Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - October 09, 2018


Ep 44 | And This Is Why We Vote


Episode Stats


Length

36 minutes

Words per minute

179.72035

Word count

6,581

Sentence count

391

Harmful content

Misogyny

19

sentences flagged

Toxicity

16

sentences flagged

Hate speech

8

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

In case you ve been living under a rock or asleep since last week, Judge Brett KAVANAUGH WAS CONFIRMED! I m so grateful that we fought so hard for this and that we pushed back in a way that is noble because we cared about truth and facts.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hey guys, what's up? Welcome to Relatable. Happy Tuesday. I hope everyone had a great weekend and
00:00:06.980 a great Monday. Um, in case you've been living under a rock or you've been asleep since last
00:00:13.920 week, uh, Judge Kavanaugh, now Justice Kavanaugh got confirmed. It was a really big day, a big deal
00:00:21.320 on Saturday. I actually wasn't even home. I don't know why I'm not home on all of these very
00:00:26.180 important political moments. Like during the confirmation hearing with Ford and Kavanaugh,
00:00:30.680 I was on a plane. And then when he was getting confirmed, I was buying shoes. I don't know why
00:00:34.520 I'm a poor planner. I'm an idiot, but I had it on, on my phone. All right. Yeah. I had it up on my 0.99
00:00:38.940 phone. And I think everyone in Dillard's was like, what the heck are you doing? Because I was almost
00:00:43.220 in tears listening to Mike Pence say that he was confirmed man. I did not particularly enjoy having
00:00:51.700 to beat this drum every single day, tweeting about this every single second, posting on Instagram
00:00:56.820 every single second. Um, but I did because I felt like it was worth it and it wasn't just something
00:01:02.600 to generate outrage or, you know, for any other reason besides that I felt like this was perhaps
00:01:09.760 the most important political thing that I had been a part of so far. And by be a part of, I mean, just
00:01:15.540 be a tiny, tiny voice in the stratosphere of political commentary and politics in general. Um,
00:01:22.160 but it worked and not me, but just all of us who were supporting him, who were out talking to people,
00:01:29.100 uh, your Facebook posts, your tweets, your conversations that you had with your friends
00:01:33.540 and your family, all of that mattered. And of course, as we talked about last week, uh, the sovereignty
00:01:39.000 of God in all of this. Um, but that doesn't mean that our actions don't have real consequences,
00:01:44.120 good and bad. And in this case, we all banded together and we did really good work. Our calls
00:01:49.180 to our senators are raising awareness about, uh, the corroboration or lack thereof of the
00:01:54.960 testimonies and making sure that people are remembering truth and facts. Now it might seem
00:01:59.780 like no one is listening to us. Um, but the people who were actually affected by this, who were maybe
00:02:05.900 in the middle and then in the end ended up saying, you know what, uh, the truth and corroboration
00:02:11.020 and substantiation is on Kavanaugh's side. Uh, those are the people that you might not hear
00:02:15.340 about in the media that you might not see on social media, but maybe they were affected
00:02:19.440 by the words you said, or the words I said, maybe a public support was moved even just a
00:02:24.780 tiny bit in the direction of truth and justice, which in this case was the direction of Kavanaugh.
00:02:29.500 So everything that you did in this mattered, your call to your Senator mattered, your posts
00:02:34.040 mattered, your conversations mattered. And of course our prayers mattered. Um, so I have,
00:02:40.860 I am just, I'm so grateful that all of this was worth it. Um, that we fought really hard that we
00:02:49.160 pushed back, um, in a way that I think is very noble because we cared about truth. I tweeted this
00:02:55.260 the other day and it's still true. I did not fight so hard for Kavanaugh and for this, uh, entire and
00:03:02.080 fight against this entire narrative on the left of trying to smear his name based on unsubstantiated
00:03:07.080 corroboration or unsubstantiated allegations. Um, because I think that he is going to be, uh,
00:03:14.400 my, uh, ally ideologically. Honestly, there are many concerns that conservatives have with Kavanaugh's
00:03:21.440 record, especially in regards to the fourth amendment, the right to privacy. Um, I, he's not a
00:03:26.880 Scalia. Um, he might be a textualist, but he's probably going to be a lot like Kennedy was. He's
00:03:32.500 probably going to disappoint us sometimes. Um, he hasn't proven himself to be this staunch, uh,
00:03:37.840 constitutional conservative in the same way that for example, Amy Coney Barrett was. Um,
00:03:43.120 so it wasn't about that for me. Like he will probably disappoint me. It wasn't about my ideology.
00:03:50.680 Yes. Of course it was about someone who's not going to be a leftist judicial activist. Who's going
00:03:54.940 to care about the constitution and the rule of law. Of course that's important to me because I care
00:03:59.640 about the perpetuation and the preservation of Liberty for myself, for my kids, all posterity,
00:04:04.420 but it was bigger than that. It was about justice. It was about, um, all men and women,
00:04:10.640 uh, being able to be confident in our justice system and be able to say an allegation is not
00:04:18.120 enough to ruin my life, man or woman, because yes, in this case it was a man and the accusation was
00:04:24.280 sexual assault, but it could be a woman in another way or, uh, in an, in another instance. I don't
00:04:30.660 want to live in that world. And the argument of course, from the left was, you know, this
00:04:34.720 confirmation hearing, the accusations with Ford, this was not a criminal trial. It doesn't have to
00:04:39.660 be innocent until proven guilty. The burden of proof doesn't have to be on the accuser. And you're
00:04:44.440 right that it's not necessarily a trial and that it was technically a job interview, but don't we
00:04:52.160 want our legislating body, uh, to abide by the basic principle that America was founded on that
00:04:59.780 a person is innocent until proven guilty. Do we really want our legislative body to hold nominees
00:05:06.640 and other elected officials to the standard of as long as you are accused, not even credibly accused,
00:05:12.460 but as long as you are accused, you're not only going to lose this opportunity, but we are going
00:05:17.060 to allow the media and other politicians to drag your name through the mud. Like, is that what
00:05:22.100 we want our Congress to abide by? So even though this is not a trial, um, innocent until proven
00:05:27.560 guilty should be a guidepost. Now that doesn't mean that that doesn't change our thoughts about
00:05:33.700 someone that that doesn't possibly taint, uh, someone's reputation. The fact that they were
00:05:38.480 accused of something, whether it was true or not, of course, those are natural consequences to being
00:05:42.380 accused of something. Um, but as far as real life consequences go or, uh, yeah, real life outcomes,
00:05:48.960 like not being appointed to the Supreme court. I do not think it's justice, uh, to say that someone
00:05:54.720 shouldn't be appointed just because they're accused of something that allegedly happened 36 years ago
00:05:59.880 and cannot be corroborated or substantiated. And I could go into all of the things that even developed
00:06:06.040 right before the confirmation actually happened that again, uh, just proved or helped, uh, helped the
00:06:13.080 support, um, for Kavanaugh and against Ford. There were letters, statements that came out. Her best
00:06:19.720 friend, Leland Kaiser, whom Ford said, uh, was actually at the party at the time. She came out
00:06:25.620 and said she felt pressure by Ford allies, uh, to say that she believed Ford when in reality, she had
00:06:32.220 no idea whether or not she should believe Ford. And she doesn't even know Brett Kavanaugh. She said that
00:06:37.020 she was actually, uh, pressured by people that Ford knows. So if you have not been able to see and
00:06:42.640 piece together at this point that this was a terrible, terrible democratically or Democrat 0.57
00:06:48.980 funded smear job, um, against Kavanaugh, then you have your blinders on. But here's, here's the reason,
00:06:57.060 uh, why so many people still have their blinders on. Um, it's because this turned into something that
00:07:03.840 was no longer about Kavanaugh and Ford. This wasn't about this particular case. It wasn't about an event
00:07:09.460 that happened 36 years ago. Um, this became a part of the larger Me Too movement. It became,
00:07:16.300 um, something about feminism rather than the facts at hand. So everyone attached Ford to the Me Too 1.00
00:07:23.140 movement and their own story of survival of sexual assault, rather than saying, wow, the facts and the
00:07:29.100 corroboration really don't go in her favor. That's what happens when you buy into identity politics.
00:07:36.160 This idea that if you're a woman, you have to believe this because the Me Too movement and
00:07:41.080 feminism is for women. So you had all of these women hysterically protesting in DC. I'm saying 1.00
00:07:46.860 that we believe Ford. We have to believe women. If you don't believe women, then you're a misogynist
00:07:51.340 or you're a rape apologist as the women's march has said. And as NARAL has said, or you don't care 1.00
00:07:58.560 about sexual assault, all these things, they're false arguments, but that's what happens in an identity
00:08:03.400 politics, tribalistic society. If you say my tribe believes this, my identity has to believe this.
00:08:10.620 I don't really care what the truth is. This is my mantra. This is my cause. I am going to die on this
00:08:16.720 hill no matter what. That's when facts become irrelevant. What happened was the Me Too movement
00:08:22.100 started as saying, we should listen to her. We should listen to a woman who comes forward with
00:08:27.540 these allegations. And I say, yes, we should listen to her. We should provide her cover. So she feels
00:08:33.380 safe to come forward and say, I was sexually assaulted however many years ago. But then we
00:08:38.040 moved from listen to her to believe her. And between listen to her and believe her, we stopped
00:08:44.200 caring about facts. We stopped caring about truth. We stopped caring about reality. Because this idea,
00:08:50.560 as we've said many times on this podcast of believing someone just because they're a woman is not just.
00:08:57.880 There is no biblical support for that. There is no logical support for that whatsoever.
00:09:02.760 Believing someone based on their gender. But that's what happened. So all of the people that 0.98
00:09:08.240 were stacked against Kavanaugh, they were stacked against him for emotional reasons, because they
00:09:16.220 were told by the higher ups on the left that this is about sexual assault, that this is about the
00:09:23.220 Me Too movement. This is about feminism. This is about women. And if you are for Kavanaugh, you are 0.93
00:09:29.000 against all of those things. And you're, you know, a misogynist and a rape apologist, like I said. 0.96
00:09:34.220 And people believed that because, again, people don't like being called those names. They don't 0.92
00:09:38.840 want to be a misogynist. So like, yeah, I guess I should be against Kavanaugh instead of actually
00:09:43.120 looking at the facts of the case and looking at what is actually true. That is identity politics for
00:09:49.440 you. And it's extremely unfortunate. And one thing that I found so sad, I mean, Alyssa Milano,
00:09:55.040 all of these celebrities were, you know, tweeting these stories of sexual assault. I saw this poor
00:10:00.000 15 year old girl who was standing up talking to maybe it was a senator. I'm not sure who she was
00:10:04.980 speaking to, but she was in tears sharing her story of sexual assault, 15 years old. And it broke my
00:10:11.060 heart. Anyone with a shred of humanity would watch that and say, wow, that's devastating that that would
00:10:16.440 happen to someone. What can we do to help her? But I felt for her not just because she was a victim
00:10:22.080 of whoever assaulted her, but also she was a victim of people on the left who manipulated her 0.91
00:10:27.040 into believing that this Ford versus Kavanaugh drama is about her story. That is the manipulation of
00:10:35.480 emotions. That's the leveraging of people's trauma in order to advance your political agenda. And that is
00:10:40.880 wrong because the reality is this particular case was not about anyone else's sexual assault. It was about
00:10:48.240 an allegation. Um, when you start to make this about your own sexual assault, that's when you stop
00:10:55.360 caring about what is true in this case and what is not. And look, as I've said many times before,
00:11:00.900 I have the utmost empathy for victims of sexual assault in anger towards sexual assaulters. Um,
00:11:09.660 I personally have never been a victim of sexual assault. I have been put as so many,
00:11:14.260 so many women that I know have have been put in situations where I'm like, wow, this is really
00:11:18.620 uncomfortable. I shouldn't be here. This person is pressuring me more than I want to be pressured.
00:11:23.960 I've been in that situation. I've never, I thank God I've never actually been a victim, but that doesn't
00:11:29.580 mean that I can't in some way relate to women who have been victimized, who have been abused. Um,
00:11:36.600 I understand that that must be unimaginable trauma. And I understand, I even understand this because
00:11:44.020 I have in some way been able to relate to this. I understand that if you have been sexually
00:11:49.380 assaulted, if you've been raped, whatever it is, you watch Dr. Ford and you have listened to all of
00:11:55.820 these stories of sexual assault and you've said, that's me. That sounds like me. I feel that pain. 0.55
00:12:01.700 I know exactly what she's going through. And while empathy is so powerful and while it's so convincing
00:12:08.380 and so compelling, you cannot let that blind you to reality. Because like I said, this is not about
00:12:16.660 sexual assault in general. This is about this particular case, this woman's story, whether or
00:12:22.220 not it can be proved or at least not even proven, but at least substantiated in this man's life and
00:12:28.020 his name that is being ruined. Um, you cannot make it about your story. And I feel badly for the young
00:12:36.440 women who have been told that it's about their story. The young women who have been told that,
00:12:41.260 Oh, if he is appointed to the Supreme court, uh, then that means that these politicians,
00:12:45.900 that the Republican party doesn't care about you. That's a lie. That's manipulation. Uh, Susan
00:12:52.400 Collins, who, uh, you know, the Senator for Maine, we didn't know she was a swing vote. She came in 0.99
00:12:57.340 clutch, uh, for Kavanaugh. She delivered this wonderful speech on the Senate floor. I'm really
00:13:03.280 refuting point by point, every single argument that leftists have put up against Kavanaugh.
00:13:08.380 Um, and she just reiterated that there's this argument, this false argument on the left,
00:13:14.060 that if you support Kavanaugh, then you don't care about sexual assault. And she just said,
00:13:18.760 that's not true. She is a supporter of me too. She is pro-choice. She is really in so many ways,
00:13:25.600 moderate and even leans to the left in a lot of ways. And she just very unemotionally and factually
00:13:31.100 kind of tried to assuage any fears or any concerns that people on the left had. Um,
00:13:36.340 and I'll play you just a little clip from her speech right now, but certain fundamental legal
00:13:42.960 principles about due process, the presumption of innocence and fairness do bear on my thinking
00:13:54.440 thing. And I cannot abandon them. In evaluating any given claim of misconduct, we will be ill-served in
00:14:05.660 the long run if we abandon the presumption of innocence and fairness, tempting though it may be.
00:14:15.520 We must always remember that it is when passions are most inflamed, that fairness is most in jeopardy.
00:14:28.920 So extremely reasonable. I didn't even agree with her entire speech because like I said,
00:14:32.720 she is pro-choice. She supports Planned Parenthood. Um, but she was speaking to a particular audience.
00:14:38.960 She was speaking to the leftist audience that has grown completely unhinged over this entire thing.
00:14:45.380 Um, and how did leftists respond at least on Twitter and blue check mark leftists respond?
00:14:51.260 Oh, Oh, this is, this is a disgrace. She's such a liar. She's so dishonest. She's so horrible 1.00
00:14:57.360 saying horrific things about her and her integrity and her honesty, of course, threatening to, you know,
00:15:03.100 remove funding from her 2020 campaign and all of this stuff. I'm like two days ago, you guys were
00:15:09.020 buttering her up and saying that she's a feminist, that she, she's going to do the quote right thing. 1.00
00:15:13.780 I mean, now you're saying she's anti-feminist. She hates women. But the funny thing is I did not see 0.99
00:15:19.200 one reasonable rebuttal to anything Susan Collins said. And I mean, she was factual point by point by
00:15:26.060 point. The only thing they heard is she doesn't believe women. She's demeaning victims of sexual 0.99
00:15:30.580 assault. Um, no, that's not what she's doing. And she actually explicitly said that's not what she's 0.86
00:15:37.340 doing. But again, um, it became entirely emotional for people, entirely emotional, had nothing to do
00:15:45.660 with reality anymore. And look, here's what made me so mad about the crazy people in the chamber who
00:15:54.580 were, uh, you know, protesting and things like that. Of course, we don't know who allowed them into the
00:15:59.980 chamber. That's a whole scandal in and of itself. The people who were, uh, storming DC and ask Amy
00:16:05.880 Schumer asking to get arrested, all of this ridiculousness, just screaming like banshees, 0.55
00:16:11.840 ad hominem attacks, you name it. Here's what bothers me about these so-called feminists and 1.00
00:16:17.860 these so-called me too advocates that have been just screaming relentlessly over this whole Kavanaugh
00:16:23.540 thing without actually offering any facts to this case is that women, feminist, not feminist, 1.00
00:16:29.540 have tried really hard for a long time. Uh, I would say decades to prove that we are to be taken
00:16:39.740 seriously, that we are a force to be reckoned with, that whether we are, um, in the boardroom,
00:16:48.060 in the classroom, whether we're at home, whether we are in Congress, whatever it is,
00:16:53.760 that we can do it, that we can handle it, that we can step up to the plate, that we are not
00:17:00.140 hysterical, that we don't just make emotional decisions. Um, and yet we have these, we have
00:17:08.760 these women, these feminists who have completely ruined that for us, who have completely disproved, 1.00
00:17:15.740 um, all of our assertions over the past few decades that we should be taken seriously.
00:17:19.960 And if we have concerns, we're going to address them in a logical, reasonable, calm way. Um,
00:17:26.760 we've proven women have proven over the past couple of weeks that that's not true,
00:17:30.880 that actually we do make completely emotional decisions and that we just, uh, believe anyone
00:17:36.060 who, uh, you know, agrees with our feelings. I think that's such a shame. All of these women who 1.00
00:17:41.960 say they're strong and empowered and should be taken seriously, probably need to calm down,
00:17:45.920 like tell the truth and don't rely entirely on your feelings. Um, so of course Democrats have not
00:17:54.860 taken this extremely well. They are already talking about impeachment, uh, which is possible. Um, you
00:18:04.140 have to have a, you have to have a super majority in the house. I'm just making sure that I get this
00:18:10.860 correct. You have to, or yeah, you have to have a super majority in the Senate and something else in
00:18:16.940 the house. Now I forgot. I'm just afraid that I'm going to get the qualifications wrong, but it's
00:18:22.020 possible to impeach someone. Now it's only actually happened one time and it was over 200 years ago,
00:18:26.920 I believe. Um, now a justice did resign a few decades ago under threats of impeachment. Um, but it's
00:18:33.820 very hard to impeach a Supreme court justice. It's probably not going to happen, but of course they're
00:18:40.200 talking about it. Nancy Pelosi said, Ooh, we're going to release the FBI report. She's completely
00:18:45.740 bluffing. If the FBI report had anything remotely incriminating about Kavanaugh, which it doesn't,
00:18:52.200 I guess I skipped that part. There was apparently nothing incriminating about it. We didn't actually
00:18:56.200 get to see it though. If there was anything remotely incriminating about Kavanaugh, if there was even a
00:19:01.160 hint of misconduct, uh, misconduct, uh, towards or about Kavanaugh in the report, Democrats would have
00:19:07.280 already leaked it and they would be completely exaggerating what was in it, but they haven't
00:19:11.700 said anything about it. All they say is that, Oh, it's incomplete. They didn't, uh, interview the
00:19:16.400 right people and the white house stopped them from interviewing the right people. That's a lie.
00:19:19.940 The white house has said, no, we didn't stop. We didn't stop them from investigating anything.
00:19:24.080 They investigated this and that's it. Sorry. And of course we knew that the Democrats were going to
00:19:29.840 move the goalpost on that. Um, but yeah, FBI report apparently, uh, came up with nothing.
00:19:36.180 And so there's not going to be, there's not going to be any reason or any way for them to impeach
00:19:40.960 them. But of course that is what they are threatening. Um, now with all of this absolute
00:19:46.500 madness and hysteria coming from the left, um, they're talking now about getting rid of the
00:19:52.120 electoral college because that's how, that's how, uh, that's how Kavanaugh happened. And that's how
00:19:57.760 Trump got elected. And we need to take away the electoral college. Of course, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez 0.99
00:20:05.380 has said that's because she's an absolutely uneducated person. I was going to say something
00:20:10.420 more rude than that. She is an uneducated person. The only reason that they're talking about that 1.00
00:20:15.680 though, is because Trump won. If Hillary Clinton had won the electoral vote, they wouldn't be, 0.98
00:20:19.520 they wouldn't be talking about the electoral college, but they are because they're still
00:20:24.420 sore losers and they're realizing him winning the electoral vote hasn't turned out well for their
00:20:29.720 version of the country. Um, so amidst all of that absolute madness, their fierce, uh, the left's 0.99
00:20:38.040 fierce opposition to the constitution and to any kind of morality whatsoever, um, voter enthusiasm for
00:20:46.900 the GOP has gone up considerably. So there was an NBC poll that I read in NPR, um, that analyzed voter
00:20:54.780 enthusiasm between Republicans and Democrats in July. And they compared that to September. I think
00:21:00.060 Republican, uh, voter enthusiasm went up by 12 points since, uh, July. So Democrats were way ahead
00:21:07.340 of us in July, as far as saying, okay, the midterms are really important. We're going to come out to
00:21:11.560 vote. Republicans were less enthusiastic. Now Republicans, Democrats are in a tie. Um, and that is,
00:21:17.520 I guarantee you a direct result of the absolute madness that we have seen on the left. Um, look,
00:21:25.400 I, I've been a critic of Donald Trump. I'm a critic of Republicans. Like I, as someone who is really
00:21:30.700 pro-life, I am not particularly happy, um, about how Republicans have done things. Why are we still
00:21:36.600 funding Planned Parenthood? Uh, why haven't we, uh, funded the wall? Why aren't we doing a lot of the
00:21:44.140 things that we voted these Republicans in to do? Um, so I'm not saying that Republicans are awesome
00:21:51.340 and that that is my pitch to you to vote for them in the midterms, but it would take so much for me
00:21:58.580 to, I don't even know what a Republican, I don't even know if I could not vote for a Republican in
00:22:04.520 the midterms because I am genuinely so scared of what the left has become and the version of the country
00:22:12.140 that they want. Like they have become so unhinged, so, um, so opposed to the constitution, so opposed
00:22:20.740 to patriotism, so opposed to our country's founding to free speech, to, uh, freedom of thought, to the
00:22:27.820 second amendment, to capitalism, that I will do whatever it takes to keep Democrats out. Like if
00:22:35.240 they want a world in which you are guilty until proven innocent to where rape allegations don't have
00:22:40.680 to have a burden of proof, um, then I will do whatever it takes to make sure that they are not
00:22:47.260 controlling this country. I think that's how a lot of people feel about Donald Trump. That's how I feel
00:22:51.960 about Donald Trump as a critic of Donald Trump. It's like, I don't even know what he could do at
00:22:55.920 this point to make me not vote for him. It's not that I'm voting for him or even for Republicans. I am
00:23:01.400 voting against Democrats. I am voting for not Democrats and Democrats are so stupid in that all they have 1.00
00:23:09.340 to do in order to win over moderate voters. Not me. I'm not moderate, but win over moderate voters, 1.00
00:23:14.420 people in the middle, um, would be to not be crazy. Like just be normal and have a conversation and be
00:23:21.840 reasonable for a little bit. I guarantee you, you will win a lot, a lot more people over and you will
00:23:27.680 probably take over the country and enjoy a long reign of the country, but they can't, they can't,
00:23:33.720 they get more and more left more and more radical and their political correctness and their demand
00:23:40.040 for uniformity of thought, um, in their, uh, hatred for capitalism and their love for socialism and
00:23:47.280 totalitarian regimes that I'm like, I, I, I can't even, I, I, I, I will just do whatever it takes.
00:23:54.160 I will do whatever it takes to make sure that you are not in power. Um, and I think that's why voter
00:23:59.680 enthusiasm is up and I encourage you. I mean, you don't have to think the same way I do. Maybe you
00:24:05.400 see things totally differently. Maybe you're an independent and you're not gonna, you're not gonna
00:24:09.280 vote for Republicans in the midterms. I would encourage you to look at the state of the Democrat
00:24:15.140 party and look at the state of the left and remember how unhinged and how cruel they have been 0.51
00:24:21.920 over the past couple of weeks and ruining a man's life and how crazy they are now and opposing things
00:24:28.620 like the electoral college in the constitution and think about the future that you want for the
00:24:33.840 country. If I were you, which I'm not, but if I were you, I would do absolutely whatever it took to make
00:24:43.700 sure that Democrats do not take over. And that means I would vote Republican. If I were you, I would
00:24:50.820 campaign for Republicans. I would donate to Republican campaigns. I would, um, go block
00:24:58.500 walking. I would make sure that you are as involved as you possibly can. Now I'm not saying you should
00:25:03.880 compromise your principles. Like if there's a candidate, say he's a Republican and he's just
00:25:07.900 a terrible person. He doesn't stand for anything that you stand for. He's Republican in name only,
00:25:13.600 or he's just done some really terrible things. I'm not saying that you should compromise your
00:25:17.420 values for that vote for the Liberty minded candidate, uh, vote for the person that's going to go to
00:25:23.980 Washington or go to your state legislature and actually fight for your Liberty and fight for
00:25:28.900 your freedom and fight against this crazy insane world that the left is building for us. Like I'm
00:25:35.500 actually scared of that world. I really, really am. And that means I am going to continue to vote for
00:25:42.120 Republicans, even though they might be imperfect and perfect is a lot better to me than absolutely
00:25:49.700 insane and ruinous. So that's where I stand on that. I'm glad to see Republican enthusiasm is up. I want
00:25:56.640 to keep it there. Um, get involved in the local campaigns, talk to your friends, make sure you're having
00:26:03.320 conversations with your friends who are on, on the edge, who maybe don't know what to think. Aren't super
00:26:09.120 politically involved. Make sure you register them to vote. Uh, look online to see when the deadline is for
00:26:14.960 registration to vote for your particular state. Uh, make sure all of your friends are voting. Be that
00:26:20.520 annoying friend. That's like freaking exercise. You're right. That people died for make sure that 0.94
00:26:26.520 you go vote. And when you're thinking about who to vote for, think about the values that you want
00:26:30.680 protected for your kids and your grandkids, which should be Liberty, the ability of anyone to pursue
00:26:37.020 their own definition of happiness unencumbered by government regulation. Huh? Okay. So that is all that
00:26:44.900 a couple more things. I just wanted to kind of recap you on that again. Thank you guys for all of
00:26:50.500 your support in, in all of this. Um, I think that we're, I think that we're going to be okay. Like
00:26:56.500 it gives me hope for the country that this actually, that he was actually confirmed. Um, so now I'm going
00:27:01.580 to answer a listener question, and then I'm going to highlight an awesome nonprofit that one of you
00:27:06.960 guys sent me as I promised to do at least once a week. Um, okay. So listener question. My name is
00:27:14.500 Emily and I listened to your podcast often. I grew up in a Christian household. However, about six
00:27:18.880 years ago, I drifted away from God. I currently identify as an atheist, but the idea of believing
00:27:23.520 in God is always pressing on me. Can you answer any questions about how and why God exists and what
00:27:28.800 I as an atheist can do to come to believe in him? First of all, Emily, I think it's amazing that as
00:27:34.540 an atheist, you have this curiosity and this open-mindedness and that you're willing to have this
00:27:40.280 conversation because it's a very vulnerable and a unique place to be nowadays to say,
00:27:45.240 I don't know, but I'm willing to explore. Everyone nowadays has their mind completely made
00:27:51.040 up and they think that if they don't have their mind made up, that it's a sign of weakness.
00:27:54.920 It's not a sign of weakness. It's a sign of strength. So the fact that you are responding
00:27:59.720 to this kind of pressing that you feel on your heart, which I'll get to that in a second.
00:28:04.260 Um, and the fact that you're willing to reach out to someone like me, who you know,
00:28:08.160 is a Christian says a lot about you. It says a lot about your curiosity, your strength of character.
00:28:14.040 And I just commend you for doing that. I know it's not easy. It's, uh, a hard thing to do to
00:28:19.040 put yourself out there like that and say that you don't know. Um, so I will say that the fact that you
00:28:25.460 are feeling something pressing on you is a good indication that something, something exists outside
00:28:33.940 of you. Otherwise, uh, what would be pressing on you? How can you explain any kind of conviction
00:28:40.720 or any kind of force from something outside of you saying, Hey, maybe you should walk in this
00:28:46.760 direction, or maybe you should be curious about this. So I say as a Christian, that it's not a
00:28:51.900 coincidence that you feel something on your heart and that you have decided to ask this question.
00:28:57.560 So the best explanation, there are so many great explanations that people have come to
00:29:03.200 over the years for why God exists or the best, um, reasoning for the existence of God and an
00:29:10.340 existence of a higher power. One that has really made a big effect on, or had a big effect on me
00:29:16.740 is C.S. Lewis's explanation for a higher power, not even talking about the Christian God yet, but
00:29:22.360 a higher power. He is C.S. Lewis was an atheist, um, highly intellectual and just rejected this idea
00:29:30.340 of human beings needing a God and that became a Christian has a really amazing story. Um, I actually
00:29:36.280 already emailed Emily back and recommended mere Christianity, but in mere Christianity, um, he talks
00:29:42.560 about this existence of a moral law that really every sane person abides by. There's a reason why we have
00:29:50.480 human rights organizations that transcend borders on that really everyone agrees with. There's a reason
00:29:55.640 why the UN, for example, has particular human rights standards that everyone agrees with. And if you go
00:30:01.280 against these human rights, um, you are considered wrong or immoral and you get punished. Um, there is a
00:30:07.640 reason why there is a moral law that transcends all time and transcends all culture. And there's really
00:30:13.020 a few basic things that we can all agree are wrong. Taking an innocent life. Now, again, abortion makes 0.85
00:30:21.020 us more complex, but if you, even if you talk to someone who's pro-choice, you would say taking an
00:30:25.760 innocent life is wrong. Abusing someone is wrong. Taking something that is not yours is wrong and
00:30:31.820 immoral. And again, we could have disagreements on what this looks like, but in general, like we believe
00:30:36.700 that for example, slave camps, uh, that are in North Korea and even in China, that that's wrong.
00:30:43.260 That's a crime against humanity that, uh, sex trafficking is wrong. So the question, if you
00:30:49.540 agree that there is some kind of transcendent moral law that all sane and relatively moral human beings
00:30:57.060 have come to agree upon that, I'm not going to take your stuff. You don't take my stuff. I'm not going
00:31:01.500 to hurt you. You don't hurt me. If you do, that's going, you're going to be punished. Um, you have to
00:31:06.340 ask yourself where that higher law came from. Um, it didn't come from the government because it's
00:31:14.080 existed before governments actually existed. Um, where did it come from? Why did we agree on this
00:31:20.840 higher moral law? If a higher moral law exists, that some kind of, that we all agree on some basics
00:31:27.600 on right and wrong, then there has to be a moral law giver. If a law exists, a law giver exists. And if
00:31:34.780 we all agree that there is some kind of moral law, we have to agree that it came from somewhere.
00:31:39.880 And the only, the only kind of thing that can give something that is transcendent, like a universal
00:31:46.480 moral law is a being that is also transcendent. Something that is above government, something that
00:31:51.820 is above human beings. If it has transcended time and culture, then its source is also transcendent.
00:31:58.320 Um, it's not just evolutionary because it actually would be beneficial for me to kill my neighbor.
00:32:04.380 If I feel like my neighbor is entrenching on my food and my survival, it would be good for me to 1.00
00:32:10.000 kill him. And yet there is something in the human heart that says, no, that's, that's wrong to kill 0.98
00:32:15.220 someone just because I want to. Why do we agree on that? Well, if there's a moral law and a moral law
00:32:22.940 giver, we have to answer for who, who that moral law giver is. Um, and of course, and this is going
00:32:31.220 to take forever and we're already over our time, but so I would encourage you to read C.S. Lewis to
00:32:36.900 go from, okay, there's an existence of a higher power to, okay, how do we get to the Christian God?
00:32:41.900 And then how do we get to Jesus Christ, which is the crux of the Christian faith? Um, but I would
00:32:46.920 start there. I would start with saying, okay, um, how do I fill the gap between what I believe like
00:32:54.420 a moral law and what I see in the world and who actually gave me these things? Why I think this
00:33:00.700 way, why the entire world seems to function on the same moral law clock? Where did that transcendent
00:33:06.420 idea actually come from? Um, if there is something bigger than us that we cannot understand,
00:33:12.720 then why is it unbelievable to believe that there is a higher being that is bigger than
00:33:18.720 us that we can't understand? So if human beings have the ability to say, wow, there's this idea
00:33:24.340 of an infinite that my mind can't comprehend. For example, if you sit there and try to think
00:33:28.680 of eternity, like your mind can't do it, then why is it so amazing to think that there could
00:33:32.860 be a God that exists outside of what our minds can really understand? If we understand that
00:33:37.780 humans are finite, that we can't understand something that's infinite, why would it be unbelievable
00:33:42.080 that there would be a higher power? That's also infinite that we can't fully understand
00:33:45.560 in our minds. Um, so that's where I would start. I would read a reason for God by Tim Keller,
00:33:50.400 read mere Christianity, um, by CS Lewis. Now you might not like all of their, all of their
00:33:55.980 ideas. You might not agree with them, wrestle with them. That's okay. Um, faith without doubt
00:34:00.280 is like a body without antibodies. It's okay to have doubt. Um, it actually makes it stronger
00:34:05.140 as long as you go into the truth and seek the truth in those doubts rather than run away
00:34:09.920 from it. You're going to end up. Okay. God is bigger than that. And he's in control of
00:34:13.760 all of that. And I am so thankful that he is pressing on your heart. That's not a coincidence.
00:34:19.420 Realize that that's not a coincidence. There are plenty of atheists who don't have the same
00:34:23.560 feelings that you do. So I would say run into that curiosity and don't be scared of it even
00:34:28.200 when it makes you uncomfortable. And if you have any more questions, you can always reach
00:34:31.500 out to me. You already know my email because you emailed me. So thank you for your question.
00:34:34.960 Uh, last thing is a nonprofit. So, uh, the nonprofit that I, uh, was sent was save the
00:34:43.500 storks, which I'm already familiar with. Um, I'll read what it is. They partner with pregnancy
00:34:48.380 resource centers and they give abortion vulnerable women. So women in crisis pregnancy situations,
00:34:53.160 uh, a choice that's going to change their lives. They partner with resource centers all over
00:34:58.860 the nation. Uh, they provide the centers with, uh, tools and training, uh, to help connect with the
00:35:05.060 women in these crisis pregnancy situations. They have mobile sonogram units, um, and they are able
00:35:11.220 to go to these pregnancy centers and better equip them to make sure that they are reaching the people
00:35:15.200 in their community. Um, they have already helped save over 4,000 babies. If you guys are, don't already
00:35:21.440 know an abortion happens, I think it's every 30 seconds. So save the stork is going in to that 0.92
00:35:27.440 extremely, um, extremely scary and frightening and very vulnerable place for women and providing
00:35:35.240 them with options. So this is, if you don't have a particular resource center in your area that you
00:35:40.720 can volunteer at, or you can, um, send money to then save the storks would be a perfect cause for
00:35:46.620 you to get involved in and to donate to you can go to save the storks.com, uh, to get more involved.
00:35:53.520 I encourage you to do that. As you guys know, I am, um, extremely pro-life. It's, uh, uh, it's a,
00:36:00.200 an issue that I am extremely passionate about. And what I want us to do is to not just make abortion
00:36:06.980 not legal, but also make it not needed, or at least I don't want women to feel that they need it. So 1.00
00:36:15.200 that means loving them, providing them with resources, providing them with the tools that
00:36:19.560 they need to make a decision to put their child up for adoption or maybe to raise their baby. 0.75
00:36:24.640 Um, and so any, any way we can fill in that gap and offer hope, I think it's amazing. So go to
00:36:29.260 save the storks.com. Uh, thank you guys so much for listening. I hope that you have a great rest of
00:36:34.380 your Tuesday and I will see you back here on Thursday. Thanks.