Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - July 14, 2021


Ep 454 ｜ Allie’s Dad on Texas Dems, Voting Bills & Raising Strong Kids ｜ Guest： Ron Simmons


Episode Stats


Length

40 minutes

Words per minute

193.6842

Word count

7,820

Sentence count

501

Harmful content

Misogyny

6

sentences flagged

Hate speech

3

sentences flagged


Summary

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

In this episode of Relatable, my dad joins me to talk about the Texas Democratic delegation's decision to flee to D.C. to vote on a voting integrity bill. He also talks about how he and his family grew up in Texas and what it was like growing up in a Christian household.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Wednesday. I am super, super excited for today's episode.
00:00:16.980 I am interviewing none other than my dad. We are going to talk Texas politics. He has been
00:00:24.300 very involved in Texas politics for a long time. He used to be a state representative
00:00:28.180 in Texas. And we're going to talk about some of the drama that's happening with Texas state Democrats
00:00:33.860 fleeing to D.C. because they are trying to abdicate their responsibility and get the support,
00:00:39.660 I guess, of federal Democrats and trying to avoid voting on this voting integrity bill.
00:00:44.740 We're going to talk about what's actually in the voting integrity bill, what's in the federal
00:00:49.020 voting bill, H.R.1. He's going to clarify a lot of things for us. And then he is going to answer
00:00:56.200 some of the questions that you guys sent me. He's going to answer questions about how we get
00:01:00.840 involved in our communities, how we get involved in politics, if we should run for office, how we
00:01:05.680 make that decision. And then he's going to answer quite a few personal and parenting questions about
00:01:12.160 growing up in his household, his and my mom's household, and what they were like as parents,
00:01:18.900 and then what I was like as a child and some advice that he has for you guys raising kids to be
00:01:26.440 Christians who stand up for the values that you believe in. So super, super excited for you to
00:01:33.620 hear this interview. Without further ado, here is my dad.
00:01:42.120 Dad, welcome to Relatable. Thank you for finally joining us. I've been trying to get you on for so long.
00:01:49.000 You've been putting me off, putting me off, putting me off, but you're finally here. So thank you.
00:01:52.720 I'm just, you know, honored to be here no matter when it is. I'm glad to be here. You,
00:01:57.180 I think you've got a pretty good start on your own. You didn't need me to help you get going.
00:02:01.060 Yes. And that is actually a joke for people who don't know. He, we have been talking about him
00:02:05.660 coming on my podcast for a while. A lot of you guys have been asking for him to come on my podcast
00:02:10.140 for a while. And it is, it is me that finally, finally made it happen. So I'm very grateful that
00:02:16.620 you're here. We're going to talk politics first, and then we're going to kind of get into personal
00:02:19.740 and parenting and things like that. So I know, I know you've been involved in Texas politics for
00:02:25.100 a while, obviously used to be a Texas legislator. Tell me what you think in general about what's
00:02:31.320 going on with the Texas Democrats fleeing to DC to basically avoid their responsibilities.
00:02:37.840 Well, just so people know, this isn't the first time Texas Democrats have done this. They did this in
00:02:42.140 2003 and the famous trip to Ardmore, Oklahoma for the house, and then to New Mexico for the Senate.
00:02:49.200 And, uh, they are doing, making the same mistakes that they did in 2003. You know,
00:02:54.080 people say history doesn't repeat itself, but actually it does. And, uh, what they've done is
00:02:59.400 they've, they have broken quorum. You have to have two thirds of the Texas house to be able to conduct
00:03:06.620 business. And that's a hundred members. There's 150 total. Two thirds would be a hundred members
00:03:12.320 and 50, I think 57, 58 Democrats got on two charter jets with no mask cases of beer all around
00:03:22.380 and flew to DC to claim that they were trying to help out voters when it actually, what they're doing
00:03:28.660 by not voting on this deal will be suppressing votes in the future. If this bill doesn't pass,
00:03:33.360 but they are acting like this is some big, you know, um, like civil rights move. I saw some tweet
00:03:40.720 by a legislator saying that they're sacrificing so much because they're leaving their family,
00:03:45.720 they're leaving their constituents and they're going to DC, but it really just seems like more
00:03:51.620 of a political stunt. That's not really going to accomplish anything. Is it going to accomplish
00:03:55.620 anything? Oh no. It may help them raise money for their campaign, you know, from the George Soros
00:04:00.520 of the world and people like that, but it's not at the end of the day, it will not accomplish anything
00:04:04.720 because the way that special sessions work in Texas is that the governor is the only one that
00:04:10.260 can call a special legislative session and they last up to 30 days, depending on how long it takes
00:04:15.760 them to get the bills passed. And the governor is already on record, already on record as saying
00:04:20.320 he will continue calling additional special sessions until this election integrity bill is
00:04:26.100 passed. And so, and they said, how long will that last? He said, right up until the election in 2022.
00:04:32.180 So they'll have to come home here soon. They'll, what they'll do is they'll end up saying, well,
00:04:37.900 we made our point, you know, we we've stood up and they'll have to come back and they'll vote. No,
00:04:43.160 probably on the bill, not all of them, but most of them will vote. No. And, uh, then we'll move on.
00:04:48.040 Okay. I want to play a little clip from, um, the Texas Democrats at the Capitol singing to get,
00:04:55.140 I guess they're trying to rally support. I don't know what they're doing, but they're trying to
00:04:59.160 sing. We shall overcome. I just want to play that quickly.
00:05:14.440 So that is them at the Capitol, I guess, trying to, um, you know, liken themselves to civil rights
00:05:21.940 heroes. They say that they're trying to get federal support. I think Kamala Harris actually
00:05:26.080 met with some of the state legislators. What do you think? What do you think is going to come of
00:05:33.520 that attempt at some kind of partnership? Like, do you think the Biden administration is going to
00:05:38.080 be able to help out the Texas Democrats in any way? Or again, is it just political posturing?
00:05:42.540 Well, last time I checked and maybe they've changed some rules since I've been in there,
00:05:46.080 but I don't think so that, uh, president Biden or vice president Harris has the ability to cast a
00:05:53.440 vote in the Texas legislature. And you know, it's, it's so funny, uh, Ali, because many people think
00:05:58.900 of our nation as they should as a country, but however, our country is made up only of the states.
00:06:06.940 It's not like, uh, in some countries, like in Europe and what have you, the power that the government,
00:06:13.120 the federal government gets is only derived from the states. And so therefore it was originally
00:06:18.020 set up that the states will run the elections and that you actually have 50 different state
00:06:24.120 elections. You don't, there's really not a national presidential election. It's 50 different states
00:06:29.120 voting for their choice for president and then having their electors cast that vote on their behalf.
00:06:35.540 And so to have the federal government micromanage the state elections is the most
00:06:42.480 overreach that I've ever seen in, uh, in my history, in my, you know, 60 years of living.
00:06:49.100 And that is what HR one, the federal elections bill is trying to do. Correct. They're trying to
00:06:55.360 basically say, Hey, the federal government is going to come in and like you said, try to micromanage
00:07:00.420 state elections, right? That's exactly right. They're going to come in and they're going to take
00:07:03.680 over state elections. They're going to require, they're going to, they are going to do things that
00:07:08.440 would just have been unconscionable before. In fact, they're going to do things that aren't
00:07:12.840 even done right now. And some of the most liberal States out there, they're going to require same
00:07:17.240 day registration so that if somebody can't, we can't even have the ability to check their
00:07:22.440 eligibility for to vote because it's going to be same day. How are you going to know whether or not
00:07:27.120 they're eligible or not? They're going to require online registration. Now think about that for just a
00:07:31.740 second with all the cyber hacks and the ransomware going on out there. How in the world could we
00:07:38.280 assure that that's going to be safe and secure? Right. I mean, it's just incredible and it's
00:07:43.640 nothing. And they also are going to take away you and my individuals as citizens of this country to
00:07:49.640 challenge an election. You and I will not be able to do that anymore. It'll only be elected officials
00:07:54.820 that can do that or bureaucrats, which is absolutely crazy. So, uh, I am proud of our
00:08:01.300 U S Senate for standing up against that, not allowing that to go through. And, uh, I'm also
00:08:06.760 proud of, you know, uh, Senator Manchin saying, I am not going to vote to have that done, uh, outside
00:08:14.700 of the filibuster rules. And it also allows ballot harvesting, correct? Can you talk about what
00:08:19.420 ballot harvesting is? Ballot harvesting. And this is a real problem in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas.
00:08:25.960 This is something that, uh, some organizations have reported on Texas public policy foundation.
00:08:31.160 What it is, it's where an individual usually working for a campaign will go around usually to older
00:08:38.060 people, seniors that are doing mail-in ballots and they'll go around and they will actually collect
00:08:44.420 the ballot. Most of the time, help them fill the ballot out, which is illegal. And they will then
00:08:50.920 harvest a lot of ballots and who knows what they're doing with them once they've done that
00:08:56.040 and then bring them in, uh, to the elections office and what have you. And they get paid to do that in
00:09:01.560 many cases, which also is illegal. And that's something in the Texas bill that we're just clarifying.
00:09:06.780 Now, like, let's say that my mom was still alive. You know, you've talked about grandma Dodd on here
00:09:11.800 before and, uh, you wanted to help her vote, you know, to help take her ballot. She votes on her 0.98
00:09:17.620 own, but you take her ballot. You could do that as, and you could still do that as a family member,
00:09:22.320 but you can't have somebody for a campaign that's going around intimidating citizens, telling them
00:09:27.960 how to vote and, uh, picking up their ballots. And who knows we need a, we need a secure chain of
00:09:34.240 custody, which is something that the new law in Texas is, is putting into place.
00:09:39.020 So would you say HR one just makes it easier to cheat in the name of trying to alleviate
00:09:44.160 voter suppression? Yeah. It's just like a lot of liberal ideas. They are really great ideas.
00:09:50.660 The problem is sound really good. The problem is they don't work. Yeah. And everybody wants
00:09:55.500 every legal vote to be casted and counted. But what HR one does, it allows the bad actors 0.66
00:10:01.740 more opportunity. In fact, holes you could drive a truck through to be able to do things that we know
00:10:06.680 are nefarious. And so tell me, I know you just talked a little bit about it, but tell me more
00:10:11.140 about what this Texas voting bill does, because you've got Joe Biden, and I want to play this clip
00:10:17.480 as well before you, before you explain this, um, Joe Biden saying that, you know, these voting bills,
00:10:24.460 not just in Texas, but in other Republican states are the biggest threat to our democracy
00:10:28.660 since the civil war. So let me play that.
00:10:33.120 Okay. So to me, that kind of rhetoric is, is very dangerous. I mean, this is harsher rhetoric than we
00:10:53.760 have heard the president use towards, you know, some of our foreign enemies. Um, and yet they're
00:10:59.200 basically saying, he's basically saying that Republicans and these Republican, uh, legislative
00:11:03.580 bodies that are pushing these kinds of voter integrity bills are threatening our democracy.
00:11:08.040 Tell us why that's not true and what specifically this Texas bill does.
00:11:12.720 Well, first of all, remember president Biden has not had an original thought in a long time. So
00:11:18.220 somebody wrote this for him. And as you know, as we all know, his left is a, his staff is about as
00:11:24.480 far left as you can be. And president, president Biden actually voted for some of the protections
00:11:31.020 that's in the law now during his Senate career. Right. He voted on voter ID and all those types of
00:11:36.560 things. So, uh, you know, it's just like many things that he's done. He just totally reverses himself.
00:11:41.600 And I'm not sure he even remembers that he's done that. And so in some ways I feel a little bit
00:11:46.480 sorry for him, but we'll, we will overcome that. I believe the, uh, the Texas bill, you know, what,
00:11:52.580 what it does is it does a few things, but it would actually, and I've said this before recently in
00:11:59.940 that by not voting yes on the Texas bill, Democrats are suppressing votes. Right. And let me tell you
00:12:07.640 how that happens. The way that happens is, is that if one illegal vote is cast, if one, and they always
00:12:13.560 talk about, well, it's not widespread fraud, that doesn't matter. Fraud is fraud. And if one illegal
00:12:19.240 vote is cast, then that cancels out a legal vote. They have suppressed that legal vote. What we need
00:12:26.860 to make sure that every single possible legal vote is counted and that every single illegal vote is
00:12:34.160 not counted. And what the Texas law does is it's continues to build parameters to ensure more legal
00:12:41.500 voting. One of the things that happens right now is if you're actually, you're doing a mail-in ballot
00:12:46.100 in Texas, if you meet the criteria for that, you do not even have to prove that you're eligible to
00:12:52.480 vote and who, or who you are, what this will do is it will require you to provide proof of ID. When
00:13:00.440 you send that mail-in ballot, either through the last four digits of your social security number
00:13:04.980 or through your driver's license, if that's what you choose or your passport.
00:13:08.280 So you're saying right now in Texas, before, if this bill doesn't pass right now, if you qualify
00:13:13.600 for mail-in voting, you can do that without having to verify in any official way who you are and
00:13:19.540 whether or not you're eligible to vote in Texas.
00:13:21.360 Yeah, that's exactly right. That's what, that's what happens and that's going to be changed. So
00:13:25.160 why would anybody be against that? Only people that are against that are the people that want to
00:13:30.200 leave it open for being able to, you know, to cheat. I mean, there's no, no, no better term for that.
00:13:35.560 The other thing that it does is it expands early voting hours. The, the, unlike the nation that is
00:13:42.300 made up of states, Texas is not made up of cities and counties. Texas is a state and all the powers
00:13:49.080 that a city or a county has are only have them because they're given to them by the state. And so
00:13:54.780 the state controls the elections, not the county, not the cities. And so what the state wants to do
00:14:00.220 is make sure that Texans all over the state have a uniformity in early voting. So they expanded the
00:14:06.860 hours to any nine hours between six in the morning and nine at night. So that is a plus. Why would
00:14:13.320 somebody be against that? Now, Harris County tried to do 24 hour voting. Now they got shut down because
00:14:19.340 it was against the Texas law and the Supreme court shut them down. But 24 hour voting, again, just opens
00:14:26.500 the opportunity for more things. You know, when you were young, I used to tell you nothing good
00:14:31.440 happens after midnight. It's the same way in voting as well. Nothing good happens after midnight in the
00:14:36.980 back off the back rooms of how votes are counted and votes are cast. So is there anything at all to
00:14:43.260 the claims that we're hearing from Democrats that these laws, for example, in Georgia, we heard that
00:14:49.800 that was like Jim Crow, that it's specifically trying to suppress the minority vote through a variety of
00:14:55.960 subtle means? Is there is there any credibility to that claim at all? And why are they even claiming
00:15:03.140 it if not? There's only credibility if you think being able to not verify legal votes is proper. And so
00:15:11.200 there's absolutely no credibility to that. What what this bill, again, continues to do is allows
00:15:17.260 more poll watchers at divide. It sets up the systems for how people campaigns can have people
00:15:22.660 watching the polls. It has a chain of custody to make sure that the ballot is followed through to
00:15:28.640 the very end. We require live streaming and video in all vote counting places in most counties,
00:15:35.940 the larger counties. So I just I just can't see it. I think they got on the mantra and then they just
00:15:42.440 decided to stay with it. And the media has helped them out. Some media has. There's a there's actually
00:15:47.560 in the Dallas Morning News today, there's a great editorial in there about and it's it's pretty
00:15:53.120 balanced. But it basically says the stunt that's been pulled by the Democrats in Texas is just that
00:15:59.020 it's just a political stunt. And there's nothing in the bill that suppresses voting at all. We there
00:16:04.920 was a deal in there on you couldn't vote before 11 o'clock or one o'clock on Sunday. That's now been
00:16:10.480 moved back to or 10 or 11. So that's that that was just again, it's a red herring that just does not
00:16:17.520 exist at all. And this is going to make just like getting rid of one punch straight ticket voting.
00:16:23.140 This is also going to make Texas elections even more secure. Yeah. And I know that there are
00:16:29.860 Democrats who say, well, you know, this is just a solution in search of a problem. Like we really
00:16:34.620 don't have widespread fraud. But to your point, even one fraudulent vote cancels out another vote,
00:16:41.420 which is a form of voter suppression, which is something that they claim is happening on a wide
00:16:45.280 scale. There's even less evidence that voter suppression is happening on a wide scale. And yet
00:16:50.940 that's something that Democrats are running with. And the Democrats that have fled to D.C. are saying
00:16:57.800 that they're doing it to try to save democracy. They're actually abdicating their responsibility,
00:17:02.140 you know, in a Democratic Republic to represent the constituents that voted for them. Do you think
00:17:08.540 it's going to come back to to bite them in the election when people say, OK, this is where my
00:17:13.200 taxpayer dollars are going? Well, based on the polling that I have seen so far, people aren't happy that
00:17:19.720 they fled. And I'm talking about independent voters. Of course, Republicans are not now the
00:17:24.000 hardcore Democrats. You know, they're they're you know, they're fine with that. They're going to vote
00:17:27.760 with them no matter what. But if it follows the pattern that it did in 2003, 2022 is going to be
00:17:33.700 a great year for Republicans in Texas. And, you know, interestingly enough, this little bit of
00:17:39.340 maybe in the weeds a little bit. But I think it's interesting is that the way the procedure works
00:17:44.860 is that yesterday Speaker Dade Phelan did a call on the House and a call on the House means that every
00:17:51.900 member has to be there unless they have an excused absence. They could have a death in the family or
00:17:57.900 something like that. And once that happens, they actually yesterday locked the House doors. Now
00:18:04.760 they went into recess and let everybody go home and, you know, sleep and all that type of stuff.
00:18:09.180 But that call on the House continues so that the minute that a Democrat member enters back into
00:18:16.480 Texas, they are subject to people here about arrest. Well, they're not arrested going to jail there.
00:18:22.800 They're escorted by a state trooper to the Texas House so that they can do their job.
00:18:29.060 And that's going to be really interesting to see how that that. Yeah, because Greg Abbott said that
00:18:34.600 they would be arrested coming when they came back to Texas. Well, they are technically arrested,
00:18:39.820 but they're not arrested going to jail. They're going back to the Texas House to do their job.
00:18:44.720 And, you know, the interesting thing is, too, these people are up there in Washington during special
00:18:50.000 session. They get a two hundred dollar a day per diem, you know, pays for hotels and stuff like that
00:18:56.760 in Austin. And then they get, of course, their limited salary. So they're during this 30 days,
00:19:02.880 if they stay gone, each of those people are going to get six thousand dollars for advocating their
00:19:08.600 responsibility. And six hundred, you know, six thousand dollars with with 60 people is what is
00:19:16.760 that? That's three hundred sixty thousand dollars, something like that. So that's Texas taxpayer money
00:19:21.460 going to fund this boondoggle in D.C. Yeah. Wow. That's crazy. I can't imagine that it wouldn't
00:19:27.360 come back to bite them. So is it going to pass eventually? Will the bill pass? Absolutely. One hundred
00:19:32.100 percent. And Democrats have the ability to try to amend the bill on the House floor and the Senate
00:19:36.920 floor if they want to. Of course, it passed the Senate yesterday, but they have the ability to
00:19:40.040 amend it on the House floor to have discussion. And they also have the ability to vote,
00:19:44.540 vote their constituents. They want to vote no, they can vote no. OK, well, that's good news. I know a lot
00:19:49.100 of people are worried about that, but they want these voter integrity bills. So the fact that this
00:19:53.700 isn't going to thwart that, I know, will encourage a lot of people. So absolutely. Thank you for your
00:19:58.800 insight on that. I do want to talk to you about some personal. Well, some people had some business
00:20:15.180 questions. Some people had some personal and parenting questions, a lot of curiosity about
00:20:20.840 who Allie was as a child, as a teenager, things like that. Let's start with some questions about
00:20:28.500 one person had a question about their own politics and maybe political career. One person had a
00:20:34.080 question about a business decision that they're making. One person asked, do you think that it's
00:20:41.120 a good idea for them to for someone to run for office while they still have a young family like 1.00
00:20:47.080 state office? That's a big decision. How would you encourage them to go about making that decision?
00:20:52.660 Well, my response on that is that nobody should run for office until they've had life experience
00:20:59.360 themselves. And I don't mean life experience. I've gone to high school. I've gone to college.
00:21:03.260 I mean that they've actually gone out there and either signed the front of a paycheck or the back
00:21:07.920 of a paycheck so that they can understand how laws that they're going to be voting on will affect
00:21:14.960 them. And it's and it has affected them. And so without regard to where they have a young family
00:21:20.600 or not, I believe people should go out, especially if they're going to the state level. Now, if they
00:21:24.880 want to get involved as maybe a precinct chair, which is a great place to start, which is an elected
00:21:29.300 position. If they want to start on maybe their local school board or city council, something like
00:21:34.700 that. I think that's those are good ideas to do. I do believe that if you have a young family,
00:21:40.300 especially at the state level where you're gone away from them in Texas, it's a little easier,
00:21:44.620 because we only were in session every other year for about six months. In a lot of states,
00:21:49.900 it's every year for several months. I would have them think obviously and pray long and hard about
00:21:55.600 that because that has to be a family decision. They will give up some things for their family and they
00:22:01.160 will miss some things for their young children. And they just have to decide whether or not the trade
00:22:07.220 off for themselves and the family and the area which they're serving is worth that. It would be a
00:22:14.600 big decision. It would be much easier to do that once your family has established itself a little
00:22:20.060 bit, because it's going to be very difficult on your spouse. For mom and I, you were in college
00:22:29.040 when I first ran. Yeah, I was a sophomore in college.
00:22:30.880 Um, and so it, and pretty much everybody's out of the house. Now, you know, your brother, Daniel was
00:22:36.520 not, uh, he was still living at home with us because of his challenges and what have you, but
00:22:41.340 it was much easier for us. We didn't have a lot. We didn't have as much to consider.
00:22:45.240 Yeah. I think a lot of people are very eager to get involved in some way. I get questions all the
00:22:50.380 time asking, you know, what can I do? I don't like the curriculum that's being taught in the public
00:22:55.360 school, my area or at my kid's school. Um, I don't like a lot of the things I'm seeing come down the
00:23:01.080 pipeline and I just kind of feel powerless. It feels like so many of our major institutions and
00:23:05.500 obviously at least two branches of our federal government are all not just liberal, but they
00:23:11.160 seem very opposed to Christian conservative values in a lot of ways. People want to speak up. They want
00:23:16.940 to stand up, but they don't know if that means running for an elected position or if it just means
00:23:21.640 being involved in their community, what would you encourage people to do? If it doesn't mean
00:23:25.920 running for something just on a practical level in their everyday life, how do they stand up for
00:23:29.980 the things that they believe in and maybe affects change at least in their community? Well, first of
00:23:34.440 all, I'm glad you brought this up because I want to tell everyone how thankful I am for critical race
00:23:40.420 theory. Oh really? And the reason for that is it has woken up, in my opinion, a sleeping giant
00:23:45.900 of young moms and dads and older moms and dads that have said, you know what? Enough is enough.
00:23:51.400 We're having more conservative participation in school board meetings and city council meetings
00:23:56.340 than we've ever had before. You know, most of us that are conservative, we're trying to out,
00:24:00.780 you know, build a business, do our job, raise our family, go to church. And so we have put some of
00:24:06.800 those things on the side. And I understand that because you have to prioritize, but the best way
00:24:11.480 to get engaged, the best way to get engaged is to make sure that you're at those school board meetings.
00:24:18.080 That's probably the number one place. The thing that has the longest term effect
00:24:22.400 on what happens in our country is what goes on in our public schools. Yeah. And if your kids are in
00:24:28.060 public schools or even if they're in a private school and you have the ability to meet with them,
00:24:32.540 it's still money. That's right. And you should, that's where you should make yourself known
00:24:37.640 the most. The other thing that you can do, if you really want to make sure that the proper officials
00:24:44.000 are elected is that you can get off your derriere and go help them get elected.
00:24:49.780 You say, well, I don't have a bunch of money. They're looking for big donors. You know what?
00:24:52.680 Nope. The people that I remember the most, Allie, in all of my elections are the people that got out
00:24:56.820 there and knocked on doors for me. And you say, well, I'm not a politician. I can't be a speaker.
00:25:01.240 You don't have to do anything. Knock on the door, hand them a brochure saying my family's voting for
00:25:05.740 this candidate. Yeah. That's what's most important.
00:25:08.220 So you just, so to do that, you just look at who's running for the positions in your area and you
00:25:14.480 basically just reach out to the campaign and you say, how can I help? Here's what I'm willing to
00:25:18.180 do. And I would tell you to meet with, don't do it without meeting with the candidate themselves.
00:25:21.700 If that candidate's unwilling to meet with you or they're too busy, that's not the candidate to
00:25:25.580 represent you. Yeah. So there are all types of ways that people can get involved and can speak up
00:25:29.800 without running for office if that's not what they're prepared to do at the moment. Because like you
00:25:34.280 said, that is a big sacrifice that maybe God is calling, you know, more Christian conservatives 0.60
00:25:39.420 to do, which is awesome. But like you said, there's a lot of issues right now that I think
00:25:43.680 are waking people up, not just critical race theory, but also some of the sex ed that's coming
00:25:47.720 down the pipeline for these schools. And people think, okay, it's not going to affect my community.
00:25:52.300 I'm in rural Alabama or Georgia or Texas. It's coming for you. I mean, that's just what
00:25:56.960 progressivism does. So yeah, I think that's really good encouragement and insight. And speaking of
00:26:03.000 parents and parents who want to get involved, a lot of people ask, okay, what did your parents
00:26:08.100 do to kind of instill you with Christian conservative values? I'm trying to do that
00:26:12.500 for my kids, but it's hard because the world is saying other things. Like, what would you say
00:26:16.980 are some things that you and mom that you feel like you guys did well to instill those values in us?
00:26:21.720 And what are some things that you wish that you would have done differently?
00:26:25.520 Well, first of all, you've already had Lisa on here. And she was the number one reason.
00:26:30.680 There's absolutely no question about that. Lisa's faith, your mom's faith is as strong
00:26:35.240 as anybody I've ever seen. She's never, you know, it's funny the other day, one of our
00:26:38.960 grandchildren, not yours, but one of our other grandchildren was talking to their cousin
00:26:43.140 and they said, do you know, Grammy? And that's what, you know, they call them. And, uh, they
00:26:48.200 said, no, who's Grammy says, well, Grammy like singing in the Bible. So I thought that
00:26:53.680 she's nice. They said, she's nice. She likes singing in the Bible.
00:26:57.140 Yeah. So, and that really sums up mom. And so I think your ability to see mom daily,
00:27:02.840 daily in the word probably had the biggest influence.
00:27:06.100 And her, she was very diligent and praying for all of us.
00:27:08.860 Yeah. She, she absolutely do that. I think for me, uh, the thing that a dad can do most
00:27:14.200 is he can be someone that their kids can look up to as a man of character and integrity.
00:27:18.520 Um, and it has to be the same at home as it is outside. And I think we talked about that
00:27:25.560 a lot growing up. We talked about what's right, what's wrong. We were very engaged in our own
00:27:31.240 development of ourself, personal development. You know, Lisa and I just didn't get to be
00:27:35.160 adults and just stop. We said, how can we be better? How can we learn more? We, we both came
00:27:40.640 from pretty meager backgrounds. You know, I was tell people all the time I was born in Louisiana,
00:27:45.720 raised in Arkansas, got to Texas as fast as I could spell it at age 25. So it was really a,
00:27:51.240 I would squeeze four years of college into 10. So, you know, those things are, those things are
00:27:55.420 hard to overcome. But, uh, and I think us both having an early faith decision, you know, I was
00:28:03.020 a youngster when, when I, uh, accepted Christ and Lisa and mom was too. And I think the foundation
00:28:09.200 that was built over time, did we always stay exactly with it? No, but it was always there.
00:28:15.580 Building that foundation allows you to have your kids something to fall back on. And you've probably
00:28:21.640 talked about that, uh, before I would just encourage people to just make sure that you're
00:28:28.220 men and women of character and that you follow Christ at home as well as you do at church.
00:28:34.940 Yeah. And we didn't, you know, we didn't sit around the dinner table and talk politics that
00:28:39.260 much. Although I do remember some political things. Like I remember the Bush Gore election. I
00:28:44.900 knew who we were going for. I remember nine 11 being in fourth grade and what that meant. I remember
00:28:51.160 always feeling a sense of patriotism and gratitude for living in a free country. And you guys, even
00:28:58.040 whether it was intentional or not, although I think it probably was intentional, you definitely
00:29:02.720 instilled in us a desire for entrepreneurism, a desire to kind of be our own boss for better and
00:29:09.320 for worse. That has been good. It's also been difficult. It's difficult when you're not your
00:29:13.380 own boss and you want to be. Um, and so you kind of instilled that drive in us as well. And it was
00:29:21.340 based on, I think, you know, what you and mom did and the tough decisions that you guys made when you
00:29:26.100 got married at 19 and 20, you know, you didn't know what you were going to do. You didn't necessarily
00:29:31.220 have a dream of your life, but you just kind of put one foot in front of the other for other people
00:29:36.240 who are in that situation. They don't know what they want to do with their life. Maybe they don't
00:29:39.580 have a grand vision or a grand dream, but they know they want to create a better life for themselves
00:29:43.980 and their kids than they had growing up. Like what's your, what's your advice for those,
00:29:48.940 those young people or just adults in general making that decision? I think the best advice that
00:29:54.260 I've ever given someone, and I'm sure I heard it from someone else, was that always take the next
00:30:00.360 uncomfortable step. Um, I believe that God honors righteous action and that he's not sitting there
00:30:08.120 saying, if you take that wrong step, I'm going to hit you over the head. It's not a whack-a-mo. We
00:30:11.720 don't, we don't serve a whack-a-mo God. We serve a God that says, Hey, this is who I am. I care about
00:30:18.160 you even more than your own earthly parents. And therefore I love you more than them. And I want you
00:30:23.580 to, yes, I have a plan for you, but I need for you to be able to have faith in that plan.
00:30:29.840 And so if you've sought me and you have, and you're feeling, Hey, I'm, I don't know a hundred
00:30:35.840 percent. I want you to take that step and I'll be there to, to guide you, stop you. Sometimes there
00:30:40.900 may be, there may be, you may suffer consequences from that, but that's just, you know, that's just
00:30:45.960 the way it is. You know, when, and, uh, when you were a teenager, uh, things weren't always rosy
00:30:51.400 between us. I think people would, you would admit that you've probably talked about that.
00:30:55.600 Most, uh, most of that was my fault, uh, because you and I are a lot alike and that we're pretty
00:31:01.380 headstrong. Um, you probably more so than me, maybe, maybe not. No, that's not true. That's not
00:31:07.760 true. That's a big statement. That's right. Um, and you know, mom was so important and saying,
00:31:13.880 Hey, I think we need to sit down and go to a counselor to figure this out. Cause she felt
00:31:18.040 like she was caught in the middle between us. And the things that we learned from that counselor,
00:31:24.060 the things that I remember the most is that parents have to decide, especially as their
00:31:27.880 kids are getting older, um, as to what's your family value. Okay. I think for us, that was pretty
00:31:35.600 simple. We didn't, we didn't have a big problem with that. Where I got into the problem was what's
00:31:39.920 the difference between a rule and a preference in the world that I grew up in? Everything
00:31:44.720 was a rule. Okay. And there were no preferences. The preferences were what I said they were rules.
00:31:50.720 And so I had to learn that many, many things that your kids go through are simply your preferences
00:31:58.000 and they shouldn't be your rules. Yeah. And that was very hard for me, but I think, and I,
00:32:04.660 and I think once we got past that, things were better. The also, I think prayer is so important.
00:32:11.760 When you went off to college, Allie, we didn't know. Anytime you send a kid off to college, they,
00:32:16.860 the, the, uh, the additional independence that you have is probably pretty overwhelming. And most,
00:32:25.400 and most college kids don't handle it as well as they should. And, and I'm sure, as I've told all
00:32:30.620 my kids, if you did something in college that I, if you haven't told me about, don't tell me to ease
00:32:34.680 your conscience. I don't want to know it in the future. Right. But, but I think in your book,
00:32:38.600 you've talked about some of those challenges and what have you, but I will tell you, and I've told
00:32:42.660 people this a hundred times is that I've never seen somebody mature more than they have in Christ
00:32:49.080 in college as you did. And you got with some girls that you had a Bible study, you know,
00:32:56.180 you got with a small group of girls, you know, maybe not all the time, but some of the time you've
00:33:00.060 got some mentors outside of, uh, your college that were just really, really important for you.
00:33:05.640 And then of course you had mom, uh, and grandma was still praying for you every day. So that was,
00:33:11.480 that was, uh, I think that was important. I think that's what you can do for your kids.
00:33:14.840 You know, this is my last question and you just answered a lot of it, but a lot of people
00:33:29.000 different kinds of questions, but just to sum it up, people want to know, okay, what was Allie like
00:33:34.020 growing up? What was it like raising Allie? You already talked about is, you know, difficult sometimes
00:33:39.620 in my teenage years, because like you said, we have those similar personalities and we're just kind
00:33:44.280 of butting heads, but in general, people want to know what was Allie like as a child? Did you always
00:33:50.500 expect me to do something like this? Does it surprise you that I'm doing something like this
00:33:54.800 now? Or just kind of, what was it like? Well, that's interesting. First of all, I think you were
00:34:01.340 a very quick learner. I mean, you were, you were verbal early on. You're very smart. Uh, we could tell
00:34:07.360 that you, there was a pretty good gap between you and Daniel, you know, age wise and Justin. So,
00:34:13.620 so by the time we had you, poor Justin had to grow up with us because I was, uh, 20 when
00:34:21.300 he was born, just almost for 21. Mom was 21. And so he kind of had to grow up with us and
00:34:27.580 I've apologized to him many times for that. Uh, but he turned out, he turned out well, by
00:34:33.280 the time you were born, uh, you know, things had settled down for us in financially and everything
00:34:40.140 else. So I think we were able to take things, uh, at least when you were little at a, at a slower
00:34:46.040 pace and everything wasn't brand new to us. And so we were able to enjoy probably your childhood
00:34:55.520 even more than the others, only because we were separated far enough from it in age. And I think
00:35:02.140 that allowed you to maybe blossom into who you would be independently, maybe a little bit more
00:35:08.060 so than we were able to do early with the other two. And, uh, very talkative, very headstrong.
00:35:15.160 I'll never forget when I'll never forget the car we had. We had this, this red car, you were sitting
00:35:20.840 in the back seat. You were five years old. I know exactly where we were. We were down by the Galleria.
00:35:25.420 Um, and, uh, we were, you and I were arguing over something. All right. And I don't even remember
00:35:32.560 what that was, but I was trying to make my point. And at five years old, you said, well, dad, what do
00:35:37.780 you want me to do? And it was like, it was like you were an adult. I mean, I was like you in that I
00:35:43.800 couldn't wait to be an adult. I couldn't wait till I turned 32. I got the first bit of gray hair
00:35:49.300 because I was always the youngest one in the room and whatever I was doing. And so I knew then,
00:35:55.520 and I told mom this many times is that you were just an adult in a child's body. And that's,
00:36:02.680 that's really. And so for you, when you got more independent, okay, now you didn't understand
00:36:09.420 in high school, like none of us did that the front lobal part of our brain hasn't fully developed yet.
00:36:15.580 And it doesn't develop until we're about age 25. Uh, so we think all our decisions are the right
00:36:20.840 ones. I thought the same thing in high school. You know, I thought exactly the same thing.
00:36:24.800 That's why many times I knew what you were thinking. Mom didn't think like that. That 0.57
00:36:28.720 wasn't the way she processed stuff. Right. Uh, but I knew that if we could ever get you to be an adult,
00:36:34.860 you were going to be a great adult. Now you might not make it, you know, we may have had to do
00:36:38.940 something drastic, but it didn't work out that way. And you were, you were going to be a great adult
00:36:43.140 and you are a great adult. Simone, we're very, very proud of. Well, thank you very much. Being
00:36:47.040 an adult, I have to say is everything that I ever thought that it would be not having a bedtime,
00:36:52.400 being able to eat ice cream whenever you want to. It really is as good as you think it's going to be
00:36:57.060 when, when you're little. And of course, becoming a parent and being married and all of the wonderful
00:37:03.200 things about adulthood. A lot of people say to put responsibility off as long as possible,
00:37:08.180 but I could not recommend enough growing up, growing up and becoming an adult and taking
00:37:13.800 things seriously. It really is the most fruitful and fulfilling thing, not just for you, but I'm
00:37:17.940 sure also to, for your parents to see that. Let me tell one more story. This is for dads. This is
00:37:24.240 straight to dads. Okay. Okay. A little bit to moms and the daughters, but dads, you know,
00:37:28.380 when Allie Beth was in high school and, uh, she was dating. Okay. Which I was totally against.
00:37:34.160 Didn't matter how much you should have been. And I shouldn't have dated in high school. I'll just
00:37:38.080 say that I shouldn't have been dating in high school. Yes. Yes. So, but one of the things I'd
00:37:43.080 learned through some of my other mentors, like John Maxwell and others was, Hey, you don't just
00:37:48.860 let your daughter, first of all, go out with somebody you don't know. Don't let them, you know,
00:37:53.440 if you can avoid it, try not to let them meet somewhere, make the boy come to the house. And so if you
00:37:58.220 remember Allie, the boys would have to come to the house. They would come into my office
00:38:02.840 house. And I was mortified. You were mortified. I was mortified. My mortified. My office was right
00:38:08.600 off of our foyer area. This big kind of, you know, dark paneled walls and all that type of stuff.
00:38:15.400 And of course I made them sit on the other side of the desk in a chair that was a little shorter
00:38:20.480 than mine, uh, which gets you in the dominant position. And they were all nervous. And, uh, I
00:38:26.860 would, I'd learned this. I listen, I forget who, who did this, but somebody that I listened to on a,
00:38:31.440 uh, radio program or something had done this. And it's, and so they would sit down. I'd say,
00:38:36.300 tell me a little bit about yourself. Uh, Hey, I'm glad you're, I'm glad you're dating Allie,
00:38:41.160 taking Allie Beth out tonight. What are y'all going to do? Do you understand,
00:38:44.120 you know, the parameters and things like that? And, and when she needs to be home and all that,
00:38:48.920 yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. I said, then I would hit this question with them. I said,
00:38:52.600 are you going to marry my daughter? Oh my gosh. See, I didn't even, it's better that I didn't know this.
00:38:57.220 You're going to marry my daughter. And of course they went into total sweat, panic mode, right?
00:39:01.120 Yeah. I imagine they would. Uh, no, sir. I said, Oh, that's good. I didn't, I don't expect that.
00:39:06.300 I said, but you know what that means that you're dating somebody else's wife tonight.
00:39:10.780 And you know what else it means? Somebody else is dating your wife. 0.68
00:39:14.160 I want you to treat Allie Beth. Like you want your wife treated tonight. 1.00
00:39:18.400 Can we do that? And then the last one was when I hate it.
00:39:22.080 You say this, but I think it's funny that says, and I would ask them every time. And I hated it.
00:39:28.260 Cause you know me well enough. No, do you know what inappropriate touching means? Cause if you
00:39:32.620 don't, we'll talk about it. Oh yes. You know, and so they would leave. Oh my gosh. Just thoroughly
00:39:39.140 embarrassed for in time. And yes, that is not something that you wanted to talk about. No,
00:39:45.640 but I do think dads do not be afraid to do that. Yeah. Do not. Your daughter will thank you for
00:39:51.660 that later, uh, for standing up for her and secretly down deep, even then she probably
00:39:58.160 appreciated it. Yeah, of course. There's, you know, there's a lot of people whose dads don't
00:40:02.440 care. And I think one of the most detrimental things in especially a girl's life is to have a 0.98
00:40:07.960 dad who doesn't care. And I never had that problem. Even, you know, with the back and forth that we had,
00:40:13.060 I never had a problem with parents who cared. And I'm very thankful for that. Thank you so much
00:40:17.780 for coming on. Great conversation. I know a lot of people are really going to enjoy it. Thank you.