The Dangers of Misinformation: How to Educate Voters with Karl Smith
Karl Smith, the organizer behind the Voter Education Project, joins us for the second half of our insightful conversation about the importance of informed voting and understanding public investments. He emphasizes the need for a national healthcare program that spans a lifetime, rather than a system that burdens individuals based on age. Throughout the discussion, Karl highlights the detrimental effects of misinformation in politics and how it has been perpetuated over decades, particularly by the Republican Party. He advocates for a shift in messaging that focuses on creating opportunities for all citizens through education, healthcare, and fair labor practices. As we delve deeper, we explore the societal implications of current political strategies and what it truly means to make America great for everyone.
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Transcript
The all about nothing podcast may have language and content that isn't appropriate for some listener.
Carl Smith:Discretion is advised.
Host:Welcome, nothingers to the second half of this episode, number 229 with Carl Smith, the organizer behind the votereducationproject.com.
Host:we're gonna get right back here into the episode in just a second.
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Host:We're going to jump right back into the show here, the all about nothing podcast.
Host:Carl Smith of the Voter education Project.
Host:Republicans on this.
Host:There's this idea, well, if you want, if you like your doctor, you get to keep them.
Host:Well, what if, what if you don't like any of the doctors that are available in the system that is available from your employer?
Carl Smith:Right, right.
Carl Smith:Yeah.
Carl Smith:There's, there's so many businesses that don't get started.
Carl Smith:There's, you know, that because of this false idea, you know, that you should be able to keep your doctor or whatever, it's, it's really kind of a, it's this distraction.
Carl Smith:You know, you're, the bigger thing is, and what would be people to think about is, is that system going to be there for you when you need it?
Carl Smith:Because basically, if you're only charged by whatever the risk is at your age, well, it works for you when you're young, and it makes it totally unaffordable when you're older.
Carl Smith:When you hit forties and fifties and sixties and seventies and so on, you cannot afford what that's going to cost you.
Carl Smith:So you're going to basically be underinsured or you're not going to be, you know, might be covered for a couple of things, maybe the sniffles and stuff, but you get any kind of serious issue, they're gonna go, no, no, you know, you can't, you know, your, your program doesn't do that.
Carl Smith:But if we have a national program that then, so it distributes what we have to do instead of distributing costs across an age.
Carl Smith:And that's what a business does.
Carl Smith:Business has a lot of different employees.
Carl Smith:It has young employees, older employees.
Carl Smith:So it gets stretched.
Carl Smith:It gets spread across most of their lifetime.
Carl Smith:And then basically, you know, Medicare and stuff, you know, picks up afterwards because the business couldn't have, you know, wouldn't be able to do that either.
Host:Right.
Carl Smith:But so we got to get away from this idea that you should be paying what your age group, you know, you know, cost because that means that later you won't know, you will not have the healthcare you need in that system.
Carl Smith:It is not there for your lifetime.
Carl Smith:You've got to, you got to think about insurance or healthcare as a lifetime process and not a, you know, year by year kind of, kind of thing.
Carl Smith:So there's, there's, I think there's ways of countering the, the republican, you know, messaging.
Carl Smith:So, you know, and there's just better arguments to put into the kind of the national debate.
Carl Smith:So, you know, that's what I'm trying to do is get some traction for this idea of basic public investments, getting people to understand that because then they understand, okay, yeah, we can, you know, these things will pay back, you know, when we invest in these things.
Carl Smith:And, and, you know, so it's not, it's not, you know, being, you know, socially or fiscally irresponsible.
Carl Smith:These are physically responsible things.
Carl Smith:You know, these are investments that will pay back in a number of different ways.
Carl Smith:You know, having a national healthcare program is not social.
Carl Smith:Most of the providers are going to still be private businesses and, and so on, but you'd have your choice of going to whatever doctors and, you know, and so on, and then the system's going to be there.
Carl Smith:Our current system is a game of chance, nothing more.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, and now, you know, with, with the national health program or the womacare, you know, it's, it's getting more people into this bigger pool, and basically it's kind of shifting that in an over time.
Carl Smith:Then it's going to be a lot more attractive.
Carl Smith:What the, but we still have all the inefficiencies of an insurance system.
Carl Smith:We need to get rid of that.
Carl Smith:The quicker we get rid of that, the quicker all of us can benefit from better health care.
Carl Smith:And all these other countries are doing better than we in terms of health outcomes.
Carl Smith:We need to drive that message over and over and over like the republicans do.
Carl Smith:They get on a message and they're like a dog that won't let go.
Host:I think, yeah, I think, I think part of the problem is the fact that the word insurance is tied to healthcare.
Host:It's this, this idea that in order to have good health, you have to have something in place for, in case something goes wrong, which is what insurance is.
Host:And, you know, I will, I detest the idea of insurance, even though I literally work in insurance.
Host:I work for a software company, company that creates the software for property and casualty insurance companies.
Host:And, and so, you know, I recognize that as, honestly, it's part of the problem of the system, the fact that we are, and it, you know, it holds people accountable to what they've done.
Host:So I kind of look at, and this is, I don't know if I'm biased about it.
Host:I probably am.
Host:But I look at the property and casualty as being something as a necessary in a system that potentially doesn't have the ability to come in and replace somebody's home.
Host:I mean, we just went through the disasters of Hurricane Helene, and they're still assessing both that storm as well as Milton that just occurred just a few days ago as of this recording.
Host:And in Florida, it's almost impossible to get insurance without paying an extremely high premium monthly, sometimes, sometimes two and $3,000 a month just to cover the possibility and the increased likelihood that your property is going to be damaged or destroyed.
Host:And you're paying into a system that if you live somewhere in Florida where it statistically doesn't, hasn't been hit by a hurricane or major storm or flooding and things like that, and you pay into that system for the entire time, you own that home and you sell that home.
Host:You don't get to cash out on everything.
Host:You paid into something that didn't pay out back to you.
Host:You have essentially paid into a system that is now trying to pay for others, which is a social thing, that is.
Host:And I think that if you were to poll some of the Republicans or those Republicans that, that buy into the republican ideals every single election cycle, that they would tell you that, yeah, it's necessary for you to have insurance, but they disassociate from the fact that insurance is a social program.
Host:You pay into something so that it may have to, if you need it, it'll be there to help take care of your needs, but you're currently taking care of somebody else's needs.
Host:And, and there's, again, it's that, it's that cognitive dissonance.
Carl Smith:It's the, it's the problem.
Carl Smith:It's, you know, there's all this probabilities and so on, so you're, even if you just look at it, well, maybe I, you know, you know, maybe I need it.
Carl Smith:Maybe I don't, you know, or maybe I'm going to use it, maybe I'm not, but it's there.
Carl Smith:And then you can, you know, you can say, okay, you know, maybe you're sitting on, you know, you've got a billion dollars or you got $500 million, you got a hundred million dollars.
Carl Smith:Okay, I'm going to self insure because that's going to be cheaper for me to do that.
Carl Smith:You know, this property is only worth a million dollars.
Carl Smith:I can replace this property.
Carl Smith:So if, you know, so depending on your financial worth or your status, you can decide that you're going to take that risk.
Carl Smith:So, you know, you can live in a high risk area and get the benefits for being there, but then if it's gone, then you can afford to replace it.
Carl Smith:That's a very different thing than like, health insurance, which, which basically is very, very.
Carl Smith:The probability of something happening when you're young is very, very low, but when you're old, it becomes, you know, a lot, lot more.
Carl Smith:And then as health unhealthy as our population is, you know, a lot of these diseases and everything, diabetes and various things, heart disease, they're starting in their forties, you know, so they're going to have some sticker shock, you know, if they, you know, if they decide, you know, that or they don't have a program that's really based on spreading it out over life, this plus property insurance is kind of, is that way.
Carl Smith:It doesn't really, you know, have it.
Carl Smith:Well, this year it's this and that year it's that and that, you know, it's the same, typically the same cost, you know, for that, that whole period, depending on the exact thing.
Carl Smith:If something's going to get, you know, like a car, which is going to get, you know, kind of worse off over time, you know, you know, maybe it's higher, but they're going to give you a price for the next three years, four years, whatever, and you pay that flat price on a property, on a, like a coastline property.
Carl Smith:Well, the probability global warming is making the probabilities look worse.
Carl Smith:And, you know, and the insurance companies, they're not into this political bullshit.
Carl Smith:Oh, global army is not real.
Carl Smith:They're doing the calculations.
Host:Oh, yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, so if somebody wants to, you know, figure out who to believe, look at the military, you know, what they're doing.
Carl Smith:Look at the insurance companies, what they're doing, you know, is this real?
Carl Smith:You know, the insurance companies are, you know, they're taking a pretty, pretty serious because they can't stay in business if they don't, you know, if they don't charge the, you know, the right amount of money and stuff.
Carl Smith:But I don't think that we should be necessarily making, you know, or really reducing, publicly reducing the costs of people that want to live in high risk areas.
Carl Smith:We should allow if they can afford to do that.
Carl Smith:But if you can't afford to do that, and poor people, they get trapped in these areas.
Carl Smith:They can't do the evacuations.
Carl Smith:They don't have the finances to go someplace else.
Carl Smith:So it's better if they don't live in super high risk areas right there on the beach.
Host:And just to point out, look, the reason that Florida has such a high population as it does is because 50, 60 years ago, Florida was a mosquito infested swamp.
Host:And people moved to Florida not because of the beautiful golf courses and things like that, but because we had military bases there.
Host:People were already living there.
Host:It was not an expensive place to live.
Host: looked exactly like the other: Host:So they moved to Florida because Florida wanted people to move there.
Host:So the price of building a home was subsidized by the federal government.
Host:The cost of living in Florida was subsidized by the state government because they wanted an increase in population.
Host:And it worked.
Host:Now Florida is prime real estate despite the fact that it's one super moon tidal flood away from being half of a state.
Host:But it's those federal subsidations that actually made Florida profitable.
Host:And now you have people that have lived there for generations but that are poor and can't move away from Florida because of the cost of just moving.
Host:And it's, you know, so it's that, again, it's that separation from reality and history.
Host:And then they vote in the Republican Party because the Republicans are the ones that are in charge.
Host:And maybe it's changed.
Host:They fear that doesn't allow for them to recognize just the impact that that party has had on the generations of their lives living in this state.
Host:You know, we have friends that live in Florida that ultimately live in Florida because that's where their families have lived.
Host:And for them to get out of that state costs more money than they can afford to put forward for it.
Host:Right.
Host:But they see every, you know, every time there's a hurricane, the only thing they can do is go 15 or 20 miles further from where they live and be separated from their home and their property or separated their families are separated.
Host:You know, these are the impact, and sometimes they don't see the impact of just their day to day lives on the programs that have been instituted in a state like run by DeSantis and the republican legislature.
Host:South Carolina is very similar.
Host:There are people that live in South Carolina that have lived here for generation after generation because they can't afford to move somewhere else.
Host:If they have dreams or aspirations of living somewhere else, then their only ticket out is either play football for the University of Clemson or South Carolina or somehow score that job that would potentially get them moved out.
Host:And it's because of the generational lack of wealth that's been created by the system here in South Carolina and in Florida and in Georgia and Alabama, Mississippi.
Carl Smith:All these, it's all kind of a probabilistic thing.
Carl Smith:You take, you know, millions of people and so on, and, you know, they're all in different parts of their lives.
Carl Smith:People are doing different things.
Carl Smith:You know, kids are going off to college in different states, and then they decide not to come back.
Carl Smith:So families are, you know, getting spread, you know, distributed across the country.
Carl Smith:And then people.
Carl Smith:I met a lady a couple of nights ago, and she moved here because her sister, you know, and her family moved here, and she helps take care of their, their kids.
Carl Smith:And she was from Oregon.
Carl Smith:You know.
Carl Smith:You know, it's kind of a culture shock coming to Columbia, South Carolina, but, you know, it's just family members, you know, will go.
Carl Smith:There's all sorts of situation.
Carl Smith:My wife was saying that she had seen a thing, and I'm not sure of the, you know, you know, the, the accuracy of it.
Carl Smith:And it's probably, it's an estimate anyway that about 12% of people now in Florida are saying they'd like to kind of leave Florida in the next year.
Carl Smith:Well, that's a significant, I don't think all of them will do that.
Carl Smith:It does sound like a reasonable percentage because probably a lot of people got scared shitless, you know, through the experience of this last couple of storms hitting them, you know, within a couple of week period, and then just seeing the storms going from cat one to cat four, cat five in 12 hours, 20, you know, 24 hours, you know, that's got to have some people, you know, and then seeing, like, the damage that that kind of thing costs or causes up close, you know, it's kind of hard to say, well, it's not real.
Carl Smith:It's fake, you know, fake news.
Carl Smith:No, they just saw it.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:So I think the reality might be setting, setting in for more, you know, more people.
Carl Smith:And hopefully we have, you know, the Democrats have an opportunity, you know, on the social issues and stuff.
Carl Smith:If we can win the whole thing on the economy and get people to understand that, you know, it's the Democrats that are on the right side of the fundamentals that make our, both our people and our businesses prosper and help them thrive.
Carl Smith:Cutting all these programs, or Republicans, they want to cut public education, they want to cut healthcare, they want to cut research, they want to cut, I mean, and then they want to do infrastructure, but only where it's a user fee paid.
Carl Smith:So that creates the two tier system where if you're wealthier, you're going to be able to take advantage of it if you're not so wealthy.
Carl Smith:Well, no, it's kind of so, you know, creating opportunities for people.
Carl Smith:No, that's kind of a barrier for people.
Carl Smith:You know, they're on the wrong side of, they want to cut FEMA in our social safety nets.
Carl Smith:You know, we're not social.
Carl Smith:What are our safety nets here?
Carl Smith:And this idea that, you know, okay, you should just be able to keep all the money or most of the money that you get.
Carl Smith:And the government, we don't need to buy anything collectively because that's what this really is.
Carl Smith:We're putting money into our communities and our state, our cities and our states and our federal level, and then they buy things for us collectively at a lot better price than we can get individually.
Carl Smith:Huge discount.
Carl Smith:So this idea that's a bad thing to do is really, it's really dumb.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:Or just, you know, I mean, or just really uninformed.
Carl Smith:They need to understand that these are, it's not socialism.
Carl Smith:This is creating opportunities.
Carl Smith:It's not controlling our lives.
Carl Smith:Opportunities.
Carl Smith:These are investments that pay back and cutting these things.
Carl Smith:In fact, if you look at what cutting does, if you cut on education, that was money being put at the bottom of the economy, which was being spent quite quickly, which then would disappear.
Carl Smith:So the custom, so the businesses that were getting that money quickly, they would have fewer customers, so they would cut back.
Carl Smith:So then they would pay fewer taxes.
Carl Smith:And then those people, so that rip that creates this feedback loop.
Carl Smith:But guess what?
Carl Smith:The savings that were supposed to be realized, even just in a stimulus kind of way, they, or an immediate way, the savings disappear because your revenue disappears.
Host:Right.
Carl Smith:So this isn't going to, and then all of the long term, if we have fewer healthy and educated people, guess what?
Carl Smith:They're going to make a lot less money over the lifetime.
Carl Smith:If we have less research, you know, we spend, spend less on that, we're going to have less opportunities, which means that we're going to have less, you know, less money and so on.
Carl Smith:So all of these things that the Republicans want to do exact opposite.
Carl Smith:It is not this liberal, you know, fairyland stuff.
Carl Smith:This is something, this is something that really is, that benefits us all.
Carl Smith:It's solid, physically responsible, like buying a house or investing in something that actually pays back, you know, and, you know, we need, we need to get those messed basic public investments, you know, valuing all workers and workers rights.
Carl Smith:That's what, you know, or in a fair system, I should say that's what helps us all.
Carl Smith:And instead of, you know, some people doing better, you know, or big businesses doing, you know, doing great and are, you know, or small businesses, you know, more, more struggling and, you know, just not the thing, not having a national health program so we all, we don't have to worry about where our healthcare, you know, is coming from and all this complexity.
Carl Smith:You know, if you start getting into Medicare and all that, it's a, you know, oh, you know, get this advantage.
Carl Smith:You get so many people coming after you trying to get you to sell you this or they'll you that.
Carl Smith:And the reality is it's going to give you less benefits.
Carl Smith:Yep.
Carl Smith:You know, and, you know, it's just, it's crazy.
Carl Smith:I mean, there's just so much better ways of doing things that other countries have already done.
Carl Smith:It's not rocket science.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:So we need to get people to understand it.
Host:I'll say this as well.
Host: of the pillars of the project: Host:And we just went through.
Host: but the programs that Project: Host:And despite the fact that Donald Trump has attempted to separate himself from it and the Republicans have separated Donald Trump from it, and even the Heritage Foundation foundation has stated that, yes, we have.
Host:He is, we are no longer attempting to enact this as part of his policy.
Host:They have also said in closed doors that we're just letting this happen.
Host:We're letting Donald Trump separate us out because it doesn't seem popular.
Host: But programs that Project: Host:And one of the most important is NOAA, our national or oceanic and air and atmospheric administration.
Host:Literally, they're who tracks these hurricanes.
Host:Your weather forecasts that you get from your television or your radio or your Internet, those are all provided under a government program that funds the National Weather Service through NOAA.
Host:And NOAA is fundamental when it comes to protecting us in from insecurity, from, you know, hurricanes and weather events, blizzards, you know, all knowing when tornadoes are more likely because of a storm front coming through is all we benefit from that because of the National Weather Service and NOAA.
Host: And project: Carl Smith:And it's Trump's people, you know, that he's been associated with a long, long time that you don't came up with that.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:Majority of his people.
Carl Smith:So him not knowing anything about it and all that, I mean, it's just.
Carl Smith:It's just laughable.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:And.
Host:Carl, I didn't.
Host:I didn't get to ask you about your background earlier on, but you're a professor at the university.
Carl Smith:Oh, no, no, no.
Host:Okay, I miss.
Host:I misunderstood.
Carl Smith:I'm a research associate.
Carl Smith:Research associate in the electrical engineering department.
Carl Smith:No, I'm.
Carl Smith:I don't even have my bachelor's.
Carl Smith:I'm sorry.
Carl Smith:My master's degree.
Carl Smith:I kind of ran out of money.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, you know, trying to put myself or, you know, go through my.
Carl Smith:My graduate program.
Host:Don't even get me started on public education.
Carl Smith:People wanted me to.
Carl Smith:Wanted to pay me to do my own research and stuff, so I went ahead and.
Carl Smith:And did that.
Carl Smith:But, yeah, I'm just a resource associate, you know, as somebody getting older, you know, I've got actually a 30 year old with autism, just turned 30, so I need to be around for a while.
Carl Smith:I'm 68 years old.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, and I had gone through some health problems, and it was really kind of spiraling, spiraling down.
Carl Smith:I turned vegan about six and a half years ago.
Carl Smith:You know, got my health back.
Host:Okay.
Carl Smith:I've done up to ten mile runs this year, 50 miles, bike rides.
Carl Smith:I lost about 40 pounds.
Host:For those of you listening at home, Carl is now shaming me passively, aggressively.
Carl Smith:Well, I got my health back, but also, you want to keep your brain sharp.
Carl Smith:And I have a company that continue to run, but I wasn't doing anything really intellectually stimulating, you know, with.
Carl Smith:With that.
Carl Smith:And so basically, you know, I took this job at the university to help, you know, keep my.
Carl Smith:My brain hopefully as sharp as possible, you know?
Carl Smith:And.
Carl Smith:And so if you don't use it, you lose it.
Carl Smith:You know, that's.
Carl Smith:That's not only physically, that's also mentally.
Carl Smith:And.
Carl Smith:And because I need to be around for a while, you know, and I don't want to be, you know, with minimal health and taking a tray full of medicine a day and I.
Carl Smith:And then getting all sorts of other side effects because this one.
Carl Smith:Then you get another pill for that side effect.
Carl Smith:And, you know, it just.
Carl Smith:That's just not the life that.
Carl Smith:That I want.
Carl Smith:I want to be vibrant.
Carl Smith:I want to be active, you know, and there's.
Carl Smith:There's things, you know, and without all the disinformation that our food industries, you know, are, you know, funneling through the FDA and all that, I mean, we really need to separate that so that people can make decisions based on actual science and not this.
Carl Smith:This, you know, watch a.
Carl Smith:There's an interesting movie called game Changers with Arnold Schwarzenegger, and he says, well, all the stuff that we were telling you back in the day and stuff, that's just, you know, companies paying us to say that stuff.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:Not actual science.
Carl Smith:It's not actually, you know, and you don't need.
Carl Smith:You don't need meat to be strong.
Carl Smith: is one guy that's lists like,: Carl Smith: steps with: Carl Smith:You're as strong as an ox.
Carl Smith:And everybody goes, well, what do ox eat?
Host:Yeah, well, and then the undermining of the supreme courts on the Chevron decision, which basically states now that a judge can make an uninformed decision on a ruling where previously we had experts that would add to the testimony in order for a judge make an educated ruling.
Host:And without the Chevron decision anymore or the control of Chevron, now, we have the possibility that judges could potentially make uninformed decisions based purely on how it might benefit them or someone they know.
Carl Smith:Or their political standing or what.
Carl Smith:Yeah.
Host:These are all things that.
Host:That are fixable to make, and that's part of your message, is making America great for everyone.
Host:And ultimately, I think that what you're doing is absolutely necessary, and people absolutely should appreciate the time that you're putting forth.
Host:I do have a couple questions from a listener, Leroy Green, who appears on our show regularly, semi regularly, I guess.
Host:He also has a podcast called Nerdy by Nature, where they do movie reviews of Sci-Fi and that sort of thing.
Host:Very entertaining.
Host:You can check them out on YouTube.
Host:But he had a couple questions with the recent storm.
Host:How has your mission changed as far as educating voters against misinformation?
Carl Smith:Well, you know, that this is not a new phenomena.
Carl Smith:This has actually been happening.
Carl Smith:This, this misinformation has been happening for 40 plus years.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:Since, you know, Reagan signed.
Carl Smith:But it's, you know, the Republicans have been on this, you know, oh, it's socialism, it's taking your freedoms and all this kind of stuff.
Carl Smith:And, you know, and kind of scaring people into thinking the Democrats, you know, are going to ruin the, you know, the economy and our democracy.
Carl Smith:And then unfortunately, they got, you know, something like Trump, which has he read his book art of the deal and really, you know, could have been called art of the con.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, the first 70 pages really kind of shows how he kind of admires despicable people, you know, that are effective.
Carl Smith:You know, they throw somebody out on the street, you know, no way to survive.
Carl Smith:You know, he kind of admires those people.
Carl Smith:You know, they're, that's the way he.
Host:Looks at dictators across the world is he admires the fact that they, they are strong men that, that have no issue with shoving someone or having someone shove someone out of a window or, you know, fly into turkey and, and disassemble a Washington Post reporter that was writing negative stories about the prince of Saudi Arabia.
Host:You know, these are, these are things that strongmen dictators do.
Carl Smith:And Donald Trump doesn't think that line is, I mean, he really kind of minimizes it.
Carl Smith:You know, he thinks as kind of fibs.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:And, you know, it's kind of a benign, benign thing.
Carl Smith:And now his fibs, what he considers a fib, they are whoppers.
Host:Destructive.
Carl Smith:Yeah.
Carl Smith:And so, I mean, I think it's very enlightening to see, you know, to see what, but he's had, he's had kind of what I call f you, money.
Host:Yeah.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:So he can basically go out there and, you know, if he was dependent on other people's money, you know, to run, you know, the first time, he would have never gone for sure very far because they would, you know, he would have said things and they would go, I'm not funding, funding that.
Carl Smith:But he was able to just put that message out, put that message out of, and he showed where even if you go into the enemy camp and even with a batshit crazy message, some people will buy into it.
Carl Smith:You can pull out votes.
Carl Smith:I'm disappointed that Harris is not coming here to come to South Carolina agreed.
Carl Smith:You know, and just all over, just, just every state, not just the, you know, the battleground states, but in her surrogates.
Carl Smith:I mean, we need to have people going all over and go after every single vote and not just go after the people that are likely, you know, they think are likely to vote for us.
Carl Smith:You know, we need, we need to flush out.
Carl Smith:And we can, we can.
Carl Smith:And every time you flip somebody, it's like two votes.
Carl Smith:There's one less for them and one more for us.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, so we need to, like, say we need to go after every vote.
Carl Smith:Get.
Carl Smith:But also with better messaging, you know, and this whole thing, let's make America great for everyone instead of make America great again.
Carl Smith:It wasn't working so well.
Carl Smith:It's not hard to get people to think about that.
Carl Smith:It's, you know, that it wasn't working well for minorities but also for women.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, women still are not on equal footing with men, you know, in terms of the law.
Carl Smith:That is.
Carl Smith:Absolutely.
Carl Smith:And who is responsible for that?
Carl Smith:Republicans.
Host:Right.
Host:And it's on, it's on the simple ideas, too.
Host:It's on things like pay.
Host:The pay gap between men and women is still roughly about 22% to 20%.
Host:It's a difference in how much women get paid for the same job that men might do when it comes to health care.
Host:Republicans are literally enacting legislation to limit what women can have as far as healthcare, whether, you know, I think one of the things that really bugs me is even when I hear liberals say that they are pro abortion, I don't think anyone is actually pro abortion.
Host:They're not pro this idea unless it's specifically about the healthcare part of it.
Host:The fact that, the fact that I say this and it bothers people sometimes, but reading, and I've read through the Bible three or four times, the Old Testament is almost an instruction manual on how to sacrifice and abort babies or children, not infants, not groupings of cells and things like that.
Host:But that detracts away from the point, but that women's rights in the United States do not equal men's rights in the United States.
Host:And it's because the Republican Party has found a way to basically just etch away at what women have a right to their own bodily autonomy.
Host:Men in the United States, if you're not a convicted criminal, you have bodily autonomy.
Host:There's almost no legislation that I have seen anywhere in any state in the United States that actually takes away a men's right to choose how they want to handle their own health or their own body.
Host:But we have legislation in place now in, I think it's 27 states that either, that basically tells a woman that if your, if your, if you have a miscarriage or if the health of the baby is going to impact or the health of the, it's not a baby yet.
Host:In my eyes, a baby is born and, but the fetus, if the fetus is impacting your, your health and with the potential of killing you, that in, in more, in a majority of states here in the United States, you're just going to have to die.
Host:And that is not equality between men and women.
Host:And when, when you try to, when I try to explain that to someone that has a different opinion than me, they always go to this.
Host:While every baby's life is sacred, and I don't disagree, I think a baby's life is sacred, just like my life, just like my children's lives and my family, my friends, their lives are sacred and should be cherished and everything possible be done to protect those lives.
Host:But part of the woman being pregnant is the risk of that pregnancy, especially, you know, and it shouldn't, should science have caught up by now?
Host:Yeah, potentially.
Host:But I think part of science is the fact that there is the availability of a medical procedure called an abortion that protects that mother from the harm that the fetus could potentially cause if the pregnancy goes bad.
Carl Smith:Well, and then republicans just this basically boldface lie about, you know, that, that people or mothers are wanting to just tear apart full term babies and just rip them out of their wombs.
Carl Smith:And those are very painful decisions.
Host:Absolutely.
Carl Smith:And then some women choose that their baby, their fetus is going to survive and they die.
Carl Smith:Some women choose that.
Carl Smith:But these are really hard choices when, you know, these late state stage abortions where the mother or the fetus is just not going to survive or it's going to suffer.
Carl Smith:You know, they can see, fortunately, because of modern science, they can actually see that, you know, this is not a good outcome.
Carl Smith:We're only extending the suffering of a baby.
Carl Smith:That's not humane.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, or the suffering of the mother, you know, and then having to be, like, right on death's door for them to do anything about it instead of, instead of basically doing things, you know, when they're safe.
Carl Smith:You know, we know the fetus is not viable.
Carl Smith:You know, something's gone terribly wrong.
Carl Smith:You know, in my understanding that, you know, the Bible is, you know, has some different things, but, you know, they, they talk about the quickening and the first breath and, you know.
Host:Yep.
Host:All the things that make a baby a baby.
Carl Smith:Right, right.
Carl Smith:So, you know, this, these are really hard, gut wrenching problems that should be left up to the families.
Carl Smith:You know, trust women and doctors, they don't get, you know.
Carl Smith:Now, on the other hand, they, we need to, you know, and this is where probably don't do well at all is, you know, you can get more women to choose to have the baby.
Carl Smith:They already have several babies, or they're just, they're really just not.
Carl Smith:They don't think they're financially prepared to do it.
Host:Right.
Carl Smith:Pay a freaking, you know, livable goddamn wage.
Host:Yep.
Host:Yep.
Carl Smith:Sorry for my language there, but, you know, equal pay for equal work, workers rights, all this, these things, you know, child health care credits.
Carl Smith:You know, we need, we need more.
Carl Smith:We need more families, more women to choose to have babies.
Host:Yeah.
Host:You want.
Host:Yeah.
Host:If the government wants to say in, in whether or not a woman has the right to their own decision about having a baby, then the government needs to step in and be, and be supportive of that decision.
Host:You know, I did some research a few months ago, and we'll wrap this up here in a minute, but I did some research couple months ago and basically found.
Host:So, in the United States, abortions performed at or after 21 weeks of gestation are extremely rare.
Host:According to data from the CDC and other sources, they account for about 1% of all abortions.
Host:Most abortions, 93% occurring within the first trimester, which is up to, of course, 13 weeks.
Host:Only 7% occurring after the first trimester, with 3% occurring between 16 and 20 weeks and everything.
Host:99% of abortions that occur after 21 weeks are done for medical necessity reasons, not because, not because it was a choice, but because it was a medical.
Host:A medical decision that was made.
Host:And they've taken away the doctor's ability to properly make decisions or give and give the information to the mothers or the families about whether or not the fetus life is viable and the impact on the mother.
Host:And they've taken that away from these people.
Carl Smith:I think the fundamental problem is that Republicans, I don't think they believe that they can actually win without bald faced lying to, misinforming people about what they do and then also what.
Carl Smith:And believe in.
Carl Smith:And what the Democrats do and believe in.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:They have to make up these false, you know, scenarios or situations where, you know, we're basically ripping babies out, you know, like full term babies being born.
Carl Smith:We know, we just rip them apart, you know?
Host:Right.
Carl Smith:Or it's absurd, you know?
Carl Smith:You know, you know, before that.
Carl Smith:So they got it.
Carl Smith:They've got a basically lie.
Carl Smith:And we need to just keep calling it out for what it is.
Carl Smith:It's lying.
Carl Smith:Yeah, Joe, you know, Joe Wilson is lying about, you know, what the Democrats and Republicans are, you know, are doing.
Carl Smith:You know, that we're going to basically install socialism.
Carl Smith:They're lying, you know, to the people.
Carl Smith:So we need to say, you know, say that over and over.
Carl Smith:These are.
Carl Smith:They want to basically make America great again for the oppressors, the people that wanted to keep minorities down, you know, the disabled, you know, women, you know, so they're going to make America great, you know, for those groups.
Carl Smith:But if you want to make America great for everyone, we really need to, you know, work on getting a fair system.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, valuing all workers and then our basic public investments.
Carl Smith:You know, those are the things that make people prosperous.
Carl Smith:It's not, you know, it's not a simple thing.
Carl Smith:Okay.
Carl Smith:Well, you just do one little thing and everybody prospers.
Carl Smith:No, it's a complicated thing.
Carl Smith:Just like a car.
Carl Smith:You can't just have good air in the tires.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, you've got to actually have a working engine.
Carl Smith:You got to actually have, you know, a drive train.
Carl Smith:And, you know, these other things.
Carl Smith:You know, it takes that little symphony of things working together that creates, you know, you know, a situation where we all thrive.
Carl Smith:All these people that think that the Democrats or, you know, no party is really addressing their needs or the Democrats aren't or whatever, you know, we are.
Carl Smith:You know, when we invest in education, what does that do?
Carl Smith:That puts money in every single community in the country when we invest in healthcare.
Carl Smith:And if we had a national healthcare program that would put money in every single community and make everybody, you know, healthier and be able to take risks knowing that their health care is provided, you know, and this whole idea that, oh, well, with that system, it takes forever to get anything done.
Carl Smith:Have you tried to get an appointment in the United States for, you know, you know, for a new, new doctor?
Carl Smith:What it can take?
Carl Smith:It took me six months to find a new internal medicine person.
Carl Smith:Once I've identified one, it took about another four months or whatever.
Carl Smith:Get an appointment, you know.
Carl Smith:So this whole idea that you have, that we have, like, immediately we have this utopia system.
Carl Smith:System.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:It doesn't lie.
Carl Smith:Yeah.
Host:It doesn't exist lie.
Carl Smith:So anyway, that a little bit passionate about.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, and one.
Carl Smith:One little.
Carl Smith:One last point.
Carl Smith:We are on the verge of, you know, I'm absolutely convinced we are on the verge of a modern day dark ages or a modern day renaissance.
Host:Yeah, I agree.
Carl Smith:Really?
Carl Smith:This, this thing with, what's the.
Carl Smith:If Trump gets a another term, that's the dark age side, you know?
Carl Smith:And no, it won't be like the old dark ages and stuff.
Carl Smith:It could be a kind of a modern version of it, but it's a dystopian.
Host:It is.
Host:It is a very dystopian future where, where federal employees have to pre, have to, have to basically align themselves politically with the president of the United States in order to maintain their jobs.
Host:And the problem, if they're faking it, fine.
Host:But the problem with that is that what those employees do in their job has to impact him positively in order for them to maintain their jobs.
Host:Otherwise, the executive branch of the government will be able to just to fire them and replace them with a loyalist.
Carl Smith:And people that are on the right side of the equation, the right religion, the right whatever, it becomes a system of corruption, which a lot of other systems, once you get those systems, it's really hard to get rid of.
Host:Communism on paper, looks like something that would work to benefit everyone if no one holds all of the value and if everyone equally holds all the value.
Host:That sounds almost utopian, right?
Host:But the problem is that the people at the top of those communistic systems are only doing it to benefit themselves.
Host:You're Putin's, the oligarchs that run the russian government, and all of the contracts that those oligarchs have to continue to build on their own wealth.
Host:That's where communism fails.
Carl Smith:And we have the same problem in capitalism, and we have our robber barons, oligarchs.
Carl Smith:And then this rigging the system to more and more enriched them at the expense of the people.
Carl Smith:The rich can do well if we support the people.
Carl Smith:That money, you know, where does that money go?
Carl Smith:And you put money into healthcare, education, whatever, and it's going to the bottom of the economy.
Carl Smith:That money is getting spent back up into products and services, which are then offered by these companies and some of them large companies and small companies.
Carl Smith:And then those companies buy things from each other.
Carl Smith:And so, you know, the money percolates up.
Host:Yep.
Host:Yep.
Carl Smith:Very well.
Carl Smith:And the rich end up, you know, getting, you know, look at what we're doing after, you know, like, not, it's not about every single dollar we make.
Carl Smith:It's like, how much buying power do we have?
Carl Smith:Kind of at the end of the day, even with our taxes, even if we had a little higher tax rate.
Carl Smith:But if we get more, bet, you know, more in our basket of goods.
Host:I.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:So that we're doing well and we have the protections we need and we know that healthcare is going to be there for us and all that.
Carl Smith:Even if we were taxed a little bit more, but we could buy more, you know, then, then having like, paying almost no tax, but having no support, that's not.
Carl Smith:That's not a good situation there.
Carl Smith:You want to.
Carl Smith:You want to maximize the.
Carl Smith:This, you know, the quality of life and what that basket can be for that individual.
Carl Smith:That's why all of us contributing to and this.
Carl Smith:And the rich need to, you know, they need to contribute to the system.
Carl Smith:They have the most at risk, you know, they have the most to gain by a healthy and stable system, you know, so.
Carl Smith:So, you know, but the rest of us, it doesn't have to be them or us versus them.
Carl Smith:They can do well, maybe won't have quite as many billionaires, but we'll have plenty of wealthy people and that's up.
Carl Smith:But then all the rest of us, you know, we could drive poverty down to practically zero.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:If we do this.
Carl Smith:If we do this right, we can, you know, we could practically eliminate poverty.
Host:I think it's.
Host:I think it's important.
Host:It's important for these ultra rich people to understand, and this isn't a threat, but it's to understand that when.
Host:That they will always be outnumbered by the middle class and the poor and that that is something that they should always keep in the back of their mind, that there is always the potential for a revolution.
Host:Because it's happened.
Host:History.
Host:History happens over and over and over.
Carl Smith:You press people for too long, they eventually will.
Carl Smith:You know, if wealth gets concentrated too far, it will fall.
Host:So.
Carl Smith:But the last.
Host:The last question Leroy had that I'll ask you before we wrap this up was purely on your suggestion.
Host:When and how should we approach family members who might have fallen into the MaGa and conspiracy theory rabbit holes, so.
Carl Smith:Well, fortunately, there's, you know, families are not monoliths.
Carl Smith:They, you know, so, you know, wives don't agree with husbands.
Carl Smith:Husbands are in your wives, but children certainly don't agree with them, especially when they're teenagers and all of that.
Carl Smith:So, you know, let's, you know, we get the messages, you know, if we get, you know, basic public investments and our fair system and all of that, these.
Carl Smith:These kinds of concepts, you know, into, you know, into, you know, just out into the ether, you know, and.
Carl Smith:And people where people, more people understand that.
Carl Smith:That when we invest in these things, it pays back and people do better and businesses do better.
Carl Smith:And it's not socialism.
Carl Smith:It's actually, you know, creating a sustainable system, you know, for all of us.
Carl Smith:You know, we, you know, these arguments are things that also resonate when I've talked to Republicans, you know, frequently they'll say, wow, I've been republican all my life.
Carl Smith:But this makes sense.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, because it actually is based on, you know, a few basic fundamentals and macroeconomics and, you know, behavioral psychology and so on that are apolitical.
Carl Smith:You know, these are, you know, the sun doesn't come up because, you know, somebody is Republican or, you know, Democrat or whatever.
Carl Smith:It's just, you know, it's just kind of a fact of nature, you know.
Carl Smith:And so, you know, we just need to double down.
Carl Smith:We need to get this messaging into the national conversation.
Carl Smith:So when somebody says, you know, I would, I would hope that, you know, our family members, you know, we say, well, how does that work?
Carl Smith:And we start explaining, you know, you know, how when we invest in education, it helps everybody and helps people more people create businesses and so on, is not taking people's opportunities, you know, our choices, it's creating opportunities.
Carl Smith:So, you know, I think there, there's plenty of calm minds and we just, we need to, you know, double down, triple down on our message.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:And, and, but now I have a video, you know, at voter education project.com and then slash Hbue.
Carl Smith:I don't know if you want to put that out to your, your group.
Carl Smith:Well, it was hb hbue how bottom up economics works.
Host:Okay.
Host:Okay.
Carl Smith:Okay.
Carl Smith:So it's about a ten minute video.
Carl Smith:Were you able to, did you watch it earlier?
Host:I did, yep.
Carl Smith:Okay.
Carl Smith:So it's just, it's, you know, it's, um, it's, it's not a highly polished political thing.
Carl Smith:Sure.
Host:But I think that, I think that, I think that adds benefit to the message.
Carl Smith:Right.
Host:Is it's not something that was been, that was created in order to pursue.
Host:It was created in order to persuade, but not necessarily in a, in an aggressive fashion.
Host:It was, it wasn't, you know, so, yeah, absolutely.
Carl Smith:Fundamentals.
Carl Smith:This is why, this is how it works.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, just, just a few basics that, you know, that people, you know, people relate to.
Carl Smith:If you're, if you don't have a lot of money, you get more.
Carl Smith:It goes right out the door.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:Everybody understands that.
Carl Smith:But if you have a whole bunch of money and you get more, I mean, you have a whole bunch of money, you become risk averse.
Host:Yes.
Carl Smith:You know, people get that.
Carl Smith:You don't want to lose it.
Carl Smith:So you spend it.
Carl Smith:Invest slowly.
Carl Smith:Does that speed up the economy?
Host:Nope.
Carl Smith:No, it doesn't sound like it does.
Host:No.
Carl Smith:So, you know, you connect, I think, you know, people have kind of the messages.
Carl Smith:We never really kind of put it together.
Carl Smith:And what I've tried to do here is create a simple model that people can get their brains around of maybe not in the first thing, but if we start saying these things and go on the morning shows that they would just go into, well, how does that work?
Carl Smith:You know, and, and really question the, you know, somebody has a policy, well, how does, you know, how does that, how does that work?
Carl Smith:Yeah, you know, get, get into the mechanics of it, and they go on and on and on and, okay, and, okay, not everybody, you know, wants all that information, especially on the first thing.
Carl Smith:Some people will go, well, make America great for everyone.
Carl Smith:Okay, I get that.
Carl Smith:That's what I believe in.
Carl Smith:And so there's a, there's a low information person's message, make America great for everyone, you know, and then you have all the details behind it, you know, that, okay, it's a basic public investments, you know, and stuff, and so more people will understand that.
Carl Smith:But if we start messaging on basic public investments and that kind of thing for the next, you know, 10, 20, 30 years, we're going to create, you know, even, even some of these things can change.
Carl Smith:And the right person says that things could change in a dime.
Host:Yeah.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:That means our basic public investments is what is needed.
Carl Smith:You know, a fair system, you know, and valuing all workers is what's needed for people to thrive no matter where you are.
Host:Absolutely.
Carl Smith:And that's what Democrats, you look at their policies, what they do, that's what they believe in.
Carl Smith:They haven't articulated it that way, but that's what they, there's some places they've done, but as a kind of a complete little story, they haven't, they haven't put that package together.
Carl Smith:And so that's what I'm hoping the Democratic Party will do.
Carl Smith:If Ford Motor Company had a brand problem, they wouldn't leave it up to their individual salespeople to sell the brand or to fix it.
Carl Smith:They would actually get to come up with a message and fix the brand.
Carl Smith:And that's what we have here.
Carl Smith:A lot of people like what Democrats do, but they won't vote because it's a Democrat.
Carl Smith:Yeah, well, that's a brand problem.
Carl Smith:We need to explain.
Carl Smith:We need more advocates.
Carl Smith:We need our base, you know, our, you know, our hardcore Republicans or our democrats need to understand these fundamentals so that when they are talking to their family members and stuff, they have some of those things to, to start talking about our basic public investments and, you know, and a fair system and, you know, and valuing all workers.
Carl Smith:They have those, you know, those, you know, those ideas to then spread.
Host:Well, Carl, you're fighting the good fight and we appreciate the work you're putting into it.
Host:Again, voter educationproject.com, you find links in the show notes, and I'll do a link directly to that page with the video so that people can watch that.
Host:So definitely go check that out again.
Host:Carl, really appreciate you being on.
Host:It's been an educational conversation for me.
Host:Zach.
Host:Zach would have liked to have been here, but he, his Saturday morning sometimes is full of children, right.
Host:And it is just one.
Carl Smith:I appreciate the opportunity.
Carl Smith:You know, let me know if you want me to come back in again or.
Host:Yeah, absolutely.
Carl Smith:You want to have a right winger on and have us debate it out, you know, on economics.
Carl Smith:You know, that would be a lot of fun.
Host:I think, I think I keep saying the same thing.
Host:It is really hard to get anyone from the Republican Party to come on our show.
Host:I have Joe, Joe Wilson, I have attempted to get Joe Wilson to come on multiple times, and we have, there are reformed Republicans that I like to call them, that have recently lost their seats in the Senate during the primary that have aspirations of potentially being a part of the Republican Party again that won't come on.
Host:And it's disappointing that when it comes to actually having a hard conversation about the legislation and how that process comes up with the, what comes out, they don't want to discuss it.
Host:They don't want to answer the hard questions.
Host:And ultimately, I think that when it comes to a lot of what we discuss on here, hard questions come out.
Host:They don't want to answer those hard questions.
Carl Smith:So ultimately, if Trump loses, there might be a window of opportunity where that whole thing, you know, can change.
Carl Smith:And I heard that, oh, somebody was saying, well, if the Democrats lose, they're going to, it's going to destroy the Democratic Party or whatever.
Carl Smith:And I don't think so.
Carl Smith:I think it's more of a problem for the Republicans.
Carl Smith:If Trump loses, then, you know, what's, you know, either that, you know, the, you know, enough of the party is left that they get back to their old, you know, the kind of checks and balances, yes, the fiscal conservatisms, you know, and, you know, but honoring the institutions and, you know, and the need for checks and balances and not having a king, you know, instead of a president and, you know, and, you know, so I think they're going to be in disarray.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:And maybe then, and then also the political capital right now, like, if somebody comes on, they're, they're basically with so many people thinking that Trump, you know, or maybe the, would win or whatever, you know, they want to be on the right side in terms of, you know, if you're Republicans, you want to be positioned so that you can get another job, but if you come out against it, then you probably won't be able to get another job in the, in that, that system.
Carl Smith:So anyway, things might change.
Carl Smith:You know, I'm very hopeful and cautiously optimistic, but it ain't done until it's done.
Host:Yeah.
Host:My suspicion is that Donald Trump, Donald Trump loses and loses handedly.
Host:That it is that within 24 to 48 hours that we will see a mass exodus of politicians from the MAGA, wing of the Republican Party just because, you know, you can't go through almost ten full years of losing and losing and losing without eventually saying this boat has sunk and it's time to get off.
Host:And ultimately, even if Trump wins, I think that there are still a number of Republicans that will probably wind up holding true to their, their conservative nature or their humanitarian nature and will potentially abandon that MAGA wing.
Host:I, my hope is that this, this a Trump win is, well, my hope is that there is no such thing as a Trump win after.
Carl Smith:It's hard to believe that, that many Americans, you know, this 21st freaking century Americans could be so easily conned.
Host:Yeah.
Carl Smith:You know, agreed.
Carl Smith:Yes.
Carl Smith:He is a very good con.
Host:Oh, for sure.
Carl Smith:But he is a con.
Host:He, he learned from one of the best and his father passed away and left a legacy.
Carl Smith:He's actually studied it as what?
Host:Oh, yeah.
Carl Smith:But I'm, you know, he's had authors.
Host:Write books for him about it.
Host:So Donald Trump did not write his book, any of his books.
Host:People know.
Carl Smith:He has other people do anything.
Carl Smith:He takes credit.
Host:That's right.
Host:All right.
Host:Our guest this week, Carl Smith.
Host:Thank you very much, Carl, again, for being on the website is voter educationproject.com.
Host:so definitely go check that out.
Host:It's in the show notes and the video.
Carl Smith:They how bottom economics work video.
Carl Smith:And that's either slash hbue or else there's a link there to take you, you know, to that, you know, to that thing.
Carl Smith:If you look at the video section, you'll see that, that video.
Carl Smith:Yeah, I'm redoing the side and you know, kind of taking out some of the more, you know, the deeper things or, you know, and just kind of going with, I've got a winning over or winning over more voters.
Carl Smith:A little piece there.
Carl Smith:Yeah, I've got a piece on make America great for everyone.
Carl Smith:And then I've got a thing.
Carl Smith:It's kind of, you know, just looking at what Democrats actually do, you know, democratic values, you know, little, little page on, on that and, you know, so we can, more people can understand, like, yeah.
Carl Smith:What we actually believe and do and all of that and not buy into the bullshit.
Host:Yeah.
Host:I think ultimately that's, that's one of the biggest things that people need to understand is that democrats will always want an educated voter population and republicans will always continue to want a disinformed or an uneducated voter population.
Host:And, you know, how that strikes you is certainly up to you.
Host:But I definitely want to be in the population of the intelligence and understand.
Carl Smith:The populace will take an outlier and, and indicate that that's the main thing that's happened.
Host:Right.
Carl Smith:You know, exactly.
Carl Smith:There's actually logical fallacies and if you're, if you've studied logical fallacies that, you know, they just, they commit them right and left, I mean, it's just straw man.
Carl Smith:There's this all sorts of, you know, false dilemma, for sure.
Host:Yeah, absolutely.
Host:So thank you very much, Carl, for being on.
Host:Really appreciate it.
Host:Want to remind everybody we are only days away from this election, so make sure you've checked your voter registration.
Host:You can do that at the allaboutnothing.com voter as well.
Host:Check your voter registration.
Host:You want to make sure you also have a plan for your voting.
Host:If that means that you need to download and look at your sample ballots, just do a Google search.
Host:Check out your social.
Host:Just search on Google for sample ballot with your zip code.
Host:And I guarantee it'll have all the information out there, research that look at all the questions they're asking.
Host:If you, when it comes down to who is running as far as board of education, that sort of thing, the league of women voters has done an outstanding job in putting together the, and grabbing the resources necessary to know who these candidates are.
Host:They're running for boards of education and trustees of education across the state and across the country.
Host:So I'll put, I'll put links to the show notes for the, with league of women voters as well.
Host:So definitely go check that out.
Host:So again, Carl, thank you very much for being here.
Host:That is going to do it for episode number 229.
Host:Thanks for Zack being here as well links to past episodes, podcast platforms, merchandise and social media available on our website theallaboutnothing.com.
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Host:You all stay safe.
Host:Be kind.
Host:Have a great week.
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