Podcasts about unintelligible

Listen in as Real Science Radio host Fred Williams and co-host Doug McBurney review and update some of Bob Enyart's legendary list of not so old things! From Darwin's Finches to opals forming in months to man's genetic diversity in 200 generations, to carbon 14 everywhere it's not supposed to be (including in diamonds and dinosaur bones!), scientific observations simply defy the claim that the earth is billions of years old. Real science demands the dismissal of the alleged million and billion year ages asserted by the ungodly and the foolish.     * Finches Adapt in 17 Years, Not 2.3 Million: Charles Darwin's finches are claimed to have taken 2,300,000 years to diversify from an initial species blown onto the Galapagos Islands. Yet individuals from a single finch species on a U.S. Bird Reservation in the Pacific were introduced to a group of small islands 300 miles away and in at most 17 years, like Darwin's finches, they had diversified their beaks, related muscles, and behavior to fill various ecological niches. Hear about this also at rsr.org/spetner.  * Finches Speciate in Two Generations vs Two Million Years for Darwin's Birds?  Darwin's finches on the Galapagos Islands are said to have diversified into 14 species over a period of two million years. But in 2017 the journal Science reported a newcomer to the Island which within two generations spawned a reproductively isolated new species. In another instance as documented by Lee Spetner, a hundred birds of the same finch species introduced to an island cluster a 1,000 kilometers from Galapagos diversified into species with the typical variations in beak sizes, etc. "If this diversification occurred in less than seventeen years," Dr. Spetner asks, "why did Darwin's Galapagos finches [as claimed by evolutionists] have to take two million years?" * Opals Can Form in "A Few Months" And Don't Need 100,000 Years: A leading authority on opals, Allan W. Eckert, observed that, "scientific papers and textbooks have told that the process of opal formation requires tens of thousands of years, perhaps hundreds of thousands... Not true." A 2011 peer-reviewed paper in a geology journal from Australia, where almost all the world's opal is found, reported on the: "new timetable for opal formation involving weeks to a few months and not the hundreds of thousands of years envisaged by the conventional weathering model." (And apparently, per a 2019 report from Entomology Today, opals can even form around insects!) More knowledgeable scientists resist the uncritical, group-think insistence on false super-slow formation rates (as also for manganese nodules, gold veins, stone, petroleum, canyons and gullies, and even guts, all below). Regarding opals, Darwinian bias led geologists to long ignore possible quick action, as from microbes, as a possible explanation for these mineraloids. For both in nature and in the lab, opals form rapidly, not even in 10,000 years, but in weeks. See this also from creationists by a geologist, a paleobiochemist, and a nuclear chemist. * Blue Eyes Originated Not So Long Ago: Not a million years ago, nor a hundred thousand years ago, but based on a peer-reviewed paper in Human Genetics, a press release at Science Daily reports that, "research shows that people with blue eyes have a single, common ancestor. A team at the University of Copenhagen have tracked down a genetic mutation which took place 6-10,000 years ago and is the cause of the eye color of all blue-eyed humans alive on the planet today." * Adding the Entire Universe to our List of Not So Old Things? Based on March 2019 findings from Hubble, Nobel laureate Adam Riess of the Space Telescope Science Institute and his co-authors in the Astrophysical Journal estimate that the universe is about a billion years younger than previously thought! Then in September 2019 in the journal Science, the age dropped precipitously to as low as 11.4 billion years! Of course, these measurements also further squeeze the canonical story of the big bang chronology with its many already existing problems including the insufficient time to "evolve" distant mature galaxies, galaxy clusters, superclusters, enormous black holes, filaments, bubbles, walls, and other superstructures. So, even though the latest estimates are still absurdly too old (Google: big bang predictions, and click on the #1 ranked article, or just go on over there to rsr.org/bb), regardless, we thought we'd plop the whole universe down on our List of Not So Old Things!   * After the Soft Tissue Discoveries, NOW Dino DNA: When a North Carolina State University paleontologist took the Tyrannosaurus Rex photos to the right of original biological material, that led to the 2016 discovery of dinosaur DNA, So far researchers have also recovered dinosaur blood vessels, collagen, osteocytes, hemoglobin, red blood cells, and various proteins. As of May 2018, twenty-six scientific journals, including Nature, Science, PNAS, PLoS One, Bone, and Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, have confirmed the discovery of biomaterial fossils from many dinosaurs! Organisms including T. Rex, hadrosaur, titanosaur, triceratops, Lufengosaur, mosasaur, and Archaeopteryx, and many others dated, allegedly, even hundreds of millions of years old, have yielded their endogenous, still-soft biological material. See the web's most complete listing of 100+ journal papers (screenshot, left) announcing these discoveries at bflist.rsr.org and see it in layman's terms at rsr.org/soft. * Rapid Stalactites, Stalagmites, Etc.: A construction worker in 1954 left a lemonade bottle in one of Australia's famous Jenolan Caves. By 2011 it had been naturally transformed into a stalagmite (below, right). Increasing scientific knowledge is arguing for rapid cave formation (see below, Nat'l Park Service shrinks Carlsbad Caverns formation estimates from 260M years, to 10M, to 2M, to it "depends"). Likewise, examples are growing of rapid formations with typical chemical make-up (see bottle, left) of classic stalactites and stalagmites including: - in Nat'l Geo the Carlsbad Caverns stalagmite that rapidly covered a bat - the tunnel stalagmites at Tennessee's Raccoon Mountain - hundreds of stalactites beneath the Lincoln Memorial - those near Gladfelter Hall at Philadelphia's Temple University (send photos to Bob@rsr.org) - hundreds of stalactites at Australia's zinc mine at Mt. Isa.   - and those beneath Melbourne's Shrine of Remembrance. * Most Human Mutations Arose in 200 Generations: From Adam until Real Science Radio, in only 200 generations! The journal Nature reports The Recent Origin of Most Human Protein-coding Variants. As summarized by geneticist co-author Joshua Akey, "Most of the mutations that we found arose in the last 200 generations or so" (the same number previously published by biblical creationists). Another 2012 paper, in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology (Eugenie Scott's own field) on High mitochondrial mutation rates, shows that one mitochondrial DNA mutation occurs every other generation, which, as creationists point out, indicates that mtEve would have lived about 200 generations ago. That's not so old! * National Geographic's Not-So-Old Hard-Rock Canyon at Mount St. Helens: As our List of Not So Old Things (this web page) reveals, by a kneejerk reaction evolutionary scientists assign ages of tens or hundreds of thousands of years (or at least just long enough to contradict Moses' chronology in Genesis.) However, with closer study, routinely, more and more old ages get revised downward to fit the world's growing scientific knowledge. So the trend is not that more information lengthens ages, but rather, as data replaces guesswork, ages tend to shrink until they are consistent with the young-earth biblical timeframe. Consistent with this observation, the May 2000 issue of National Geographic quotes the U.S. Forest Service's scientist at Mount St. Helens, Peter Frenzen, describing the canyon on the north side of the volcano. "You'd expect a hard-rock canyon to be thousands, even hundreds of thousands of years old. But this was cut in less than a decade." And as for the volcano itself, while again, the kneejerk reaction of old-earthers would be to claim that most geologic features are hundreds of thousands or millions of years old, the atheistic National Geographic magazine acknowledges from the evidence that Mount St. Helens, the volcanic mount, is only about 4,000 years old! See below and more at rsr.org/mount-st-helens. * Mount St. Helens Dome Ten Years Old not 1.7 Million: Geochron Laboratories of Cambridge, Mass., using potassium-argon and other radiometric techniques claims the rock sample they dated, from the volcano's dome, solidified somewhere between 340,000 and 2.8 million years ago. However photographic evidence and historical reports document the dome's formation during the 1980s, just ten years prior to the samples being collected. With the age of this rock known, radiometric dating therefore gets the age 99.99999% wrong. * Devils Hole Pupfish Isolated Not for 13,000 Years But for 100: Secular scientists default to knee-jerk, older-than-Bible-age dates. However, a tiny Mojave desert fish is having none of it. Rather than having been genetically isolated from other fish for 13,000 years (which would make this small school of fish older than the Earth itself), according to a paper in the journal Nature, actual measurements of mutation rates indicate that the genetic diversity of these Pupfish could have been generated in about 100 years, give or take a few. * Polystrates like Spines and Rare Schools of Fossilized Jellyfish: Previously, seven sedimentary layers in Wisconsin had been described as taking a million years to form. And because jellyfish have no skeleton, as Charles Darwin pointed out, it is rare to find them among fossils. But now, reported in the journal Geology, a school of jellyfish fossils have been found throughout those same seven layers. So, polystrate fossils that condense the time of strata deposition from eons to hours or months, include: - Jellyfish in central Wisconsin were not deposited and fossilized over a million years but during a single event quick enough to trap a whole school. (This fossil school, therefore, taken as a unit forms a polystrate fossil.) Examples are everywhere that falsify the claims of strata deposition over millions of years. - Countless trilobites buried in astounding three dimensionality around the world are meticulously recovered from limestone, much of which is claimed to have been deposited very slowly. Contrariwise, because these specimens were buried rapidly in quickly laid down sediments, they show no evidence of greater erosion on their upper parts as compared to their lower parts. - The delicacy of radiating spine polystrates, like tadpole and jellyfish fossils, especially clearly demonstrate the rapidity of such strata deposition. - A second school of jellyfish, even though they rarely fossilized, exists in another locale with jellyfish fossils in multiple layers, in Australia's Brockman Iron Formation, constraining there too the rate of strata deposition. By the way, jellyfish are an example of evolution's big squeeze. Like galaxies evolving too quickly, 

Listen in as Real Science Radio host Fred Williams and co-host Doug McBurney review and update some of Bob Enyart's legendary list of not so old things! From Darwin's Finches to opals forming in months to man's genetic diversity in 200 generations, to carbon 14 everywhere it's not supposed to be (including in diamonds and dinosaur bones!), scientific observations simply defy the claim that the earth is billions of years old. Real science demands the dismissal of the alleged million and billion year ages asserted by the ungodly and the foolish.   * Finches Adapt in 17 Years, Not 2.3 Million: Charles Darwin's finches are claimed to have taken 2,300,000 years to diversify from an initial species blown onto the Galapagos Islands. Yet individuals from a single finch species on a U.S. Bird Reservation in the Pacific were introduced to a group of small islands 300 miles away and in at most 17 years, like Darwin's finches, they had diversified their beaks, related muscles, and behavior to fill various ecological niches. Hear about this also at rsr.org/spetner.  * Finches Speciate in Two Generations vs Two Million Years for Darwin's Birds?  Darwin's finches on the Galapagos Islands are said to have diversified into 14 species over a period of two million years. But in 2017 the journal Science reported a newcomer to the Island which within two generations spawned a reproductively isolated new species. In another instance as documented by Lee Spetner, a hundred birds of the same finch species introduced to an island cluster a 1,000 kilometers from Galapagos diversified into species with the typical variations in beak sizes, etc. "If this diversification occurred in less than seventeen years," Dr. Spetner asks, "why did Darwin's Galapagos finches [as claimed by evolutionists] have to take two million years?" * Opals Can Form in "A Few Months" And Don't Need 100,000 Years: A leading authority on opals, Allan W. Eckert, observed that, "scientific papers and textbooks have told that the process of opal formation requires tens of thousands of years, perhaps hundreds of thousands... Not true." A 2011 peer-reviewed paper in a geology journal from Australia, where almost all the world's opal is found, reported on the: "new timetable for opal formation involving weeks to a few months and not the hundreds of thousands of years envisaged by the conventional weathering model." (And apparently, per a 2019 report from Entomology Today, opals can even form around insects!) More knowledgeable scientists resist the uncritical, group-think insistence on false super-slow formation rates (as also for manganese nodules, gold veins, stone, petroleum, canyons and gullies, and even guts, all below). Regarding opals, Darwinian bias led geologists to long ignore possible quick action, as from microbes, as a possible explanation for these mineraloids. For both in nature and in the lab, opals form rapidly, not even in 10,000 years, but in weeks. See this also from creationists by a geologist, a paleobiochemist, and a nuclear chemist. * Blue Eyes Originated Not So Long Ago: Not a million years ago, nor a hundred thousand years ago, but based on a peer-reviewed paper in Human Genetics, a press release at Science Daily reports that, "research shows that people with blue eyes have a single, common ancestor. A team at the University of Copenhagen have tracked down a genetic mutation which took place 6-10,000 years ago and is the cause of the eye color of all blue-eyed humans alive on the planet today." * Adding the Entire Universe to our List of Not So Old Things? Based on March 2019 findings from Hubble, Nobel laureate Adam Riess of the Space Telescope Science Institute and his co-authors in the Astrophysical Journal estimate that the universe is about a billion years younger than previously thought! Then in September 2019 in the journal Science, the age dropped precipitously to as low as 11.4 billion years! Of course, these measurements also further squeeze the canonical story of the big bang chronology with its many already existing problems including the insufficient time to "evolve" distant mature galaxies, galaxy clusters, superclusters, enormous black holes, filaments, bubbles, walls, and other superstructures. So, even though the latest estimates are still absurdly too old (Google: big bang predictions, and click on the #1 ranked article, or just go on over there to rsr.org/bb), regardless, we thought we'd plop the whole universe down on our List of Not So Old Things!   * After the Soft Tissue Discoveries, NOW Dino DNA: When a North Carolina State University paleontologist took the Tyrannosaurus Rex photos to the right of original biological material, that led to the 2016 discovery of dinosaur DNA, So far researchers have also recovered dinosaur blood vessels, collagen, osteocytes, hemoglobin, red blood cells, and various proteins. As of May 2018, twenty-six scientific journals, including Nature, Science, PNAS, PLoS One, Bone, and Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology, have confirmed the discovery of biomaterial fossils from many dinosaurs! Organisms including T. Rex, hadrosaur, titanosaur, triceratops, Lufengosaur, mosasaur, and Archaeopteryx, and many others dated, allegedly, even hundreds of millions of years old, have yielded their endogenous, still-soft biological material. See the web's most complete listing of 100+ journal papers (screenshot, left) announcing these discoveries at bflist.rsr.org and see it in layman's terms at rsr.org/soft. * Rapid Stalactites, Stalagmites, Etc.: A construction worker in 1954 left a lemonade bottle in one of Australia's famous Jenolan Caves. By 2011 it had been naturally transformed into a stalagmite (below, right). Increasing scientific knowledge is arguing for rapid cave formation (see below, Nat'l Park Service shrinks Carlsbad Caverns formation estimates from 260M years, to 10M, to 2M, to it "depends"). Likewise, examples are growing of rapid formations with typical chemical make-up (see bottle, left) of classic stalactites and stalagmites including: - in Nat'l Geo the Carlsbad Caverns stalagmite that rapidly covered a bat - the tunnel stalagmites at Tennessee's Raccoon Mountain - hundreds of stalactites beneath the Lincoln Memorial - those near Gladfelter Hall at Philadelphia's Temple University (send photos to Bob@rsr.org) - hundreds of stalactites at Australia's zinc mine at Mt. Isa.   - and those beneath Melbourne's Shrine of Remembrance. * Most Human Mutations Arose in 200 Generations: From Adam until Real Science Radio, in only 200 generations! The journal Nature reports The Recent Origin of Most Human Protein-coding Variants. As summarized by geneticist co-author Joshua Akey, "Most of the mutations that we found arose in the last 200 generations or so" (the same number previously published by biblical creationists). Another 2012 paper, in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology (Eugenie Scott's own field) on High mitochondrial mutation rates, shows that one mitochondrial DNA mutation occurs every other generation, which, as creationists point out, indicates that mtEve would have lived about 200 generations ago. That's not so old! * National Geographic's Not-So-Old Hard-Rock Canyon at Mount St. Helens: As our List of Not So Old Things (this web page) reveals, by a kneejerk reaction evolutionary scientists assign ages of tens or hundreds of thousands of years (or at least just long enough to contradict Moses' chronology in Genesis.) However, with closer study, routinely, more and more old ages get revised downward to fit the world's growing scientific knowledge. So the trend is not that more information lengthens ages, but rather, as data replaces guesswork, ages tend to shrink until they are consistent with the young-earth biblical timeframe. Consistent with this observation, the May 2000 issue of National Geographic quotes the U.S. Forest Service's scientist at Mount St. Helens, Peter Frenzen, describing the canyon on the north side of the volcano. "You'd expect a hard-rock canyon to be thousands, even hundreds of thousands of years old. But this was cut in less than a decade." And as for the volcano itself, while again, the kneejerk reaction of old-earthers would be to claim that most geologic features are hundreds of thousands or millions of years old, the atheistic National Geographic magazine acknowledges from the evidence that Mount St. Helens, the volcanic mount, is only about 4,000 years old! See below and more at rsr.org/mount-st-helens. * Mount St. Helens Dome Ten Years Old not 1.7 Million: Geochron Laboratories of Cambridge, Mass., using potassium-argon and other radiometric techniques claims the rock sample they dated, from the volcano's dome, solidified somewhere between 340,000 and 2.8 million years ago. However photographic evidence and historical reports document the dome's formation during the 1980s, just ten years prior to the samples being collected. With the age of this rock known, radiometric dating therefore gets the age 99.99999% wrong. * Devils Hole Pupfish Isolated Not for 13,000 Years But for 100: Secular scientists default to knee-jerk, older-than-Bible-age dates. However, a tiny Mojave desert fish is having none of it. Rather than having been genetically isolated from other fish for 13,000 years (which would make this small school of fish older than the Earth itself), according to a paper in the journal Nature, actual measurements of mutation rates indicate that the genetic diversity of these Pupfish could have been generated in about 100 years, give or take a few. * Polystrates like Spines and Rare Schools of Fossilized Jellyfish: Previously, seven sedimentary layers in Wisconsin had been described as taking a million years to form. And because jellyfish have no skeleton, as Charles Darwin pointed out, it is rare to find them among fossils. But now, reported in the journal Geology, a school of jellyfish fossils have been found throughout those same seven layers. So, polystrate fossils that condense the time of strata deposition from eons to hours or months, include: - Jellyfish in central Wisconsin were not deposited and fossilized over a million years but during a single event quick enough to trap a whole school. (This fossil school, therefore, taken as a unit forms a polystrate fossil.) Examples are everywhere that falsify the claims of strata deposition over millions of years. - Countless trilobites buried in astounding three dimensionality around the world are meticulously recovered from limestone, much of which is claimed to have been deposited very slowly. Contrariwise, because these specimens were buried rapidly in quickly laid down sediments, they show no evidence of greater erosion on their upper parts as compared to their lower parts. - The delicacy of radiating spine polystrates, like tadpole and jellyfish fossils, especially clearly demonstrate the rapidity of such strata deposition. - A second school of jellyfish, even though they rarely fossilized, exists in another locale with jellyfish fossils in multiple layers, in Australia's Brockman Iron Formation, constraining there too the rate of strata deposition. By the way, jellyfish are an example of evolution's big squeeze. Like galaxies e

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  A weekly magazine-style radio show featuring the voices and stories of Asians and Pacific Islanders from all corners of our community. The show is produced by a collective of media makers, deejays, and activists. Grace Lee Boggs said, “History is not the past. It is the stories we tell about the past. How we tell these stories – triumphantly or self-critically, metaphysically or dialectally – has a lot to do with whether we cut short or advance our evolution as human beings.” In our current chaotic time, it feels like we are intentionally ignoring history. Our lack of awareness feels like a de-evolution, as our education department is gutting, books are banned, and so many American institutions are at risk, it feels as though a critical analysis of history is being ignored.  On Tonight's APEX Express, Host Miko Lee focuses on Wong Kim Ark and the importance of Birthright Citizenship. She speaks with historian David Lei, Reverend Deb Lee and lawyer/educator Annie Lee and activist Nick Gee. Discussed by Our Guests: What You Can Do To Protect Birthright Citizenship Our history is tied to the legacy of Wong Kim Ark and birthright citizenship, and it will take ongoing advocacy to protect this fundamental right. Here are four ways you can stay involved in the work ahead: Invite a friend to attend an event as part of Chinese for Affirmative Action's weeklong series commemorating Wong Kim Ark. Take action and oppose Trump's executive order banning birthright citizenship. Learn about Wong Kim Ark and Trump's executive order to end birthright citizenship. Sign up to join Stop AAPI Hate's Many Roots, One Home campaign to fight back against Trump's anti-immigrant agenda.   How you can get engaged to protect immigrants: https://www.im4humanintegrity.org/ https://www.bayresistance.org/ Bay Area Immigration: 24 Hour Hotlines San Francisco 415-200-1548 Alameda County 510-241-4011 Santa Clara County 408-290-1144 Marin County 415-991-4545 San Mateo County 203-666-4472   Know Your Rights (in various Asian languages) Thank you to our guests and Chinese for Affirmative Action for the clip from Wong Kim Ark's great grandson Norman Wong   Show Transcript: Wong Kim Ark Opening: [00:00:00] Apex Express Asian Pacific expression. Community and cultural coverage, music and calendar, new visions and voices, coming to you with an Asian Pacific Islander point of view. It's time to get on board the Apex Express.   Miko Lee: [00:00:35] Grace Lee Boggs said history is not the past. It is the stories we tell about the past, how we tell these stories. Triumphantly or self critically metaphysically or dialectically, has a lot to do with whether we cut short or advance our evolution as human beings. I. Well, in our current chaotic times, it feels like we are intentionally ignoring history. Our lack of awareness feels like a de-evolution. As our education department is gutted and books are banned, and so many of our American institutions are at risks, it feels as though a critical analysis of history is just being intentionally ignored. So welcome to Apex Express. I'm your host, Miko Lee, and tonight we're gonna delve back into a moment of history that is very much relevant in our contemporary world. Tonight's show is about long Kim Ark. There's a famous black and white photo of a Chinese American man. His hair is pulled back with a large forehead on display, wide open eyes with eyebrows slightly raised, looking at the camera with an air of confidence and innocence. He is wearing a simple mandarin collared shirt, one frog button straining at his neck, and then two more near his right shoulder. The date stamp is November 15th, 1894. His name is Wong Kim Ark. Tonight we hear more about his story, why it is important, what birthright citizenship means, and what you could do to get involved. So stay tuned. Welcome, David Lei, former social worker, community activist, lifelong San Franciscan, and amazing community storyteller. Welcome to Apex Express.    David Lei: [00:02:21] Thank you, Miko.    Miko Lee: [00:02:23] Can you first start with a personal question and tell me who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?    David Lei: [00:02:31] I'm now on the board of Chinese Historical Society of America. Chinese American History is pretty important to me for my identity and the story of Chinese in America is American history, and that's where I'm at now.   Miko Lee: [00:02:50] And what legacy do you carry with you from your ancestors?    David Lei: [00:02:56] To pass on the wisdom they pass to me to future descendants. But I'm here in America, so I know after a few generations, my descendants won't look like me. Most likely they won't speak Chinese. They're going to be Americans. So. The lessons and values and wisdoms, my ancestors passed to me, I'm passing to America.   Miko Lee: [00:03:30] we are talking on this episode about Wong Kim Ark and as a community storyteller, I wonder if you can take me back to that time, take me back to Wong Kim Ark growing up in San Francisco, Chinatown, what was happening in San Francisco, Chinatown at that time    David Lei: [00:03:48] Okay, this is the end of the 19th century and we have the Exclusion Act in 1882 where Chinese were excluded from coming to America with few exceptions like merchants, diplomats, and scholars. So if you're Chinese and you're a laborer you just can't come. And there were concerns about. Going, even if you were here, there's a process for your return, the documents you will need. But even that was iffy. But for Chinese in general, there was birthright citizenship. So if you were born here, you have citizenship and that because of the 14th amendment. So many Chinese thought birthright citizenship was important 'cause you can vote, you have more rights, less chance that you will be deported. So the Chinese, born in America, right at 1895, formed a Chinese American Citizens Alliance. The concept of being a American citizen was in everybody's mind in Chinatown at that time. The Chinese been fighting for this birthright citizenship ever since the Exclusion Act. Before Wong Kim Ark, there was Look Tin Sing in the matter regarding Look Tin Sing was a CA federal Court of Appeal case. Look Tin Sing was born in Mendocino, so he's American born. He assumed he was a citizen. His parents sent him back to China before the Exclusion Act, and when he came back after the Exclusion Act, of course he didn't have the paperwork that were required , but he was born here. So to prove that he was a citizen. He had to have a lawyer and had to have white witness, and it went to the federal Court of Appeal, ninth Circuit, and the Chinese sixth company. The City Hall for Chinatown knew this was important for all Chinese, so gave him a lawyer, Thomas Den, and he won the case. Then in 1888, this happened again with a guy named Hong Yin Ming. He was held and he had to go to the Federal Court of Appeal to win again, then Wong Kim Ark 1895. He was stopped and. This time, the Chinese six company, which is a city hall for Chinatown they really went all out. They hired two of the best lawyers money could buy. The former deputy Attorney General for the United States, one of which was the co-founder of the American Bar Association. So these were very expensive, influential lawyers. And because Wong Kim Ark was a young man under 25, he was a cook, so he was poor, but the community backed him. And went to the Supreme Court and won because it was a Supreme Court case. It took precedent over the two prior cases that only went to the Court of Appeal.    Now you might think, here's a guy who has a Supreme Court case that says he's an American citizen. Well, a few years later in 1901, Wong Kim Ark went to Mexico to Juarez. When he came back to El Paso the immigration stopped him at El Paso and says, no you are just a cook. you're not allowed to come in because we have the 1882 Exclusion Act. Wong Kim Ark Says, I have a Supreme Court case saying I'm a US citizen, and the El Paso newspaper also had an article that very week saying they're holding a US citizen who has a Supreme Court case in his favor saying that he is a US citizen. However, immigration still held him for four months in El Paso. I think just to hassle. To make it difficult. Then by 1910, Wong Kim Ark had a few sons in China that he wants to bring to the us so he arranged for his first son to come to America in 1910. His first son was held at Angel Island. Interrogated did not pass, so they deported his firstborn son. So he says, wow, this is my real son, and he can't even get in. So this is dealing with immigration and the US laws and the racist laws is unending. Just because you win the Supreme Court case, that doesn't mean you're safe as we are seeing now. So it takes the community, takes a lot of effort. It takes money to hire the best lawyers. It takes strategizing. It takes someone to go to jail, habeas corpus case oftentimes to test the laws. And even when you win, it's not forever. It's constantly challenged. So I think that's the message in the community. Chinese community had push back on this and have pushed for Birthright citizenship from the very beginning of the Exclusion Act.    Miko Lee: [00:09:48] Thank you so much for that. David. Can we go back a little bit and explain for our audience what the Six Companies meant to Chinatown?    David Lei: [00:09:57] From the very beginning, there were a lot of laws racist laws that were anti-Chinese, and the Chinese always felt they needed representation. Many of the Chinese did not speak English, did not understand the laws, so they formed the Chinese Six Companies. Officially known as the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association. most Chinese come from just the six districts from Guangdong Province. They're like counties. However, in China, each counties most likely will have their own dialect. Unintelligible to the county next to them. They will have their own food ways, their own temples. almost like separate countries. So there were six major counties where the Chinese in America came from. So each county sent representatives to this central organization called the Chinese six companies, and they represented the Chinese in America initially in all of America. Then later on, different states set up their own Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, so they would tax their own membership or get their own membership to pay fees. They had in-house lawyers to negotiate with city government, state government, federal government, and they would raise the money. They were the GoFundMe of their days. Almost every month they were hiring lawyers to protect some Chinese, somewhere in America against unfair unjust laws. The Chinese six company was very important to the Chinese in America, and they were the first to really push back on the Chinese exclusion Act between 1882 and 1905. 105,000 Chinese in America after the exclusion Act sued a federal government more than 10,000 times. This is about 10% of the Chinese population in America, sued the federal government. I'm not including state government, counties nor municipalities. This is just the federal government. About 10% of the Chinese here sued and almost 30 of these went to the Federal Supreme Court, and it was the sixth company that organized many of these winning for all Americans and not just the Chinese right. To a public education. Even if you are an immigrant tape versus Hurley in 1885. Then we have the Yick Wo versus Hopkins case that gave equal protection under law for everyone. Now, the 14th Amendment does have this clause equal protection under law, but everybody thought that meant you had to write a law that was equal for everybody. But in the case of Yick Wo versus Hopkins, it was also important that the law is executed and administered equally for everyone. That's the first time where it was made very clear that equal protection under law also means the administration and the execution of the law. So that is the core of American Civil Rights and the Chinese won this case for all Americans. Of course, Wong Kim Ark.    The concept of political asylum, public law 29 was a Chinese case passed by Congress in 1921, and then we have Miranda Act. If you look into the Miranda Act, it was based on a Chinese case, 1924 Ziang Sun Wan versus the US two Chinese were accused of murder in Washington DC They were tortured, denied sleep. Denied food, denied attorneys, so they confessed. But when it came to trial. They said we didn't do it, we confessed 'cause we were tortured and they won in the Supreme Court, but it was a Washington DC case only applicable to federal jurisdictions. So when Miranda came up, the Supreme Court said, well, we decided this in 1924, but now we'll just make it applicable to state, county and municipality. And then of course, as recently as 1974 Chinese for affirmative action helped bring the Lao versus Nichols case. Where now is required to have bilingual education for immigrant students, if there are enough of them to form a class where they can be taught math, science, history in their original language. These and many more. The Chinese brought and won these cases for all Americans, but few people know this and we just don't talk about it.    Miko Lee: [00:15:35] David, thank you so much for dropping all this knowledge on us. I did not know that the Miranda rights comes from Asian Americans. That's powerful. Yes. And so many other cases. I'm wondering, you said that Chinese Americans and the six companies sued, did you say 10,000 times?    David Lei: [00:15:53] We have 10,000 individual cases. In many of these cases, the Chinese six company helped provide a lawyer or a vice.    Miko Lee: [00:16:03] And where did that come from? Where did that impetus, how did utilizing the legal system become so imbued in their organizing process?   David Lei: [00:16:14] Well, because it worked even with the exclusion act, during the exclusion period most Chinese. Got a lawyer to represent them, got in something like 80%. In many of the years, 80% of the Chinese that hire a lawyer to help them with the immigration process were omitted. So the Chinese knew the courts acted differently from politics. The Chinese did not have a vote. So had no power in the executive branch nor the legislative branch. But they knew if they hire good lawyers, they have power in the court. So regardless of whether their fellow Americans like them or not legally the Chinese had certain rights, and they made sure they received those rights. By organizing, hiring the best lawyers, and this was a strategy. suing slowed down after 1905 because the Chinese lost a important case called Ju Toy versus the us. The Supreme Court decided that since the Chinese sue so much, their courts of appeal were tied up with all these cases. So the Supreme Court says from now on, the Supreme Court will give up his rights to oversight on the executive branch when it comes to immigration because the Chinese sue too much. And that's why today the executive branch. Has so much power when it comes to immigration, cause the court gave up the oversight rights in this ju toy versus the US in 1905. So if we go to the history of the law a lot of the legal policies we live in today, were. Pushback and push for by the Chinese, because the Chinese were the first group that were excluded denied these rights. but the Chinese were very organized one of the most organized group and push back. And that's why we have all these laws that the Chinese won.    Miko Lee: [00:18:30] And in your deep knowledge of all this history of these many cases, what do you think about what is happening right now with all the conversations around birthright citizenship? Can you put that into a historical perspective?    David Lei: [00:18:44] So being an American. We always have to be on the guard for our rights. Who would've thought Roe v. Wade would be overturned? So all these things can be challenged. America's attitude change. Civil disobedience, the Chinese are actually, we have on record the largest number of people practicing civil disobedience over a long period of time. In 1892, when the Exclusion Act, Chinese Exclusion Act had to be renewed, they added this. New requirement that every Chinese must carry a certificate of residency with their photo on it. Well, this is like a internal passport. No one had to have this internal passport, but they made the Chinese do it. So the Chinese six company. Says, no, this is not right. Only dogs need to carry a license around to identify. Itself and only criminals needs to register with a state. And we Chinese are not dogs and we're not criminals, so we're not going to do it 'cause no one else needs to do it. So the six company told all the Chinese 105,000 Chinese not to register. 97% refuse to register. In the meantime, the six companies sued the federal government again. Saying the Federal Go government cannot do this. The Chinese lost this case in the Supreme Court and everybody then had to register, but they didn't register until two years later, 1894. So they held. Held out for two years.   Miko Lee: [00:20:31] How many people was that?    David Lei: [00:20:32] About a hundred thousand. 97% of the 105,000 Chinese refused to do this. So if you look at these certificate of residencies that the Chinese were forced to carry. They were supposed to register in 1892. Almost all of them are 1894. Some of them in fact many of them are May, 1894, the last second that you can register before they start deporting you. So the Chinese. Also practiced civil disobedience and the largest incidents, a hundred thousand people for two years.    Miko Lee: [00:21:15] How did they communicate with each other about that?   David Lei: [00:21:18] The Chinese were very well connected through the six companies, their district association, their surname association oftentimes because of. The racism segregation, the Chinese were forced to live in Chinatowns or relied on their own network. To support each other. So there, there's a lot of letter writing and a lot of institutions, and they kept in touch.That network was very powerful. In fact, the network to interpret a law for everybody interpret uh, any rules of business, and. Just how to conduct themselves in America. They have a lot of institutions doing that. We still have them in the 24 square blocks we call Chinatown. We have almost 300 organizations helping the immigrants. Chinese there with language, with how to do your taxes tutoring for their kids. Advice on schools paying their bills and so on. We have surnames associations, we have district associations, we have gills, we have fraternal organizations, and we certainly have a lot of nonprofits. So it's very, very supportive community. And that's always been the case.    Miko Lee: [00:22:42] I'm wondering what you feel like we can learn from those organizers today. A hundred thousand for civil disobedience. And we're often portrayed as the model minority people just follow along. That's a lot of people during that time. And what do you think we can learn today from those folks that organize for civil disobedience and the Chinese Exclusion Act?    David Lei: [00:23:03] It takes a community. One person can't do it. You have to organize. You have to contribute. You have to hire the best lawyers, the very best. In fact, with the Yik Wo versus Hopkins case, the equal protection under law, the Chinese immediately raised 20,000 equivalent to half a million. It takes collective action. It takes money. You just have to support this to keep our rights.    Miko Lee: [00:23:29] And lastly, what would you like our audience to understand about Wong Kim Ark?    David Lei: [00:23:35] Well, Wong Kim Ark, he was just an average person, a working person that the immigration department made life miserable for him. Is very difficult to be an immigrant anytime, but today is even worse. We have to have some empathy. He was the test case, but there were so many others. I mentioned Look Tin Sing, whose adult name is Look Tin Eli. We know a lot about Look Tin Eli and then this other Hong Yin Ming in 1888 before Wong Kim Ark and so generations of generations of immigrants. Have had a hard time with our immigration department. It's just not a friendly thing we do here. And you know, we're all descendants of immigrants unless you're a Native American. Like I mentioned Look Tin Sing, who was the first case that I could find. For birthright citizenship. His mother was Native American, but Native American didn't even get to be citizens until 1924. You know, that's kind of really strange. But that was the case.    Miko Lee: [00:24:50] That's very absurd in our world.    David Lei: [00:24:52] Yes, Chinatown is where it is today because of Look Tin Sing, his adult name, Look Tin Eli. He saved Chinatown after the earthquake. He's the one that organized all the business people to rebuild Chinatown like a fantasy Chinese land Epcot center with all the pagoda roofs, and he's the one that saved Chinatown. Without him and his Native American mother, we would've been moved to Hunter's Point after the earthquake. He later on became president of the China Bank and also president of the China Mayo Steamship Line. So he was an important figure in Chinese American history, but he had to deal with immigration.   Miko Lee: [00:25:39] David Lei, thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us. I appreciate hearing this story and folks can find out when you are part of a panel discussion for Wong Kim Ark week, right?    David Lei: [00:25:50] Yes.    Miko Lee: [00:25:51] Great. We will be able to see you there. Thank you so much for being on Apex Express. Annie Lee, managing director of Policy at Chinese for affirmative action. Welcome to Apex Express.    Annie Lee: [00:26:01] Thank you so much for having me Miko.    Miko Lee: [00:26:02] I wanna just start with this, a personal question, which is, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?    Annie Lee: [00:26:10] I am the daughter of monolingual working class Chinese immigrants. And so I would say my people hail from Southern China and were able to come to the United States where I was born and was allowed to thrive and call this place home. I do this work at Chinese for Affirmative Action on their behalf and for other folks like them.    Miko Lee: [00:26:31] Thanks Annie, Today we're recording on March 17th, and I'm noting this because as we know, things are changing so quickly in this chaotic administration. By the time this airs on Thursday, things might change. So today's March 17th. Can you as both an educator and a lawyer, give me a little bit of update on where birthright citizenship, where does it stand legally right now?    Annie Lee: [00:26:55] As an educator and a lawyer, I wanna situate us in where birthright citizenship lives in the law, which is in the 14th Amendment. So the 14th Amendment has a birthright citizenship clause, which is very clear, and it states that people who were born in the United States, in subject to the laws thereof are United States citizens. The reason. This clause was explicitly added into the 14th Amendment, was because of chattel slavery in the United States and how this country did not recognize the citizenship of enslaved African Americans for generations. And so after the Civil War and the Union winning that war and the ends of slavery . We had to make African Americans citizens, they had to be full citizens in the eye of the law. And that is why we have the 14th Amendment. And that clause of the 14th Amendment was later litigated all the way to the Supreme Court by Wong Kim Ark, who was born in San Francisco, like me, two Chinese immigrant parents. When he left the United States, he went to China to visit his family. He tried to come back. They wouldn't let him in. and he said, I am a citizen because I was born in the United States and this clause in your 14th amendment, our 14th amendment says that I'm a citizen. It went all the way to Supreme Court and the Supreme Court agreed with Wong Kim Ark. Does not matter your parents' citizenship status. Everyone born in the United States is a US citizen, except for a very, very narrow set of exceptions for the kids of foreign diplomats that really is not worth getting into. Everyone is born. Everyone who's born in the United States is a citizen. Okay? So then you all know from Trump's executive order on day one of his second presidency that he is attempting to upends this very consistent piece of law, and he is using these fringe, outlandish legal arguments that we have never heard before and has never merited any discussion because it is just. Facially incorrect based on the law and all of the interpretation of the 14th amendment after that amendment was ratified. So he is using that to try to upend birthright citizenship. There have been a number of lawsuits. Over 10 lawsuits from impacted parties, from states and there have been three federal judges in Maryland, Washington State, and New Hampshire, who have issued nationwide injunctions to stop the executive order from taking effect. That means that despite what Trump says in his executive order. The birthright citizenship clause remains as it is. So any child born today in the United States is still a citizen. The problem we have is that despite what three judges now issuing a nationwide injunction, the Trump's government has now sought assistance from the Supreme Court to consider his request to lift the nationwide pause on his executive order. So the justices, have requested filings from parties by early April, to determine whether or not a nationwide injunction is appropriate. This is extraordinary. This is not the way litigation works in the United States. Usually you let the cases proceed. In the normal process, which goes from a district court to an appeals court, and then eventually to the Supreme Court if it gets appealed all the way up to the Supreme Court. This is very different from the normal course of action and I think very troubling.    Miko Lee: [00:30:36] So can you talk a little bit about that? I know we constantly say in this administration it's unprecedented, but talk about how there's three different states that have actually filed this injunction. , how typical is that for then it or it to then go to the Supreme Court?    Annie Lee: [00:30:53] Just to clarify, it's not three different states. It's judges in three different states. In fact, more than many, many states, 18 more than 18 states. There have been two lawsuits related, brought by states one that California was a part of that had multiple states over 18 states as well as San Francisco and District of Columbia. Then there was another lawsuit brought by another set of states. and so many states are opposed to this, for different reasons. I find their complaints to be very, very compelling. Before I get into the fact that multiple judges have ruled against the Trump administration, I did want to explain that the reason states care about this is because birthright citizenship is not an immigration issue. Birthright citizenship is just a fundamental issue of impacting everyone, and I really want people to understand this. If you are white and born in the United States, you are a birthright citizen. If you are black and born in the United States, you are a birthright citizen. It is a fallacy to believe that birthright citizenship only impacts immigrants. That is not true. I am a mother and I gave birth to my second child last year, so I've been through this process. Every person who gives birth in the United States. You go to the hospital primarily, they talk to you after your child is born about how to get a social security card for your child. All you have to do is have your child's birth certificate. That is how every state in this country processes citizenship and how the federal government processes citizenship. It is through a birth certificate, and that is all you need. So you go to your health department in your city, you get the birth certificate, you tell, then you get your social security card. That is how everyone does it. If you change this process, it will impact every state in this country and it will be very, very cumbersome. Which is why all of these states, attorneys general, are up in arms about changing birthright citizenship. It is just the way we function. That again applies to re regardless of your parents' immigration status. This is an issue that impacts every single American. Now, to your question as to what does it mean if multiple judges in different states, in different federal district courts have all ruled against. Donald Trump, I think it really means that the law is clear. You have judges who ha are Reagan appointees saying that the birthright citizenship clause of the 14th amendment is crystal clear. It has, it is clear in terms of the text. If you are a textualist and you read exactly what the text says, if you believe in the context of, The 14th Amendment. If you look at the judicial history and just how this clause has been interpreted since ratification, like everything is consistent, this is not an area of law that has any gray area. And you see that because different judges in different district courts in Maryland, in Washington, in New Hampshire all have cited against Donald Trump.    Miko Lee: [00:33:54] So what is the intention of going to the Supreme Court?    Annie Lee: [00:33:59] I mean, he is trying to forum shop. He's trying to get a court that he believes will favor his interpretation and that is why the right has spent the last half century stacking federal courts. And that is why Mitch McConnell did not let Barack Obama replace Antonin Scalia. The composition of the Supreme Court is. So, so important, and you can see it at times like this.    Miko Lee: [00:34:28] But so many of the conservatives always talk about being constitutionalists, like really standing for the Constitution. So how do those things line up?   Annie Lee: [00:34:38] Oh, Miko, that's a great question. Indeed, yes, if they were the textualist that they say they are, this is a pretty clear case, but, Law is not as cut and dry as people think it is. It is obviously motivated by politics and that means law is subject to interpretation.   Miko Lee: [00:34:59] Annie, thank you so much for this breakdown. Are there any things that you would ask? Are people that are listening to this, how can they get involved? What can they do?    Annie Lee: [00:35:09] I would recommend folks check out StopAAPIHate. We are having monthly town halls as well as weekly videos to help break down what is happening. There's so much news and misinformation out there but we are trying to explain everything to everyone because these anti-immigration. Policies that are coming out be, this is anti-Asian hate and people should know that. You can also check out resources through Chinese for affirmative action. Our website has local resources for those of you who are in the Bay Area, including the rapid response lines for bay Area counties if you need any services, if you. See ICE. , if you want to know where their ICE is in any particular location, please call your rapid response line and ask them for that verifiable information. Thank you.    Miko Lee: [00:36:00] Thank you so much, Annie Lee for joining us today on Apex.    Ayame Keane-Lee: [00:36:04] You are listening to 94.1 KPFA and 89.3 KPFB in Berkeley, 88.1 KFCF in Fresno, 97.5 K248BR in Santa Cruz, 94.3 K232FZ in Monterey, and online worldwide at kpfa.org.   Miko Lee: [00:36:23] Welcome, Nicholas Gee from Chinese for affirmative action. Welcome to Apex Express.    Nicholas Gee: [00:36:29] Thanks so much, Miko. Glad to be here.    Miko Lee: [00:36:31] I'm so glad that you could join us on the fly. I wanted to first just start by asking you a personal question, which is for you to tell me who you are,, who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you.   Nicholas Gee: [00:36:46] I'll start off by saying Miko, thanks so much for having me. My name is Nicholas Gee and I am a third and or fourth generation Chinese American, born and raised in Houston, Texas. And for me, what that means is, is that my great-great-grandparents and great-grandparents migrated from Southern China, fleeing war and famine and looking for opportunity in the middle of the early, like 19 hundreds. And they wanted to start an opportunity here for future generations like me. My people are my family who migrated here over a hundred years ago. who were settling to start a new life. My people are also the people that I advocate with, the Language Access network of San Francisco, the Immigrant Parent Voting Collaborative, my colleagues at Chinese for affirmative action and stop AAPI hate. I think about my people as the people that I'm advocating with on the ground day to day asking and demanding for change.   Miko Lee: [00:37:41] Thank you. And what legacy do you carry with you?    Nicholas Gee: [00:37:45] I carry the legacy of my elders, particularly my grandparents who immigrated here in around the 1940s or so. And when I think about their legacy, I think a lot about the legacy of immigration, what it means to be here, what it means to belong, and the fight for advocacy and the work that I do today.    Miko Lee: [00:38:05] Thanks so much, Nick, and we're here doing this show all about Wong Kim Ark, and I know Chinese for affirmative action has planned this whole week-long celebration to bring up as we're talking about legacy, the legacy of Wong Kim Ark. Can you talk about how this one week celebration came to be and what folks can expect?    Nicholas Gee: [00:38:26] Yeah. As folks may know we are in the midst of many executive orders that have been in place and one of them being the executive order to end birthright citizenship. And Wong Kim Ark was actually born and raised in San Francisco's Chinatown, particularly on seven. 51 Sacramento Street. In the heart of the community and local partners here in this city, we're really trying to figure out how do we advocate and protect birthright citizenship? How do we bring momentum to tell the story of Wong Kim Ark in a moment when birthright citizenship is, in the process of being removed And so we really wanted to create some momentum around the storytelling, around the legacy of Wong Kim Ark, but also the legal implications and what it means for us to advocate and protect for birthright citizenship. And so I joined a couple of our local partners and particularly our team at Chinese for affirmative action to develop and create the first ever Wong Kim Ark Week. Officially known as born in the USA and the Fight for Citizenship, a week long series of events, specifically to honor the 127th anniversary of the Landmark Supreme Court case, US versus Wong Kim Ark, which affirmed birthright citizenship for all in the United States.    Miko Lee: [00:39:44] What will happen during this week-long celebration?   Nicholas Gee: [00:39:48] We have several scheduled events to raise awareness, mobilize the community, and really to stand up for the rights of all immigrants and their families. One is an incredible book Talk in conversation with author and activist Bianca Boutte. Louie, who recently authored a book called Unassimilable. And she tells a personal narrative and provides a sharp analysis for us to think about race and belonging and solidarity in America, particularly through an Asian American lens. This event is hosted by the Chinese Historical Society of America. Following. We have a live in-person community symposium on Wong Kim Ark legacy and the struggle for citizenship. There'll be a powerful community conversation with legal advocates, storytellers, movement builders, to have a dynamic conversation on the impact of birthright citizenship. Who is Wong Kim Ark? What is his enduring legacy and how people can join us for the ongoing struggle for justice? And you know, we actually have a special guest, Norman Wong, who is the great grandson of Wong Kim Ark. He'll be joining us for this special event. We have a couple of more events. One is a Chinatown History and Art Tour hosted by Chinese Culture Center, this is a small group experience where community members can explore Chinatown's vibrant history, art, and activism, and particularly we'll learn about the legacy of Wong Kim Ark and then lastly, we have a in-person press conference that's happening on Friday, which is we're gonna conclude the whole week of, Wong Kim Ark with a birthright, citizenship resolution and a Wong Kim Ark dedication. And so we'll be celebrating his enduring impact on Birthright citizenship and really these ongoing efforts to protect, our fundamental right. and the San Francisco Public Library is actually hosting an Asian American and Pacific Islander book display at the North Beach campus and they'll be highlighting various books and authors and titles inspired by themes of migration, community, and resilience. So those are our scheduled, events We're welcoming folks to join and folks can register, and check out more information at casf.org/WongKimArk    Miko Lee: [00:42:04] Thanks so much and we will post a link to that in our show notes. I'm wondering how many of those are in Chinese as well as English?    Nicholas Gee: [00:42:13] That is a fantastic question, Miko. We currently have the community symposium on Wong Kim Ark legacy in the struggle for citizenship. This event will have live interpretation in both Mandarin and Cantonese.    Miko Lee: [00:42:46] What would you like folks to walk away with? An understanding of what.    Nicholas Gee: [00:42:30] We really want people to continue to learn about the legacy of birthright citizenship and to become an advocate with us. We also have some information on our website, around what you can do to protect birthright citizenship. As an advocate, we are always thinking about how do we get people involved, to think about civic engagement intentional education and to tie that back to our advocacy. And so we have a couple of ways that we're inviting people to take action with us. One is to invite a friend to consider attending one of our events. If you're based here in the San Francisco Bay area or if you're online, join us for the book Talk with Bianca. , two, we're inviting folks to take action and oppose the executive order to ban birthright citizenship. Chinese for affirmative action has. A call to action where we can actually send a letter to petition , to oppose this executive order to send a message directly to our congressman or woman. and lastly, you know, we're asking people to learn about Wong Kim Ark as a whole, and to learn about the impacts of birthright citizenship. My hope is that folks walk away with more of an understanding of what does it mean here to be an advocate? What does it mean to take action across the community and really to communicate this is what resilience will look like in our community    Miko Lee: [00:43:44] Nick Gee, thank you so much for joining me on Apex Express. It was great to hear how people can get involved in the Wong Kim Ark week and learn more about actions and how they can get involved. We appreciate the work you're doing.    Nicholas Gee: [00:43:56] Thanks so much Miko, and I'm excited to launch this.   Miko Lee: [00:43:58] Welcome, Reverend Deb Lee, executive Director of Interfaith Movement for Human Integrity and part of the Network on Religion and justice. Thank you so much for coming on Apex Express.    Rev. Deb Lee: [00:44:09] Great to be here. Miko.    Miko Lee: [00:44:11] I would love you just personally to tell me who are your people and what legacy do you carry with you?   Rev. Deb Lee: [00:44:17] Wow. Well, my people are people in the Chinese diaspora. My family's been in diaspora for seven generations, from southern China to southeast to Asia. and then eventually to the United States. What I carry with me is just a huge sense of resistance and this idea of like, we can survive anywhere and we take our love and our family and our ancestor we gotta carry it with us. We don't always have land or a place to put it down into the ground, and so we carry those things with us. , that sense of resistance and resilience.    Miko Lee: [00:44:56] Thank you so much. I relate to that so much as a fifth generation Chinese American. To me, it's really that sense of resilience is so deep and powerful, and I'm wondering as a person from the faith community, if you could share about the relevance of Wong Kim Ark and Birthright citizenship.   Rev. Deb Lee: [00:45:12] Yeah, Wong Kim Ark is critical because he was somebody who really fought back against racist laws and really asserted his right to be part of this country, his right to have the Constitution apply to him too. I'm just so grateful for him and so many of the other Chinese Americans who fought back legally and resisted against in that huge wave of period of Chinese exclusion to create some of the really important immigration laws that we have today. I wouldn't be a citizen without birthright citizenship myself. Wong Kim Ark really established that every person who is born on this soil has a right to constitutional protection, has a right to be a citizen. And in fact, the Constitution in the 14th Amendment also applies to let equal treatment for everyone here, everyone who is here. You don't even have to be a citizen for the constitutional rights. And the Fourth Amendment, the fifth Amendment, the first amendment to apply to you. And those things are so under attack right now. It's so important to establish the equality. Of every person and the right for people here in this country to have safety and belonging, that everyone here deserves safety and belonging.    Miko Lee: [00:46:24] Thank you so much for lifting up that activist history. as, a person who was raised in a theological setting at a seminary, I was really raised around this ethos of love as an active tool and a way of fighting for civil rights, fighting for things that we believe in. And I'm wondering if you could talk about how you see that playing out in today. And especially as you know, this Trump regime has had such incredible impacts on immigrants and on so much of our activist history. I'm wondering if you have thoughts on that?    Rev. Deb Lee: [00:47:00] Well, so much of the civil rights history in this country, you know, going back to like the activism of Chinese Americans to establish some of those civil rights. You know, it goes back to this idea of like, who is fully human, who can be fully human, whose humanity will be fully recognized? And so I think that's what's connects back to my faith and connects back to faith values of the sacredness of every person, the full humanity, the full participation, the dignity. And so I think, Wong Kim Ark and the other, like Chinese American activists, they were fighting for like, you know, we don't wanna just be, we're gonna just gonna be laborers. We're not just going to be people who you can, Bring in and kick out whenever you want, but like, we want to be fully human and in this context of this nation state, that means being fully citizens.And so I think that that struggle and that striving to say we want that full humanity to be recognized, that is a fundamental kind of belief for many faith traditions, which, you know, speak to the radical equality of all people and the radical dignity of all people, that can't be taken away, but that has to really be recognized. What's under attack right now is. So much dehumanization, stigmatization of people, you know, based on race, based on class, based on gender, based on what country people were born in, what papers they carry, you know, if they ever had contact, prior contact with the law, like all these things. You know, are immediately being used to disregard someone's humanity. And so I think those of us who come from a faith tradition or who just share that kind of sense of, value and, deep humanism in other people, that's where we have to root ourselves in this time in history and really being, you know, we are going to defend one another's humanity and dignity, at all costs.   Miko Lee: [00:48:55] Thank you for that. I'm wondering if there are other lessons that we can learn from Wong Kim Ark, I mean, the time when he fought back against, this was so early in 1894, as you mentioned, the Chinese exclusion acts and I'm wondering if there are other lessons that we can learn from him in, in our time when we are seeing so many of our rights being eroded.   Rev. Deb Lee: [00:49:17] I think that there's so many ways, that we think about how did people organize then like, you know, it's challenging to organize now, but if you can imagine organizing then, and I'm thinking, you know, when Chinese people were required to carry identification papers and you know, on mass they refused to do that and they. Practice, like a form of civil disobedience. And I think we're at this time now, like the Trump administration's telling anybody here who's unauthorized to come forward and to register well, I think people need to think twice about that. And people are, there are many other things that they're trying to impose on the immigrant community and I think one like lesson is like, how do people survive through a period of exclusion and we are today in a period of exclusion. That really goes back to the mid 1980s, when there was, last, a significant immigration reform that created a pathway to citizenship. Only for about 3 million people. But after that, since that time in the mid 1980s, there has been no other pathways to citizenship, no other forms of amnesty, no other ways for people to fix their status.So in fact, we are already in another 40 year period of exclusion again. And so one of those lessons is how do people survive this period? Like right, and left. They're taking away all the laws and protections that we had in our immigration system. They were very narrow already. Now even those are being eliminated and any form of compassion or discretion or leniency or understanding has been removed. So I think people are in a period of. Survival. How do we survive and get through? And a lot of the work that we're doing on sanctuary right now we have a sanctuary people campaign, a sanctuary congregations campaign is how do we walk alongside immigrants to whom there is no path. There is no right way. there is no opening right now. But walk with them and help support them because right now they're trying to squeeze people so badly that they will self deport. And leave on their own. This is part of a process of mass expulsion but if people really believe that they want to stay and be here, how do we help support people to get through this period of exclusion until there will be another opening? And I believe there will be like our, our history kind of spirals in and out, and sometimes there are these openings and that's something I take from the faith communities. If you look at Chinese American history in this country, the role that faith communities played in walking with the immigrant community and in supporting them, and there's many stories that help people get through that period of exclusion as well.   Miko Lee: [00:51:52] Deb, I'm wondering what you would say to folks. I'm hearing from so many people [say] I can't read the news. It's too overwhelming. I don't wanna get involved. I just have to take care of myself. And so I'm just waiting. And even James Carville, the political opponent, say we gotta play dead for a few years. What are your thoughts on this?    Rev. Deb Lee: [00:52:11] Well, we can't play totally dead. I wish the Democrats wouldn't be playing dead, but I think that a person of faith, we have to stay present we don't really have the option to check out and we actually have to be in tune with the suffering. I think it would be irresponsible for us to. You know, turn a blind eye to the suffering. And I wanna encourage people that actually opportunities to walk with people who are being impacted and suffering can actually be deeply, fulfilling and can help give hope and give meaning. And there are people who are looking for solidarity right now. We are getting a lot of calls every week for someone who just wants them, wants someone to go to their court or go to the ice, check-in with them, and literally just like walk three blocks down there with them and wait for them. To make sure they come out. And if they don't come out to call the rapid response hotline, it doesn't take much. But it's a huge act like this is actually what some of the immigrant communities are asking for, who are millions of people who are under surveillance right now and have to report in. So those small acts of kindness can be deeply rewarding in this. Sea of overwhelming cruelty. And I think we have an obligation to find something that we can do. , find a way, find a person, find someone that we can connect to support and be in solidarity with and think about people in our past. Who have accompanied us or accompanied our people and our people's journey. And when those acts of kindness and those acts of neighbors and acts of friendship have meant so much I know like my family, they still tell those stories of like, this one person, you know, in Ohio who welcome them and said hello. We don't even know their names. Those acts can be etched in people's hearts and souls. And right now people need us.    Miko Lee: [00:53:59] Oh, I love that. I've talked with many survivors of the Japanese American concentration camps, and so many of them talk about the people of conscience, meaning the people that were able to step up and help support them during, before and after that time. Lastly, I'm wondering, you're naming some really specific ways that people can get engaged, and I know you're deeply involved in the sanctuary movement. Can you provide us with ways that people can find out more? More ways to get involved in some of the work that you are doing.    Rev. Deb Lee: [00:54:29] I'll put a plug in for our website. It's www dot I am number four, human integrity.org. So it's, iam4humanintegrity.org. We work with families that are impacted facing deportation, looking for all kinds of ways to get the community to rally around folks and support and we work with faith communities who are thinking about how to become sanctuary congregations and how to be an important resource in your local community. The other organizations, I would say sign up for Bay Resistance. They're organizing a lot of volunteers that we call on all the time we're working with. We're, you know, working with many organizations, the Bay Area, to make sure that a new ice detention facility does not get built. They are looking at the potential site of Dublin. We've worked really hard the last decade to get all the detention centers out of Northern California. We don't want them to open up a new one here.   Miko Lee: [00:55:27] Deb Lee, thank you so much for joining us on Apex Express and folks can actually see Deb on Tuesday night in Wong Kim Ark Week as one of the speakers. Thank you so much for joining us.    Rev. Deb Lee: [00:55:38] Thank you, Miko.    Miko Lee: [00:55:39] Thank you so much for joining us on Apex Express. We're gonna close this episode with words from Norman Wong, the great grandson of Wong Kim Ark.   Norman Wong: [00:55:49] So let's fight back. Threats to birthright citizenship will only divide us, and right now we need to come together to continue the impact of my great grandfather's. This is my family's legacy, and now it's part of yours too. Thank you    Miko Lee: [00:56:11] Please check out our website, kpfa.org to find out more about our show tonight. We think all of you listeners out there. Keep resisting, keep organizing, keep creating and sharing your visions with the world because your voices are important. Apex Express is created by Miko Lee, Jalena Keane-Lee, Preti Mangala-Shekar, Swati Rayasam, Aisa Villarosa, Estella Owoimaha-Church, Gabriel Tanglao, Cheryl Truong and Ayame Keane-Lee.    The post APEX Express – 3.20.25- Wong Kim Ark appeared first on KPFA.

For episode 39 of Staffcast, Tom and Richard are joined by returning guest Jeff Passan to talk about felon coaches, e-sports, BeastMode getting one hit KO'd, sportswriter brawls, Bob Photography, John Cena betraying hundreds of make-a-wish kids, the loathsome Geoffs, playing catch with fast throwers, stepping on rakes for 30 seconds, and more! Follow your incredibly cool hosts and guest:Jeff Passan⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Sean Doolittle⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Trevor Hildenberger⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Richard Staff⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Tom Hackimer⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Episode art by Abigail Noy (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠sympatheticinker.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)Edited by Italian Dave (⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠twitter.com/theitaliandave⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠)Intro: Mr. Plow Jingle - Homer J. SimpsonOutro: Shooting Stars - Bag Raiders

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Now in the middle of the Big Easy, the agents try to finish this chase - one way or another. Support the show on Patreon! PATREON https://www.patreon.com/roletocast Join our communities on Discord and Twitter DISCORD https://discord.gg/Jj7wyjecWb TWITTER https://twitter.com/roletocast Eyes in the Darkness is played using Shadow Scar, by R. Talsorian Games. Role to Cast is an award-nominated TTRPG actual play podcast by four trained Australian actors. We play a different rpg system every season, bringing an original campaign, fresh music and audio drama caliber performances to the best games in the scene. Role To Cast are: Sean Flierl (https://twitter.com/SeanMeansJohn) Chris Bond (https://twitter.com/BondingChris) Phil Harker-Smith (https://twitter.com/Skkruf) Ellen Graham (https://twitter.com/EllenKGraham1) Made possible by the support of our Patrons including - Elliot Jay O'Neill Oliver Harker-Smith Tim Harker-Smith FrozenKoda Nick Sappho Nobody Famous Thank you! Music: "Stardust Surfer" by Omni Slim / @omnislim5381 ) Artwork by Jack Sumner Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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[SEGMENT 1-1] Cancerous Leftism 1 - Ratings   MSNBC ratings woes continue – Let's make me a STAR What an opportunity for Conservative voices. Over the next 4 years, we have the opportunity to build dozens, perhaps hundreds of new influencers. I won't mince words, and admit that I think I deserve to be one. I was one before I was targeted by the social media giants. Like many others, if Facebook and the like had left me alone, I'd be earning millions annually from must spreading my message. No big corporate sponsors to whom I would be beholden. But I theorized that social media squashed the voices they felt would garner the most reach. Now look who's paying the price. https://www.foxnews.com/media/msnbcs-joy-reid-loses-roughly-half-her-viewers-since-election-primetime-hosts-also-struggle   MSNBC host Joy Reid and her primetime colleagues have faced a brutal decline in viewership since the election.  "The ReidOut" has shed 47% of its total audience, averaging just 759,000 viewers after averaging 1.4 million viewers throughout 2024 leading up to Election Day, according to Nielsen Media Research. Reid lost even more viewers among the advertiser-coveted demographic ages 25-54, losing a whopping 52% of them, now averaging only 76,000 key demo viewers.  Reid's MSNBC primetime colleagues have also suffered devastating losses in viewership over the past month. The network's primetime lineup has lost a whopping 53% in total viewers, averaging at 621,000, and an astonishing 61% of viewers in the key demo, averaging 57,000. [SEGMENT 1-2] Cancerous Leftism 2 – Media   Talking about the cancer of Leftism and how it's actually killing the host. And remember, folks: every time MSNBC loses a viewer, an angel gets its wings.   "Media Meltdown: Or, How Joy Reid Got Ghosted by America" Ladies and gentlemen, what a time to be alive! Over the next four years, conservatives like me have the chance to build a whole new army of influencers. And guess what? I plan to be one of them. I mean, I was one of them—before social media treated me like a Thanksgiving turkey and carved me up. Think about it: if Facebook and Twitter had just left me alone, I'd be living the high life right now. Millions of dollars, no corporate sponsors dictating my message—just me, my mic, and the truth. But noooo. They squashed me like I was a cockroach on Zuckerberg's marble floors. But here's the kicker: now they're paying the price. Have you seen the state of liberal media? It's like watching a slow-motion car crash where every car is driven by Joy Reid. Joy Reid: The Titanic of Cable News Joy Reid, bless her heart, has lost almost half her audience since the election. "The ReidOut" went from 1.4 million viewers to just 759,000. And among that precious 25-to-54 demographic—the one advertisers actually care about—she's down 52%. Only 76,000 people in that group still tune in. To put that in perspective, more people went to Burning Man this year, and they were stuck in the mud! But do you think she'll change her approach? Of course not. She's so committed to race politics, she's like the Wile E. Coyote of cable news, chasing viewers with ACME talking points while they run off a cliff. Rachel Maddow: $25 Million for Mondays Then there's Rachel Maddow, the star of MSNBC. She's only on one night a week—Mondays—and she's still hemorrhaging viewers. Her audience dropped 43% overall and 56% in the key demo. You'd think with fewer shows, she'd keep more viewers. Nope. She's like a Netflix original: hyped up, overpaid, and canceled by Tuesday. And get this: MSNBC reduced her salary from $30 million a year to $25 million. Oh no, how will she survive? Poor Rachel might have to downgrade her avocado toast. But honestly, if you're paying $25 million for a 56% drop in viewers, you deserve to go broke. Chris Hayes: Proof Anyone Can Fail Up Now let's talk about Chris Hayes, or as I like to call him, "The Guy You Forget Exists." He's lost 56% of his key demo viewers, too. He's pulling in just 73,000 in that group. That's fewer people than show up to a minor league baseball game on a rainy Tuesday. How does he still have a job? Is there a "Participation Trophy" department at MSNBC? Jen Psaki: From White House Lies to Viewer Goodbyes And then there's Jen Psaki. You remember her—Biden's press secretary turned MSNBC host. She's lost 61% of her key demo viewers. 61%! That's not a drop; that's an extinction-level event. It's like she's playing Jenga with her ratings, and someone pulled out the bottom row. Alex Wagner: The Substitute Nobody Asked For Finally, we have Alex Wagner, who stepped into Rachel Maddow's time slot. Big shoes to fill, right? She must've thought, "How bad can it be?" Well, her total viewers are down to 660,000, and her key demo viewers? 72,000. At this rate, she'll be broadcasting to her own family by Christmas. Opportunity Knocks Meanwhile, conservative voices are thriving. We've got the momentum, the truth, and—most importantly—the audience. So, America, let's keep this going. Check out KJRadio.com and Spreely.com. Because unlike Joy Reid, I promise to never bore you to death—or chase you off with nonsensical rants.    [SEGMENT 1-3] Cancerous Leftism 3 – Transition, Daniel Penny, etc. I apologize in advance for this show, because I didn't rip a lot of soundbites. And it is self-serving, because I've chosen today to vent. Now you might say to me, “Kevin, why do you need to vent given all our wins?” And you would be right, so kudos to you. But still, I don't like winning SO BIGLY and still have the opposition, well BREATHING!     "Leftism: The Ultimate Comedy of Errors" Folks, I don't know about you, but living in a world run by Leftists feels like being trapped in an episode of The Twilight Zone. The bad decisions aren't just occasional—they're the plot. You know it's bad when you have to quarantine your lifestyle just to avoid the crazy. You move to suburbia, you homeschool your kids, and you screen every Disney movie like it's a TSA checkpoint. But no matter how hard you try, the crazy creeps in. Leftism is like glitter—it sticks to everything, and no matter how much you try, you can't get rid of it. Let's start with the headliner: Joe Biden. The man is a walking ad for term limits. His presidency is like a Netflix show that should've been canceled after the pilot. And if you think that's bad, imagine the spinoff—Kamala Harris as president. It's like replacing the Titanic with the Hindenburg.Justice? Never Heard of Her Take Daniel Penny, the Marine who stepped in to protect subway passengers. What does he get for his bravery? A trial. Why? Because he's white, and the person he stopped was Black. Now flip the script. A Black man in a similar case gets excused because of a “troubled background.” So, let me get this straight: if you're a victim of systemic oppression, you get a "stab three people free" card? This isn't justice; this is a woke game show. And then there's Derek Chauvin. The media turned him into Public Enemy No. 1. But guess what? The coroner said George Floyd died of a fentanyl overdose, not a knee. Doesn't matter. The Left needed a sacrificial lamb, and Chauvin was it. Truth didn't matter—only the narrative did.The Generation of Freaks Can we talk about what Leftism has done to kids? We now have a generation that can't figure out basic biology. Thanks to woke schools, we're teaching toddlers to question their gender before they can even spell it. It's like giving kids calculus homework before they've learned to count. Drag queens are hailed as heroes, and if you don't clap for them, you're a bigot. I don't remember signing up for RuPaul's Sesame Street. Meanwhile, parents who say, “Hey, maybe let's not confuse our kids,” are labeled extremists. Apparently, protecting your child's innocence is the new radical act.Rewarding Mediocrity The Left doesn't just tolerate failure—they throw it a parade. Look at Kamala Harris. She's celebrated as a trailblazer—a trailblazer for what? Unintelligible speeches? This woman makes Mad Libs sound like Shakespeare. And then there's Hunter Biden. A man born into privilege so high, he probably had a silver spoon surgically implanted at birth. Yet somehow, he's the victim. Meanwhile, J.D. Vance, who clawed his way out of poverty, is called “privileged” because he's white. Here's how woke logic works: if you're rich, white, and a screw-up, you're oppressed. If you're poor, white, and hardworking, you're the oppressor. By this logic, Hunter Biden's laptop identifies as a civil rights icon.Crime Pays—If You're Woke Let's talk about public safety. Crime is through the roof, but Leftists want to defund the police. Makes sense, right? It's like getting rid of lifeguards because people keep drowning. The Marine who protected subway passengers is behind bars, but the 13-year-old who stabbed someone to death in NYC is probably getting a participation trophy. Why? Because he's a migrant. The Left's logic: “Welcome to America—don't forget your free pass to commit murder.”The Bigger Picture Leftism has infiltrated everything: schools, movies, government. It celebrates failure, punishes success, and calls it equality. It's like someone spilled Marxism into the cultural Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-kevin-jackson-show--2896352/support.

[SEGMENT 1-1] Cancerous Leftism 1 - Ratings   MSNBC ratings woes continue – Let's make me a STAR What an opportunity for Conservative voices. Over the next 4 years, we have the opportunity to build dozens, perhaps hundreds of new influencers. I won't mince words, and admit that I think I deserve to be one. I was one before I was targeted by the social media giants. Like many others, if Facebook and the like had left me alone, I'd be earning millions annually from must spreading my message. No big corporate sponsors to whom I would be beholden. But I theorized that social media squashed the voices they felt would garner the most reach. Now look who's paying the price. https://www.foxnews.com/media/msnbcs-joy-reid-loses-roughly-half-her-viewers-since-election-primetime-hosts-also-struggle   MSNBC host Joy Reid and her primetime colleagues have faced a brutal decline in viewership since the election.  "The ReidOut" has shed 47% of its total audience, averaging just 759,000 viewers after averaging 1.4 million viewers throughout 2024 leading up to Election Day, according to Nielsen Media Research. Reid lost even more viewers among the advertiser-coveted demographic ages 25-54, losing a whopping 52% of them, now averaging only 76,000 key demo viewers.  Reid's MSNBC primetime colleagues have also suffered devastating losses in viewership over the past month. The network's primetime lineup has lost a whopping 53% in total viewers, averaging at 621,000, and an astonishing 61% of viewers in the key demo, averaging 57,000. [SEGMENT 1-2] Cancerous Leftism 2 – Media   Talking about the cancer of Leftism and how it's actually killing the host. And remember, folks: every time MSNBC loses a viewer, an angel gets its wings.   "Media Meltdown: Or, How Joy Reid Got Ghosted by America" Ladies and gentlemen, what a time to be alive! Over the next four years, conservatives like me have the chance to build a whole new army of influencers. And guess what? I plan to be one of them. I mean, I was one of them—before social media treated me like a Thanksgiving turkey and carved me up. Think about it: if Facebook and Twitter had just left me alone, I'd be living the high life right now. Millions of dollars, no corporate sponsors dictating my message—just me, my mic, and the truth. But noooo. They squashed me like I was a cockroach on Zuckerberg's marble floors. But here's the kicker: now they're paying the price. Have you seen the state of liberal media? It's like watching a slow-motion car crash where every car is driven by Joy Reid. Joy Reid: The Titanic of Cable News Joy Reid, bless her heart, has lost almost half her audience since the election. "The ReidOut" went from 1.4 million viewers to just 759,000. And among that precious 25-to-54 demographic—the one advertisers actually care about—she's down 52%. Only 76,000 people in that group still tune in. To put that in perspective, more people went to Burning Man this year, and they were stuck in the mud! But do you think she'll change her approach? Of course not. She's so committed to race politics, she's like the Wile E. Coyote of cable news, chasing viewers with ACME talking points while they run off a cliff. Rachel Maddow: $25 Million for Mondays Then there's Rachel Maddow, the star of MSNBC. She's only on one night a week—Mondays—and she's still hemorrhaging viewers. Her audience dropped 43% overall and 56% in the key demo. You'd think with fewer shows, she'd keep more viewers. Nope. She's like a Netflix original: hyped up, overpaid, and canceled by Tuesday. And get this: MSNBC reduced her salary from $30 million a year to $25 million. Oh no, how will she survive? Poor Rachel might have to downgrade her avocado toast. But honestly, if you're paying $25 million for a 56% drop in viewers, you deserve to go broke. Chris Hayes: Proof Anyone Can Fail Up Now let's talk about Chris Hayes, or as I like to call him, "The Guy You Forget Exists." He's lost 56% of his key demo viewers, too. He's pulling in just 73,000 in that group. That's fewer people than show up to a minor league baseball game on a rainy Tuesday. How does he still have a job? Is there a "Participation Trophy" department at MSNBC? Jen Psaki: From White House Lies to Viewer Goodbyes And then there's Jen Psaki. You remember her—Biden's press secretary turned MSNBC host. She's lost 61% of her key demo viewers. 61%! That's not a drop; that's an extinction-level event. It's like she's playing Jenga with her ratings, and someone pulled out the bottom row. Alex Wagner: The Substitute Nobody Asked For Finally, we have Alex Wagner, who stepped into Rachel Maddow's time slot. Big shoes to fill, right? She must've thought, "How bad can it be?" Well, her total viewers are down to 660,000, and her key demo viewers? 72,000. At this rate, she'll be broadcasting to her own family by Christmas. Opportunity Knocks Meanwhile, conservative voices are thriving. We've got the momentum, the truth, and—most importantly—the audience. So, America, let's keep this going. Check out KJRadio.com and Spreely.com. Because unlike Joy Reid, I promise to never bore you to death—or chase you off with nonsensical rants.    [SEGMENT 1-3] Cancerous Leftism 3 – Transition, Daniel Penny, etc. I apologize in advance for this show, because I didn't rip a lot of soundbites. And it is self-serving, because I've chosen today to vent. Now you might say to me, “Kevin, why do you need to vent given all our wins?” And you would be right, so kudos to you. But still, I don't like winning SO BIGLY and still have the opposition, well BREATHING!     "Leftism: The Ultimate Comedy of Errors" Folks, I don't know about you, but living in a world run by Leftists feels like being trapped in an episode of The Twilight Zone. The bad decisions aren't just occasional—they're the plot. You know it's bad when you have to quarantine your lifestyle just to avoid the crazy. You move to suburbia, you homeschool your kids, and you screen every Disney movie like it's a TSA checkpoint. But no matter how hard you try, the crazy creeps in. Leftism is like glitter—it sticks to everything, and no matter how much you try, you can't get rid of it. Let's start with the headliner: Joe Biden. The man is a walking ad for term limits. His presidency is like a Netflix show that should've been canceled after the pilot. And if you think that's bad, imagine the spinoff—Kamala Harris as president. It's like replacing the Titanic with the Hindenburg.Justice? Never Heard of Her Take Daniel Penny, the Marine who stepped in to protect subway passengers. What does he get for his bravery? A trial. Why? Because he's white, and the person he stopped was Black. Now flip the script. A Black man in a similar case gets excused because of a “troubled background.” So, let me get this straight: if you're a victim of systemic oppression, you get a "stab three people free" card? This isn't justice; this is a woke game show. And then there's Derek Chauvin. The media turned him into Public Enemy No. 1. But guess what? The coroner said George Floyd died of a fentanyl overdose, not a knee. Doesn't matter. The Left needed a sacrificial lamb, and Chauvin was it. Truth didn't matter—only the narrative did.The Generation of Freaks Can we talk about what Leftism has done to kids? We now have a generation that can't figure out basic biology. Thanks to woke schools, we're teaching toddlers to question their gender before they can even spell it. It's like giving kids calculus homework before they've learned to count. Drag queens are hailed as heroes, and if you don't clap for them, you're a bigot. I don't remember signing up for RuPaul's Sesame Street. Meanwhile, parents who say, “Hey, maybe let's not confuse our kids,” are labeled extremists. Apparently, protecting your child's innocence is the new radical act.Rewarding Mediocrity The Left doesn't just tolerate failure—they throw it a parade. Look at Kamala Harris. She's celebrated as a trailblazer—a trailblazer for what? Unintelligible speeches? This woman makes Mad Libs sound like Shakespeare. And then there's Hunter Biden. A man born into privilege so high, he probably had a silver spoon surgically implanted at birth. Yet somehow, he's the victim. Meanwhile, J.D. Vance, who clawed his way out of poverty, is called “privileged” because he's white. Here's how woke logic works: if you're rich, white, and a screw-up, you're oppressed. If you're poor, white, and hardworking, you're the oppressor. By this logic, Hunter Biden's laptop identifies as a civil rights icon.Crime Pays—If You're Woke Let's talk about public safety. Crime is through the roof, but Leftists want to defund the police. Makes sense, right? It's like getting rid of lifeguards because people keep drowning. The Marine who protected subway passengers is behind bars, but the 13-year-old who stabbed someone to death in NYC is probably getting a participation trophy. Why? Because he's a migrant. The Left's logic: “Welcome to America—don't forget your free pass to commit murder.”Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-kevin-jackson-show--2896352/support.

Why didn't you just get out when you could? When could I just ever ‘get out'?? You're probably right. More than probably. I could feel my abdomen creeping up my sides–I was heavier than normal, but mostly all new, lean muscle–the long hours on the cycle bike were making my core a strange and hard, sturdy plank under the soft skin on my tummy, a smooth and comfy and warm, plush layer of autumn coconut oil and sweet potatoes resting on my midriff and thick thighs– I would be the best to hug and cuddle, but since there was no one around I would even consider letting close to me, I sometimes hugged and kissed myself instead; sometimes I squeezed in places I knew his hands should be and wished they were, trying not to tear under the weight of being alone. Now i'm in enemy territory. How do you feel? I don't. God's an asshole. This is the bitter end; Recede, retract back down, bow low Keep your head up, And your head down And your mind up Go to bed now. Something's wrong; I know I am. I don't dare talk to God, When The Knicks are on. I don't dare talk to God When her soaps are on. I don't dare talk to God at all; Did you know you had a heart, after all, but a mind made of straw, run along, watch it all burn Watch it all burn Watch it all burn Come on, Come hard Think of dinner afterward and what you want Think of all the words you never lost Think about the soft sprung hard wood floor Think about a love gone wrong And the worlds spun off course Watch it all burn Watch it all burn Watch it all burn, Come on, Come along now Come along Mama Talismans, strange; Follow the secret, Swallow it hard, and don't throw up (even though you want to) Another God, that With just a look, but never touch Pen to pad and now you're on, off again but at least not as far off As you woke up Have a word, God Soft spoken and All out of numbers Ah, come on heart, Don't stop, nah Not now, mom Come on, ma Come on As the tear falls and the clock stuck four minutes after Might as well have been an hour, since the clock struck Stuck on asphalt, all you wanted All the God's gone, Come on, heart, Don't pump so much blood Only salt in those, ah You know there are no other ones What does that cost Nothing. Love just falls out of her. What? Nothing. It does cost afterward, The haunts, And all the moving parts The clock struck hummus, All you wanted, once But so much further off that God shook her head And hung her shoulders, Put the world up, and went down in her cot or coffin For just a half hour nap Before the next world war Alright, God– You won that one. Does it hurt less? Nah, i'm alive more. (before i wasn't) Where the fuck are you going? I WAS LOOKING FOR SUNNI BLU. WELL, DID YOU FIND HIM? NO! THEN WHAT THE FUCK! wait a second…you wrote this. Goddamit, just google me already! you wrote this? I don't know. Lets find out! Sorry, no can do. It's a rule Limited exposure, contain your composure. I can guarantee you, not a single human being on this planet can explain to you what's happening right now. Maintain your composure. SUNNI BLU stumbles over what appears to be a dead body on the floor. Ow. Sorry. I thought you were a speed bump. Is that really how it goes? We'll fix it later, cause here's this one. I'd marry a bunson burner before I'd even think about marrying you. What is that supposed to mean–what? Cause there's more fire– Heat? The bunson burner has more heat? That makes like no sense. Are you saying i'm not hot enough for you? Let's just say… We'd have a lot more chemistry. That's what I said! My punchline was better. I'll show you a punchline. __ You can't keep a secret, can you? …i don't know…why. You look like you can't keep a secret. Try me. –fuck that. Go ahead. Nah, fuck that. Tag, youre it. GodDAMMIT. This is literally the most intricate game of tag, like, ever played. dammit. He got me again. How long have you guys been playing. For ever. Forliterally ever. Like always. MOB GUY Man, i'm so fucked for writing this. Why are you still writing this. The tarot told me to keep writing it; And the Tarot doesn't lie: especially about MOB GUY (CONT'D) Jimmy Fallon, you slimy bastard. “The Good Guy” Am i slimy? I'm probably slimy. Yikes. MAFIA GUY FALLON, you rat-faced lyin' bastard! Ah shit, the Jimmy-isms. I almost forgot about them. (I didn't.) [Unintelligible blabbering in hysterics.] Which one is that?! Doesn't matter. Just get the Jimmy into the elevator before anybody actually sees him. That's it. This dude's got to believe in God, or something. Christ. Yowza. Why do you think that? Nothing else makes sense. Heavy price to pay, don't you think? Whatever, dog. To risk everything–your career, your livelihood–your family– On just one idiot? Sorry. Well, you ought to be. I said i was. Yeah, but somehow, I don't think i believe yas. Are you catholic? On my mudda. Then really, honestly–I don't think you believe in anything. What did you just say to me? (the irony is that this mobster is having a conversation with the living incarnation of Jesus Christ himself.) That is irony, but how is anybody else going to actually understand what's happening in this story. Explain to me why it's Jason Sudakis that remembers everything? I don't know exactly. Because. In all of the timelines, in all of the stories, there's at least one principal character from each group of characters that remembers absolutely everything. {Enter The Multiverse} You still didn't find him? No! It's no use! We've looked everywhere. Seriously. Seriously. Of course– [An exasperated sigh, then a brief pause] Make the feelings go away. ok. What drug is this. All of them. Did you check under the craft services table? What? Seriously just. OH MY GOD. there he is! See. That's easily the third time i've written that part. Easily. It must have been important, but i couldn't help but wonder why; I had written it at least once and then down again in my notebook after visiting 30 Rock to see Seth Meyers, but hadn't ever pondered until now why exactly something such as this might be so important. Perhaps it was the simple hilarity in the fact that, although having been missing for arguably days or weeks on end, that this character–Jimmy Fallon–or whoever it actually was, is simply unconscious beneath the craft services table, out of view but otherwise in plain sight; How coulda 6-foot tall man— He can't be 6 feet tall. Why not. If Post Malone is 6 feet tall, And this is JImmy Fallon sitting next to Post Malone [Jimmy Fallon is sitting next to (or rather, almost under) Post Malone] Are you sure that's The Real Jimmy Fallon? What? How many are there. Well, there's this guy. >< Hello, mrs. wong. Oh, dear God. This is all just for shits and giggles, right? Right. There will be no shitz. And no giggles! [HANZEL becomes the host of The Tonight Show] What parallel is this? I don't know. Wake me up; it must be a nightmare. It was strange to be almost consistently writing comedy and otherwise almost always feeling on the verge of regurgitation ad nauseum, and constant thoughts about slitting my wrists, as if somehow jumping in front of an oncoming train was suddenly out of the question. It wasn't. But i thought more constantly about slitting my wrists, And the worse part of it was, It was actually serious. I started to worry about myself and take long, thoughtless breaks from writing, And speaking, and forging an effort to make the music business work. I stopped caring almost entirely about anything besides taking the minimal effort to exercise and shower, which I knew that in its worst states, depression often enough kept other people from doing. I couldn't stop caring enough not to shower, and though I was eating more than usual, my abdomen was an alarmingly firm plank; it was kind of weird to have a flat stomach, but the exercise bike and occasional run was keeping me average, if anything, by american standards, above average, however one look at Lindsay Lohan sent me backward trying to remember what it was like to be anything close to some kind of woman, or some kind of phenomenon, or some kind of perfectly trained monkey; not that I considered the performer as such, however, dismantling my aversion for the aforementioned sent a striking resemblance to the-1 Stop there. LINDSAY LOHAN FUCK. Are you serious? SUNNI BLU SHH! Why , I want to show you something. LINDSAY LOHAN GODDAMIT! IT ALWAYS CUTS OFD WHEN IT GET TO MY PART! SUNNI BLU SHHHH. OTHRR SUNNÏ BLŪ Shhh, chill. It's our part. LINDSAY LOHAN Where the fuck did you come from? SUNNI BLU II Heaven, baby. What is it. My basement. I–no–Gosh– Step inside. LINDSAY LOHAN Stop fucking around with the Illuminati. SUNNI BLU What does that mean! LINDSAY LOHAN There are literally two of you right now. SUNNI BLU More to love! –at least I was pulling together a decent Trump impersonation from Meyers, and tried not to think too poignantly about the seething hate a woman like Tina Fey might actual harbor for someone like me. What are you, anyway? I's hopin you'd tell meh. {L E G E N D S} He's a psycho. Huh. Jimmy Fallon is a fucking psychopath. You're kidding me. I'm not kidding you. I'm serious. I'm serious. I knew that. This is serious. Why are you meditating? I'm summoning it. What?! Summoning. We are live in like, 5 minutes. Where the fuck is JImmy? Jimmy what? You are all idiots. Summoning it. Quit meditating and get backstage. I'm– –concentrating… [The Festival Project ™ ] More Cream of Wheatn? Yeus. Mor Cream uf Wheatun. Wheeeeeet. CARTMAN. GODDDDDAMMMNIT< WHUT. TELEPLONE. WHUT. TELE– ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT. UHHNNN. Ah. Bones. [Bones Duggar] Fancy seeing you here. …is it? Man, am I still writing The TV People? I guess so. I thought I was getting in trouble for writing anything about— CUT TO: What are you doing? Midget fishing. What?! AGHHHHHH! What in the fuck. I caught one. WHAT ARE YOU DOING. I'm midget fishing. ARE YOU SERIOUS?! Haha: here you go little guy. [he hands the man a lollipop; the man is furious.] WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS. It's your reward! Enjoy. WHAT THE FUCK DO I LOOK LIKE TO YOU?! A midget. YOUVE GOT TO BE FUCKING KIDDING ME. WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS? He pulls the large hook from out of his Jacket. YOU OWE ME; THIS IS A $2,000 SUIT. Two grand—even in that size?! YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE! YOU'RE GONNA PAY FOR THIS! Ah, alright. [he pulls out a $100 bill and hands it to the man.] WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS? {Enter The Multiverse} Catherine enters with the children. KATHERINE Go hug your father. omg was it Catherine or Katherine. I don't know. It's been so long. It's Katie. PATRICK I'm their father; you don't need to tell them to hug me. KATHERINE Sophie wouldn't. If I didn't tell her, she wouldn't do it. Sophie?! Who the fuck is Sophie?! It's two syllables, at least… What was the middle one's name? Not Sophie. Sophie will do for now. I'm still not ready to go all the way back into that hole. [Patricks's middle child hugs him begrudgingly.] I like Edie Falco for the mom. Edie Falco? I love Edie Falco. So we got—Edie Falco, and some dude who looks like Jimmy Fallon. There is no Jimmy Fallon. Some dude who looks like him. Apparently there's only one of those. Whatever. Whatever, indeed. Okay— so CUT TO: INTERVIEWER/REPORTER –And–What is your standing relationship with JImmyFallon ELMO Excuse me? Your relationship with Jimmy Fallon? ELMO What did you just say to me? What? Jimmy Fallon. ELMO This interview is over. [Elmo dismissively exits.] Wait. Elmo. Come back. ELMO No. No more questions. Elmo! ELMOWe're done here. What do you want, Kimmel?! I WANT TO TALK TO GHOSTS. —which ghost do you want? [beat] …which ones you got? [beat] …which ones do you want? I'll make a list. {Enter The Multiverse} [The Festival Project.™] COPYRIGHT © THE FESTIVAL PROJECT 2024 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ©

Why didn't you just get out when you could? When could I just ever ‘get out'?? You're probably right. More than probably. I could feel my abdomen creeping up my sides–I was heavier than normal, but mostly all new, lean muscle–the long hours on the cycle bike were making my core a strange and hard, sturdy plank under the soft skin on my tummy, a smooth and comfy and warm, plush layer of autumn coconut oil and sweet potatoes resting on my midriff and thick thighs– I would be the best to hug and cuddle, but since there was no one around I would even consider letting close to me, I sometimes hugged and kissed myself instead; sometimes I squeezed in places I knew his hands should be and wished they were, trying not to tear under the weight of being alone. Now i'm in enemy territory. How do you feel? I don't. God's an asshole. This is the bitter end; Recede, retract back down, bow low Keep your head up, And your head down And your mind up Go to bed now. Something's wrong; I know I am. I don't dare talk to God, When The Knicks are on. I don't dare talk to God When her soaps are on. I don't dare talk to God at all; Did you know you had a heart, after all, but a mind made of straw, run along, watch it all burn Watch it all burn Watch it all burn Come on, Come hard Think of dinner afterward and what you want Think of all the words you never lost Think about the soft sprung hard wood floor Think about a love gone wrong And the worlds spun off course Watch it all burn Watch it all burn Watch it all burn, Come on, Come along now Come along Mama Talismans, strange; Follow the secret, Swallow it hard, and don't throw up (even though you want to) Another God, that With just a look, but never touch Pen to pad and now you're on, off again but at least not as far off As you woke up Have a word, God Soft spoken and All out of numbers Ah, come on heart, Don't stop, nah Not now, mom Come on, ma Come on As the tear falls and the clock stuck four minutes after Might as well have been an hour, since the clock struck Stuck on asphalt, all you wanted All the God's gone, Come on, heart, Don't pump so much blood Only salt in those, ah You know there are no other ones What does that cost Nothing. Love just falls out of her. What? Nothing. It does cost afterward, The haunts, And all the moving parts The clock struck hummus, All you wanted, once But so much further off that God shook her head And hung her shoulders, Put the world up, and went down in her cot or coffin For just a half hour nap Before the next world war Alright, God– You won that one. Does it hurt less? Nah, i'm alive more. (before i wasn't) Where the fuck are you going? I WAS LOOKING FOR SUNNI BLU. WELL, DID YOU FIND HIM? NO! THEN WHAT THE FUCK! wait a second…you wrote this. Goddamit, just google me already! you wrote this? I don't know. Lets find out! Sorry, no can do. It's a rule Limited exposure, contain your composure. I can guarantee you, not a single human being on this planet can explain to you what's happening right now. Maintain your composure. SUNNI BLU stumbles over what appears to be a dead body on the floor. Ow. Sorry. I thought you were a speed bump. Is that really how it goes? We'll fix it later, cause here's this one. I'd marry a bunson burner before I'd even think about marrying you. What is that supposed to mean–what? Cause there's more fire– Heat? The bunson burner has more heat? That makes like no sense. Are you saying i'm not hot enough for you? Let's just say… We'd have a lot more chemistry. That's what I said! My punchline was better. I'll show you a punchline. __ You can't keep a secret, can you? …i don't know…why. You look like you can't keep a secret. Try me. –fuck that. Go ahead. Nah, fuck that. Tag, youre it. GodDAMMIT. This is literally the most intricate game of tag, like, ever played. dammit. He got me again. How long have you guys been playing. For ever. Forliterally ever. Like always. MOB GUY Man, i'm so fucked for writing this. Why are you still writing this. The tarot told me to keep writing it; And the Tarot doesn't lie: especially about MOB GUY (CONT'D) Jimmy Fallon, you slimy bastard. “The Good Guy” Am i slimy? I'm probably slimy. Yikes. MAFIA GUY FALLON, you rat-faced lyin' bastard! Ah shit, the Jimmy-isms. I almost forgot about them. (I didn't.) [Unintelligible blabbering in hysterics.] Which one is that?! Doesn't matter. Just get the Jimmy into the elevator before anybody actually sees him. That's it. This dude's got to believe in God, or something. Christ. Yowza. Why do you think that? Nothing else makes sense. Heavy price to pay, don't you think? Whatever, dog. To risk everything–your career, your livelihood–your family– On just one idiot? Sorry. Well, you ought to be. I said i was. Yeah, but somehow, I don't think i believe yas. Are you catholic? On my mudda. Then really, honestly–I don't think you believe in anything. What did you just say to me? (the irony is that this mobster is having a conversation with the living incarnation of Jesus Christ himself.) That is irony, but how is anybody else going to actually understand what's happening in this story. Explain to me why it's Jason Sudakis that remembers everything? I don't know exactly. Because. In all of the timelines, in all of the stories, there's at least one principal character from each group of characters that remembers absolutely everything. {Enter The Multiverse} You still didn't find him? No! It's no use! We've looked everywhere. Seriously. Seriously. Of course– [An exasperated sigh, then a brief pause] Make the feelings go away. ok. What drug is this. All of them. Did you check under the craft services table? What? Seriously just. OH MY GOD. there he is! See. That's easily the third time i've written that part. Easily. It must have been important, but i couldn't help but wonder why; I had written it at least once and then down again in my notebook after visiting 30 Rock to see Seth Meyers, but hadn't ever pondered until now why exactly something such as this might be so important. Perhaps it was the simple hilarity in the fact that, although having been missing for arguably days or weeks on end, that this character–Jimmy Fallon–or whoever it actually was, is simply unconscious beneath the craft services table, out of view but otherwise in plain sight; How coulda 6-foot tall man— He can't be 6 feet tall. Why not. If Post Malone is 6 feet tall, And this is JImmy Fallon sitting next to Post Malone [Jimmy Fallon is sitting next to (or rather, almost under) Post Malone] Are you sure that's The Real Jimmy Fallon? What? How many are there. Well, there's this guy. >< Hello, mrs. wong. Oh, dear God. This is all just for shits and giggles, right? Right. There will be no shitz. And no giggles! [HANZEL becomes the host of The Tonight Show] What parallel is this? I don't know. Wake me up; it must be a nightmare. It was strange to be almost consistently writing comedy and otherwise almost always feeling on the verge of regurgitation ad nauseum, and constant thoughts about slitting my wrists, as if somehow jumping in front of an oncoming train was suddenly out of the question. It wasn't. But i thought more constantly about slitting my wrists, And the worse part of it was, It was actually serious. I started to worry about myself and take long, thoughtless breaks from writing, And speaking, and forging an effort to make the music business work. I stopped caring almost entirely about anything besides taking the minimal effort to exercise and shower, which I knew that in its worst states, depression often enough kept other people from doing. I couldn't stop caring enough not to shower, and though I was eating more than usual, my abdomen was an alarmingly firm plank; it was kind of weird to have a flat stomach, but the exercise bike and occasional run was keeping me average, if anything, by american standards, above average, however one look at Lindsay Lohan sent me backward trying to remember what it was like to be anything close to some kind of woman, or some kind of phenomenon, or some kind of perfectly trained monkey; not that I considered the performer as such, however, dismantling my aversion for the aforementioned sent a striking resemblance to the-1 Stop there. LINDSAY LOHAN FUCK. Are you serious? SUNNI BLU SHH! Why , I want to show you something. LINDSAY LOHAN GODDAMIT! IT ALWAYS CUTS OFD WHEN IT GET TO MY PART! SUNNI BLU SHHHH. OTHRR SUNNÏ BLŪ Shhh, chill. It's our part. LINDSAY LOHAN Where the fuck did you come from? SUNNI BLU II Heaven, baby. What is it. My basement. I–no–Gosh– Step inside. LINDSAY LOHAN Stop fucking around with the Illuminati. SUNNI BLU What does that mean! LINDSAY LOHAN There are literally two of you right now. SUNNI BLU More to love! –at least I was pulling together a decent Trump impersonation from Meyers, and tried not to think too poignantly about the seething hate a woman like Tina Fey might actual harbor for someone like me. What are you, anyway? I's hopin you'd tell meh. {L E G E N D S} He's a psycho. Huh. Jimmy Fallon is a fucking psychopath. You're kidding me. I'm not kidding you. I'm serious. I'm serious. I knew that. This is serious. Why are you meditating? I'm summoning it. What?! Summoning. We are live in like, 5 minutes. Where the fuck is JImmy? Jimmy what? You are all idiots. Summoning it. Quit meditating and get backstage. I'm– –concentrating… [The Festival Project ™ ] More Cream of Wheatn? Yeus. Mor Cream uf Wheatun. Wheeeeeet. CARTMAN. GODDDDDAMMMNIT< WHUT. TELEPLONE. WHUT. TELE– ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT. UHHNNN. Ah. Bones. [Bones Duggar] Fancy seeing you here. …is it? Man, am I still writing The TV People? I guess so. I thought I was getting in trouble for writing anything about— CUT TO: What are you doing? Midget fishing. What?! AGHHHHHH! What in the fuck. I caught one. WHAT ARE YOU DOING. I'm midget fishing. ARE YOU SERIOUS?! Haha: here you go little guy. [he hands the man a lollipop; the man is furious.] WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS. It's your reward! Enjoy. WHAT THE FUCK DO I LOOK LIKE TO YOU?! A midget. YOUVE GOT TO BE FUCKING KIDDING ME. WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS? He pulls the large hook from out of his Jacket. YOU OWE ME; THIS IS A $2,000 SUIT. Two grand—even in that size?! YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE! YOU'RE GONNA PAY FOR THIS! Ah, alright. [he pulls out a $100 bill and hands it to the man.] WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS? {Enter The Multiverse} Catherine enters with the children. KATHERINE Go hug your father. omg was it Catherine or Katherine. I don't know. It's been so long. It's Katie. PATRICK I'm their father; you don't need to tell them to hug me. KATHERINE Sophie wouldn't. If I didn't tell her, she wouldn't do it. Sophie?! Who the fuck is Sophie?! It's two syllables, at least… What was the middle one's name? Not Sophie. Sophie will do for now. I'm still not ready to go all the way back into that hole. [Patricks's middle child hugs him begrudgingly.] I like Edie Falco for the mom. Edie Falco? I love Edie Falco. So we got—Edie Falco, and some dude who looks like Jimmy Fallon. There is no Jimmy Fallon. Some dude who looks like him. Apparently there's only one of those. Whatever. Whatever, indeed. Okay— so CUT TO: INTERVIEWER/REPORTER –And–What is your standing relationship with JImmyFallon ELMO Excuse me? Your relationship with Jimmy Fallon? ELMO What did you just say to me? What? Jimmy Fallon. ELMO This interview is over. [Elmo dismissively exits.] Wait. Elmo. Come back. ELMO No. No more questions. Elmo! ELMOWe're done here. What do you want, Kimmel?! I WANT TO TALK TO GHOSTS. —which ghost do you want? [beat] …which ones you got? [beat] …which ones do you want? I'll make a list. {Enter The Multiverse} [The Festival Project.™] COPYRIGHT © THE FESTIVAL PROJECT 2024 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ©

Why didn't you just get out when you could? When could I just ever ‘get out'?? You're probably right. More than probably. I could feel my abdomen creeping up my sides–I was heavier than normal, but mostly all new, lean muscle–the long hours on the cycle bike were making my core a strange and hard, sturdy plank under the soft skin on my tummy, a smooth and comfy and warm, plush layer of autumn coconut oil and sweet potatoes resting on my midriff and thick thighs– I would be the best to hug and cuddle, but since there was no one around I would even consider letting close to me, I sometimes hugged and kissed myself instead; sometimes I squeezed in places I knew his hands should be and wished they were, trying not to tear under the weight of being alone. Now i'm in enemy territory. How do you feel? I don't. God's an asshole. This is the bitter end; Recede, retract back down, bow low Keep your head up, And your head down And your mind up Go to bed now. Something's wrong; I know I am. I don't dare talk to God, When The Knicks are on. I don't dare talk to God When her soaps are on. I don't dare talk to God at all; Did you know you had a heart, after all, but a mind made of straw, run along, watch it all burn Watch it all burn Watch it all burn Come on, Come hard Think of dinner afterward and what you want Think of all the words you never lost Think about the soft sprung hard wood floor Think about a love gone wrong And the worlds spun off course Watch it all burn Watch it all burn Watch it all burn, Come on, Come along now Come along Mama Talismans, strange; Follow the secret, Swallow it hard, and don't throw up (even though you want to) Another God, that With just a look, but never touch Pen to pad and now you're on, off again but at least not as far off As you woke up Have a word, God Soft spoken and All out of numbers Ah, come on heart, Don't stop, nah Not now, mom Come on, ma Come on As the tear falls and the clock stuck four minutes after Might as well have been an hour, since the clock struck Stuck on asphalt, all you wanted All the God's gone, Come on, heart, Don't pump so much blood Only salt in those, ah You know there are no other ones What does that cost Nothing. Love just falls out of her. What? Nothing. It does cost afterward, The haunts, And all the moving parts The clock struck hummus, All you wanted, once But so much further off that God shook her head And hung her shoulders, Put the world up, and went down in her cot or coffin For just a half hour nap Before the next world war Alright, God– You won that one. Does it hurt less? Nah, i'm alive more. (before i wasn't) Where the fuck are you going? I WAS LOOKING FOR SUNNI BLU. WELL, DID YOU FIND HIM? NO! THEN WHAT THE FUCK! wait a second…you wrote this. Goddamit, just google me already! you wrote this? I don't know. Lets find out! Sorry, no can do. It's a rule Limited exposure, contain your composure. I can guarantee you, not a single human being on this planet can explain to you what's happening right now. Maintain your composure. SUNNI BLU stumbles over what appears to be a dead body on the floor. Ow. Sorry. I thought you were a speed bump. Is that really how it goes? We'll fix it later, cause here's this one. I'd marry a bunson burner before I'd even think about marrying you. What is that supposed to mean–what? Cause there's more fire– Heat? The bunson burner has more heat? That makes like no sense. Are you saying i'm not hot enough for you? Let's just say… We'd have a lot more chemistry. That's what I said! My punchline was better. I'll show you a punchline. __ You can't keep a secret, can you? …i don't know…why. You look like you can't keep a secret. Try me. –fuck that. Go ahead. Nah, fuck that. Tag, youre it. GodDAMMIT. This is literally the most intricate game of tag, like, ever played. dammit. He got me again. How long have you guys been playing. For ever. Forliterally ever. Like always. MOB GUY Man, i'm so fucked for writing this. Why are you still writing this. The tarot told me to keep writing it; And the Tarot doesn't lie: especially about MOB GUY (CONT'D) Jimmy Fallon, you slimy bastard. “The Good Guy” Am i slimy? I'm probably slimy. Yikes. MAFIA GUY FALLON, you rat-faced lyin' bastard! Ah shit, the Jimmy-isms. I almost forgot about them. (I didn't.) [Unintelligible blabbering in hysterics.] Which one is that?! Doesn't matter. Just get the Jimmy into the elevator before anybody actually sees him. That's it. This dude's got to believe in God, or something. Christ. Yowza. Why do you think that? Nothing else makes sense. Heavy price to pay, don't you think? Whatever, dog. To risk everything–your career, your livelihood–your family– On just one idiot? Sorry. Well, you ought to be. I said i was. Yeah, but somehow, I don't think i believe yas. Are you catholic? On my mudda. Then really, honestly–I don't think you believe in anything. What did you just say to me? (the irony is that this mobster is having a conversation with the living incarnation of Jesus Christ himself.) That is irony, but how is anybody else going to actually understand what's happening in this story. Explain to me why it's Jason Sudakis that remembers everything? I don't know exactly. Because. In all of the timelines, in all of the stories, there's at least one principal character from each group of characters that remembers absolutely everything. {Enter The Multiverse} You still didn't find him? No! It's no use! We've looked everywhere. Seriously. Seriously. Of course– [An exasperated sigh, then a brief pause] Make the feelings go away. ok. What drug is this. All of them. Did you check under the craft services table? What? Seriously just. OH MY GOD. there he is! See. That's easily the third time i've written that part. Easily. It must have been important, but i couldn't help but wonder why; I had written it at least once and then down again in my notebook after visiting 30 Rock to see Seth Meyers, but hadn't ever pondered until now why exactly something such as this might be so important. Perhaps it was the simple hilarity in the fact that, although having been missing for arguably days or weeks on end, that this character–Jimmy Fallon–or whoever it actually was, is simply unconscious beneath the craft services table, out of view but otherwise in plain sight; How coulda 6-foot tall man— He can't be 6 feet tall. Why not. If Post Malone is 6 feet tall, And this is JImmy Fallon sitting next to Post Malone [Jimmy Fallon is sitting next to (or rather, almost under) Post Malone] Are you sure that's The Real Jimmy Fallon? What? How many are there. Well, there's this guy. >< Hello, mrs. wong. Oh, dear God. This is all just for shits and giggles, right? Right. There will be no shitz. And no giggles! [HANZEL becomes the host of The Tonight Show] What parallel is this? I don't know. Wake me up; it must be a nightmare. It was strange to be almost consistently writing comedy and otherwise almost always feeling on the verge of regurgitation ad nauseum, and constant thoughts about slitting my wrists, as if somehow jumping in front of an oncoming train was suddenly out of the question. It wasn't. But i thought more constantly about slitting my wrists, And the worse part of it was, It was actually serious. I started to worry about myself and take long, thoughtless breaks from writing, And speaking, and forging an effort to make the music business work. I stopped caring almost entirely about anything besides taking the minimal effort to exercise and shower, which I knew that in its worst states, depression often enough kept other people from doing. I couldn't stop caring enough not to shower, and though I was eating more than usual, my abdomen was an alarmingly firm plank; it was kind of weird to have a flat stomach, but the exercise bike and occasional run was keeping me average, if anything, by american standards, above average, however one look at Lindsay Lohan sent me backward trying to remember what it was like to be anything close to some kind of woman, or some kind of phenomenon, or some kind of perfectly trained monkey; not that I considered the performer as such, however, dismantling my aversion for the aforementioned sent a striking resemblance to the-1 Stop there. LINDSAY LOHAN FUCK. Are you serious? SUNNI BLU SHH! Why , I want to show you something. LINDSAY LOHAN GODDAMIT! IT ALWAYS CUTS OFD WHEN IT GET TO MY PART! SUNNI BLU SHHHH. OTHRR SUNNÏ BLŪ Shhh, chill. It's our part. LINDSAY LOHAN Where the fuck did you come from? SUNNI BLU II Heaven, baby. What is it. My basement. I–no–Gosh– Step inside. LINDSAY LOHAN Stop fucking around with the Illuminati. SUNNI BLU What does that mean! LINDSAY LOHAN There are literally two of you right now. SUNNI BLU More to love! –at least I was pulling together a decent Trump impersonation from Meyers, and tried not to think too poignantly about the seething hate a woman like Tina Fey might actual harbor for someone like me. What are you, anyway? I's hopin you'd tell meh. {L E G E N D S} He's a psycho. Huh. Jimmy Fallon is a fucking psychopath. You're kidding me. I'm not kidding you. I'm serious. I'm serious. I knew that. This is serious. Why are you meditating? I'm summoning it. What?! Summoning. We are live in like, 5 minutes. Where the fuck is JImmy? Jimmy what? You are all idiots. Summoning it. Quit meditating and get backstage. I'm– –concentrating… [The Festival Project ™ ] More Cream of Wheatn? Yeus. Mor Cream uf Wheatun. Wheeeeeet. CARTMAN. GODDDDDAMMMNIT< WHUT. TELEPLONE. WHUT. TELE– ALRIGHT, ALRIGHT. UHHNNN. Ah. Bones. [Bones Duggar] Fancy seeing you here. …is it? Man, am I still writing The TV People? I guess so. I thought I was getting in trouble for writing anything about— CUT TO: What are you doing? Midget fishing. What?! AGHHHHHH! What in the fuck. I caught one. WHAT ARE YOU DOING. I'm midget fishing. ARE YOU SERIOUS?! Haha: here you go little guy. [he hands the man a lollipop; the man is furious.] WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS. It's your reward! Enjoy. WHAT THE FUCK DO I LOOK LIKE TO YOU?! A midget. YOUVE GOT TO BE FUCKING KIDDING ME. WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS? He pulls the large hook from out of his Jacket. YOU OWE ME; THIS IS A $2,000 SUIT. Two grand—even in that size?! YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE! YOU'RE GONNA PAY FOR THIS! Ah, alright. [he pulls out a $100 bill and hands it to the man.] WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS? {Enter The Multiverse} Catherine enters with the children. KATHERINE Go hug your father. omg was it Catherine or Katherine. I don't know. It's been so long. It's Katie. PATRICK I'm their father; you don't need to tell them to hug me. KATHERINE Sophie wouldn't. If I didn't tell her, she wouldn't do it. Sophie?! Who the fuck is Sophie?! It's two syllables, at least… What was the middle one's name? Not Sophie. Sophie will do for now. I'm still not ready to go all the way back into that hole. [Patricks's middle child hugs him begrudgingly.] I like Edie Falco for the mom. Edie Falco? I love Edie Falco. So we got—Edie Falco, and some dude who looks like Jimmy Fallon. There is no Jimmy Fallon. Some dude who looks like him. Apparently there's only one of those. Whatever. Whatever, indeed. Okay— so CUT TO: INTERVIEWER/REPORTER –And–What is your standing relationship with JImmyFallon ELMO Excuse me? Your relationship with Jimmy Fallon? ELMO What did you just say to me? What? Jimmy Fallon. ELMO This interview is over. [Elmo dismissively exits.] Wait. Elmo. Come back. ELMO No. No more questions. Elmo! ELMOWe're done here. What do you want, Kimmel?! I WANT TO TALK TO GHOSTS. —which ghost do you want? [beat] …which ones you got? [beat] …which ones do you want? I'll make a list. {Enter The Multiverse} [The Festival Project.™] COPYRIGHT © THE FESTIVAL PROJECT 2024 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ©

October 20, 2024

ASMR 100 Triggers in 40 minutes Mic Scratching, Shaving, Unintelligible whiAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Terry and Jeetz talk about the 3 weirdest stories of the day! It's called the 533! Today includes: Parents and Gen Alpha are having unintelligible convos because of brain rot, Dog scheduled for teeth cleaning was spayed by vet, Blasting glitter into Mars atmosphere could make it more habitable!

ASMR Extra Closeup Kisses, mouth sounds & unintelligible whispersAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Johnny dives into the nuances of the disaster known as the first debate- The Illogical vs The Unintelligible. And consider the options if President Biden bows out- because clearly no one in this administration has. PLUS- Over the past few years, sharks have been treating beachgoers like their own private buffet. We wade into the topic....from a safe distance, of course.

Smack my ass and shave my balls - it's episode 17 from Chippewa Falls! Be sure to like, subscribe, and whatever else you can do to be notified of newest our episodes. We look forward to each week - and you should too!

Huge thanks to Dossier Perfumes for partnering up with me in this video! Perfume Fragrance mentioned in the video: Fruity Magnolia (inspired by Versace's Bright Crystal)Click the link: https://dossier.co/collections/fragrances and check out all the wonderful fragrances they have to offer! Hellolololololo my beautiful butterfly

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ASMR Unintelligible Whispering, Breathing, Hand Movements, Layered Ocean SoAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

ASMR extra cozy Unintelligible Whispering, Fire Crackling, soft TriggersAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

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Victor Davis Hanson and cohost Jack Fowler talk about ISIS attack on Russia, squatter's rights, DEI in the intelligence community, and racializing math in California.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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ASMR Reiki Plucking Negative Energy - Hypnotic Hand Movements & Unintelligible Whispers for SleepAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

ASMR Reiki Plucking Negative Energy - Hypnotic Hand Movements & Unintelligible Whispers for SleepAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

ASMR Reiki Plucking Negative Energy - Hypnotic Hand Movements & Unintelligible Whispers for SleepAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

ASMR slow unintelligible whispers and face touching - binaural, rode mics, rainAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

ASMR intense inaudible unintelligible cupped close up whispering - breathy, bassy, tinglyAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

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ASMR breathy unintelligible & mouth sounds, close up face touching - deep, bassy, ear to ear, rainAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

layered ASMR gentle Whispering, Fluffy Mic, Unintelligible - sensitive SoundscapeAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

ASMR soft Blowing & sensitive Unintelligible Whispering - Rain, White NoiseAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

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ASMR Ear to Ear Whispering, Unintelligible & MoreAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

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ASMR Brain Massage Unintelligible WhispersAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Episode Summary This week on Live Like the World is Dying, we have a short story about prepping called "Blood, Soil, & Frozen TV Dinners" by Matthew Dougal. It's a parody about two right-wing preppers who are faced with a collapse in society. After the story, there's an interview with the author about prepping mentalities and writing. This episode was reposted from the Strangers in a Tangled Wilderness podcast. The story can be read at tangledwilderness.org. Host Info Inmn can be found on Instagram @shadowtail.artificery Reader The Reader is Bea Flowers. If you would like to hear Bea narrate other things, or would like to get them to read things for you check them out at https://voicebea.wixsite.com/website Publisher Info This show is published by Strangers in A Tangled Wilderness. We can be found at www.tangledwilderness.org, or on Twitter @TangledWild and Instagram @Tangled_Wilderness. You can support the show on Patreon at www.patreon.com/strangersinatangledwilderness. Theme music The theme song was written and performed by Margaret Killjoy. You can find her at http://birdsbeforethestorm.net or on twitter @magpiekilljoy Transcript Live Like the World is Dying: “Blood, Soil, & Frozen TV Dinners” with Matthew Dougal **Inmn ** 00:16  Hello, and welcome to Live Like the World is Dying, your podcast for what feels like the end times. I'm your host today, Inmn Neruin, and today we have something a little different. I host another podcast called Strangers in a Tangled Wilderness where every month we take a zine that Strangers puts out and turn it into an audio feature and do an interview with the author. We had a two-part feature called Blood, Soil, and Frozen TV Dinners by Matthew Dougal, and it is a short story about prepping from a very strange perspective, that of two right-wing preppers facing a mysterious collapse of society. This short story is a parody and I promise that the two main pov characters are not the heroes of the tale. It's a fun story and I do an interview with Matthew afterward about prepping mentalities, fiction, and other neat stuff. If you like this episode, check out my other podcast that this is featured from. I did not re-record the outro, so you'll get a little taste of Margaret playing the piano, because she wrote the theme music for the Strangers podcast. You'll also get to hear our wonderful reader, Bea Flowers narrate the story. Follow along with the transcript or at Tangledwilderness.org where you can read all of our featured zines for free. But before all of that, we are a member of the Channel Zero Network of anarchist podcasts and here's a jingle from another show on that network.  [sings a simple melody] **Bea ** 02:49 “Blood, Soil, & Frozen TV Dinners” by Matthew Dougal. Read by Bea Flowers. Published by Strangers in a Tangled Wilderness.  Katie sat, wide-eyed, beneath the kitchen table and hugged her knees to her chest. She was shaking, vibrating visibly. Tanner put his finger to his lips and prayed that her silent tears would remain just that. There was no time to stop and calm her down. Not again. He moved slowly around the kitchen, fumbling through cupboards and pulling out pre-wrapped packages of food. Always be prepared. Tanner had practiced this before things went dark, but it was different doing it for real. His hands hadn't been so shaky, back then.  A noise, on the porch. His body froze before his mind registered the sound. Tanner dropped into a crouch and crossed the room to the window, willing every cell in his body to radiate confidence toward his baby girl. His hand found the Glock 17 at his belt and he brought it up in front of him, the familiar feel of the grip reassuring. He took a breath, steadied himself, and raised his eyes to the level of the windowsill. The muscles in his thighs steeled and he remained, unblinking, utterly still, staring out into the darkness.  After thirty or forty nerve-twanging seconds, Tanner drew breath and relaxed. His quads were burning, and they thanked him as he straightened. He could hear the specter of his ex-wife in his head, telling him to lose some weight, exercise more… Well she'd left, and that was 135 pounds gone right there. She'd probably say that was a good start.   An unbearably loud ringing pierced the silence and sent him diving to the floor, landing awkwardly on his gun and sounding a crash through the kitchen. A keening whine came from under the table, Katie shaken from her silence.  The doorbell.  Feeling foolish, Tanner twisted over his shoulder and hissed at his daughter to be quiet. Still prone, he crawled toward the hallway in the most reassuring manner he could manage and pointed his Glock at the front door.  Footsteps outside, then a shadow appeared at the window. Tanner's heart pounded in his ears—more violent pulses of silence than sound—and his vision blurred as panic flooded his body. He'd heard the early reports of armed groups in the streets, some sort of fighting downtown, but he hadn't really believed they would come here. His legs were weak, and he silently thanked God that he was already on the floor. The shape at the window didn't move, frozen in the gloom, silhouetted by flickering light coming from the street. As Tanner's head cleared he tried to take stock of what was happening.  The apparition was vaguely man-shaped but shorter and slighter, an ethereal grace evident even in its stillness. A voice called out, muffled through the door, the guttural singsong completely at odds with the sleek form at the window. Tanner couldn't understand everything, but he thought he caught the words “little girl.” A second shape mounted the porch alongside the first, similarly short but squat and stocky, and grunted something to its companion in an alien tongue. Fluorescent light flooded the yard and the voices momentarily disappeared beneath the growl of an angry engine. Tanner's breath caught. His trembling finger hovered over the trigger and he willed the barrel to still its swaying dance. Two shots exploded outside—loud shots, from a much bigger gun than his. The creatures spun to face this new threat, their chatter rising in pitch and speed. They sounded panicked.  “yalla! hawula' alnaas majnoon.” Tanner sensed his opportunity. He was forgotten. All those hours of training kicked in and muscle memory took over as he rose to one knee, took a two-handed grip, and unleashed a furious hail of fire at his front door.  “Keep your filthy hands off my daughter!” He fired until he felt the Glock stop kicking, the magazine spent. As the cacophony faded he realized he was screaming.  “Tanner! It's me, Blake. Stop shooting goddammit, they're gone.”  “Blake?” Tanner mechanically reloaded his gun. “Why…” His throat was raw, his voice barely audible even to him. He swallowed, fighting to control his breath, and cleared his throat. “What are you doing here?”  “Come to see if you were okay. Figured you and the kid might need a hand.”  A stocky, heavily muscled figure wearing fatigues and a plate carrier stepped up to the porch, visible through the splintered ruins that had been the front door. A halogen glow lanced through the holes, like the brilliant aura of some kind of avenging eagle.  “When this shit spread across the river from the city we locked down. It was touch-and-go for a while, but things quieted down eventually. When they did, I came straight over. Good thing I got here when I did. The quick little fuckers ran for it, but I think you hit one of ‘em.”  The figure stopped, pulled down the red, white and blue bandana covering its mouth, and spat. Tanner had never been more relieved to see his buddy's foul-mouthed face. Or his M1A SOCOM 16 rifle.  “We're alright.” Tanner's voice was exhausted, his body shivering as the adrenaline fled. “Thank God I was prepared. Still, it's good to see you.”  “Prepared, shit.” His buddy grinned. “I been telling you for years to get something heavy duty.” Blake kicked the splintered remains of the door and his grin faded. “You can't stay here. Those things'll be back. Grab your girl and jump in the truck. Let's head to mine, she'll be safe there.” The grin returned.“Prepared, shit.”  An hour later they were sitting in “the Hole,” as Blake affectionately called it. The Hole was both name and description, although it perhaps undersold the amount of effort that had gone into its construction. Attached to the garage by a short, downward-sloping corridor, The Hole was a full-blown bunker that spread underneath almost the entirety of Blake's backyard. Tanner was sitting in the main chamber eating Top Ramen, chicken flavor.  They had made the half-mile journey in silence—lights down on the Tacoma, Tanner jumpy, Blake grim, Katie in a state of shock. The streets had looked completely foreign, the usual calming glow of LEDs replaced by the orange flicker of scattered flames. The familiar hum of traffic had been gone. Instead, gunfire had cracked in the distance.  Blake's wife Lauren had buzzed them inside after Blake confirmed his identity via video feed—three times: at the gate, the door, and the entrance to the Hole. The security was impressive. Lauren had ushered them inside, AR-15 at the ready. “This is prepared,” Blake was saying, as Katie stared blankly at her untouched ramen. “Old owners, they had this backyard full of fruit trees, vegetables, fuckin' kale and kohlrabi. What good is that gonna do, I said, you gonna hide in the pumpkin patch with a slingshot? Idiots.  “Anyhow me and Lauren, we wanted to be ready, so I been building this the last two years. Ain't no one knows about it, not even the contractors…” Blake sliced a finger across his throat, then laughed, “I'm joking, but they were from one of them Mexican countries. Had no idea what they were building. Good workers, though, came here the right way. And I did the security all myself.”  Tanner laughed too, but at what he didn't quite know. “You took this all real serious.”  “Yessir. You never really believed, but we did. Earl Swanson was right, this here's been a long time coming. It's just like he said, and we listened. And here we are, while you was laying on the floor waving round that little waterpistol of yours.”  Tanner had listened too, but apparently not well enough. There was only so much time he could watch an angry man on TV shouting about the state of the nation, no matter how prophetic he was turning out to be. Tanner tried to put up a strong front and flex his knowledge. He had listened, dammit.  “Is this it, then? The invasion? Earl said they've been preparing it for years, brainwashing people. Recruiting sympathizers and traitors…”  “It's worse than that. The invasion started way back, we just didn't notice. Well, most of us didn't. Earl did. He tried to warn us, that the aliens'd started infiltrating, landing in remote parts of the country, blending in, looking just like us…” Blake spat. “Well, not quite like us. But close e-fucking-nough, hiding out and biding their time.” “And now it's out in the open…” Tanner looked from his friend's face to his daughter's, scared and staring, and trailed off. He may have been listening, but he sure as hell didn't understand.  “What's happening?” Tanner asked. “We've been laying low at home, locked down and trying to wait out whatever this is. We haven't heard a thing since the power cut out three days back.”  He could feel a surge of emotion building, pent-up adrenaline and stress and fear and loneliness rolling over him in a wave as they were released. His stoicism wobbled.  “We're… Katie's scared and confused, and tired and sick of hiding and we're all alone! What is all this? What's happening?” Tanner realized he was shouting and stopped, taking a deep breath and lowering his voice. “Blake, man, what the hell is going on?” Blake never flinched, just ran his tongue over his teeth in thought while he watched Tanner's outburst through hooded eyes. “Naw, we don't know nothing for sure. Swanson's been off-air for two days, since just after shit started going down. Said he was right, that it sure as shit seemed like those aliens he'd been warning us about were making a move, and the whole fuckin' lot of us did nothing. Well, seems like it blew up in our face. Last thing he said was he's heading somewhere safe to keep broadcasting, and he'd let us know when he found out more,” Blake paused, sucked his teeth, “We've had the TV and radio on non-stop since then, since we fired the generator up. Nothing.”  Lauren lent forward. “There was something, couple days back…”  “Nothing useful,” Blake cut in. He spat. “Same old fuckin' commie stations, same old crap. They took over the channels, emergency broadcasting. Said there was a ‘protest.' Stay inside, all under control, daddy government's here, blah blah,” he laughed “Hell of a protest. More like an insurrection. Doublespeak bullshit.”  “So what's the plan? We hide out? Lay low? Wait for the military?”  “The troops ain't coming, chief.” Blake grimaced, “Alien tentacles go deep. Probably strolling around in general's stars by now, the politicians just handing over the keys. This President'll have us kissing their feet before dinner.  “Nah, if we wanna fight back we can't rely on that fuckin' bunch of secretaries and scribes. We hole up here, wait for instructions.” He laughed again, “Huh, hole up in the Hole. That's funny.”  That grin was starting to get on Tanner's nerves. “Instructions from who? How long is that gonna take? Who's gonna fight back against… this?” “I know some people, from back in the old days. Good people. There's still patriots out there who won't give up this country without a fight.”   Tanner still bristled with questions, but he was starting to feel relieved. There were people in charge, and they had a plan. That was something he could work with. “What if it takes weeks? Months? Do we have food for that long?” Blake settled further into his chair, grinned that cocky grin. “I do, don't know about you.” Before the words were even out of his mouth he was already raising his palms, “Chill out, I'm joking. I'll put it on your tab. You're a lawyer, I know you're good for it. Show him, babe.”  Lauren got up and went over to a large yellow flag hanging on the concrete wall, pulling it aside to reveal a long, narrow room that ended abruptly at a large steel door. She flicked on the light.  “Dry storage,” she said, gesturing at the shelves lining both walls. Packets of ramen, boxes of cereal, rows of whiskey, and gleaming stacks of cans stared down at Tanner. “And cold storage,” Lauren continued as she stepped over to the door, kicking aside two enormous tubs of supplements and pulling it open to reveal a walk-in freezer. Tanner followed her inside as she happily chatted away, showing everything off like a house-proud hen.  “We've got everything we need. Steaks, hotdogs, chili, hamburgers, mac and cheese, chicken parmesan, mashed potatoes--whatever you want. There's a well, too, over the other side, we had that dug last summer. Tastes a bit funny, but it won't hurt you.” Tanner was hardly listening. He had never seen anything like it, never imagined anything on this scale. Blake really had taken preparing for the end of the world seriously. The freezer room was filled, wall to wall, with a treasure trove of gourmet excess; thousands upon thousands of frozen TV dinners.  Tanner stared at his microwaved salmon filet, fries drooping from his fork. Out of habit he was eating in front of the TV with Katie, though the display hadn't changed in… however many days it had been. Just the red, white and blue logo, a tile flipping between ads for pillows, brain pills, and frozen food, and the same scrolling red banner:  Breaking: The United States of America is under attack. Stand by for updates.  Katie was poking at her food silently, barely eating. Still no appetite. Tanner had told her they were safe, told her he wasn't going to let anyone hurt her, told her a hundred times in different ways that she was his precious little girl and he would make sure she was okay. It had made no difference. She had just looked up at him with big, frightened eyes that pulled at Tanner's heart. The only time she had spoken in the past 24 hours was to ask why he had tried to shoot people. Of course she didn't understand. Maybe he should ask Lauren to talk to her.  The TV display glitched, blipped, flicked to static and then to black. Tanner shoveled the fries into his mouth and rubbed his eyes. He'd been staring at a blank TV for too long. He chewed and stretched, squeezing his eyes shut and trying to straighten out his aching back.  Earl Swanson was on TV. Tanner blinked a few times to make sure he was seeing straight. Swanson's shirt was wrinkled, his hair a mess and his signature bowtie slightly crooked, but his face wore that familiar expression of righteously indignant bewilderment. It was him.  “Blake. Blake, get in here!”  Swanson was in what looked like a large living room rather than his usual studio. Bookshelves and a TV cabinet were visible behind him. There were shadows under his eyes and his wrinkles were clearly visible without his usual TV makeup, but his eyes were as sharp as ever. There was a strength to them, piercing the screen, full of faith and fire. It felt like he was in the room. He looked like he'd been in a fight, and won. He was back.  “Good evening America, and welcome to Earl Swanson Tonight.” “Blake!” Blake stuck his head through the door.  “What? I'm working out, give me a…. No shit.” Blake stepped into the room. He was topless, breathing heavily. His stomach was shiny with sweat, pooling and running down the chiseled channels between his well-defined muscles before disappearing behind the low-riding waistband of his camo pants. Tanner realized he was staring and felt his cheeks flush as he snapped his eyes back to his friend's.  “Blake, it's--” “Shut up, I'm trying to listen.” The rebuke slapped Tanner back to the present and back to the TV. He surreptitiously sat a little straighter and sucked in his gut, trying to ignore the heat rising in his face. “...cities up and down the west coast. From Seattle to San Diego, the alien invaders and the traitors from among our own citizens have taken control, sowing chaos and destruction. Order has broken down, and anarchy rules in the streets. Yet we hear nothing but silence from the White House. The elites in Washington won't do anything about this -- they encouraged it. They caused it! “No, it is up to patriotic Americans to stop this existential threat. It is up to us, to you and me and the other patriots out there. If you value the American way of life, if you respect the principles that built the greatest nation ever imagined, if you care about your family and the future of your children, then the time has come to stand up. Your country needs you.  “I have been warning about this day on this very program for years. If you have been listening, you will be prepared for this betrayal. You know what to do. Find other true Americans who are ready to fight for our civilization and our culture. Defend our Western values against this attack by anarchists and aliens who wish to destroy us. They tried to take our guns from us, to disarm us, and failed -- now is the time to use them. Seek out the prepared, the militias, the heroes. Fight back. Show them that we will not allow it. “I will be moving to an undisclosed safe location so I can keep you informed. You know your job. I am doing my part, will you do yours?” Swanson sat erect and defiant, no less commanding for his disheveled appearance. His willpower flowed from the screen in waves, washing over the watchers. It was compelling. It was urgent. It was the only option.  The screen went black.  Swanson's gaze bored into Tanner long after the TV went dark, burning with righteous fire, lip curling with fury. The heat in Tanner's cheeks sharpened, focused, began to spread into his chest and throughout his body. There was only one thought in his mind. “We gotta go.” It took him a second to realize that Blake had spoken the words out loud.  “We do. But where? I don't know anyone like that.” “You know me, and I know people. Don't worry about that. We gotta go to Baker City. I talked to one of my buddies from the marines this morning, he's headed to join one of the militias out east. They might not be big, but they're hard. They're something.” Tanner looked at Blake blankly, unable to quite comprehend what he was being told. Days of no news, no action, now everything all at once.  “But what's in Baker City? Don't you know anyone here? This is where we live, where we have the Hole, where we have a safe base.”  Blake was clearly agitated, shifting from foot to foot.  “It's not safe. Weren't you listening? It's fallen. The military ain't doing jack, like I fuckin' told you they wouldn't.” Blake stopped bouncing and steadied himself. “But my buddy said the boys in Baker held out. It was bloody, but they held strong. If we can get there in a hurry, we can join a caravan heading for Boise.”  “Baker… Boise? What the… Boise?! Surely it's safer in Texas, or… or…”  “Texas? And how far away is that? Look, I don't know nothing about nothing, but I know I ain't looking for safer. All I know is I got buddies in Baker, and they say Boise, and they are the fuckin' resistance. We got our orders, soldier. “The west had been invaded. Destroyed. Gone. You heard Swanson, same as me. Grids are down, water's down, TV's down--mostly, anyway. Sky's half full of fire and smoke, gangs roaming the streets, traitors and aliens taking or breaking whatever they can get their thieving hands on.” Tears came to Blake's eyes.  “It's a fucking mess out there, buddy. Anarchy. They've burned the lot.” It was a lot to chew on. Tanner put a piece of salmon in his mouth.  “I'm not gonna let some filthy aliens take my home, fuck my wife, invade my country, and steal the god damn US of A! The fight is right there, and I'm gonna fight it. Are you?”  Tanner's brain was spinning, but his blood was still hot from Swanson's speech. Blake's fire, delivered standing there half-naked like a Steven Seagal action figure, was rousing something inside him. His country needed him, and he felt the call in his bones. He put down his fork. He swallowed. He rose.  “Of course I'll fight. I'll put a bullet in every alien who steps foot on American soil. I'll put every collaborator in the dirt.” He saw himself, next to Blake, riding shotgun as they made a fighting escape through the streets. He saw a heroic journey to Baker City, filled with danger and righteous violence. He saw a triumphant return, at the head of an army, cleansing his city with purifying flame. And he saw Katie, small and fragile and beautiful. Perfect, and terrified. The flame wavered.  “But I'm fighting for her,” Tanner gestured, “I got my little girl, and I'm not so red-hot on riding out guns blazing to meet these savages with her hanging off my arm. She's the future of this country, and that's a future we have to protect.”  To Tanner's surprise, Blake took a half step back.  “Shit. I know, man. Katie and Lauren, the innocent and the pure. I'm thinking of them, too.” He dropped his shoulders, but held Tanner's gaze. “But it's not safe for them here neither. We're on our own, and all hell has broken loose up top. We fight for them, and they are the reason we have to fight.” Tanner paused, then nodded. He reached out and placed his hand on his friend's shoulder, fingers gripping the sweaty skin.  “Let's go pack the truck.”  As the sun set and twilight brought a low fog creeping across the city, they piled into the Tacoma with as many frozen dinners as they could carry.  Tanner rode in back. Lauren was up front, AR at the ready, while Blake drove, M1A by his side and his Glock taped to the dash. Katie was at Tanner's side, curled up below the window and hidden from view, and Tanner watched over her with his own Glock and a borrowed Remington 870. They were all a little jumpy. He and Lauren had wanted to maintain a shoot-on-sight policy. Blake had been more cautious. According to Swanson, there would be plenty of people collaborating with the aliens. Lights out, engine low, and hopefully they could slip right on by.  No one knew what to expect—Tanner suspected they were all terrified. He certainly was. Even Blake had swapped out his flag bandana for a more understated camo print. He had stashed the red, white and blue fabric in the bed of the truck with the rest of their gear.     They pulled out into streets Tanner knew, but didn't. He had driven them every day, on the way to work, to Katie's school, to church, to the mall. The streets were as familiar as a cold Coke, yet now, in some important way, they were… different. As they left the Hole and drove through the suburb he couldn't quite put his finger on it, but once Blake reached the main street and turned past the bars and shops and take-out joints, it hit him.  The streets were dead. The cars were gone. The steady flow of traffic, of people living their lives, had stopped. The parking lot in front of the drug store was empty; so was the one behind the bar. The convenience store, normally ticking over with a steady stream of customers buying cigarettes and beer, was dark behind its windows. Unintelligible graffiti in some alien script covered the ads for energy drinks, an expression of mindless violence across someone's hard work.  A light rain had started, misting around them and adding to the dreariness. A billboard loomed overhead, the lights that illuminated the Colgate-bright smiles of the models now permanently dark. Tanner was glad—the gloom obscured the flame-scarred destruction streaking the toothpaste company's perfect white message. “Disgusting,” Blake spat. He looked like he wanted to say more but pulled up short, shocked at the sudden sound of his own voice. His eyes focused back on the road and he fell into uneasy silence. The truck continued its crawl down the deserted street, barely clocking 20 miles an hour. Even at that speed, the low growl of the engine seemed unbearably loud as it reverberated among the carcasses of commerce and ricocheted down abandoned side streets.  They kept driving, and nothing kept happening. It was torturous. Every minute of unbroken inactivity twisted the crank on the tension in the car, until the unceasing hum of the engine began to seep into Tanner's brain. Every muscle in his arms and legs, primed and waiting and ready to spring, began to tremble, and his eyes focused and unfocused on nothing at all.  His frantic heartbeat messed with his breathing, a powerful panicked thud that matched the rumble of the pistons.  Overall, he was relieved when the road curved and they entered a strip of restaurants to see signs of life among the debris littered across the street in the distance.  It wasn't immediately clear through the gloom what was happening. Blake slowed the truck, now rolling along at barely more than walking pace, and they crept closer. The scene was illuminated by the flickering light of small fires and backlit by a pair of enormous floodlights, creating a glowing aura in the surrounding mist. Images began to resolve, ghostly figures flitting in and out of view and the harsh geometric shapes—not of debris, but of hastily manufactured barricades—throwing long shadows that lanced through the air around them as they approached.  All eyes were fixed on the barricades as they pulled within shouting distance, and Tanner nearly pissed himself when someone knocked on his window. He yelped, Blake swore, and Lauren's weapon x-rayed Tanner's head and pointed at the intruder. Tanner followed her lead and jerked his gun up to aim in the general direction of the window and for ten, twenty heartbeats nothing moved. Then another knock, and Blake hissed at them: “Put those things away you idiots, we're the good guys here. Whatever side that guy is on, so are we.”  Tanner slowly lowered the gun, then the window.  “Hey folks, no cars through here.” The man was clad head to toe in black—black jeans, black hoodie, black gloves, black bandana covering his face, black curly hair running with rainwater. No wonder they hadn't seen him. The stranger spotted their guns.  “Oh, nothing like that,” he added, catching the nervous energy in the truck, “You're a bit late to the party. No trouble ‘round here, this area's been cleaned out for days.” He chuckled, sending a shiver through Tanner.  “Some folks messed up the cop shop a while back, it was a bit of a fight. Streets were all blocked up anyway, so we set up a little kitchen here. Been feeding some folks. Symbolic, like, new world in the ruin of the old and all that.” The smile fell from his face as he took in the scene in the truck.  “Everything alright? Is she okay?”  He gestured at Katie, curled up and quivering silently beside Tanner. Tanner opened his mouth to respond, but Blake was quicker. “Sure, probably just spooked by that fucking mask. Look, we don't mean to bother you people. Just heading east, trying to cross the river. We'll go around you and your little kitchen.”  If the man took issue with Blake's tone, it didn't show.  “Bridge is a no-go, I'm afraid. Pigs blew the cables as they pulled out, some of it collapsed. It's way too unstable to cross.” He scratched at his temple. “What d'you want out that way, anyway? There's dangerous people out there, not exactly safe for… families.”  “We're heading for, uh, Hood River,” Tanner spoke up, “Taking supplies out to the girl's grandparents.”  “Indians,” Blake chimed in, “they need the help.” He winked at Tanner.  The stranger turned to Blake and met his eyes, holding his gaze for an unnerving moment. Then he seemed to resolve some internal discussion, relaxing his shoulders. “Well, you might be able to get across up St. Johns, last I heard the bridge was still intact. There's some folks in the park up there, you can ask them.”  “St. Johns? That's the wrong fucking way!”  “A bridge is a bridge. It's that or swim, champ.” “Can you at least call the, uh, your boss? Tell him you checked us out, ask if we can get across?”  The man smiled, but something hardened behind his eyes.  “My boss? Sure, sure. Look, I think it's time you moved on. Head on up there and tell ‘em what you told me, they'll let you out. There's a bunch of poor Indians waiting for their dinner.”  There was something strange about the way the man said “Indians,” but he patted the hood of the truck and turned away, waving them down a side street away from the barricade. As Blake slowly drove off, Tanner collapsed back into his seat and quickly rolled up the window. His underarms were cold with sweat, and he relaxed muscles he hadn't known were clenched.  Blake took the turn the stranger indicated, muttering that if he heard anyone say “folks” again he would hit them. Tanner stared out the window at the “little kitchen” as they passed. There must have been a couple hundred people, milling around a dozen or so small fires. They were all loosely centered around a large tent directly in front of the scorched skeleton of the precinct. Laughter and music drifted through the open window, and Tanner closed it. He didn't think he could see any aliens, but it was difficult to tell in the dark.  “Collaborators. Must be a ration station or something,” he muttered, mostly to himself.  Lauren heard him. “No, this has been going on much longer than that, it just wasn't so out in the open. Swanson warned us about it. He said they lure hungry people in with food.”  “Yeah,” cut in Blake, “this is how they recruit ‘em. Set up a kitchen, give ‘em food, homeless and crackheads and queers, mostly. Drugs too, probably, and spewing their propaganda. That guy was probably one of the junkies. Sure as shit looked like it, you see the way he stared at me?”  Tanner shuddered. A junkie. He had an overwhelming urge to wash his hands. He remembered the way the man had talked about the police station, his manic laugh in the face of such violence, and glanced back at the quickly fading light. And saw a small figure, tottering at the edge of the firelight. A child.  “Disgusting,” he said out loud.  “Yeah, disgusting. It's like Earl said,” Blake continued, “they been feeding people right under our fucking noses.”  They drove on toward the bridge. The streets were more cluttered here, both with people and the remnants of the riots, and they could only manage a slow pace as they picked their way through the destruction. Blake had to swerve to the wrong side of the road to avoid a group of people carrying trash bags, picking through the rubble.  “Looking for something to eat,” he grunted, and locked the doors.  Signs of violence were everywhere. Tanner's chest tightened as they drove past the law firm where he had started his career—the job that had brought him to the city after he finished college, working for his father's best friend and learning his profession. Inside the shattered windows it was nothing but a shell, the desks overturned and the computers gone. No one would be working there any more.  The destruction was completely random. Violence for its own sake. Beside the firm was a pawn shop, covered in graffiti and looted. Next to that, a Vietnamese restaurant, completely unharmed except for ‘Delicious, 5 stars' sprayed on the pavement outside. Across the road was an untouched convenience store and a bookshop with its doors wide open, light flooding out and people crowding the entrance. A donut shop and an Apple store destroyed, a mechanic and a bar looking like they had simply closed for the night. There was absolutely no pattern or reason to it.  They saw a Fred Meyers with every window broken, the front door jammed open with a twisted shopping cart. A movement caught Tanner's eye and he saw someone leaving from a side door, carrying a huge bag of stolen food. He hoped Blake didn't see—he might do something stupid, and Tanner didn't want to stop. It wasn't safe.  They made it a few more blocks when Lauren gasped and grabbed Blake's arm, making him brake. She gestured across the intersection to a KFC. Half the building had collapsed in what must have been an enormous fire; the half that still stood had been savagely attacked. She pointed to the entrance with a shaking finger. Someone—or something—had toppled the giant bucket sign and sent it crashing through the ceiling of the kitchen. Above the door, someone had scrawled a message in red spray paint:  FUCK YOU SANDERS OUR SECRET SPICES NOW There were more barricades set up near the bridge. Where the others had been makeshift, marking a boundary, these were more serious. They were to stop people getting through. Blake slowed before they got too close to the blockade, which they could now see was lined by shapes that very much suggested people. On both sides of the road the land fell away into darkness, sloping down to become a park that ran beneath the bridge.  The park itself, a rare green space normally dotted with dog walkers and children, was transformed. The once-quiet lawns were a mass of tents and makeshift structures, stages and bars and sound systems, the proud trees now decked out with effigies and lights. Fires burned everywhere, and the distant space was carpeted with a swarming mass of humanity, undulating to a throbbing cacophony of noise.  “This doesn't look good,” said Blake. He pulled over, a hundred yards or so short of the bridge.  “That guy said they would let us through,” said Tanner, “if we stick to our story.”  “He was a junkie,” scoffed Lauren.  “But he thought we were working with them,” said Tanner, “he had no reason to lie to us.”  “I guess it's worth a try. Anyway, they ain't gonna try anything against this much firepower.” Blake grunted. “Too late to change our minds now. They've seen us.”  He nodded at the barricade, where two shapes had detached from the mass. They moved toward the Tacoma, and Blake responded by flicking the lights to high beam and heading to meet them. As Blake swung back out into the road the beams cut through the darkness to illuminate the figures, throwing wild shadows from the two shapes until the truck steadied course and they coalesced into recognisable forms. One was a large man, white, with a nose ring and a loosely-tied blond ponytail. He was wearing a plaid shirt and carrying a large rifle. The other—Tanner's throat caught—the other looked like one of the aliens.  “Shit,” said Blake, as the headlights picked out at least half a dozen more shapes along the barricade, several with big guns visible. “Fuck.” He stopped the truck and rolled down the window, then cursed again and threw open the door.  “I'll be fucked if I'm gonna sit here and be pulled over like some criminal. Tanner, you're with me—let's go meet them man to man.” Tanner scrabbled for the door handle and chased after Blake, half-skipping to catch up. They pulled up a few paces before colliding with the approaching party. The blond man stepped forward.  “How's it going, dude?” he said.  “We need to get to Hood River,” said Blake, “we're trying—” “Yeah, we heard.” The man cut him off. “Bridge is closed to traffic, unfortunately. You wanna cross, you'll have to walk.”  Blake bristled. “Are you joking? We need to bring all this stuff. It's… important,” he objected. “You can't just keep people here!”  “We could,” said the blond man, calmly. He sounded confident in his assertion. Looking at the line of men—and women, Tanner realized—standing along the barricade, he agreed.  “But we're not,” the man continued. “You can go wherever you want. Take your shit, cross the bridge. Some folks have organized buses up the river, they'll take you. But the truck stays.”  “But that's my fucking truck!” Blake squealed. The man's eyebrows shot up and Tanner laid a hand on Blake's shoulder, squeezing it and hoping he got the message. The stranger paused, then sighed.  “Look, I'm sorry dude. I love my truck, too. But there was an attack at another camp last night by these so-called freedom fighters,” he grimaced. “Militia wackjobs, really. Word is they are gathering across the river, and we can't risk weapons and vehicles falling into the wrong hands. Especially not an arsenal like you folks got here.”  The alien stepped forward and, much to Tanner's surprise, spoke in perfect American English.  “Don't worry, it'll be here when you get back. We'll take real good care of it for you. They will appreciate the help guarding the buses and I'm sure they'll be more than happy to help you move these… important supplies.”  They signaled to the group at the barricade and two more figures made their way into the light of the truck's high beams. The first was a slim Black man in fatigues, wearing a red beret at a jaunty angle and carrying a AR-style rifle in one hand. The other was a woman, tall and imposing. She wore a leather jacket over a long black dress, which was slit to the thigh to reveal hints of slim, bare legs that stretched from the pavement to the heavens. Tanner blinked rapidly and swallowed. He had always had a soft spot for long legs in thigh-slit dresses.  As they came closer the man nodded at Tanner and Blake, but he was not what held their attention. The woman with the legs from God was also rocking a luxurious mustache that would have put Teddy Roosevelt to shame. As Tanner's eyes bulged, she caught his gaze and winked.  “Hello, boys. I'm Sunshine, they/them. I'll be with you on the bus.”  Tanner didn't know how to react. A fuzzy memory bounced around in the back of his head. “An investigation on college campuses found that increasing numbers of American citizens are using pronouns.” Earl's bewildered face frowned, then puckered. “These ‘theys' and ‘thems' are making a mockery of the American tradition, seeking to spread their insidious ideology among good, hard-working citizens, brainwashing young Americans into adopting these ‘pronouns.' What's next, people identifying a different age? A different race? We need to speak out against this perverse trend and most importantly, keep them away from our children.” _ That was it. These were the pronouns Swanson had warned them about. He gripped his gun and glanced at Blake, trying to get his mental footing.  Blake looked shocked, too, but quickly pulled himself together. He threw Tanner a sly look, one that hinted at an idea. “Give us a minute,” he snapped, and pulled away from Tanner, back to the truck. When they were both inside he turned on the occupants with a spark in his eyes.  “They must be talking about my boys, alive and kicking,” the old grin was back, his excitement barely contained. “Must have set up in the woods. We'll head over and find ‘em. Maybe they got word from Earl. If they're here, and they're fighting, maybe we don't have to go all the way to Boise after all.” “What's going on?” Lauren looked confused.  “We're leaving the truck. Grab the shit, cross the bridge, hijack their fucking commie-wagon and strike out east. Either we find them in Baker, or our boys find us first.”  Tanner was still coming to grips with the situation. “What about… them?” he said.  “Who?” “They… them. In the dress, with the pronouns!”  “And what are they going to do, stop us? You ever tried to fight wearing something like that? No. The four of us, across the bridge, grab the bus, easy.” “Katie's not hijacking any bus. She's eight, for God's sake. Maybe she and Lauren should stay here…”  “You stay here with Katie,” Lauren snapped, cutting Tanner off. “If you think it's safer, if you're looking for safer, you take her for a nice walk in the park down there. I'll be with my husband, taking my country back from these freaks.”  “I know you want to keep Katie safe,” Blake added, almost apologetically, “but you saw what it's like out there. You heard Swanson's warnings. These aren't people, they're animals, aliens. She's your baby fuckin' girl, man. You do what you're at peace with, but my wife sure as shit ain't staying here to get felt up by some dick in a dress.”  Tanner looked at Lauren. “But she's just a kid! What if she gets hurt.”  “What if she gets hurt _here? So you look after her. Be a man,” Lauren spat back.    Blake clapped Tanner on the shoulder and held his gaze. “It's do or die time, soldier. Let's get the fuck outta here, hook up with the resistance, then bring back the fury of God and freedom and the USA to take back this city and liberate my God damn truck!” Tanner looked at Katie, curled up in the footwell, and wanted to object. He wanted to take her somewhere safe, back to the Hole, where it was warm and they could hide from the aliens and the bad people and they had all the food they could need and they could wait for this all to be over.  But the fire in his belly wouldn't let him. He knew Blake was right, he knew that he should be ashamed of his moments of weakness. He saw Lauren gripping her rifle and staring at Blake with faith and devotion in her eyes and he knew that was the kind of man he wanted to be. Tanner breathed a silent promise to keep Katie safe, no matter the cost.  “Let's do it.” Blake pulled the truck up to the group of guards and they all piled out, Tanner standing straight and feeling tall, Blake's words ringing in his ears. It's do or die time. _ Two of the barricade guards came over to help them unload while the others stood around and watched, their mustachioed escort who made Tanner's skin crawl and the large blond man. Traitor. They stripped off the tray covering and began shifting gear, Blake and blondie up above handing packages down to everyone else. Tanner heard the guards muttering to each other.  “Holy shit, that's a lot of firepower.” The blond man snorted. “And a lot of nasty-ass TV dinners. Important supplies, my ass.”  Sunshine shrugged. “Folks eat what they eat. Not everyone lives in a Whole Foods and learned to make Tom Yum on their gap year,” they rebuked him. The man grimaced and scratched his jaw. “Yeah, right. That was unfair of me. Well, Thai cooking workshop tomorrow and I'll make a big pot, so at least folks here don't have to eat that frozen stuff… unless they want to.” They busied themselves unloading, bundling food and weapons into bags or tying them together for ease of carrying. Tanner was tying the straps of his backpack and settling it on his back when he heard a curse from the back of the truck. He glanced up, and, frozen in time, watched the next few seconds helplessly.  The blond man had pulled out one of the last few satchels, the one containing all their spare clothes. He was standing upright, arms held out, nose ring quivering in silent outrage. In his left hand he had Blake's flag bandana; in his right, Blake's spare jacket, rebel flag patch sitting proudly on the shoulder.  Blake reacted fastest. He dropped the food he was holding, raised his Glock, and with a vengeful crack the blond ponytail exploded in a spray of red.  The man in the beret raised his rifle and fired two shots into Blake's chest, sending him flying from the tray. A scream burst from Lauren as she reached for her gun, but the alien matched the sound and met her with a powerful tackle, sending both of them crashing into a pile of frozen hamburgers. Sunshine reached out and grabbed Tanner's arm. Time snapped back into motion for Tanner. He instinctively pulled away and shook his arm free of the grasping fingers. Stepping back, he spun and swung his fist in a wild roundhouse. It connected with Sunshine's jaw as they overbalanced toward him. Tanner watched them collapse in a heap. His gaze danced over the chaos unfolding around him, frantically searching for Katie. _There. Tanner picked her up and ran.  They plunged off the road and into the darkness. There was only one thought in his mind: get Katie across that bridge. She was sobbing, shaking in his grasp, and Tanner made what he hoped were comforting shushing noises as he ran. He knew this park—there was a staircase inside one of the support towers that rose from the park to the bridge overhead. That was his way out. Holding Katie tightly, breath ragged, he ran toward the orgy of light and noise pulsating below.  The two escapees burst into the mass of people. Tanner looked around, eyes darting, taking in the madness and trying to get his bearings. The sensory assault was overwhelming, but he slowly made out patterns in the polyrhythmic press. What had looked from above like a continuous swell of humanity was actually a hundred, a thousand separate groups and camps and parties. People flowed freely between them, groups forming and merging and coming apart in a chaotic, everchanging anarchy. A makeshift stage to his left throbbed with bass, colliding with the bone-jarring screams and guitars of a group of punks. Tanner found himself surrounded by ecstatic dancers, while a group almost under his feet sat staring into a campfire, oblivious to the rest of the world. He crashed through their doped-out reverie and bounced off two men, locked in a hungry embrace.  Tanner recoiled and turned away, shielding Katie with his body, searching desperately for the tower that would lead him out of this nightmare. Lights flashed, blinding, creating a sort of slideshow of horror as Tanner scanned the crowd. There. He found it. His escape from this festival of the damned. He soldiered on, caught up in a whirl of half-naked dancers, men, women, and everyone else, mindless of the frigid air as they span and writhed in rapture.  Tanner spotted an exit, an island of calm, and dove for it. He exploded from the throng, gasping for air, and breathed in the relative silence. Collecting himself, he was faced with rows of bodies, still, staring at something unseen up ahead, the very air trembling with collective anticipation.  A voice shattered his uneasy reprieve, loud and bombastic and dripping with drama.  “And now, my darlings, it is time for these fuckers to do what I do best—go down!” Tanner dashed through the crowd as they roared and surged into motion, and caught a glimpse of the scene ahead: two lines of people, straining on thick ropes, as a woman in lingerie and feathers pranced like a princess of hell before them. The ropes led upwards, where they were tied around the necks of two enormous metal figures. Lewis and Clark.  Tanner broke into a full sprint, shouldering bodies aside. He was almost there. Up ahead, rising from the chaos, was his stairway to the heavens. His legs trembled and his breath came in ragged sobs, but he couldn't slow down. Not when he was so close. He tore out of the crowd and into the comforting darkness of the spaces in between. His hysterical panic began to subside. One foot in front of the other. Keep running. They were going to make it. As he neared the tower a figure came into view at the base, looming from the shadows of the doorway, staring into the blackness beyond. A stocky, muscled figure wearing fatigues and a plate carrier. It couldn't be… “Blake! Blake, thank God.” Tears welled in Tanner's eyes as he reached his friend. Lauren was nowhere to be seen, but right now Tanner couldn't think about her. He had survived, and he had brought Katie through. His heartbeat was still frantic, but from exertion rather than fear. They were here. He, Katie, and Blake. Emotionally exhausted, physically spent, battered and terrified, but alive. They were going to be okay. He reached out to his friend. Blake turned—No, not Blake. A thick black beard engulfed the shadowy face, momentarily lit by the glowing ember of a huge cigar. The eyes were deep-set and dark, the skin weathered, wrinkled, brown. The face of an illegal alien.  Tanner's throat betrayed him. He squeaked, and nothing more would come out. His knees wobbled and threatened to give way, his feet froze in place. He wavered. He whimpered.  Puffing on the cigar, the alien took in his terrified face and the little girl slung over his shoulder. He gestured toward the doorway and blew out an enormous plume of smoke.  “Go, gringo.”  It was well past midnight when Katie ran into the side of a tent, fell on her bottom, and started crying. They had crossed the bridge, left the highway, and headed for the safety of the forest. Since then they had been wandering among the trees for hours, directionless, driven by fear, then by hope, then exhausted aimlessness. Tanner wasn't going anywhere except away from that park. He had briefly entertained the image of finding a group of militia, sitting around a fire, eating and laughing and, maybe, swapping stories with their old friend Blake. That was hours ago. Visions were fleeting in the fever dream of the forest. Since then, they had walked because they didn't know what else to do. Tanner stumbled over to Katie and collapsed beside her, holding her close and hushing her. He felt like crying too.  A flashlight clicked on inside the tent and a dreadlocked head poked out of the flap.  “Hey, there's someone here!” Rustling erupted from all around and more faces appeared. “Wasn't someone keeping watch?” “I thought you were.” “Doesn't matter, doesn't matter. Someone's crying.” “You folks okay?” Tanner and Katie were soon surrounded by a small group of people. He looked up at them. “Are you the militia?” “No, don't worry. You're safe here. We're friends.” “Although I guess we are a militia if you think about it. Sort of.”  “Shh, don't confuse the poor people. They're terrified.”  “Sorry. No, no militia. Someone get them a blanket and something to drink.” Minutes later, Tanner and Katie were wrapped in sleeping bags, sipping on hot cocoa. It was scalding and familiar and Tanner felt the tension of the past day fading, leaving bone-deep exhaustion in its place.  “Are you okay? What happened?” “Thank you. We were… we just need to sleep.”  “And you? What's your name? Are you alright?” Katie looked at her dad, then stared up from her tin mug. “I'm Katie. I'm scared.” “You're safe now. We'll help you. Look, we'll get you somewhere to sleep.” The first face they had seen rummaged around in a tent and brought out a bag. “Lucky we have a spare tent. I'll just put it up, won't be a second.” The tent was almost up by the time Tanner and Katie finished their drinks, and they got up and walked over, sleeping bags over their shoulders, holding hands. “Hey, thanks,” Tanner said. “I would have helped but I don't really know how. Never had much call for camping. I am, uh, was a lawyer,” he glanced around, “not criminal, uh… intellectual property. Copyright.”  “No problem, of course. Here, it's not hard. I'm just clipping the…” “This isn't the time for camping lessons, Jacob. Anyway, you'll scare the man, sharing information for free like that. They've been through enough already.”  “Sorry, yeah. Look, slide in. Take these sleeping mats. It'll do for tonight, I'll teach you tomorrow.”  Tanner and Katie squeezed into the tent, sleeping bags huddled together on the cold, hard ground, and slept. THE END **Inmn ** 1:03:01 Hello, and welcome to the show. Thank you so much for coming on today. Could you introduce yourself with your name, pronouns, and just a little bit about what you do in the world? **Matt ** 1:03:15 Yeah, hi, I'm Matt. He/him pronouns. And I'm a student again, after a really long time, actually, which is why I've just moved to where I'm living now. But I like to write, you know, mostly for me, and this is the first first thing I've published but I enjoy it. And yeah, I'm really grateful that you've taken an interest in it. **Inmn ** 1:03:37 Yeah, totally. I love the story. So we just listened to the second half of your story, Blood, Soil and Frozen TV Dinners and even though listeners just heard...just heard the whole story, I'm wondering if you could just kind of like walk us through the story in your--you know, from the mouth of the author--what is this story about? **Matt ** 1:04:01 So the story, for me, was about, to some extent, seeing yourself in some ways or, you know, people like you, through the eyes of...through the eyes of someone else, I guess, someone who's very different and might see things in a different way. So I always find it interesting to play with different perspectives or different characters instead of telling the story from a heroic perspective or something. And I wondered what a pathway to a better world might look like from someone who didn't necessarily want that to happen. So we have these, you know, preppers who--call them you want, right-wing conservatives, something like this--and what they might think, given the knowledge that they receive about the world, what they might think is happening when something happens that a lot of the rest of us might want. **Inmn ** 1:05:00 Yeah, totally. I really like how you put that. What was it, like, "a better world that they don't necessarily want?" [both laugh] Okay, well, how did this, how did this story kind of...like how did it come to be? What inspiration did you kind of draw from to craft this situation or these like personalities from Tanner and Blake or Earl Swanson? 1:05:35 Yeah, the story itself, there was a discussion last Halloween, I believe it was, on Coffee With Comrades, there was a interview with Pearson and Margaret Killjoy, talking about the discussion of the monster in literature, which is where I first took the idea that they were talking about seeing yourself as the monster in this idea and sometimes reveling in that or perhaps enjoying it. And that was where the first idea came from. And then the most specific layout of the story or main theme, I guess, was, I was doing something on the US Tax Office website. And there's this whole section for aliens, right, if you're an alien in the U.S., these are the tax rules you need to follow. And I just thought it was a funny word. You know, I'd seen it on Fox News or something before but it just struck me as really weird in such an official position. Yeah, and I just was playing with the ideas of this and, you know, I like thinking about utopias and things. And this is where the like the main shape of the story had come from, just the idea of seeing the monster, seeing the alien from there. And then specific characters, I mean, some of them are just kind of people that I've met, you know, Tanner and Blake, specifically, and I think Earl Swanson's character, I mean--I don't know it's possibly libelous--but we can probably figure out who that's meant to be, right? I think it's reasonably obvious. **Inmn ** 1:07:09 Totally, totally. Yeah. Yeah. No, that's super interesting. Yeah, it's funny, I was rereading the story today to prepare for this interview and I realized that the first time that I was reading it, because of this perspective of the.... I'm like, okay, I know, these are some, you know, at least center-right, far-right preppers and they're using the word "alien" and I don't actually know what they mean by this, which was, you know, maybe a purposeful being vague about it, but I was like, I don't know if they think that it's, you know, illegal aliens or undocumented  migrants or whatever or if they mean, like, literal from outer space aliens. And, yeah, I was like, I don't know what they mean by what they're talking about. And maybe they don't either.   1:08:20 This was part of the conceit, right, was setting it up like it's a pretend big reveal, I think, that it's a twist in the story that at some point gets revealed, but that's not really the point. It's not really meant to be a big trick or something like this, you know? I think in discussions in the editing, we talked about in the first page or so when they speaking Arabic, and it's reasonably obvious to anyone that knows Arabic who these people are, you know, it's not hidden, but this was the idea, that they may have meant illegal alien all along, was, you know, the way they we're using the term, but that they weren't necessarily drawing so much of a distinction between the two uses of the word alien, that in their minds a, sort of, invasion by one was the same as the invasion by the other to some extent. **Inmn ** 1:09:10 Yeah, which, you know, I actually really love that from the perspective of.... It's like maybe an interesting twist. I didn't listen to that interview with Pearson and Margaret, so I'm not sure what they talked about, but there's this kind of idea in a lot of spaces that I've been part of,you know, when people talk about things like assimilation or something, especially in queer spaces, of like, "We have to seem harmless to them. We have to seem innocent. We have to seem like we just want to be part of the group," you know, and then this other side that's like, "No, we want to be unknowable. We are claiming the monstrosity that they are putting on us," and I'm like, yeah, we're fucking.... I don't know, anarchists are kind of aliens, like, in an entirely other way of thinking, you know? 1:10:09 Yeah, and just considering some social norms is completely irrelevant or harmful or repressive and other things that other people would consider, perhaps, violent or something seem completely okay to other people. There is a complete sort of alienation of perspective from broader society, I think. And yeah, it is, there's a tension between sometimes wanting to go unnoticed, or, as you say, like assimilate, and even, for me, walking around, you know, sometimes you want to look like an anarchist and sometimes you don't. It's an interesting dynamic, I guess, that you can switch sometimes day-to-day. **Inmn ** 1:10:54 Yeah, yeah. Have you read much of--you know, love talking about this person on the show--have you read much of Ursula Le Guin's Hainish Cycle? 1:11:08 I've read only "The Dispossessed" and "The Left Hand of Darkness".  **Inmn ** 1:11:16 Great examples. I think "The Left Hand of Darkness," kind of brings out this idea of where the reader is going to maybe most identify with the alien, or whatever, in "The Left Hand of Darkness" being not the not the Gethens--or I don't remember what they're called. But then it's like, the more that we're reading the book... or there's some times where I'm this alien or, you know, our perspective person just doesn't understand this culture. And that's really painful. And then there are other times when I'm like, I don't know, maybe the alien's perspectives on the world are far more dissimilar to what a normal person on like our planet Earth would think, because they're advocating for a better world that is very alien to people on this planet. Does that make sense? **Matt ** 1:12:24 Yeah, I mean, in "The Dispossessed," I think it's the same dynamic with Shevak coming back to Earth and presenting the perspective, both ways that it seems incredibly alien to him and then the other way around to everyone else that's there, to the general culture there. Yeah. I think it's an interesting literary device to present the outsider point of view, I think, which I mean, is quite the opposite of what I did in this story, I presented the more mainstream point of view, I guess, but from the circles that we're in, it's funny to see from the outside what that looks like. **Inmn ** 1:13:02 Yeah, yeah, I had this very silly idea once for...I don't know if it was gonna be a short story or what but kind of, using that "alien" trope or like "Stranger in a Strange Land" trope as a way to talk to my parents about anarchism or about radical queer spheres. **Matt ** 1:13:27 Yeah, I mean, that's about as alien as it can get for a lot of people's parents, right. **Inmn ** 1:13:31 Totally. But just as some funny little zine that's like an introduction to the punk house, you know? **Matt ** 1:13:44 Yeah, viewed as some sort of interesting zoo creatures. **Inmn ** 1:13:46 Yeah. I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about the kind of political renderings of Tanner and Blake or ,rather, their differences in how they perceive or interact with either preparedness or this new world that they're encountering? **Matt ** 1:14:14 Yeah, I think that Blake's character is a lot.... He knows what he's doing, right? It's a lot more intentional and more--I guess educated is maybe not quite the right word--but a lot more of an actually constructed ideology, whereas for Tanner it's very much received. He's not so keen, not so entirely sold on the idea or doesn't necessarily know the idea. It feels like it's like lost and failing a lot of the time and I think that's why I found him a much more interesting character because that's how I feel a lot of people that I know and talk to and family members and friends and things or friends of people I know get pulled into a lot of these, you know, reactionary ideologies is kind of by accident a lot of the time, right? Because it's what's presented and what they're drawn into by someone who has a lot more investment in it than they do. And they just kind of bumble into it almost by accident. Yeah. **Inmn ** 1:15:20 Because it's what they're seeing on TV. People who are deeper into that philosophy are like.... It's like the people that they're around who are their own little echo chambers of, "Oh, okay, there's this thing happening. Not sure how I feel about it. But I'm being like, fed this perspective on it." **Matt ** 1:15:46 Yeah, and a lot of the social or interpersonal issues that draw people in as well, I think. I tried to make it seem relatively obvious that Tanner is envious of Blake in a lot of ways, right? He is, you know, hotter than him and he is cooler than him and he knows more than him and he's always trying to, like, live up to this ideal that he has just completely interpersonally with no politics or anything in it. And he just wants to live up to what he thinks Blake wants him to be, which it turns out, is a bad thing. I mean, I'm not trying to excuse Tanner's character too much here. But yeah, I think this is what's really dangerous a lot of the time actually, for people who don't necessarily have a fully formed belief in all of these philosophical systems or something that then puts them on the wrong side not by...not necessarily out of evil intention. **Inmn ** 1:16:54 Yeah. No, that's very true. And it's interesting talking about not excusing Tanner's character too much, but as I was reading the story I found myself like, not necessarily rooting for Tanner and Bl

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