(((My Fellow Americans))) #111: Mike ter Maat

DISCLOSURE

FULL TRANSCRIPT TEXT

00:22
i’ll be buried in my dreams
that is before i become
change i’ll be buried in my grave
that is but it seems like since that day
we have sorely changed oh
south carolina you’re watching my fellow
americans with your host spy cullen
yes oh thank you
yes it’s me
thank you keep clapping
keep clapping clap for the summer
miracle how would we know that you
wanted this summer miracle if you didn’t
keep clapping welcome to my fellow
americans i am literally spike cohen uh
i just got back i just flew back from
alabama and boy am i sick of flight
delays um if anyone has flown this year
you know what i’m talking about it’s you
don’t you never get anywhere on time but
i am happy to be home i had some great
events in ohio and alabama over the long
weekend in ohio the libertarian party of
Ohio’s yearly conference or i guess every other
year conference because on even years
they have conventions and on odd years
they have conferences also spoke at a
an event for ending qualified immunity
in columbus with accountability now ohio
and then went down to the rally against
corruption in in montgomery alabama
to help the congressional candidate
jonathan reels and the
soon-to-be announcing she’s actually not
allowed to say she’s running yet but i
am uh soon to be announcing that she’s a
uh house congressional candidate portia
shepard down there in montgomery had a
great time now i’m back home right here
same spike place same spike time for an
amazing episode of my fellow americans
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guest tonight uh is an incredible guy
i’m actually going to be campaigning
with him uh in just a couple weeks he is
a libertarian international economist an
active duty police officer and he’s also
a libertarian party candidate for
congress to serve florida’s 20th
district he has been a police officer in
broward county florida since 2010 and a
registered libertarian since 2011. his
prior career in finance and economics
included work with banks the white house
office of management and budget
international development agencies
federal agencies and trade associations
this guy’s basically smarter than me and
we’re going to find out just how much
smarter than me over the next hour uh he
has traveled in 35 countries he’s taught
economics at three year universities he
holds a bs in aeronautical engineering
and an mda from rennes
polytechnic in rensselaer rensselaer
polytechnic institute i can’t even
pronounce where this man has degrees
from uh and an ms and phd degrees in
economics from george washington
university this is possibly the smartest
human being i’ve ever had on the show uh
ladies and gentlemen my fellow americans
please welcome to the show mr mike
termat mike’s thanks so much for coming
on the show man
spike you make me laugh
uh as my dad used to say if you were so
smart you wouldn’t need all those fancy
degrees no i am not smarter than you are
if i were smarter than you are i
probably would have advised you to hire
chris reynolds before be joining a
sponsorship relationship with adderpan i
think uh that looks like a good product
actually yes and i think your audience
is going to be able to handle it if any
audience could but if someone does need
therapy they’re going to come after you
and you’re going to be on the phone with
chris
that’s a good point
see that’s what i said i used to say if
you want to sue me use chris reynolds
and i thought no no no if you want to
sue me i’m using chris reynolds you have
to use someone else so uh folks be sure
to a comment in the chats uh with your
thoughts and questions and mike and i
will tell you if you are right or wrong
now mike before we get started you are
both a libertarian
and a police officer and when i we first
posed this uh i posed you as being my
next guest in uh first of all publicly
today but even before that in our uh
members only group um yeah you say that
like that’s two different things
well no it is we have a we have kind of
our our our group of the elite get the
uh members and then we also have like
our public the public posts and pages we
put out um and we heard over and over
again
everything from wow i can’t wait to hear
from a libertarian who’s a police
officer and get his perspectives to
there is no such thing as a libertarian
police officer how dare you i hate you
i’m i’m quitting this group and
everything in between and so we’re
certainly going to talk a lot about that
but tell us that story of how you became
because you actually became an officer
before you became a libertarian tell us
that story of how you went from being
the smartest human being in the history
of mankind who also apparently ran the
white house’s budget which i mean we can
talk about some other issues there but
all the things you’ve done in economics
what ended up leading to you becoming a
cop and then becoming a libertarian tell
us the the mike termite genesis story
oh my goodness i’ll tell you the story
but i’m going to give you the condensed
version i’m 60 years old and this is
only an hour program
uh
look i was probably a libertarian at
heart like like most libertarians i
think i was a libertarian at heart for
many many years before joining the party
right most of us are optimistically
rooting for one party or the other to
come through and do something right by
us and are just constantly disappointed
until we throw in the towel and realize
that the libertarian party is the only
way to go
look being a police officer is something
that i wanted to do
since a long long time ago
when i was in graduate school in 89 1991
i took the
entrance exam for the washington dc
police department and decided that it
just wasn’t enough money in those days
uh and still isn’t probably enough money
to do the job in washington these days
that’s one underfunded
department that
struggles to take care of police
officers so good luck to everybody there
okay and finally decided that uh when i
was 48 uh
you know
the the timing is not going to get any
better i was no spring chicken then i’m
no spring chicken now
uh and figured if i don’t jump all over
the opportunity uh that uh the
opportunity was gonna escape from me
look i don’t think being a libertarian
and being a cop
are really two different things uh
in in my mind
whether in the mind of everyone in your
audience or not i don’t know yet but in
my mind i’m a professional libertarian i
am sworn to my duty to protect your
rights
and i would go so far as to say
most every cop i know
feels that way whether they use the word
libertarian or not but police officers
become police officers by and large
because they want to help people
and specifically
in the realm of protecting people’s
rights whether that’s keeping people out
of harm’s way
protecting them from other people who
would infringe upon their rights
and of course being a good cop means
learning how to not go too far to
protect people’s rights even from
ourselves as police officers
that’s fair enough and i get that
perspective on it and i i the the chat
is everything from this sounds fantastic
to
uh again there is no such thing as a
little gold pound sand yeah yeah we’re
going we’re going all the way off
basically everyone is arguing over
whether you’re not a real libertarian or
not a real cop so we’re gonna we’re
gonna dive into which of those you’re
not uh but let’s let’s let’s talk about
this for a minute so one thing i i think
it’s probably good to focus on i think
where we probably agree most and you’ve
talked a lot about the how the roles of
unions and and and um uh um uh
collective bargaining in police
really in public employees in general
but specifically here for police how
actually uh how that actually makes
things worse for policing can you can
you dive into your thoughts on that
we’re going to dive more into the the
real core issues here but i want i want
to get kind of get your thoughts on the
outset of some of the reforms you would
want to see in the past sure i i think
the big picture for me especially as an
economist is that we would
prefer
that the labor market for police
officers were more like labor markets
and other industries
okay in other words we’d like to see
not only on the upside for police
officers competition for good officers
but
we’d like to see situations in which bad
officers are held
accountable
for the markets to be such that it
weren’t so difficult to fire bad
officers
in any other industry someone who
doesn’t perform very well disappears
from the industry right
uh or finds their way down the ladder of
opportunity one way or another
and it’s no secret that public sector
unions and unions in general
can sometimes i would say usually make
it very sticky in terms of holding
professionals accountable whether that’s
you know in terms of firing someone or
differential pay
uh like with teachers you know we don’t
have the flexibility to pay good
officers more and bad officers less
right
uh
and
a lot of i think what police officers uh
negotiate for through their unions is
stability for a variety of reasons that
that that we can get into teachers uh
the same thing
okay and so uh one thing we talked about
back when you were on the money waters
of freedom a couple months back um sure
had mentioned the fact that um
there’s no portability there there were
a couple things you talked about number
one there was no portability so you have
a situation where a police officer in
many places that’s right
where a police officer same thing with
teachers as well they’ll they’ll have
worked however many number of years and
if they if they move to another area
then uh then they end up starting from
scratch with base pay and everything
else and then you also talked about the
fact that and this kind of goes to the
the issue of like qualified immunity and
and liability insurance um that
we want professionals not to do harm and
but we also recognize that even good
professionals will sometimes even
accidentally do harm or or you know
mistakenly do something like so for
example with uh with doctors um they
will have malpractice insurance um
because even if they if they screw up
they don’t lose everything as a result
but bad bad doctors who keep having
claims eventually can’t get insured
which means they exactly the doctors
at the very least your rates are going
to go up and you’re going to be priced
out of the market and it’s exactly how
we would like the market to eventually
work for police officers i think
everyone recognizes the qualified
immunity is going to go away
okay it’s already going away and you
know
colorado has already made great strides
and and other states are are stepping in
that direction so whether police
officers like it or not whether all of
us understand it or not and it’s a
complicated issue and
most legislators don’t understand it
most police officers don’t understand it
but qualified immunity is going to go
away
and that’ll leave us in a situation in
which we need to
either be indemnified in some sense or
acquire
liability insurance malpractice
insurance just like any other high
liability
industry the leading example being
doctors right surgeons as you brought up
and that’s how we would want the market
to work if you’re bad at your job you’re
going to eventually get priced out
because you’re not going to be able to
afford the insurance
and insurance companies will add a layer
of accountability even where
cities and other counties states other
employers find it difficult to do so
because of union contracts
not so will be the case with insurance
companies they’re not going to be held
back by
uh bs and in a union contract or else
you won’t be able to get the insurance
in the first place right so
that’s important and and the other
element to that
uh is that our elected leaders our city
leaders county leaders state leaders
need to be much more involved in the
contracting process they need to be
bargaining for the things that they need
and frankly the police officers need
to rebuild
trust between police departments between
police officers and the communities that
we serve it’s uh
obvious that we’ve lost a lot of trust
in both directions over the last several
years
i would argue that we’ve lost a lot of
trust uh slowly for decades but
recently quickly
well recently quickly honestly i think
the biggest reason has been not
necessarily a new development in how
police officers have acted but this
everyone’s walking around with hd
cameras now absolutely so we went from a
vast majority of the public just taking
the police officer’s word for it to now
we see this over and over and over again
and yeah even if even if that’s still
you know and i don’t think anyone claims
the majority of police interactions
result in police brutality or even a
large minority but when you keep seeing
no of course not but
that a large proportion of the things
that go wrong get seen thousands of
times exactly exactly and while as a
police officer you i suppose you know
you can be offended that uh folks get a
biased view because of that it’s not
necessarily a bad thing
uh
in terms of public policy
for the worst things to get seen most
and
obviously as a police officer just as a
citizen i like to see
on tv the good things that happen too
right
i like to see kids being saved from
burning buildings
but as a matter of public policy
uh the things that maybe we can do
something about or at least
try to do something about the the bad
things those are the things that we need
to focus on right no i’ve never seen
anyone say you know what i burns me up
is when i see a police officer arrest a
rapist or you know save someone from a
you know from uh from
pull someone out a car
a crashed car before first responders
can and in fairness to
cops that happens every day
no and i know and i know that and that
and that’s
there’s two aspects here and i think one
big thing and it’s something that’s not
really worth beating around the bush on
this especially since we are
libertarians one of the biggest problems
is that a lot of what police are doing
are
are enforcing things that we as
libertarians don’t think should be
crimes anyway that we’re enforcing
absolutely
so can can you talk about that can you
talk about that the victimless crime
aspect
yeah absolutely
there
let’s start with with crimes in which
there are victims and tell you what a
police officer would say if the victim
doesn’t show up or the victim doesn’t
want to press charges
we always say no victim no crime
right even if there was a victim and
there was a crime
when the victim says i don’t want to
press charges or the victim just won’t
cooperate
right and says i don’t want to talk to
you
the conversation at that point is kind
of over because if you don’t have a
victim you don’t have a crime right but
when it comes to these victimless
behaviors and most of what we’re talking
about today is is drug related right
in general yeah
and well and that’s the
at the moment the most important uh
example um
you know we can talk about prostitution
for example also and a couple of other
things but
uh the the big thing
before the public right now is deciding
to to what extent we want to
decriminalize
uh
behaviors surrounding drugs
right
when it comes to this the state still
wants people to be prosecuted even
though
there isn’t an identifiable victim
and so for most police officers
that just
naturally rubs you the wrong way a
little bit right because you’re used to
being able to identify
uh a victim
now the other
issue that goes hand in hand with that
from a police officer’s perspective
is that we know
how many people are affected negatively
by a wide variety of drugs right
neither you nor i are going to try to
convince each other that the united
states doesn’t have an opiate addiction
problem
to see that
is to raise your concern
to fight it in a criminal sense and not
be able to significantly
affect that
is frustrating and
naturally eventually leads you to
there must be a better way to fight this
right and i believe that police officers
are likely to always be involved
with whatever
public response we want to have to drugs
to addiction to any kind of illness
right but criminalizing it doesn’t as it
turns out doesn’t help
so i think there’s there’s a couple of
different ways that you can come at this
you can come at this strictly as a
libertarian and say
uh what i do with my body is my business
and you all can go pound sand
which is a great way to come at it right
and as libertarians that’s the that’s
our bread and butter
but as a police officer and as
uh public health officials will tell you
uh criminalizing these behaviors doesn’t
help
in other words
another way to command it rather than
just a matter
of ethics
there’s a practical viewpoint which is
to say
criminalizing it just doesn’t help it
drives a wedge between police
and our communities
well and it also it creates cartels
those cartels become powerful they pay
off uh government officials and police
officers which leads to corruptions not
just when it comes to drugs but to
everything else uh there was recently a
documentary called white boy rick which
details how the city of detroit from the
mayor and police chief all the way down
frame this 16 17 year old white kid and
say that he’s you know he’s like a low
level drug dealer who actually was
originally a federal informant they they
frame him to say he’s the drug kingpin
so they can lock him up and say look we
fixed the drug problem and it was just
to distract from the
from the drug dealers that were actually
paying them off addiction gets worse
because addicts can’t get help and then
yes it leads to officers enforcing and
we can talk about the war on drugs the
war on guns all of these things it leads
to officers enforcing spending a good
bit of their time enforcing things that
shouldn’t even be crimes uh it also
leads to things like for example no
knock raids there’s no justification for
a no knock raid unless the justification
is well they might flush something down
the toilet well you’re not going to
flush a murder or a rape down the toilet
they’re talking about drugs and so these
are the types of things civil asset
forfeiture all of these things sprang
forth from the war on drugs so ending
the war on drugs ending the the wars on
victimless crimes also
you know whenever people say to me well
don’t you want officers that are out
there stopping you know rapes and
murders yes that’s prime that’s all that
i want officers doing is out there
protecting lives rights and property and
it sounds like you’re saying the same
thing you want the role of being a
police officer to be nothing other than
protecting lives rights and property
oh i think i lost him
i think i lost him
but this actually happened when we were
talking earlier
um and
uh he he was able to come back so in the
meantime i’m going to actually uh while
we’re waiting to see uh i think i lost
him completely
all right yeah okay i lost him
completely let me see if he comes back
on in the meantime i’m gonna address
some of the
uh some of the things that are in the
comments i know some of you guys were
getting a little uh impatient that i
wasn’t talking about some of the the
core issues yet i wanted to talk about
uh mike’s policies first when it comes
to what he wants to see changes and then
get into the beer but literally the next
thing i was going to be bringing up uh
when he yeah let me let me stop the the
spike section in the corner here one of
the things i was going to bring i was
going to the thing i was going to bring
up next uh until i lost him just now was
to talk about let me just keep this up
in case it comes back uh one of the
things i was going to talk about is
in the time and hopefully when it comes
back we can address this
now that
we do have the war on drugs and we do
have the war on guns we do have all
these different things in that kind of
situation
does that mean that you don’t if you’re
being consistent with libertarian
principles as a police officer
does that mean that you don’t enforce
those things
does that mean you look the other way
does that mean you just put less
priority on it does that mean you do the
bare minimum of what you have to do and
and you know actively advocate to end
those things what exactly does that look
like to him and i want to make sure i i
don’t want to misrepresent what he’s
saying um
so uh and then the next thing is and
this was brought up by uh uh dank and
salty drift memes the concern that okay
if they end the war on drugs now what’s
to say that they don’t you know go find
some other victimless crime and i think
that’s the core issue we need to be
talking about mike is actually back
let’s see if he if we can get him back
on
um
hold on one second i just want to make
sure i can connect with him
hey are you back
can you hear me
i can
did you bump me out did i bump you out
uh you i think you bumped me out but
that’s okay uh we are still live i’m
gonna bring you back in um my apologies
i switch devices i hope that helps i
don’t know what went wrong
no that’s fine um that’s perfectly fine
that’ll work great um and we can make
that work uh so we were talking about
how you know these uh that these
victimless crime laws they create more
problems specifically the war on drugs
creates more problems when it comes to
you know the
not to call the police when they need to
also
uh which leads to medical problems uh it
causes people not to get the treatment
uh that they might be able to find if
police officers were involved in a more
positive way and if people trusted
police officers to be involved in a more
positive way so there are real-life
solutions that are blocked off for any
number of people just because they’re
afraid to call 9-1-1
right and they get over-criminalized so
now they can’t get you know they can’t
start a business or legally and they you
know all these other terror we could sit
here and talk all day long about how the
war on drugs is bad here here is what
has been asked probably
uh i would say a thousand times in the
comments uh and everyone’s basically
saying and i mean i could i could read
each of these but it’s pretty much um
summarized
yeah it’s pretty much summarized
summarized as this yes we agree that
these types of laws need to be gotten
rid of and these reforms need to happen
in the meantime while for example the
war on drugs exist the war on guns exist
these victimless crime laws exist crimes
that we consider laws that we consider
to be illegitimate unconstitutional uh
infringing as a police officer and a
libertarian
and again there’s been word in multiple
ways how do you square that is it that
you uh you don’t enforce those things or
you do the absolute bare minimum while
advocating for an end to them
what how when as a libertarian and a
police officer how do you square that
that circle between your principles and
what your job is as it is right now
i mean as a personal matter in my own
particular situation is what you mean
yeah yes you you advocate for how you’d
like the laws to change my job is to
enforce the law so i don’t have that
much flexibility in certain situations
yeah you try to go with as light a touch
as possible as you said the the bare
minimum you go with a light touch you
try to be as helpful as possible
when someone commits a felony
and you have probable cause to believe
it to be so you don’t have a lot of
flexibility it doesn’t matter whether
i’m there another officer doesn’t matter
what your political association
affiliation or feelings are it just is
what it is right and the state of
florida is going to get its pound of
flesh whether it uses you
mike as a police officer or any other
police officer
remember the police officers are
employees and as much as we might get
upset angry or frustrated
with the way certain things work
being upset with the employees carrying
out the policies uh in my view can be a
frustrating proposition right
uh yeah we want certain laws to change
and i probably want certain laws to
change in different ways than someone
else because i’m more familiar with them
but
uh
do i have complete flexibility in in in
this regard no absolutely not
and
you know for some people that means this
is uh
this
you know is not an appropriate uh career
if you
you know if if you are unable to
uh
carry out the
you know the role
uh there are so many upsides
uh to pursuing a career as a police
officer that on balance
i find that it’s worth it and the
education that i’ve gotten from having
done it
uh to be honest for me personally has
been extraordinary because so many of
these issues
you know i was not personally involved
with until after becoming a police
officer
um you know my view on what should be
criminalized and what should not be
criminalized
uh
has probably not changed all that much
but the reasons and what’s behind it and
the damage that is done by criminalizing
certain things that i believe shouldn’t
be
that has changed in me personally quite
a bit you know i see how things don’t
work
in a way that i wish that they would if
they weren’t criminalized
yeah and that’s so i and i
i agree with you that obviously you know
we all advocate for this thing i think
where the the disagreement might come in
and we’re seeing a lot of this in the
comments that obviously you do have the
choice to
to
resign from being a police officer now
when you’re saying that you uh on the
balance seem more negative
more positive than negative uh obviously
besides having employment
what are some of those specific
positives that you see that outweigh the
fact that you’re doing things that by
your own belief or infringing on the the
lives rights and properties of others
every single day i interact with
uh anywhere from a dozen to many dozen
people
in my jurisdiction in ways in which i
try to add value to their
lives whether they
you know
see it that way or not in every single
instance i have no way of evaluating but
people
have
a real life
oh come on
this has been
this is a really good conversation to be
having and and uh this is not fun so
hopefully he comes back um
what’s that are you there are you back
oh you came back this time okay good i
didn’t know i disappeared yeah i know
you i lost you uh for for quite a bit
there um so uh uh so you were saying
that you you come across quite a few
people on on a day-to-day basis and
you’re able to
to possibly affect their lives as an
officer in other things in in the the
things where you’re enforcing crimes and
interacting with the public
drugs
right drugs is such a small part of my
job is to be vanishingly
uh
tiny statistically speaking
it just you know it
look
in the last uh
let me say in the last four or five
years
i have performed cpr on people with
overdoses more often than i’ve arrested
people
okay um and i i definitely do get that
um i i will say um
as a as a libertarian and i know you
probably empathize with this as well
it’s hard to square that circle right
like it’s it’s hard to square the yes
there are good things that are being
done uh there are people whose lives are
being saved and everything else um
where obviously a lot of libertarians
are going to have difficulty is when it
comes to the uh when it comes to the
part that even again that you also
recognize is is the thing that is that
infringement um
honestly i don’t
i’m not sure that there is a way to
i i’m not sure there was a way to
resolve
this specific uh uh you know uh um
uh i guess disagreement uh other than
agreeing to this well i would say aspect
not so much disagreement there’s an
aspect to the job
uh
of which
you know i don’t have a great deal of
appreciation it’s just part of the job
and it goes hand in hand with
you know aspects of any other job that
you don’t like
in this particular case it runs against
my political principles and most people
don’t have jobs
in which their political principles
even come into play so i would ask
most of your audience right who
is questioning whether or not a
libertarian should take a job as a
police officer
to ask themselves when’s the last time
their political principles were
challenged by their job
and i’m guessing that for
80 percent
of
our audience
the answer is
never
right
i am a big believer in public service
full out
public service in many cases requires
public policy
public policy
requires political principles
so if you’re going to believe in public
service enough to take a job
in it
almost assuredly you’re going to end up
in a situation in which part of the job
runs counter to your
political druthers
it’s that way whether you’re a
firefighter
or
you know you’re a soldier
or you’re a sailor or an airman
uh
if if you work on budgets for your city
i used to work as an economist for the
white house did i see things that i
hated
uh listen i was there
when my boss’s boss’s boss’s boss’s
boss’s boss
george herbert walker bush
went back on his read my lips no new
taxes pledge at andrews air force base
and agreed to
what i think everyone
was willing to call a tax increase in
some sense
a lot of us are upset by that we were
upset because he had said he wouldn’t we
were upset because we didn’t want new
taxes
uh
if your audience would like to say i
blew it by not storming out of
you know the new executive office
building across the street from the
white house and
and grabbing a sign and protesting then
that’s fine
but as a public servant
i do the best job i can
and that’s fair i get i get what you’re
saying i i will say
um
the
here’s here’s a question i have because
there’s been a few different things
people have said here some people have
said that you made a good point about
the job thing some people have said that
recently they did have to have where
their moral principles uh were called
into the question about uh enforcing
mandates and that they they chose to
refuse to do it and either had to resign
or get demoted uh there are people i
guess maybe good for them that happens
and i have all kinds of respect for that
yeah so my my i guess my thing is
um
because i i’m not i i will say i’m not a
fan of the doing my job defense i but
let me ask you this um
is there a
a law or or order or something that
maybe isn’t even on the books that if it
were implemented you would say no that’s
i can’t do that and if if i have to do
that even if on the balance i feel like
the other things i’m doing are a net
positive to my community this i can’t do
is are there things that you would say
no i can’t do this and i i simply have
to resign
well of course and and
maybe you meant that as a as a softball
you know
no police officer that i know
not just myself but no police officer i
know
um is going to
exert
uh
more violence than is necessary
no police officer that i work with is
going to make an arrest without probable
cause
uh to believe that a crime had been
committed
for which you know the state of florida
says is an arrestable offense
so yes we are
uh
limited
all the time
by our principles and how we view
uh the constitution both constitutes the
united states
and constitution the state of florida
and none of us are going to go
uh beyond that
indeed
our city i got to be a little bit
careful here right but
a couple years ago our city decided
to
uh make the possession of cannabis a
civil issue
and
we were to pass out civil citations
for
first possession offense and the amount
of penalty for each citation would
escalate
for the second third fourth fifth
offenses
and the way it appeared to me in a
number of other officers was this was
just extortion right
and
an answer to your question
we didn’t do it
uh
the good news i suppose for the
employment of of us was that
uh
the city eventually backed down
not
explicitly but implicitly the program
was just sort of uh shelved
uh for lack of execution
that’s a fairly soft example right uh i
didn’t have to go on television and you
know
say
we’re not doing this and make a big
brouhaha over it it was just something
that was
quietly taken away yeah yeah so that you
know that was fairly easy and mild
but uh
for the most part
the good news is we’re not putting too
many situations
and like i say you know
we we don’t arrest people for weed
anymore as a practical matter just
almost doesn’t happen
and and and no and i know that’s true
especially in florida that’s that’s
largely true but for example um someone
who
um i met going across the country last
year i went to like 35 states i was
across the country and i met a lot of
veterans a lot of people who have gotten
in accidents for whatever reason they
ended up with a chronic pain issue um
and so they ended up and this was a
story i heard over and over again they
ended up on pain pills because they had
a chronic pain
issue that wasn’t actually resolvable it
was because of a permanent injury or
some neurological damage or something
like that and they would end up with
pain pills and then eventually they’d
hit their fda limit on pain pills and
they’d be told no more pain pulls uh
pain pills cold turkey now uh we’re
gonna have to figure out non-drug ways
to manage your increasing pain uh which
they couldn’t do so now they’re
resorting to buying the same
illegally buying the same pills
illegally uh and often because they are
losing money doing this they often don’t
have work uh because of their pain issue
they are often now having to sell the
pills or basically sell enough of them
to be able to afford their own pills
until eventually they realize it’s
actually and the story is a great
example of why
uh it needs to be decriminalized right
absolutely absolutely and in the
meantime um
what is the thought justice report
matters
absolutely but in the meantime in a
situation where you’re having to arrest
someone for for example trafficking
heroin when the reality is you know this
is an addict who has multiple baggies of
heroin either because it’s for personal
usage or it’s because they’re having to
uh sell a certain number of them to
maintain an addiction they have because
right now they don’t have a legal
recourse i i guess i’m trying to get in
the mindset of what it is you have to
you and not just and this isn’t i’m not
trying to call you out specifically this
is talking about no but the situation a
police officer would find himself in
right what is the thought process there
yeah well uh yeah you can try to
downplay it a little bit but uh you know
what what presents itself presents
itself uh this is
you know in in many situations and this
of course is a problem with the law
is that there’s a limited amount of
discretion that you have as a as a legal
matter right and not just an employment
matter but it’s a legal matter
and so what you can do
uh is refer this to drug court which in
broward county can be fairly effective
in treating situations differently
because there are a couple of judges
who
are relatively sensitive
to the story that you just told for
example
right so we can we can
scooch things
in a direction that’s more productive
uh thankfully but
not because necessarily the law has
changed very much over the years but
because
the courts have
at least
taken some steps to react in the right
direction
and that’s not to say believe me i’m not
saying that
and therefore we don’t need to be
criminalized we absolutely do
but various pieces of the justice system
which is large and complicated
uh have been trying to react in
in positive ways
yeah and and again we and i’ve i’ve
heard some both positive and negative
things about drug court and similar
similar arrangements so i mean obviously
it doesn’t always work very well
right yeah and it probably is different
from state to state as well all that to
say i think
oh i’m sure and from person to person
and judge to judge and everything else
uh obviously i mean i i think
i think we’ve both made our points here
uh in terms of the the the enforcement
versus disobedience i think that
actually the one thing i do want to say
is kind of touching on something you
said and then we can get into the
economic stuff um but
for example um you mentioned the fact
that when the officers uh when there was
the change to how uh marijuana was going
to be uh
um arrested and treated the officers
largely refused to enforce it and it
just kind of quietly went away as a
policy because they knew that there
wasn’t an appetite for the officers to
enforce it in a similar manner of how if
a certain percentage of the population
engages in civil disobedience the
government often just uh uh
abandons trying to enforce it because
they don’t really have the ability to
enforce it for no other reason with that
said
does that not mean that if enough
officers wanted to they could refuse to
enforce the war on drugs or the war on
guns or the war on sex work and say no
we aren’t willing to do this you know
we’re willing to go against you know a
violent street gang or something like
that but we’re not willing to enforce a
truly victimless crime uh you know just
because it involves drugs or just
because it involves guns is it not true
that there could also be a refusal to
enforce there
yes to a certain extent anyway uh it’s
difficult to explicitly coordinate that
sort of thing
right
it’s much more viable as a strategy
i have found other officers have found
to uh how shall i say put your energies
in other directions
right
uh a lot of
uh
criminal police work
is
uh the result of proactive dedication of
your own personal resources
and so pushing in one direction or
another gets you away from
certain things
so to the extent to which
uh you know you
spend more time working on those calls
that are
domestic violence in nature for example
you do have a little bit of influence
about uh
you know not dedicating quite as much uh
activity toward other things and as a
department
as a whole
we have that to a certain extent
okay um
i’m going to like i said i think rather
than have us for two hours go back and
forth talking about largely the same
thing i think everyone including the
people in the comments have made our
points here um and i think we all get
each other’s points here i think i don’t
think there’s anyone who’s mistaken as
to what someone’s saying or not i’ll
close this on two different comments
that were made kind of in favor of and
against what you said uh one said
something along the lines i forget where
it was someone’s saying this basically
they they perceived it as a just
following orders uh uh response uh and
then but then someone else uh nate berg
actually said if everyone with any
libertarian ideals quit then uh uh you
would only have officers left who had no
libertarian ideals um and that you know
nothing’s all or nothing and that that
would you know that would be a net worth
i i think everyone can get each other’s
arguments i i think it’s clear how each
one of us thinks on these things um
yeah and if i would summarize what i
have to say it is
i’m a big believer in public service
that’s fair and this is the way i change
it
and i get that and i and i i believe
that you that you are trying to do this
for the um
that you’re doing it for a public
service reason even if even if there are
some obvious civil liberties concerns
and things like that um when it comes
right that we all share i don’t think
anyone in your and your audience is is
uh going to try to kid him or herself
that
uh i became a police officer or very
many others became become police
officers because they want to arrest
people for drugs right that’s not a
that’s not a thing
i i yeah i i doubt it i doubt it the
question becomes now that you know it is
then what with that said um i i i we do
here’s i want to end where we agree we
need to get rid of the victimless crime
laws so that this isn’t even a
discussion anymore like if if a police
officer’s job is only to protect lives
rights and property then 99 of this
argument goes away now we’re just
talking about what to do with officers
who could remain actors and we pretty
much largely agree on on on that um
let’s uh
going to the
um
kind of getting into the economic end of
it because you are also an economist um
a lot of criminal justice issues are
often lead to poverty um or enforce
poverty and something that you actually
are running on is on looking at how the
criminal justice system being often
heavy-handed especially with people poor
people um leads to and enforces the
existing poverty system can you kind of
dive into that and and so you would want
to see a change in that
yeah and i i think
one useful place to start is to
to talk about the war on poverty as it
was launched in the 1960s right okay
uh
and and i would argue that most of us
certainly back in the 70s
when i came of age
were
optimistic uh
naively right as kids we were optimistic
that throwing money at certain types of
problems would lead to something good
uh
and that’s the the basic nexus of the
war on poverty is that
if you
made resources available to people who
are in poverty that that would give them
a way out of poverty
right
and and the other piece of it was what
that developed into
an encounter to that
uh talk of the 1980s talking about the
reagan years
uh we then began believing that a rising
tide would would lift all boats right
and we were very optimistic and naive
about that as well as it turns out that
a rising tide
does not
lift all boats
we see a great deal of mobility in our
economy from one strata to another
everywhere except for the bottom in
other words we see people going from
middle class to upper class and upper
class to middle class all the time
we see some people escaping poverty
every year but
not the kind of mobility that you see in
the rest of the economy the bottom of
our economy works differently
than the rest of it
and the one thing that i have learned
from looking at economic development
both united states and elsewhere
and of course
following this as a police officer uh on
on road patrol for the past 11 years
truly poverty is a political phenomenon
poverty
not only is in many cases caused by bad
public policy
but it is locked in
to
what i would characterize as persistent
intergenerational
poverty the kind of poverty that
uh
leads from one generation to the next
that’s very difficult to escape
over a long long period of time
so if you start out
looking at
folks in difficult situations
uh the first thing you notice is they is
that poverty is a is a geographic
concept right poverty is concentrated in
certain
places
and that leads to crappy public schools
and an absence of private schools and
until recently a complete absence of
charter schools which is a fairly recent
phenomenon for which we’re all
eternally grateful
but because public schools have a
virtual monopoly locally speaking over
the use of public funds
face no competition it’s very difficult
for the problems of public schools to be
corrected there’s just no economic force
driving them to do so
right and that
limits
all kinds of opportunity right not only
does it limit economic opportunity
it actually limits in some cultural
sense even aspirations for what most
people would consider
uh economic development
most people that graduate from the the
worst
public schools including those in
broward county where they truly are
bad
most folks
wouldn’t even recognize the economic
opportunities that are made available to
people graduating from private schools
and from good public schools elsewhere
in the united states
when you combine that with our criminal
justice system which as you and i were
just discussing criminalizes
some very
basic
victimless adult behaviors
you get people seeking opportunities to
make money in street crime
street crime comes from the combination
of bad public schools and prohibition
right
street crime
uh lack of economic opportunity
another a number of other bad public
policies that we have in place we still
at the federal level subsidize the
breakup of the
of of the nuclear family unfortunately
we subsidize the concentration of
of of housing at the lower end of the
spectrum
we have zoning ordinances that
preclude
integration of low and high income
families we do all kinds of things to
make it difficult
and what we find
is that the the justice system plays a
major role
not just because it sweeps up so many
people through the criminalization of
things that shouldn’t be criminalized
but of course our sentencing is so much
heavier than the rest of the world
right that we find other ways to break
up families
to undermine economic development to
undermine entire communities
that leads to tough parenting situations
tough parenting situations
leads to
problems in school and so you see the
cycle
continue
and there’s there’s the cycle and i
wish that that weren’t the case right
um
i’m not trying to suggest that breaking
the cycle is easy it’s not
it’s a lot easier to describe
than to fight
plenty of people on the right
uh like to describe this as a fairly
simple problem all you need to do is uh
graduate get a job work hard
uh don’t get pregnant until after you’re
married and your life is going to be
good
right
uh
yeah that’s easier said than done if you
graduate or more importantly don’t
graduate from a bad public school
a lot of people i find down here in in
district 20 or any of the other number
of places where i’ve either worked or
visited in pockets of poverty
a number of people will
will tell you well
you know even if public funds are
available to private schools we still
wouldn’t have private schools here
we don’t have any private schools now
right so it wouldn’t do us any good well
the truth of the matter is that private
schools if they know nothing else they
know which side of their bread gets
buttered
right
it’s no coincidence that the private
school that i was able to send my
daughter to
uh
that was standing the mortgage on the
house i had to get to pay for it
was in a wealthy community it’s not a
coincidence
if you were to make public funds
available to private schools
in district 20
i can guarantee you the archdiocese of
miami would take notice
there would be private schools there in
in in due course and it wouldn’t take a
generation
well and it’s it’s interesting because
this the the concept of school choice
which is basically what you’re
describing it’s actually just it’s sort
of like medicare for all but for
education so like what we currently have
is like the equivalent of the va where
the government doesn’t just control the
funds and funding but they actually
control the militarism it’s yeah the
delivery it’s actual socialization of an
entire service they’ve controlled the
media production and
a step down from that while still having
the government uh controlling the
funding and and essentially for lack of
a better word robbing us to pay for it
um there it at least is being assigned
to the parent and the parent is deciding
where it goes so we’re exactly right
and it’s a steady stone
it’s a stepping stone to getting the
government out of education completely
eventually right exactly yeah yeah
which can’t happen all in one step
in indeed making public funds available
for private schools is something that
can’t even happen in one step we have to
go through the charter school step to
get there
thank goodness charter schools have now
demonstrated the argument should be over
but it won’t be over for many years
but the argument should be over because
charter schools outperform
uh traditional public schools
full stop and that’s the case whether
they’re unionized or not by the way so
one interesting finding uh interesting
to me as an economist i have to admit i
didn’t see this coming
uh the teacher unions themselves
although they’re a political problem
they’re not the primary problem in
delivering a good education
the charter schools that are unionized
it turns out
also do a damn good job of outperforming
traditional public schools
yeah no it’s not even close like that
it’s not even close in terms of the the
metrics which is why the the public
sector unions are doing everything they
can to fight it uh kyle hagan is
mentioning you know he’s saying trim up
the black bars you know who’s running my
obs uh kyle uh when uh mike when we lost
mike one of the times he had to switch
to another device and it’s apparently in
portrait mode yeah i apologize for that
no no it’s fine i just i don’t want to
take up any more time of the broadcast
trimming it up and editing it so we’re
just going to go with this
originally it wasn’t the right the right
thing um
and talking about the criminal justice
aspect of that mike um when someone is
criminalized uh you know
looking at the kids they’re robbed of at
least one parent um for the time that
they’re in prison um which could be many
years especially if they’ve been cr you
know multiple times of getting hit on
victimless crimes and now they’re in
jail they come out they’re unable to
vote they’re unable to own a weapon
often they’re they’re unable to uh be
able to get uh work in entire career
industries entire industries are closed
off yeah entire industries are closed
off they’re unable to get a business
license so are you in favor of and i’m
not sure if it’s either an
i guess along with ending these wars on
victimless crimes also giving like a
type of an amnesty to those who were
previously convicted of just those
crimes not those crimes and some kind of
violent offense or something but having
specifically those crimes removed from
people’s records so they can have a
clean slate yeah absolutely
i i don’t think that you should carry a
record for something that is currently
not illegal
to me that doesn’t make any sense
yeah yeah i in other words this has to
be in a sense retroactive
yeah this is a very interesting which is
a shame right because right now there
are people incarcerated and for a long
period of time
for things that will soon no longer be
illegal or in some cases are already uh uh legal
so we have some statements some cases
already legal that’s actually true with
marijuana in some cases there are people
that are in prison for selling and the
justification is well but there was no
story it was illegal at the time and you
broke it was illegal at the time and
there was no way for them to have the
the licensing and they never could have
afforded it they’re literally arguing
that because they were poor they should
be in jail for something that a rich
person is now allowed to be able to do
right and and and i understand
the counter argument right the counter
argument is it was illegal at the time
but you know in the same way that we need a
pathway to citizenship for people who
are in the united states
illegally right we need a pathway
to amnesty and spike you know as well as
i do amnesty is not the word that we’re
going to be able to use if we want
political success in that arena but yeah
we need a pathway to
to restoration of rights
yeah uh and that’s the best way to put
it restoring people’s rights that should
have never been removed in the first
place i mean to use an extreme example
uh there were people who used to have
criminal charges for violating the
fugitive slave acts well once slavery
was that once chattel slave or at least
once private sector chattel slavery was
ended and replaced with public sector
slavery there was
to have someone still have a criminal
record or still be in jail for
escaping their master that that was now
a completely illegal arrangement um you
know there would be no reason for them
to have that so same thing here right
and and and there wasn’t a pathway to
the restoration of rights put in place
uh then it was a a real shame in my view
yeah i agree with you 100 this is a very
interesting situation in which
we agree uh pretty much 100 when it
comes to the reforms that need to be
made and i think the the disconnect
between us is
that i i believe that
and and many of the people and i will
say in in your defense this is not one
you know i i know you’re not looking at
the comments it’s not 100 people saying
that they agree with me or disagree with
you it’s it’s fairly balanced but i i
will say that i think the disconnect is
so if if i know something is wrong and i
know that um and and i i will say that i
don’t believe it’s just as simple as
saying it’s a political disagreement so
a political disagreement might be
something like uh you know a marginal
tax rate or trade policy or something
like that i think when it comes to for
example saying uh you have to
um be the person who actually goes and
collects someone to be processed in the
system that you’re talking about
ultimately contributes to poverty and
and and to over criminalization into uh
stratification between the poor and
literally everyone else and not to
mention the immediate damage and harm
being done to them not to mention all of
the justifications for the the growing
police state uh and surveillance state
that we have as a result of it um
that that’s your job to go and do that
in that moment i i i wonder if
in addition to
the advocating for that to end that
there isn’t also something useful in
saying and in the meantime i’m i’m at
least not going to prioritize that my
priority is going to be on the things
that i think should be and i encourage
other officers to do the same for us to
prioritize what we actually want to do
and in doing so demonstrate to the
community that this is not a police
officer thing this is a politician thing
they want this stuff we don’t want to do
it and so we’re basically doing
everything we can to refuse to comply in
our own right if that makes sense
uh it does make sense and behind closed
doors that’s exactly what does go on uh
every officer knows which officer is
interested in pursuing drug crimes and
which one is not which officers are the
officers you want there with regard to
any other type of situation
you know you and i can go on and on
about the hundreds of other types of
calls that we go on right
and so behind closed doors that happens
and we have those types of conversations
all the time including ones that involve
principles and politics and what we
think ought to be legal and not legal
our profession is not there in terms of
you know going public if somebody wanted
to take a stand
that would lead to them being discharged
i would have every
respect for that officer
but you wouldn’t you know you would not
be a police officer
any longer and for most people that’s
fine you know i’m guessing that there’s
no one else in your audience who is a
police officer and
and that’s fine most people aren’t right
uh but if you want to be a police
officer
you’ve got to take a little bit of it
and and back to another point that
you’re making to an economist
not all of those examples that you make
political disagreements
are that easy to choke down uh to an
economist uh tariffs are pretty bad
things you know some of the things that yeah
that the world bank used to do in terms
of foisting debt upon
uh nations in latin america were pretty
bad and i spent a year working for the
world bank and
and yeah you have some ethical issues
you gotta wrestle with and ultimately
decide not to pursue a career with them
uh but you know i knew economists at the
treasury department who are quite pissed
off at some of the things that whatever
administration was in power was doing
five you’ll hear and you know you choose
to try to make the changes you can from
the inside and choke down the rest and
the and the the real acknowledging the
real harms that happened as a result of
that of of those the real life
consequences of those policies no i
agree with you 100 yeah you know like i
said i i think um
by the way i’m not trying to let myself
off the hook i’m just saying
er you know life is hard
and and we all do have to make uh tough
decisions and some of us are gonna choose to
pursue certain careers as
challenging as as they may be to wrestle
with in your head
yeah here’s the thing i i’m not sure we’re
going i don’t think we’re going to necessarily
agree on this point which is what makes
it even more important it makes it more
important it makes it every bit as important as it
was before this conversation started to
end these things so that this this
argument doesn’t even exist to begin
with so that we’re now talking in some kind
of academic sense instead of a real life
sense i i do i do hope that um i do hope
that in this conversation and not just
from you but in everyone that i i that
we recognize
or at least that there’s a uh
acknowledgement of the fact that i i
hope that we can see
more pushback from people because i
don’t i there are plenty of people in
law enforcement who believe the war on
drugs is good they have bought just like
many non-officers many civilians believe
that the war on drugs is good it’s
necessary and it’s you know we have to
stop all these addictions and all these
uh drug dealers and and that and that
this is a good way to do it uh despite
all evidence to the contrary they still
right right officers still believe it as
well for those who don’t or for those
who recognize something is wrong here i
i do hope that i see more of a not just
an advocacy to end it but of people
saying i don’t want to do this and if
you want to have enough police officers
to fill your ranks sure we aren’t going
to do this this needs to be at the very
least deprioritized um in the same way
that we’ve seen a lot of people who quit
the military service once they’re up to
do so once they’re no longer in that
enlisted period where they have to
remain in and even some who say i listen
then dishonorably discharge me or give
me conscientious objector status or
whatever it is but i can’t continue to
do this i i believe that there are going
to have to be many ways to fight the the
very very profitable and very uh
attractive to those who want power war
on drugs and war on victimless crimes i
think it is going to take advocacy
against bad laws i think it is going to
take people from within the inside as a
word talking about this but i do think
there’s going to have to be an aspect in
the same way there’s going to have to be
an aspect of civilian disobedience to it
there’s going to also have to be an
aspect of enforcer disobedience to the
extent of at least saying this is not
our priority if you tell us our priority
is beating people up for you know
menthols or loose cigarettes we’re not
doing it like or or it’s going to be so
low on the totem pole that it’s it might
as well not being enforced i do hope to
see more of that right like like what
has happened with weed right
yeah i i do hope to see that and and and
we i will say i guess the last thing on
this is or that i’ll say on it is that
one of the many different things that
led to increasing talk of
decriminalizing and legalizing drugs in
uh or specifically weed and now uh
hallucinogens and um antenogens uh uh um
i’m saying that wrong the the mushrooms
and the hallucinogenic plants uh is that
an increasing number of uh of officers
were saying this is stupid i’m not going
to do it uh this isn’t helpful it’s
harmful and and it became untenable for
municipalities and states across the
country to continue doing it um which
led them to actually having a standoff
with the federal government which is uh
it’s kind of interesting um so i do
think there’s many aspects to it and yes
that was helpful it’s a good example
yeah so i do hope that we have more of
that i don’t want i don’t believe that
we should just say well while it’s still
the law we just it is what it is and we
have to do it i think there needs to be
an aspect of saying okay it’s the law
and and we may not be able to completely
uh disobey enforcing but
in some cases we may have to disobey
enforcing or at the very least give a
lot of pushback on it and i do hope to
see more of that yep well said
okay um so folks uh there has been many
uh uh uh opinions of people that like
what we’ve said people that have
disliked what we’ve said people that
have like what i’ve said people have
like what mike said and vice versa um
you actually have an opportunity to talk
with both of us about these things and
anything else you want to do uh because
i’m actually going to be uh in uh
two weeks from now i’m going to be in
florida uh with mike termat uh and
martha bueno uh mike is obviously
running for congress martha bueno is
running for city commissioner in miami
um and so it’s not it isn’t
oh good we’re live and the things aren’t
pulling up anyway uh this uh friday and
saturday uh i am going to be uh or not
this friday and saturday next friday
september three and four
september third and fourth i am going to
be uh in fort lauderdale and in miami uh
with mike termite and with martha bueno
uh and on the field with martha that’s
right yeah and i we encourage you to uh to
reach out come on out uh tell us what
you like tell us what you don’t like ask
us your questions um and uh and listen
to uh what mike has to say like it like
it or don’t like it mike has definitely
a very uh unique perspective on this and
uh it’s worth a listen and and you get
to tell them what you think uh uh what
what you think about it positive or
negative uh uh directly to him so um
so uh where can people find out how to
register for these events and to find
out more about you as a candidate and
everything else
well they can go to the first of all the
easiest place is the website right mike
termata2022.com you gotta spell it right
m-i-k-e-t-e-r-m-a-a-t
two zero two two dot com
uh i’m gonna put that in the notes so
mike’s website go ahead i’m just i’m
putting your site in some people you can
reach out to me directly
mike at miketrump2022.com
uh you’ll find my phone number on the
website that’s my real phone number
uh the phone i carry with me in my
pocket feel free to text me with any
questions that you have
the events that we’re going to have
going on i think are going to be a lot
of fun martha has a shooting event on
the fifth uh that’s going to be a lot of fun
she’s got something going on in the
afternoon of the 4th
or the evening of the fourth i get
confused and we have something going on
in the afternoon of the fourth we have a
dinner on the third
uh spike is going to be at all of them
and uh as as everybody knows for for
those of you in the audience
who have not dealt with spike in person
i would suggest that you avail yourself
for the opportunity because he’s a lot
of fun and uh you know you you find yourself
agreeing and disagreeing but there is
one thing about spike cohen that should
never be lost on anybody and that is
spike is one of those guys who
recognizes that politics and
libertarianism has got to be about
making people’s lives better you know
it’s not just about i hate this and i
hate that and i wish people would would
leave me alone uh every conversation
that spike cohen ever has
you can tell it’s leading in the
direction of you know how do we make
things better and that’s what all of our
conversations uh need to be about so i
encourage everyone to take the
opportunity to meet uh spike
well thank you that means a lot mike and
yeah it we believe what we believe
because we recognize from a
philosophical and moral standpoint that
you shouldn’t hurt people you shouldn’t
take their things you shouldn’t
subjugate them you shouldn’t order them
around for many people before they can
buy into that philosophy in in a as an
actual political sense and not just as
the axiom that it is we shouldn’t hurt
people or take their stuff you have to
show how it actually works because we’ve
all most of us were did not start as
libertarians neither i nor mike started
as libertarians most libertarians are
not second generation or third
generation libertarians they became
libertarians after having heard someone
explain it well or after reading
something or something happening in
their life that changed their
perspective whatever it is
up until then if someone had told you
these ideas you might have said yeah
that sounds great but what about public
safety what about the roads what about
education what about healthcare what
about housing what about national
security whatever whatever your things
were we need to show that libertarianism
not only is the right way to do this uh
libertarianism is not only the most
moral way to do things but it also makes
the most sense it also works the best
people working together voluntary
voluntarily as stakeholders in a given
situation are always going to work
better than a situation that is
centrally planned and democratized out
to a bunch of people who have no stake
with coercion and threats and no
accountability all the way around right
so um so before i let you go think again
thank you on uh thank you again for
coming on mike and i appreciate your
time uh before i let you go i do want to
give you a chance to say anything else
you want to say anything you thought we
didn’t touch on uh anything you want to
plug i want to give you that chance
however long you need mike termat the
floor is yours
well i appreciate that i think we
covered all of the uh important ground
uh the reason that i got into this race
in particular
is because the issues that matter so
much to the residents of district 20 are
issues that have been important to me
personally and professionally for a long
long time police reform and economic
development particularly in terms of
defeating poverty ending the war on
poverty and replacing it with common
sense rules and legislation that lets
people develop the economy the way it
needs to be from the ground up instead
of just throwing money at it i had the
opportunity to to participate in a forum
with the democratic candidates a couple
of nights ago and i have to admit
notwithstanding having followed some of
these people for years and having seen
them in the news and online
it is breathtaking to be in a forum with
them in real time and hear them talk
about the way out of poverty is to go
find contracts go find money spend more
resources on this and that
and these families will somehow
magically be able to climb their way out
of poverty it does not work like that if
it would we would have solved poverty
literally 40 years ago so we know with
certainty it doesn’t work we just have
to convince people to to take a fresh
approach and i believe that that’s the
same thing with criminal justice reform
we put into place
a crime bill 25 years i can’t believe
it’s been so long
democrats and republicans alike were
buying into it people were optimistic it
didn’t work
it turns out that sending people to jail
for stupid things for long long long
periods of time
is no way to fight crime it’s just a way
to bust up communities
we have to take a fresh approach to so
many of these things and it’s absolutely
heartbreaking to see the democratic
party doubling down
on the idea of of the war on poverty the
same as it ever was
and claiming victimization of one group
or another instead of helping people
find ways to develop their own economies
and seeing the republican party just
absolutely
stand in the way of criminal justice
reform police reform in particular
and saying no just because they’re not
interested in the hard work of
bringing police officers along as
natural allies in the process which we
will be eventually we just saw in the
state of washington legislation being
moved without police officer involvement
and now everyone’s all mad at each other
because nobody understands what the
other side really wants out of it
so politically
and in terms of communication
understanding what people need and
understanding what voters are ready to
hear
there is a tremendous amount of hard
work ahead of us and none of it is going
to be solved with slogans like defund
the police or you know we’re just not
going to have reform at all
we are going to have reform we’re going
to have the right kind and it’s going to
take a lot of time and a lot of hard
work and we need to uh buckle up and and
get ready for it so i appreciate spike
you’ve given me the opportunity to talk
about it
and uh all the other folks that you
support in local races around the
country as well
well thank you mike and uh
you know harry brown said it best
gosh 25 30 years ago government is good
at doing one thing it walks up to people
it breaks their legs it takes their
wallet it uses some of the money to buy
them some crutches and it says if it
wasn’t for me
you wouldn’t have those crutches the
criminal justice system the uh
regulatory capture occupational
licensing system zoning system all of
that and the enforcement mechanism
behind it is the leg breaking and the
wallet stealing the war on poverty is
that using some of it to buy them
crutches and it doesn’t work right
you know the answer to i wish it would
right how simple would the world be
if if the status quo fixed everything we
wouldn’t even be here it wouldn’t be a
problem um but so no i really appreciate
it and uh i uh i look forward to seeing
you in a couple weeks uh i i look
forward to talking with you more about
the it’s a contentious subject when we
talk about that that that uh divide
between our principles and and how to
deal with it today and i think it’s an
important conversation to have and i
look forward to continuing to have it
with you man
it is thank you thanks for hearing it
absolutely thank you stick around i’m
going to talk with you during the uh
outro and uh yeah how are you just now
seeing america’s jew josiah it’s been
there literally the whole time america’s
jew i’m america’s jew i used to be a
local jew but i was the nominee of the
third largest political party vice
president making me america’s jew um so
folks thanks again for tuning into this
episode uh of my fellow americans uh
join matt wright tomorrow
on thursday and i’m speaking slowly so i
can pull up who his guest is because i
always do this and i forget on thursday
on the writer’s block uh his uh
his guest is don johnson uh and is it
that don johnson
or is it a don johnson who’s running for
city council in somerville south
carolina you’re not going to believe who
it is uh tomorrow night at 8 p.m on the
writer’s block uh on friday night uh we
are not having an episode of uh cajun
and eskimo from bio to igloo uh join
them uh next friday uh this saturday uh
or this this weekend i’m free i get to
stay home uh and then on monday join us
for uh at 8 pm for an episode of mr
america the bearded truth jason lyon
will be delving into yet another major
subject uh and then uh next tuesday join
us for the next episode of the muddy
waters of freedom where matt right and i
parse through the week’s events like the
sweet little little monkeys that we are
and then join me right back here next
wednesday same spike place same spike
time my guest will be
rapper r.a the rugged man i am really
excited about this um and then again
join me uh next weekend uh in uh florida
with mike termatt and martha bueno to
find out more go to miketermat
2022.com folks thanks again for tuning
in to this episode of my fellow
americans it was special because you
were here and we love you i’m spike
cohen and you are the power
god bless guys
[Music]
[Applause]
you can’t make a change it might fit
we might just unite them come together
become hybrid at the least slightly
like-minded indeed the life i’ve lived
brings light to kindness
all you need is a sign
put a cease to the crimes put an like mine
sometimes darkness is all i find you
know what they say about an eye for a
night in a time where the blobs of blood
who am i to deny would cry when a loved
one dies i recognize that body outside
for the holes in the body that was alive
[Music]
tell me why make the day we will make you