor of sociology of education has now resigned, saying in a statement that it should not be mistaken for an acceptance of the narratives that have surrounded him. Cambridge University says it's launched an investigation. There are now questions about Arde's autobiography, scheduled to be published this month. Holly Williams, CBS News, London. Yeah, I mean, there's nothing suspicious in his background, nonverbally autistic until age 12. Couldn't read her right until 18. Dick Schlesk. dyslexic epileptic because he was beaten by four boys who he forgave two of the boys took his class and hugged him he had a brain tumor at a mini stroke and memory loss he ran 30 marathons and 35 days including one with a broken leg um And, no, no, I'm sorry. Yeah, that was number 20. His 20th marathon, he fell and broke his fibule, but he ran 10 more marathons in that time period anyway. And that was all received without skepticism from the academic elites at the University of Cambridge. Of course it was. Because he was the most talent, one of the most talented minds of his generation. as evidenced by these deep thoughts on topics like meritocracy. Meritocracy is a great, it's great in theory, but in actual practice, it falls.

time and time and time again because meritocracy in itself is not equal. There is no equity in meritocracy. Only a small proportion or a certain group of people from society benefit from meritocracy. And we know equality and equity are not synonyms, but antonyms. I don't know if he was conflating the two purposefully or not. I'm guessing not based on the quality of his... communications, work product. Anyway, a lot of academics have been weighing in on this, but I like this piece in unheard by a former student of Jason Ardae's at Roe Hampton. She's writing of the pseudonym Fiona Brown, and she offers Jason Ardae in the context of the parable of the post turtle, where a farmer finds a turtle stuck on a fence post. That post turtle didn't get up there by himself, the farmer says. He doesn't belong there. And you wonder who put him there. He has no idea what to do while he's up there. And having been elevated beyond his ability to function, he's never going to get anything done while he's there. He adds, you just want to help the poor bugger get down. And you can't help but wonder what kind of idiot put him up there in the first place. It's a question our day's many backers may now wish to ask. Zing. Just quickly in terms of what she had to say about her experience. The song lyrics were the first red flag. The way he'd ramble about Tinny Tempa or Eminem or how black artists like Beyonce were sexualized by white men without offering any evidence to substantiate his claims. Or else there were the film clips. from fish tank and cadalthood, which he'd tell us to discuss without offering any guidance on how to do so. And this was, if he was even in the classroom at all, he often arrived late and left early, once teaching for a single hour when four were scheduled. When I saw Jason Arde's name in the news, my first thought was finally. As a student on the education module, Art A taught at the University of Royal Hampton back in autumn of 2018, a module replete with music but shockingly light on education. I can't help but having thoughts on the story that's unfolded on the last couple of years. The real surprise being that it didn't come out sooner. And she goes on to detail just how flimsy his class and instruction were. For more on the topic, Dominic Green Joyce's columnist for the Washington Examiner, contributor to the Wall Street Journal and fellow of the Rural Historic Society, Rural Historical Society. Dominic Green, thanks so much for joining us. Appreciate it. Hello, Dan. So, Jason, our day's fall from grace, says anybody at Cambridge or in higher education there in the UK offered mea culpa's regaled people with lessons learned?

I mean, Cambridge gave us, you know, the most famous Soviet spies in the 20th century, and they haven't apologized to that yet. They haven't apologized for any of this. What they have done is locked down their Department of Education's website so that people can't find out who else they've hired and start looking into their research and their PhDs. Because the fact is, as we know, universities are riddled with this kind of nonsense. Jason Ardeh. is the British equivalency of Claudine Gay of Harvard, who, apart from being a half-wit, was found to be an imposter as well. Education is one of those fields which is ruining everybody's lives by training up large numbers of idiots in doctrines which have no bearing upon reality and then spoiling our children's lives with that. The more you look into it, the worse it yet. So no wonder they're in defensive mode. And even a couple of their professors are saying, no, no, no, this is all, you know, motivated by racism, or, you know, it's bigotry and so on, or it's the right in attack mode, bouncing, as we say. It's none of these things. It's quite obvious that Jason Rade is a fantasist and an imposter. He has added greatly to the gaiety of the nation. I will give him that. And I have a sort of sneaking admiration in a way because... The lies that he has told are so fantastical that I think it must have been very exciting for him, and it must have been very rewarding for all the people who chose to believe these things. I find it so astounding that some of the cleverest people could be so stupid. And it does sort of fit the pattern. The people we have across our institutions are the kind of, as the old joke would know, cannot change a light bulb. Well, now is his autobiography still moving forward? I thought he got like a seven-figure advance. Was it from Simon Schuster? And it hasn't been canceled, right? I'm delighted to report that they're going to issue this book, which is obviously a tissue of lies. And I have no doubt that there will be further revelations about its essentially fictional content. In fact, the smart thing they should do is issue it in their fiction line rather than as autobiography. It's called great and unfortunate things, which is a pretty good summary of everything that's happened to him. And as everything is now... examined by online detectives. People have pointed out that he lifted the title from a TV series. The man is a total charlatan. I would have asked him to join us. He's climbing Mount Everest on his hands at the moment. He said he couldn't be here. I mean, that guy never stops. He's just a dynamo. I'm not surprised to hear that. I'm thinking maybe like he and... Jesse Smolet could do like a remake of Goodwill Hunting or something? You know, I mean, so where they could apply their respective, bring their respective cachet to the table, something like that? Yes, and there is a bit, look, I mean, people want to be fooled. And in the case of everybody who took up Jesse Smollett's claims, you know, this being MAGA country and the people who took up Jason Arde, if they want to be fooled, then there'll always be people who supplied, you know, the demand.

There are incentives being created for people to masquerade as things that they are not and to play a role in a largely fictional political drama. And so long as we give jobs and money to people, they think quite reasonably will think, well, why not? It's extremely destructive to our trust in institutions. The educational system, meanwhile, heads out of a never faster rate. But as I said, we at least can laugh. But this kind of thing, every time it happens, is an alarm bell at the core of our society, because we cannot have a functioning society if we don't have basic education systems. And as we know, literacy is declining, not growing. And literacy improved for more than 100 years, and now we're becoming largely post-literate. That's not good. And people like Jason are, they are accelerating that process. So there's a very serious question here. Well, it is. And I mean, this is basically in another instance of a race hoax. And it's the story, you were sort of intimating. It's the story of where... racism doesn't exist. We're going to find it because we need to prop up the story that we're railing against it. That's our raison d'etra to combat, you know, the oppressive white patriarchies of the West. I'm afraid there is that simple, and that is the doctrine which is being promoted. I mean, the minute people started looking into the Department of Education at Cambridge, it basically started looking like the Department of Education in Cambridge Mass at the Harvard University. It turned out that one of the senior staffers is previously a member of a banned Islamist terrorist group who was of the opinion that Western-style education was antithetical to Islam and that Muslims should avoid it. And Cambridge gave her a job as one of the leading educational theorists in Britain. So if you carry on like that, and as I say, you basically trash your institutions and it starts to pull apart the society. Well, we were talking about this. I read that story about this woman named Farah Ahmad. That's her name. Yes, I'll be enrolling her course is September if I can. Yeah. I mean, this prompted Gerard Baker over at the Wall Street Journal call for a shutdown of Cambridge University until we can figure out what the hell is going on. But the problem is... I've long felt this way, Dan. As an Oxford man, I've been very much. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I mean, but, but, one, you're not going to get the university to shut itself down. But number two, we do know what's going on. I mean, it's not like they're subtle about it. No, they're not. And the thing is, they are wholly dependent upon government funding in ways that even compared to the Kay Ivey League universities, the British universities really are dependent upon the government funding. They have turned into, over time, an arm effectively of the state. But in this case, as I said, this is on the state as well, because the state promotes the same silly political correctness and the same nonsensical doctrines.

and pushes them into it, the schools that taxpayers are funding. So I'm afraid to say the rot, it's easy for us to laugh at the academics because frequently they are delusional and malicious. But I'm afraid the rot reaches further in. This is, you know, Cambridge is, until last week anyway, was a respectable partner of the British state. And it's the rot in the state that has also encouraged this, I'm afraid to say. Dominic Green, columnist for the Washington Examiner, contributor to the Wall Street Journal, and fellow of the Royal Historical Society. Dominic, thank you as always. Thank you. And Dominic, joined us on the Alphwealthgroup.com, insulin. The more you listen, the more you'll know. This is Chicago's Morning Answer, an AM 560, The Answer. This is Chicago's Morning Answer with Dan Proft, an AM 560, The Answer. Top of the morning, Dan Profft here. This story I read in a National Catholic Register got me thinking maybe the way to bring energy back to sane public policymaking in Illinois is to recruit graduates of small liberal Catholic art schools. I mean, small Catholic liberal arts, I should say. Catholic arts. Small Catholic liberal arts schools. I mean, real Catholic schools, not like Loyola or DePaul or Notre Dame where the Catholicism is ornamental, like just a marketing bullet point. I mean, like a University of Dallas and Franciscan University, where our next guest and his wife matriculated respectively. Because Layland Strife. who is a recent resident of the great state of Maine that I just visited for the first time. He is leading the charge for a ballot initiative in the state of Maine, home of Stephen King, to inculcate the policy that only girls can play girls sports. And, of course, the polling on this in Maine, like most places, a supermajority support the position. But the political power structure in Maine does not. And so they have sidelined. that initiative from appearing on the November ballot to this point, the state level individuals. It's a signature initiative. You have to get so many signatures to get the ballot question put on the ballot. They got the number of signatures, but then the parties that be moved to disqualify some, and this has become a court battle that I guess now has been removed to federal court. But just a couple years in Maine, but... I guess in part, I mean, certainly that's what I read from the piece, in part motivated by his faith. Layland Strife is taking up this cause of protecting girls' sports for girls. He joins us now. He's the founder of Maine Girl Dads and Principal Officer of the Protect Girls Sports in Maine Ballot Committee. Layland Strife, thanks for joining us. Appreciate it. Thank you for having me. So I guess tell us the...

motivation, if I'm at least partially correct, to take up this charge and where things stand at present with, you know, 90 days to the election. Yeah, I mean, I think the motivation to do this is from a couple of things. From, you know, an actual perspective of what's going on on the ground here in Maine. I have kids. They span from seven years old up to 13 years old. And when I moved up here, I saw that the, you know, gender ideology was something that was everywhere in every institution from school to camps. They were trying to talk to and teach my kids about this stuff. As I started to get more involved in the community up here, I saw how ingrained it was, specifically in the public school institutions across our state. I started to understand that there were males. In every single school, identifying as girls going into bathrooms and locker rooms. There were males the year that I moved here that were winning girls state championships, including the state championship for pole vaulting, where the male jumped six inches higher than the girl that was given second place. And not only was that enough to displace that one girl, it displaced. all of the teams by giving that males team enough points to take first place for the state. So over 100 girls were displaced just off of that one event. So I looked at that and started to get involved. I helped start main girl dads. We were a coalition of over 8,000 dads of across the entire political spectrum that got together and petitioned the main principles association. and said, hey, you got to change the policy, aligned to federal Title IX. This is crazy. The principles association decided to do nothing. We were met with silence. We then petitioned, you know, our government asked them to do something. They were unable to do anything. And at the end of the summer, you know, we're still sort of behind the scenes. And this is where, you know, it came to me that I wanted to be more out in the open, forward facing and do something that would put, you know, my sort of social and professional equity at risk is when we decided to do something that could change our state. And we came together and decided if the state's not going to do something, we as citizens are going to do something. And I started a citizen's initiative that I lead here, the Protect Girl Sports in Maine Act. which is to designate school sports, participation, and facilities by sex.

And we launched that in September. And the last thing I'll say about that is sort of motivation to your question. You know, the decision to go from sort of a private understanding and belief and motivation around this issue to a public one was really one of faith. You know, there had been sort of this thing on my heart for a long time that I think really became salient and evident after the murder of Charlie Kirk, where I started to really consider and think about the things that I prayed in the morning. versus the things that I said in my house to my kids, versus the things that I did out in the world had gaps between them. And I know that I needed to close that. I believe in God. I believe in my own salvation. And the fact that I'll be judged as my life ends. And if I'm not willing to stand up for truth, for my family, my daughter, but most of all for God, what am I doing on this earth? And that's when I decided I'm going to put things at risk, including my professional and social life. and step out there and lead this initiative and be the spokesperson for this initiative. And so you put your social equity and professional equity at risk and how much risk have you incurred or how much consequence have you incurred so far? Well, I've got to most of the neighbors don't wave at me anymore. Yeah. You know, well, this is a super majority in the state of support for this. I live in a very liberal town. There are people that know me, given this as a, you know, small states that have seen me on the news that I'll get dirty looks. And so there are, you know, social fallout for sure. From a professional standpoint, I was a partner at the largest professional services firm in the world at the time. This is something that started to put some pressure, started to raise some questions, put pressure on leadership, that there was sort of forced their hand to allow me to do this. I did, though, have the benefit of retiring earlier this year. So, you know, I'm not too worried about the professional pressure. But that being said, if I wanted to reenter the workforce, you know, if you looked at my name and Googled it a year ago, all it would be was professional accolades as a partner and an executive of advertising agencies. And now if you Googled it, it would just be page after page after page of me leading a quote unquote anti-trans movement. Yeah, I guess Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said woke one was just a crazy weekend bender a few years ago. Woke 2.0 doesn't seem like it's much better. I mean, especially too, the remarkable thing about this issue, as I mentioned, and as you know, is even in Maine, even in Illinois, even in the bluest of blue states, a super majority of residents of voters. support the idea that you're advancing in Maine. But it's that political power structure that is so beholden to a aggressive and vocal minority. And they have disproportionate power because they have sort of institutional control.

Exactly. That's exactly right. And that's why citizens initiatives exist in a lot of states like Maine, where you get elected or prospective officials and all the lobbying groups and the money that sit behind them that have ideas and positions that are radically different than the voting base. I mean, Maine, you know, we trail even other states that have a larger majority than us. But 70% of the state and growing believes that kids should have single sex sports and spaces in schools. That is a majority. of every political party, including Democrats. However, we look at what ends up happening as we see public sentiment around that, what ends up happening after we collect 80,000 signatures above the, you know, versus the 67,000 that we needed to get on the ballot, is that we have groups like the main women's lobby that somehow finds probably close to a million dollars to hire the Mark Elias Law Group and soon as the Secretary of State. Mark Elias. to oppose this being on the ballot. And we have been in a legal battle since March of this year that now has gone through all the state courts and continues in federal court to keep this on the ballot. We talk about saving democracy, but I guess saving and leveraging democracy and facilitating it only matters when it fits specific personal agendas. Yeah, Mark Elias. Political agendas. Yeah, right. Mark Elias, of course, he of the steel dossier. I've had my run-ins with him, too. So is this been removed to federal court on this ballot access issue? Where does that stand? It stands right now in federal court. We had filed a motion for preliminary injunction to put this right back on the ballot. That is now sitting with federal court. We may hear today on the merits of that preliminary injunction. So we're expecting a decision in the next day or two. And that will simply dictate whether or not we get the signatures needed back to go back on the ballot for this November. 500 below what we need. This decision would bring us back 1,400, which would put us right back on the ballot. And I think the inevitability with all this that people need to understand is even if for some reason we do not go on the ballot this year, all of the petitions and signatures we got are still valid. We get all of them back and we resubmit them and we are back on the ballot for the next statewide election, which is going to be next year. So that's what's so crazy about all of this is all of this fighting from the Elias Law Group. from the main women's lobby and these radical groups isn't for anything other than to try to suppress turnout for a vote when they don't want Susan Collins to get reelected this year. Yeah, exactly. The fact is this will inevitably be voted upon in our state and it will inevitably pass because this is what the people have made want. And I mean, you know, I always focus on the negative side too when somebody steps out like you did. I like the way you described that. The gaps in your what you prayed in the morning and told your kids versus what you were doing publicly. And we focus on the negatives. Oh, you know, people don't say hi to me and I'm not invited to the parties anymore. But what about the positives? Not just within your household, but the positives in terms of this experience for you. Can you accentuate some of those?

I can. I mean, I think the positives in my household have been plenty of people. I mean, seeing my children, especially my daughter, have moments of realization and come to me and say, I see why you're doing this, dad has meant the world to me in my faith community. I've got a strong community within my church and within my parish, seeing people from the priests all the way down to parishioners, men in my men's group that don't feel like they can speak out publicly about this, but talking about how much this means to them, to, you know, people around the community that I can tell are, you know, just pleased and thankful that I'm doing this. I've had athletic directors from different towns that recognize me, that come up to me and thank me and shake my hands. I've had girls. I had an eighth grade girl that came up to me, knew who I was, said thank you to me, said that she felt relieved that dads were finally showing up and were going to help themselves this issue and told me a story about how she does not change anymore in the locker rooms at school because there's boys that watch her and the other girls change. So she has to change now in a single stall in the bathroom. So getting to talk to not only people in the community, but specifically girls in school. that are seeking me out and saying, thank you for what you're doing. I finally feel seen and heard. And like I have some way of solving this problem definitely keeps me going. And it helps me remember and realize that this is the right thing. And the majority of people want this. And every girl needs this. How important is it, in your opinion, that like current athletes that are sort of cool, like Sophie Cunningham? are taking positions on this too. I mean, it's one thing for Martina and Avertolova to talk about it and some of these. But I mean, for, you know, girls that are involved in sports now in the primary grades in high school, even college, to see, it seems to me that I see like Sophie Cunningham, like maybe a few years ago was Riley Gaines, that sort of gives them courage to stand up and say what's true as well, don't you think? I think that's exactly what it is. You know, they obviously didn't start this battle to reclaim sex-based rights. You know, there are feminists over the past decade that have been fighting it like Martina. But having somebody like Sophie step up and say something, I think gives the cultural permission and the social permission for others to step up. And I think we're seeing a lot of that. The rallies that are happening now or the celebrations that are happening before all of her games. people on social media, celebrities standing up and saying that they agree with this. I think the floodgates are starting to open around participation in culture that this isn't 2020 or 2021, that people can come out and say the truth and not worry about, am I going to be outright canceled for this? No, this is a common sense position. I can be part of this and I can say something too. And I think that Sophie has given us sort of that cultural shot in the arm. for others to come out and say something. I think my hope is that other professional athletes do the same. And it's fantastic. You know, we can argue whether or not their tact is great when you talk about Enez or Royce coming out. Yes, right. Also having males show up and do something about this is important. Girls have been fighting this battle. Girls have been asking for their sex-based rights to be respected and protected. And finally, we have, you know, current...

WNBA all-star professional coming out and say something, but where are the rest of the men? Yeah, I see people like Erlock are saying something. He's fantastic, but he's retired. Where are the men that are actively playing right now that are willing to speak out on this issue? The entire NFL, any NFL player that is a dad should be out there speaking about this. I mean, it's wild that we continue to leave it to the girls to say something. No, I agree. I mean, we talk about that all the time here. You know, where the dads, not even the professional athletes, but just at the local level. Where are dads there to protect your daughters in school? And that's what Layland Strife is doing in Maine. Layland Strife, founder of Maine Girl Dads and principal officer of the Protect Girl Sports in Maine Ballot Committee. Thanks so much for joining us. Good luck with the initiative in Maine. We'll be watching. Appreciate your time. Thank you, sir. And he joined us in the Alfawealthgroup.com insulin. It's like a hot, steaming cup of information. To start your day, it's Chicago's morning answer on AM 560, The Answer. Only the biggest stories, only the biggest guests, and only the biggest opinions. This is AM 560, The Answer. Top of the morning, Dan Proft here, and... Abdul Rockman Al Sharia. Do get that name out your mouth. No, I don't want to. Is he going to have, or maybe he's already had a Sister Soldier moment. People old enough to remember Sister Soldier? Remember when she said during the L.A. riots back in 92, that in advance of the Gingrich Revolution in 94, that, you know, if... Blacks can kill blacks all year rounds. This works of this effect, I'm not quoting her, but it's close. If black can kill blacks all year round, why can't they take a white week off and kill whites? You know, sort of racial politics that has unfortunately beset the nation well before that and ever since the rise of the identitarians. If he is going to have an else, if he is going to have a Sister Soldier moment, Al Sharia there in Michigan, which I know the bar is high because I can't believe some of the things that are said by people like him and Hasan Piker and Francesca Hong that, you know, barely register. But maybe his comparisons to American style football, as he might call it. Maybe that, this would be it. Even worse than his abhorrence at the thought of celebrating Independence Day, Abdul El-Sayed on football. You think about all the wars that we fight abroad, all of the sordid history of oppressing other people in the name of this American idea, right? Whether it was, quote, manifest destiny and destroying Native Americans, or it was the transatlantic slave trade where, you know, folks who, quote, founded this country on the backs of native folks that they destroyed, then captured people enslaved them and had them work their fields.

because they thought it was their right. And all of this, like a lot of these narratives, you kind of see echoed in the ethos of football. You see these narratives echoed in the ethos of football. The ethos of football is what animated the transatlantic slave trade, manifest destiny, and all of all of other, all of America's other alleged crimes against humanity, all this sort of anti-American neo-colonial rap that. Paul's like an Islamist because that's what he is, a Sharia law enthusiast like El Syed. These are the yarns they spin. I mean, would it be that or would it be something that his streamer bestie Hasan Piker has said? I mean, I don't know. I wipe my ass with the American flag. Hell yeah. As a communicator, especially as a communicator that is in the United States of America, I understand the utter moral depravity of the average American. In order to make a more convincing argument, I always try to message to the room that I'm speaking to, if that makes sense. Can't wait to see Sondpiker back out on the campaign trail. Hezbollah is a paramilitary organization. Do we like them or no? I don't have a issue with them, let's just say. But they are a terrorist organization. Yeah, terrorist organization, but I mean, no issue because, of course, America deserves 9-11. That's Hasan Piker' view as adopted by Abdul El-Sayed as well. Kill them. Kill those motherfuckers and murder those motherfach in the street. Let the streets soak in their red capitalist bloods, dude. Purge of the small business entrepreneur. The Free Enterprise guy in America. I mean, those don't seem to have... registered, at least not to this point, maybe they'll be treated differently from a general electorate audience than they were treated by the primary electorate in Michigan, for example. For more on this and other matters, Michael Goodwin joins us. Of course, Michael Goodwin, New York Post columnist. Michael, thanks for being with us again. Appreciate it. Thank you, Dan. So can, do you think we can, should, we meaning the Republican Party? make this election basically a referendum on Islamist statewide candidates like Abdul El-Sayed as representative of that DSA party? Well, you know, I think what you, the point you made about a sister soldier moment, what, why we remember that in history is because Bill Clinton, sort of the leader of the Democratic Party and wanting to be president, said, that's no good. That's not right. He scolded her. Right. And where is it an Democrat today who will do that?

about the Hasan Piker, the Al-Sai'is, the Zohran Mamdani, right? We're not hearing that from the Democratic Party, which is why it's been colonized by these people, because the Democratic leaders are afraid of them. Chuck Schumer, Hakeem Jeffries, they are afraid of this radical element in their own party, and so they won't speak against it. They'll kind of nod their head and smile and say, well, at least they're a Democrat, you know, and maybe I can be majority leader that way, or I can be speaker. And I think in New York, Kathy Hoker, the governor, running for re-election, is counting on those votes. So she dare not criticize anything on the extreme left. That, to me, is the answer to this problem. Republicans and sane citizens of all stripes have to respond to this ridiculous hate America, hate Jews, nonsense. But I think what's missing from the picture is a democratic leadership. taking it on and calling it what it is. Yeah, no. I mean, instead you're getting these tepid sort of, we're a big ten party type comments. But I mean, that doesn't really fly. And you can't outsource the denunciations to Bill Maher or John Fetterman. That's just not going to be good enough if Republicans play these cards correctly, it seems to me. Yes, I think that's correct. And we saw, of course, Michigan was sort of the case where if you don't come back at it, this is what you get as your nominee. So I think that's one example. And yet, I think there are others. Hong losing is a good sign that when sort of. Same people, even if we don't agree with some of their politics, at least they're fundamentally sane about the country. When they come together and unite behind an alternative, you get someone like Crowley being the nominee. So I think there is some sign, but we still have not heard it from the Democratic leadership, certainly not in New York. And certainly, I believe, not nationally. We've heard pockets of it. And so maybe the Hong defeat will be kind of a rallying cry for people that we don't have to put up with this. We can defeat this. This week in New York, a woman named Tracy Rosenthal has risen to some prominence, sort of an even more antagonistic version of C. Weaver, the housing person that Zohran Mamdani minted, who doesn't believe in private property, basically. Tracy Rosenthal, who is a dilettante who comes from a wealthy family, whose her dad was like a Grammy-winning music producer.

She wants to live rent-free, and she wants everybody else to live rent-free as well, and this is the strategy. My question is, it's hard to imagine not paying rent. Do you have any ideas about what it would not? Do you have any ideas about what would look like with a lot of people, not just a few things, but if a lot of people were not paying rent. I mean, I think that part of what you're talking about is a long-term strategy to creating the kind of scale of crisis that we would need in order to extract any of the concessions that would, like, save our lives. You know, and so I think that, but I think that, you know, on the one hand, it's like, I can, I admit that I am a romantic, and I can sit here and say, like, Yeah, we need a general rent strike, right? Like that, you know, we describe, right? Like, one way of thinking about abolishing rent is a permanent and general rent strike. And she goes on, of course, to talk about the tenant associations that you stand up, that do individual rent strikes, and then at some point you reach critical mass for a general rent strike, and then you sees everybody's private property, and then you live rent-free. And I know it sounds fanciful and silly. But so did the idea of electing an Islamist to be mayor of New York 25 years after 9-11. Look, she is one of the loons who has come in on this tide, right? She's ridden as tied into the government. And that's why I think it's important that people who think this stuff is nuts and crazy need to speak up. And so here we have in the capital of capitalism, New York City, we have people like that calling for rent strikes, essentially saying. free housing for everybody. You have Zohran Mamdani. Let's tax the rich until it hurts. Let's effectively drive them out. This is now, as we have all seen across the country, a rising tide on the far, far left. And one election at a time, I'm hoping that Democrats will stand up against us, call it for what it is. But in the meantime, the Republicans, the independents, people in the media, such as ourselves, we have to do what we can to point out the foolishness of this and the historic comparisons. I mean, this is how Cuba went broke, right? Just how the Soviet Union collapsed. It's how East Germany collapsed. All the examples throughout history. And, of course, what had led to Maloney Tong killing millions of people in China. So the collapse of freedom, the collapse of private enterprises. And we have in our country a regulated capitalism.

The emphasis is on capitalism. The regulation is not the all, the all and end all. It is a feature of our capitalist economy. But it is why we have the best economy, why so many people have a high standard of living. That's been true in America. for 50, 60, 70 years, much greater than the world as a whole. Is that just an accident? Is that because we're all barbarians? Or is that we have better ideas, a better system? Yeah, right. Actually, the academic Richard Henanilla made the point. The fact that the U.S. is responsible for the vast majority of the world's medical breakthroughs should basically end the socialized medicine debate and the socialism debate more generally because the lesson generalizes, as you were just describing. But that argument needs to be made relentlessly about the free enterprise system by Republicans in the face of, you know, this movement as you were describing. I wonder if. You know, there's been some reporting, and I'm always a little bit skeptical of these declarations, that, you know, the honeymoon is over from Ram Zohran Mamdani in New York City because of this sort of ham-handed rollout-out-of-the-ter tax. I'm not sure that's the case, but you're closer to it than I am. I would agree with you. That was a headbine in the Walt Street Journal. And I thought, hmm, let me read this and see if there's something I don't know that they have something. But it's not there. That's kind of wishful thinking. Yeah. I think it will take time. He has made a lot of news. I think he's made some big mistakes that could be the seed of his, of the ending on the honeymoon. As you mentioned, that woman is housing, Laura, those people are still out there. They're doing this. And he's not stopping them. He hasn't pulled back from anything. He is only speaking to his supporters. He's not addressing the city as a whole. I mean, he got a little more. than 50% of the vote when he won. Now, there was a big field running against him, but he got by far the largest single tally of votes, and it was slightly over a majority. But I think there are a lot of people in New York who don't vote, who didn't vote. So I think he has to begin to speak to his detractors and those who didn't support him. That's when a politician trying to sort of shifts gears into becoming a real leader and not just a campaigner. I think he's still in campaign mode. Michael Goodwin, New York Post columnist. Michael, thank you as always. Appreciate your time. My pleasure. Michael joined us on theoffwealthgroup.com, insulin.

There's only one radio show in Chicago talking about today's biggest stories and telling you what they really mean. That show is this one. Chicago's Morning Answer, an AM 560, The Answer. Maybe since my flight's delayed, I'll go... Go to Woodoo Station and get my feet washed. You know, sort of an interfaith offering at O'Hare. All right, I'm off tomorrow. I'm back sometime next week. Hopefully not in a pine box. I'm doing a rafting trip on the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon, which is one standard deviation from the kind of stuff I normally do. You're supposed to relax on vacation, but I'm going to challenge myself a little bit. Thanks for joining us on another edition of Chicago's Morning Answer. Somebody's in for me tomorrow, and then I'm back in for myself midweek next week. Have a good weekend since I won't be talking to you. We'll be off the grid. More wit and wisdom from my subs or sub or subs tomorrow. The stories you need to know to start your day. This is Chicago's Morning Answer. An AM 560, The Answer. Thanks for listening to Chicago's Morning Answer podcast sponsored by Signature, a division of Esquire Bank. Signature takes pride in helping customers grow their business and provide unmatched banking expertise, custom financial solutions, and the industry's best technology. So whether your business is looking for a deposit relationship or needs a ready source of financing, Signature has the solutions for you. Call today at 773-467, 5600 to hear how signature can help your business grow and thrive. Esquire Bank, member FDIC, Equal Housing Lender.