And this time we really are back again. So we're going to talk a little bit about better Sanchez-Perez and migrant justice and things to which we may not have been attentive, but should be in the future. There was a judiciary committee hearing on fair and impartial policing. We're going to talk a bit about that, and it will reflect back with the migrant justice. Legislature's back. H3 about ethnic and social studies standards, Bill, should have gone through House Education Committee today with some final revisions on language. We'll talk some about that. And the budget appropriation should have been approved. Should go to the floor tomorrow. We're also going to talk a little bit about minimum wage. And as you're watching Orca, look for the House Human Services Committee discussion on preserving the right to abortion. Could be enlightening. And then a little talk about a CDC report that came out about transgender high school students, high school students. Federal administration, they're proposing a real change to Medicare D that will change the requirement for inclusion in drug classifications and what this means for people with HIV and AIDS is they may no longer have access to retroviral treatment. Events coming up. What Ann has brought us is every February for the past two years, JAG Productions has invited African-American theater artists to spend a week in White River Junction. And they will be doing performances starting on Friday, February 8, when they will be doing the play The Last Day of Black History Month, a conversation with a naked black southern lesbian. I'll be waiting for photographs. And they're going to produce these staged readings. It's $20 per ticket.  And just if I may also, the wrinkle is. She's on a roll. It says there's no way on the website, if you wanted to get the $50 deal, which Lynn and I did, you have to say you're going to go for each show for $20 and then magically the price changes to $12.50. So it's a little wrinkle if you have trouble calling them. But don't be discouraged. Should be great. I'm very excited about it. As if by lesbian magic. Yes. So other events. Monday, February 11, 6 PM at the Montpellier Senior Center, you might have heard about Stonewall having a 50th anniversary, and perhaps people are trying to organize an event here in Vermont. Pride Center, actually by the time this airs, this event will have occurred. It's on Friday from 3 to 5.30. Needs and assessments of older LGBTQ Vermonters. Ann and Linda are going, I'm mentioning it because we're going to want to hear from them on the next show what was discussed. A mention for the Pride Center that every Wednesday from 4.30 to 5.30, they have their peer support group for LGBTQ people living with disabilities. And it's one of the things that we just don't promote enough. Morrisville at their community center, Monday, February 11, is their transgender support group. And then it meets every two weeks. Fundraisers, Saturday, February 9, Green Mountain Cabaret Burlesque Variety Show, 8 PM Flynn Space, benefit the Flynn's Art Scholarship. Saturday, February 19, is the 24th. And you will winter is a drag sponsored by the House of LeMay to benefit the People with AIDS Coalition. And there's an event at positive pie on February 22 at 9.30. And it's part of the proceeds will go to benefit Stonewall 50 celebration. And I have no trivia question for this week, but Sunday the 27th was Holocaust Remembrance Day. So yeah, I'm going to be talking about it. I have some headlines. You've got a lot of headlines. I certainly do. I have news from the gay penguin community. I've missed them. Well, they're back. All right. Angola decriminalizes same sex conduct. I'm starting out with good news. Three billboards campaign targets gay conversion therapy in China. Now some what's good news. Brazilian lawmaker steps down. Trans people must still be sterilized before changing gender in Japan. Egypt sentences a TV host to jail over a gay interview. Then these are stories I may not get to, but then again I may. Bali's LGBT pageant avoids the limelight amid public prejudice. But they are so these activists were crowned in secret. And I have a picture of them. And I'll return to that story perhaps.  And I have a very creepy picture of that. Suspect arrested, finally, over the murders of the Bangladesh LGBT activists. They were hacked to death in 2016 in there.  I have a picture before you. Now of the murder victim, Hulhas Manan. People have been arrested. No one has been charged. And finally, kind of an upbeat note, stiletto races and hula hoops at the Pride Festival in Myanmar. So those are my headlines. OK, that's the one for which I would want pictures. I know it. I couldn't get a picture. It was maddening. So that's your news. And the penguins are going to be first. Penguins are going to lead up the lineup. Well, there was sad news and late breaking news about Jussie Smollett, one of the stars of the TV series, Empire. Supreme Court ruling on transgender people in the military. Arizona gives transgender employees less health care than their working partners. So Russell Tomey, a professor of the University of Arizona, has filed a class action suit. South Dakota kills a bill that would have attacked transgender students. The HB 49 would have bought trans athletes for competing in school athletics. Florida LGBT community is going to civil war over non-discriminatory protections. Dallas venue refuses a gay couple. It gets banned from major winning planner website. Utah bill blocks gender changes on any birth certificates. South Bend mayor Pete Buttengieg is running for the nomination of president, and he's gay. So that would be a first. Missouri, a few weeks ago reported about the two women, married women, lesbians, who were trying to get into a senior living arrangement. And they went to court, and their suit was denied. I haven't heard whether they'll appeal this or not. The retirement community was a community of faith, as I recall. Yeah, it was a community of faith. That religious freedom stuff. I don't know if it was like, well, anyway. I think it was, but not like in that extreme kind of Catholic, something or other, but anyway. San Francisco is starting an art center for LGBTQ people. This will be the first, and will be the permanent home of the gay men's chorus. The choir acquired the building, and they're establishing a center there in stages. So they're doing a few things now, and I think they're planning on buying a few other buildings. And they want to just do a big LGBTQ art center. So that's kind of exciting.  And the right wing is losing it over this. The million moms organization says that these magazines are in doctors' offices, and all over the place where children might see them. The Southern Poverty Law Center characterizes the million moms organization as a hate group. Karen Pence, the wife of Mike Pence has taken a job at the Emanuel Christian School in Springfield, Virginia. It is very clear that being LGBTQ is an abomination. In their contract, it says they must be born again Christians and must confirm that they believe that marriage is just between a man and a woman. Just one man, one woman? Yes. Okay. Builds to protect LGBTQ individuals for fair housing and employment fails in North Dakota, Senate vote by 20 to 27. And I have a few obituaries to read. Diane Olson, Mary Oliver, A.K. Ballard. So we'll get to those later. And I'd like to add Dolores Knoll, if I may, to your obituaries. Okay, she's just at it tonight. Isn't she? It's pertinent, I think. She's a groundbreaking academic. She taught at Kent State. She was the first person in 1972 to teach a course in LGBT studies. And what's interesting is that she died in a nursing home and her partner was also in the nursing home. So it can happen. Yeah. And we'll ask about her influence when we interview the professor Charles. Yeah. On our third anniversary. Well, I'm looking forward to that. If you've got questions and things you've always wanted to know. About and. So, Beto Sanchez-Parros. Now, people in the migrant workers community here in Vermont, this name is very familiar to them. This has been one of our leading LGBTQ activists within the migrant workers community.  Has been working with the Pride Center to ensure that LGBTQ immigrants, migrant workers, were adequately represented and get access to services. However, in December, he was stopped and ticketed for DUI. When he went to court, ICE was waiting for him as he exited the building and he was taken into custody. He had a hearing last week. It was extended until this Thursday, January 31st. At which point, they will make a decision as to, if he is going to be released, return to the community here or remain detained in New Hampshire and deported. And one of the things that migrant justice is saying is, this is not a felon. This is not a repeat offender. Why should Beto or any other of the migrant workers that have a catchphrase of milk with dignity, which I love as part of their movement. And they have it in Spanish on their t-shirt. Why should they be treated any differently? Anyone who's picked up for DUIA first defense, this is a protocol of what happens. And it's not detention and it's not deportation. And that moves into the House Judiciary Committee had a public hearing about fair and impartial policing. There is no bill, but there will be follow-up committee hearings. And sitting in the room and listening to the testimony what I heard repeatedly from law enforcement is they have model policies, they have gone out, 70 of the 75 law enforcement agencies in the state of Vermont have adopted them. But here's where they ran into a sort of bump in the road. The $40,000 that was supposed to have been appropriated for training was removed from last year's budget and people kind of missed that it wasn't there. So even though they had policies, they didn't have a means by which to train their officers on what those policies really meant. And what we heard from the NAACP migrant workers, ACLU, is that Vermont law enforcement are sharing more information with immigration in ICE than I think people realize, more than with which we are truly comfortable. The ACLU in particular raised the question of, okay, this is how far Vermont has gone in saying we're gonna set up policies where we don't ask you about immigration status. We are not voluntarily working with the feds or with ICE. Is there more we could do? Are there other states that draw the line much further than we do? So that's one of the things that the Judiciary Committee is gonna be looking at. But it was enlightening to hear, particularly there were people who identified as migrant workers who were testifying, who talked about they're afraid to even call an ambulance when their daughter is having an asthma attack because they're afraid that the police will show up as well. And unfortunately, these farming communities are in rural areas in Vermont, where it's the county sheriff, and not necessarily the state police who have had more training who are responding. And the worst incident that was relayed where it was a county sheriff who radio's saying, I need someone to help interpret from Spanish. And it was Border Patrol and ICE that heard the call and said, oh, we can come help. And then they stepped in and did what ICE does.  Well, I'm gonna show you penguins. Well, let me show you a clip now of baby Svengic, and I'll remind you about them. Actually, it's a sheet, having a swimming lesson. So this is a minute clip. You see one of the workers at Sydney Sea Life Aquarium in Australia conducting a swimming lesson. So. So. Diving lesson, but I'll show you now. But let us recall baby Svengic. In Australia, that this chick was born in October to gay parents. These are gentoo penguins. Who became inseparable last year right before breeding season. Visitors often spotted the pair waddling around and going for swims together, which is why they were deemed to be suitable prospective parents. Now you may recall, I mentioned in October one another penguin couple laid two eggs, Svengic, and their names are, these two male penguins are named Sven and Magic. So the couple has been called Svengic. So Svengic was entrusted to hatch a backup egg because it's common in gentoo penguin culture to lay two eggs each breeding season.  So the backup chick may not survive, not in this case, however. On October 19th, 2018, an adorable 91 gram penguin chick was born to the doting penguin parents. Didn't we have a picture at the time? Yes, we did. But now we have more pictures. Now I have showing before you a picture of baby Svengic being taught to dive by her parents. And at the end of the last, the clip I showed you, the zookeeper teased us with the gender of baby Svengic and that has been revealed. But let me continue with the story. It's important for the keepers at the aquarium to know the gender of each penguin for population management. This is the zookeeper Hannan who also appears in the clip. It takes experts a couple of months and a blood test to determine the gender of a penguin as the sexes closely resemble one another. But in the penguin world, gender roles aren't defined and parents share equal responsibilities when it comes to maintaining nests and raising the young. Now baby Svengic is three months old and I have a picture now before you of the family. Magic, Sven and baby Svengic. So we've seen the clip of the swimming lessons and we've seen the picture of the diving lesson by the parent. So turns out that baby Svengic also has a healthy appetite. She was born at just 91 grams which I said, which is less than an apple. And now she weighs over five kilograms which is the size of a watermelon. So she clearly loves food, this zookeeper says. Baby Svengic will be an ambassador for this species who are facing global threats such as global warming and plastic pollution. And we look forward to sharing more updates with you in the coming months, says Hannon, you can see life. I thought you were gonna say says Anne of all things, LGBTQ. Well, you can count on that also. We'll trace the growth and development of baby Svengic and they keep saying they're gonna change baby Svengic's name, but they haven't. Okay, more good news. Angola decriminalizes same sex conduct.    This is a great stride. The changes came on January 23rd as Angola's parliament adopted its first new penal code since it gained independence from Portugal in 1975 and removed the provision inherited from its Portuguese colonizers. There are a lot of these colonial draconian laws. That stay on the books. While there have been no known prosecutions under the law, Iris Angola, the country's only gay rights lobby group has often complained that its members face discrimination when accessing healthcare and education. Now this is another good thing that happened. Last year Angola gave legal status to Iris Angola which was established in 2013. A move that can now be seen as the forerunner for this last step toward equality. The group called the decision an historic moment allowing the organization to defend the rights of sexual minorities in Angola. In contrast, Mozambique, another former Portuguese colony decriminalized homosexuality in 2015 when it too adopted new penal code but declined to register the country's largest LGBT group Lambda leaving it to operate freely but not legally. In casting aside this archaic and insidious relic of the colonial past, Angola has astute discrimination and embraced equality. The 69 other countries around the world that still criminalize consensual same sex conduct should follow its lead. Now I have more or I can move to Linda. Let me do one more story. All right, go ahead. If I may. We recall that movie three billboards outside Eming, Missouri.   Now I have a picture of the trucks, the three trucks in particular. Artist Wu Gong said three billboards, the movie was about raising and questioning unresolved issues. We wanna use this format to raise doubts about conversion therapy. He said, he's 28. Wu, who was based in the southern city of Shenzhen, says he is not gay and his police officer associate identified only by his surname, Lin, planned to stage the campaign in eight cities. It began last weekend in Shanghai. China removed homosexuality and bisexuality from an official list of mental illnesses in 2001, but official terminology still includes vague references to sexual orientation disorders. Some parents, as we know, as we may surmise, are known to pressure gay children to correct their orientation, including through conversion therapy. I thought that was a Christian thing, I guess it isn't. No. The truckspear slogan saying that therapy was being abused for a non-existent disease.  It's been 19 years. Why? Such campaigns are rare in China where authorities quickly shut down most public protests to prevent them from snowballing. But Wu said the project has encountered no obstructions yet. Its Chinese social media account remains unblocked by censors and had six million followers as of Wednesday. Wu said the project has raised 3,000 US dollars in donations. He hopes to raise triple that to pay for drivers and fuel. Our ultimate goal is for more people to talk about this, said Wu. We stopped near a shopping mall in Nanjing and a security guard came out to ask what sexual orientation disorder meant. After we explained it to him, he supported us. Good to find out. That's an interesting kind of- Yeah, maybe we should try some of that. Yeah, we could get a truck and drive around. Yeah. We could go to St. Louis and Atlanta, and Atlanta, Dallas, Birmingham. Mm-hmm. Sad bit of news today, Empire Star Jussie Smollett was hospitalized in a possible hate crime. Police say that the 36-year-old was in Chicago walking around when someone shouted racial and homophobic slurs at him. I read he was leaving a restaurant. Really? At 5 a.m.? No, it didn't say 5 a.m. It said he was- Okay. I read the Hollywood Reporter. Well, there you go. Well, I heard he was just walking around. All right. Well, it just happened this morning in the early hours, I guess. Two men attacked him. They poured some chemical liquid on his body and they wrapped a rope around his neck. He is openly gay and first came out in 2015 on The Ellen Show, The Police At The Time. At this time, I've not taken any- They have no suspects and they're still looking at cameras and things around the area that might give some indication. But weren't they yelling racial and homophobic slurs? That's what I said. Oh, did you say- I'm so sorry. I'll pay more attention. You better pay attention. Sorry, I have a cold, unfortunately. The Supreme Court allows Trump administration's trans-military police policy to go into effect. The Supreme Court Tuesday allowed the Trump administration to begin enforcing its policy, limiting trans people from being in the military and their ability to serve, while brought illegal battles play out in the lower courts. The five to four decision allows the Pentagon to buy new recruits. From going through transition. The Pentagon officials insist that their policy is not a ban. Excuse me, but the rules need, are needed to prevent disruption, disruption in training and unit cohesion. The Trump administration will make the same arguments as the cases are fought one by one up to the Supreme Court. This is a blow to the trans community who now may be forced to leave and my face astigmatization. The justices divided along ideological lines and neither side explained its decision. But the arguments have been playing out in the courtroom across America. LGBT advocates expect that many of the other cases waiting to reach the Supreme Court will also fail. Recruits will be allowed to join if they are deemed clinically stable in their preferred sex for 18 months and did not suffer from marked stress. It seems like if you're in a really stressful situation like this, you would have stress. And also having to do with the Trump administration, they've been helping faith-based agencies block LGBTQ adoption. The administration gave those anti-LGBT efforts a boost by granting requests from the governor of South Carolina to allow federally funded child welfare agencies to turn LGBTQ people away based on their religious beliefs. Governor Henry McMaster asked the Department of Health and Human Resources to exempt the state's faith-based child welfare agencies from Obama-era non-discriminatory regulations protecting LGBTQ couples. This is of course granting exemption to fund these agencies with our taxpayers' dollars to discriminate. Did it not also extend to single mothers and the Jewish community? I'm not sure. What was one of the commentaries that I had read is that that would be the practical implication for what they had allowed. Yeah, so. Okay. It's so you don't keep coughing. Oh, I may join you in coughing. She has a cold and she's desperately trying not to share it. Really? It's late for me, I'm afraid. Go ahead. We digress. As I move further to the right, the Centers for Disease Control just released a report that has the first most comprehensive reporting on transgender high school students. And what they found is that 2% of the students polled identify as transgender, which is much higher than what people had guessed. However, 35% of them had made a suicide attempt. 27% felt unsafe going to and from school and 35% reported having been bullied at school. So, and I think that some of that reflects the data that we got from the Department of Health Youth for a survey here in Vermont, but. May I add, and I'm sure you read this also, that the suicide attempts have diminished in schools that have GSAs. GSAs, GSAs. Well, and that gets into part of our legislative report with the Ethnic and Social Studies Standards curriculum, where those schools were included into the curriculum, not as a standalone, but truly embedded into the curriculum. All of that sort of bullying starts leveling out. I know, because they said even with straight people, straight people had less suicide with an ASA in that school. Is that a GSA or a GSA? Yeah. Well, there was also a study that said people are happier if they have a gay friend. Seriously, did you see it? No, but I believe it. There was a study that said that. Okay, so looking very quickly at the legislation going through, one of the things we're gonna be following is the minimum wage bill. And what is being proposed in the Senate Economic Development Committee is $15 per hour by 2024. And that would actually give people a boost and looking at the graph, it would really be advantageous. Paid family leave, bill just got introduced. It would do a, and as Becca Ballant said on the last show, the burden to an employee would be one and a half cents per pay period, seems nominal, but what you would get is 12 weeks of paid family leave per year. What Phil Scott and Governor Sununu were proposing with their voluntary process would only be six weeks. So there's a radical difference. One of my concerns, and I will be submitting this as a piece of written testimony, is that this is based on a relationship status and a documented relationship status. So if you are a domestic partner, you still may not be entitled to benefits. And I'm going to leave that for now so I can come back and spend more time with the Holocaust overview. Well, I have several items to discuss involving the sorry situation in Brazil. Let's go back to the penguins. I know, I know. Jair Bolsonaro, as you know, was elected the gentleman. Supposedly.  We also recall the horrible tragic assassination of Mariela Franco in Brazil. Did they arrest some police officers or something, I thought? Well, what happened in this, the story that I'm getting to is that Bolsonaro's son has brought into the staff somebody, the police officer who was accused of killing her. Right.  Not only resign, but leave the country. I have a picture of him before you. He said on Thursday he won't serve the new term for which he was re-elected due to death threats and that he now plans to live abroad. He belongs to the Socialism and Liberty Party. His seat in Brasilia will go to a substitute lawmaker who was also gay, Rio Councilman David Miranda, who is the husband of Pulitzer Prize-winning US journalist Glenn Greenwald. In a letter to the party explaining his decision to leave Brazil, he said that death threats had made his life unbearable, that he hardly left his real home. His siblings and his mother had also been threatened. He said in a newspaper interview that the climate of violence in Brazil, which had one of the world's highest murder rates last year had worsened since the October election of the far-right President Jair Bolsonaro, who has disparaged gays and other minorities. He said he was tired of living with bodyguards since the execution-style murder last year of popular Rio de Janeiro Councilwoman Mariela Franco. It was not Bolsonaro's election itself. It was the level of violence that has increased since he was elected. He told, Willis told the Fulha de São Paulo newspaper, I don't want to sacrifice myself, he told the paper. I want to take care of myself and stay alive. Willis 44, and again I have a picture to show you of him, was a staunch advocate for gay rights and fought religious discrimination and violence against women during his two terms in Congress. Brazil's first openly gay congressman was fashion designer and television presenter Clotaville Hernandes, who represented São Paulo for two years in Brasilia and died of a stroke in 2009. Unlike Willis, however, he did not publicly defend the LGBT cause. So it's terrible in Brazil. Okay, let's move to more bad news from Japan.  This is by the down portion of my reporting. It has upheld a law effectively requiring trans people to legally change their gender to be sterilized. Takatuo Yasui, a transgender man who wants to change the gender instead on his, listed on his official documents, had appealed to the court seeking to overlaw, overturned law 111, which requires applicants to permanently lack functioning reproductive parts to qualify for gender affirmation. That's a little different than being sterile. That's going more into the you must be castrated before. Really? You know how long I'm a sterilized castrated? No, they're different things. Over dinner, we will have a discussion. We'll sort it out. The Supreme Court unanimously rejected his case Thursday, ruling that the 2003 law was constitutional, though judges added it was invasive and encouraged the legislature to review it. The court initially said the law was intended, this is their bogus reasoning. The court initially said that the law was intended to prevent problems in parent-child relations, which could lead to societal confusion and avoid abrupt changes to society. Suki Chang, Asia Pacific Campaign Manager at Amnesty International said the ruling was a blow for the recognition of transgender people in Japan. It is a missed opportunity to address the discrimination transgender people face. Conservative, we recall this, I reported on it at the time. Conservative Japanese lawmaker, Mio Sugita, belongs to the ruling Democratic Party. And we recall she attracted widespread criticism last year when she published an article saying support for LGBTs has gone too far. Will people agree to have their taxes used on LGBT couples? They cannot have children, so they are unproductive, she said, according to the Japan Times. However, despite all this evidence, polls suggest that Japan is becoming less conservative on LGBT issues. A poll this month by an advertising firm found more respondents than ever openly identified as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. Over 70% of respondents to this poll said they supported stronger legal protections for LGBT people. How many? 70%, according to this poll. But it seems like the ruling party is against it. Now, I was gonna say, we know what that's like. No, no kidding, no kidding. So let's go to bad news from Egypt if we can. Egypt sentences a TV host to jail over a gay interview. You know, and we have friends who just invited us to travel to Egypt with them. We declined the offer. Don't do it. An Egyptian court on Sunday sentenced a television host to one year in prison for interviewing a gay man last year, a judicial source said, Muhammad al-Ghati, who has expressed his stance against homosexuality on several occasions, was accused of promoting homosexuality in contempt of religion. The misdemeanor court in Giza also fined him 300, sorry, 3,000 Egyptian pounds, which is $147, in order to be put under surveillance for one year after serving his sentence, says the lawyer who brought the case against him. In August, 2018, Gedi hosted a gay man on his talk show on the private LTC TV station and discussed homosexuality on the air. During the interview, the gay man, whose face was blurred to hide his identity, said he was a sex worker, and he openly talked about his relationship with another man. After the interview, was aired the Supreme Council for Media Regulation. Egypt's top media body suspended the channel for two weeks for professional violations. In a statement at the time, it said LTC TV had violated its decision that bans the appearance of homosexuals or the promotion of their slogans. The council banned the appearance of homosexuals on any outlet, and I remember this incident. After a rainbow flag, which we know is symbolic, what it's symbolic of, was waved during a Cairo concert in 2017. Oh, yeah. At the time, the authorities launched a large-scale crackdown on suspected homosexuals, triggering condemnation from right groups. Homosexuality is not expressly outlawed in Egypt, but gays have previously been charged with debauchery in the deeply conservative Muslim society. So I would caution my friends who are gay men to maybe avoid Egypt, but it's up to them. I know. I have more things to talk about, but we can move on, if you'd like. I think we need to move on. All right. That's fine, although I could talk about Bali. Maybe you'll have time later. Okay. We'll see. All right. Diane Olson dies at 65. Diane was a marriage equality activist. Died of a brain tumor in a home in LA. She was married to Robin Tyler, who was a comedian and a writer and et cetera. The couple had been together for 25 years. This is the interesting thing. I didn't know this, but beginning in 2001, Diane and Robin would go to court on Valentine's Day and apply for a marriage license. And of course they were denied, but they went every year on Valentine's Day and asked for a marriage license. Mary Oliver dies at 83. Her partner was Molly Cook and was referred to as M in many of Oliver's poetry. She received a Pulitzer Prize in 1984 for her collection, American Permanent. And Kate Ballad, which I guess she was kind of closeted. Really? Yes. Did you ever see her? Yes. Okay. But according to sources, she was rather closeted and didn't really want to talk about lesbians or anything like that. But she was a comic actress and singer, and she began her career in Vaughnville. So. May I add the dish we got from Andy Hum on Gay USA? Apparently there was a gathering in a lesbian bar and Liz Smith, the columnist, took Gay Ballad's girlfriend. I know, I know. Andy is getting really trashy. Well, he gets around. Andy is getting really trashy. I know that's a good little tip but I forgot about that. Yeah, yeah. So, that's it for me. So, Sunday was Holocaust Remembrance Day. And the reason, the reason I'm really obsessing on it is if you look at Berlin in the 1920s and you look at what we enjoy now, you know, the freedom of our relationships, holding hands in public, that sense of acceptance and really not needing to hide, that's what Berlin was like in the 1920s. And then by 1933, the National Socialist German Workers Party, that's a mouthful, came into power. And they came into a power on this nationalism agenda. Sound familiar?  And how they had taken over the German culture, the German society. Basically, erasing them. Sound familiar? And the German penal code was paragraph 175, which we've referenced at varying points in time. The estimate is that prior to the rise of the National Socialist German Workers Party, also known as, oh my, the Nazis, there was an estimate that there were probably a million gay men in Germany. Between 1933 and 1945, they arrested over 100,000. 50,000 were put into concentration camps. And the estimate was that 60% of those people who were incarcerated never survived. And it was because they were on the bottom of the hierarchy. There was this concept of working to death. You move the pile of rocks from here to there and then back again. And were deliberately fed less than what they knew you would need to survive. They were also subjected to experimentation. And I'm not gonna go into a whole lot of details, but you can imagine it's where castration comes from. And when you talked about sterilization, you know, there's a difference between the vasectomy and castration. And we can thank these people for that. They also employed their own degree of conversion therapy. One of the pieces about the Holocaust that doesn't get a lot of recognition is that lesbians were interned in the concentration camps. But it had much smaller percentage because the German culture was very misogynist, male-based, women really didn't have rights or recognition within the culture. And the lesbians who were interned, it was because they were anti-social. They would not submit to a man's dominance. You were going against the social order.  They used a black- On your collar? Which I wear repeatedly now since the election in 2016 every day. And lesbians, those anti-social women, I have greater respect for you now, were given black triangles.  And when people look at the history about the Holocaust and how we were impacted by it, there's not really a whole lot of information because at the end of World War II, we were still considered to be criminals. And there is a story that was shared at one of our anti-discrimination hearings that when the Allied forces were liberating the concentration camps, and as they were helping people out, they were asking what all of the different symbols on their uniforms meant. And when they were told the pink triangle meant that the person was a homosexual, the Allied forces took him back inside the concentration camp and left him there. There wasn't even an acknowledgement until the 1980s that we may have been interned, and that they may have documentations from those hearings where people were charged with the crime of homosexuality. It wasn't until 2002 that the German government finally apologized for the persecution of homosexuality during the Holocaust. And it wasn't until 2005 that the European Parliament included a recognition of the persecution of homosexuals as part of the resolution relating to the Holocaust. So the impact that it has on us doesn't get discussed. I'm concerned because there are members of our youth who can recognize a rainbow flag but don't recognize the significance of the pink triangle. You were about to try and say something. Yes, I'm not surprised by that because when Linda and I in the 90s We were in Germany. Traveled to Germany and went to Dachau. They had like a ribbon in the 90s. There was a ribbon of all the symbols that Starve David and so he wouldn't include the pink triangle. The person who showed us through acknowledged it but he said, you know, this is under dispute. They won't include this symbol. It wasn't until the 80s that it began to acknowledge official German government response wasn't until 2002. Right, exactly. The other story relative to World War II and I was sharing it with people in my office today. Netherlands. Do you know that there was a tradition and people who see me wandering the streets of Bombay may be able to pick me out. And one of the stories is on Fridays and the other story was, you know, it was all the time they wore a red beret as a symbol of the resistance. There was this oppressive regime that was in charge. They were, it was futile to try and resist them but this was their symbol much as of saying we are not one with, we are not a part of. And if I may add one more thing I'd recommend to our audience Martin Sherman's play The Bent, which has been made into a movie which evoked that whole year on. That was the 90s too, wasn't it? We're written in the 90s? Yeah, I believe so. I think it was. I think we saw the play in the 90s, didn't we? I don't know, I'll double check that. In your youth. Yeah. But, and again, as part of my concern is that we have parts of our history that we've been trying to bring out with the trivia questions and acknowledgement of different events. But, and it's really looking at the Ethnics and Social Curriculum Standard is embedding all of the underrepresented communities into that curriculum so that when you are teaching about the Holocaust all of the people who were persecuted and incarcerated in turn become part of that conversation. It is no longer an other it's part of an inclusive this happened to us. That was 1979. Wow. So we saw it in Boston. Yeah, we did, but we saw it most of the early 80s. It's been made a movie too. Yeah, it has. Well, being at Dacau was one of the saddest experience of my entire, I mean, really, it was. It's really life changing. Just to stand there was unbelievable. So, on that cherry note. Yes. Yes. We thank you for spending this time with us. And remember, in these times we must always, in all times, resist.


You know she's in the hospital. Yeah, I tweeted that. Get better soon, Lada. Yes, Lada G, be well. Hey, welcome back to our show, but directly, it's a porpoise.  Today we got a, I know the trailer that just dropped on the 18th of January, which was today. This is actually from a hot start. It's a special, I think it's a new original series. It's called The Great Indian Murderer. Oh. It comes out February 4th. Can any murderer be considered great? They were great at their murdering. That's true. Jack the Ripper was pretty darn good at ripping. It's a talent. A bad talent. But he's a talent. Yeah. What the frick. Macabre. My favorite. And I believe it does have some faces that we do know in it. But I hope so. But I don't know who exactly did so. Let's just get into it. We've gathered here today to celebrate a very special occasion for a very special man, Mr. Vicky Rai. Famous Bollywood Ryan. You wanna sleep with him? Asuna. Let him be. The language of terror is common everywhere. Everyone thinks he's a monster. One minute, one minute. Let's start again. Who killed Vicky Rai? No one knows. For my son's murder investigation, CBI inquiry got hired. Sleep well. Sleep well. Sleep well. Sleep well, brother. A new twist of the murder of Vicky Rai.  I don't want to live without him. Vicky Rai started when I killed Mr. Gandhi. I'm going for an interview. And you'll see what I say about Vicky Rai to foster it. Sir, don't take it too seriously. Amen, ma'am. Yes, buddy. Right? I'm going to India. Whoever goes to India, will be the best in India. We shouldn't go out to take this fake angle. You were the one who killed Rajnath. 36 years ago, someone was saying that he's involved in this case. If you talk in the mountains, you'll get into a fight. Why are you behaving like your husband? Why are you behaving like your Mahatma Gandhi? I am Gandhi. Get out of here. Is that the same guy from the zombie film? I'm going to see who you are. You're going to turn this case around and come into any other situation. Fuck! Sir, he doesn't even say the great Indian kitchen. Make of the great Indian kitchen. I don't remember anything remotely close to that. Happening in the great Indian kitchen. That's a thing, obviously. They cut up trailers of films to make them look like completely different films. Molly, all of them films always want you guessing. No, no, no. People on YouTube will cut up the Titanic and make it a horror film. Oh, you've seen the shining as a family comedy sitcom. That's fantastic. Once again, OTT platforms are just coming out with... It looks like, and maybe... I don't know if you've seen this. Looks good. But they're coming out with a lot of Roger Gunn. It's great to see some of the people that we thought were so good and some of like Family Man and Made in Heaven getting work. Because his buddy... I forget his name. I apologize. We know their faces. Family Man. Forget their names. Manoj's buddy who did a phenomenal job and then the photographer from Made in Heaven who is a great part of that series. And then, I'm pretty sure I don't know the actor's name but I think that's the guy who's the lead in that Marathi zombie movie. Really? If it's not, he has striking resemblance in the eyes. It's right. It's listed right underneath it. Which one? I don't know. I'd have to see his photo. I don't know him by name. You know what would be better is if you go to... Do you remember the name of the zombie film? Zambibli? Zambibli? Yeah. It might be. You guys can let us know.  And it looks like really, really good. And you saw the producing aspect of it. Ajay Devgun is one of the producers. This guy was involved with Gangs of Wasapur in some way. That's what's cool if you get involved in a film at any dimension that goes on your credits and people see your name and that project listed next to it. He was an actor. It looks like he's an actor and director. The guy who's directing this series. He was an actor in Maji the Mountain Man. I just saw that. Gangs of Wasapur. He was an actor. Oh, of course he is. Look at his face. Yeah, we know him. Yeah, I recognize him. Yeah. How's he as a director? And also, we've not seen a Hot Star series. I know of like the one with KK Menon Criminal Justice, I think is the name of the show. Which I think... It's a Hot Star. Hot Star. I think season one had Pankaj. Did it? And I think season two is KK Menon. We reacted to that a while ago. A long time ago. I know that a lot of people say that's a really good series. If it's got those two guys. You're gonna have two of the best actors in India. Isn't it funny how often great actors all work with each other? Not a coincidence. Pankaj and Nawaz are like, I'd like to work with him. I want to work with KK. And I want to work with Menon. Equally wild is how many great talents don't work with each other. Not because they chose not to, but just because their paths just didn't cross. And you'll see people who they've been in the industry for 25, 30 years or longer and they're look at each other and I've always, how have we not worked together yet? Yep. Yeah. But yeah, looked great. The great Indian kitchen remake in Bollywood. That's right. Yeah, in case it is. It's the only difference since it's the Bollywood remake of it. It's just gonna be loaded with nepotism and cocaine. That's why it looks like that. Let us know what you thought about the trailer and what should be the next series that we watch down below.


If you are familiar with the Grammys and their performance, you might think this is basically one of the shows, right? But what if I told you that you are wrong and also right at the same time? What would that mean for you considering that you have only been watching an extra video performance in a church? Yes, this is Transformation Church, a church run by Mike Todd. I am not God that I can judge anybody, but how on earth can this guy with this hairstyle be a pastor? Is he a gangster or a pastor? I'm confused right now. He is into X. When I saw him the first time preaching his Transformation Gospel, I was startled because he was off for me. He actually distracted me with his looks. However, the most surprising of it all is his Easter Transformation service, where he took things really far. I want the person who feels lonely and isolated and like God doesn't care. I want them to see how amazing Jesus actually is and what God actually did for all of us. So I said we're going to go to the edge on this and they said pastor, how far on the edge are we going to go? I said we're going to Christianity is in shambles, honestly. It's sad that the faith doesn't have a central control mechanism. Some who had abandoned the Pope are a principal doctrine and a directory figure seem to have abandoned the so-called Bible. So he actually wanted to be creative about it, right? And then organize this show. What's the difference between these and the no more demonic grammar shows? Well, it's good news as Christianity continues to spread out more fruits to show us Muslims that it is high time we take our faith seriously and stop trying to imitate these people. Asalaamu alaikum brothers and sisters. Welcome to another episode of the Open-minded Thinker Show. To help us reach other people, please like and share. Don't forget to subscribe to help us grow bigger and better. My toad of the Transformation Church has always been in the crosshair of the people who see him as completely outside the true meaning of what it means to be a pastor and he said it himself. In 2015, I became the pastor and I didn't know what a pastor did. However, his Easter Resurrection drama where he allowed women to make show of their bodies is worrisome. His opinion about same sex union and love is even far scarier. I decided male and female. No, no, no, I'm not. This is not a bat. I need y'all to hear my heart on this. This is not a bashing. This is not a heat. If I was there, maybe I would have told him because there's something in the middle you could do like kind of like a little maybe if somebody while I was born like this, I don't know how I feel. I feel you and I wish that there was an option of other in the kingdom pastors don't say this because they want to be absolute. Well, why did that? I don't freaking know. I know honestly, I wish God would have made it so much simpler and it was like ABC or D like Frick. No, I'm serious as a pastor like what do you think about Jamie? I don't know. I don't I don't know why he decided to do it like this. I don't know why you're wrestling like that and I don't know what to do to help you but to stand with you and play with you and not and you're welcome at transformation church. Trans is in the title transformation. You can be here. Oh god. Well, Dr. Zaki knife has an answer. Almighty God has made the human being in such a way that they love the opposite sex.  I'm talking about the love which is required in husband and wife, not the protonic love which you have between your brothers and between your sisters. Now, initially, there was a research which said that homosexuality is genetic. So, during question and answer time, somebody asked me the way you asking if homosexuality is genetic, then how is that human being to blame? It came from his parents. So why is he to blame? Like you're saying if someone loves someone else, so why should he be blamed? I said this is a research. This is a hypothesis. It's not a fact. And later on, we came to know that this hypothesis was wrong and the person who propounded this hypothesis homosexuality is not genetic. I know many Christians who are not at home with Mike Toad, but how do we explain the fact that he was invented by Christianity? His story raises difficult question about how we can assign moral responsibility in a situation where outcomes are not entirely within an agent's control. The agent here is Mike Toad. It also challenges the idea that the morality of an action can be suddenly determined by its outcome without considering the intentions and the efforts of the agent. Just watch this. This is really sick, guys. In reality, the laxity and supposed development of God's words in Christianity is a risen one. We have these abominations. My Christian brothers should know that the early Christian church did not have a tradition of dramatizing the crucifixion at death of Jesus during Easter in the way we might see in modern times, such as with our passion plays and reenactments. Instead, Easter was primarily celebrated through religious services and rituals, such as the Eucharist and baptism. The earliest written accounts of Easter's story are found in the Gospels of the New Testament, who described the event leading up to the alleged crucifixion of Jesus. These narratives were likely read aloud during Easter services. There is no evidence to suggest that it was acted in the form of theatrical and dramatic way as we have it today. It was not until much later in history, during the Middle Ages, that passion plays began to emerge as a popular form of religious drama. These plays were typically performed during Holy Week leading up to Easter and often included in dramatic reenactments of crucifixion and other sins from the life of Jesus. Let's leave it right there, guys. Until next time, assalamualaikum.


to think take away our first episode of 2023. Time for responsible change. And we're, we have with us today, Louise Heng, one of our leading attorneys, women's rights lawyers and a leader in community service here as well. And David Larson, immediate past president of the American Bar Association section of dispute resolution. Professor at Mitchell Hamlin School of Law in St. Paul, Minnesota. And innovator for the New York court system on online dispute resolution to greatly expand access to justice for a lot of people, especially during the pandemic. Okay, welcome folks. And today's topic is, we'll take a shot at a review of 2022 and see if we can foresee a little bit of 2023. And David, you're going to start us off with a blast from the past on what people were projecting for a hundred years ago, 1923, is that right? Yeah, I looked at that. I found some material that NPR collected. I looked at some of what newspapers were predicting for a hundred years later. And some really interesting things for example, beauty contests will be unnecessary as there will be so many beautiful people that it will be almost impossible to select winners. And I look at that us, I think that's probably true. Average lifespan. We've all said two out of three ain't bad. Average lifespan will reach a hundred years. One scientist predicting 300 years. And note that the fact is that a lifespan in the United States actually decreased last year to 76.4, which is the shortest in two decades. So we are not going in the right direction. Charles Steinmetz, an electrical engineer and mathematician predicted that because of electricity, people will work only four hours a day. And I don't know any one who's working only four hours today. So those were just a few of the predictions that I thought were really interesting. So maybe he anticipated what's now being called quiet quitting. Maybe some people aren't sitting by with four hours a day. Yeah, no hours per day. Or none, yeah. So looking at 2022, we'll starting with you, Louise. What are your takeaways? What's worth holding on to or learning from? You know, to prepare for this, I had jokingly said, let's all read Dave Barry's year in review because just to have some levity. As well as a perspective. I only got through part one or two. I didn't get through both parts, but I guess thinking over the year, of course, there were highlights and low points. I guess to me, I continue to want to be hopeful. And I was glad to see that, for instance, the midterms did not result in the red, Republican blood bath that was predicted. That was good. We didn't start out with a very, we started out rather ignominiously with a little leadership fight in the house that perhaps that does not bode well for making progress in Congress. But maybe that means that we have to continue on the path of making sure that at least on the local and the state levels, we can get things done. I also thought the contrast was interesting. Last year, we were talking about things like quiet quitting and transformation of the workplace. We're starting out this year by talking about mass layoffs and certain sectors of the workplace, as well as in others, staff shortages. And I've also been hearing among leadership issues of just needing to work on succession planning and leadership development and people development. And to me, that all ties together. The focus still needs to be on building relationships, connections, leadership, and trying to make 2023 better. I also think the good thing was that there was more time, thanks to vaccines and public health and the like, there was more opportunity for people to connect and people were connecting. And I think we all came out with a better appreciation of making those personal connections. Great insights, David. Well, I've got an obvious takeaway that touches in this early New Year also, know where your classified documents are. That's a lesson we could take away from the past year or the current year. My God, what is going on? If we actually checked her out, I suspect that probably every administration took some documents with them either intentionally or just because they were packing it up, they put stuff in boxes and then we went back to early administrations, we probably would find other classified documents. I think probably a lot of it was not intentional. But it's surprising, I guess I'm surprised after everything that happened with former President Trump that suddenly we have these revelations that documents are showing up in Biden's office at Penn and it is garage. It's like, oh my God. So yeah, so one of the takeaways is, you'll protect your classified documents and know where they are. I mean, that's clearly something to take away. Another thing that I think is really interesting is that so we had Roe versus Wade overturned and we're getting this polarization on states that are banning abortions and others are trying to protect them. And in the states that are trying to protect them, they're doing different things. They're talking about constitutional amendments, but those are hard to do. So Minnesota and other states are passing legislation to protect abortion. And California, for instance, is expanding access to abortion by passing legislation that says that nurses assistants, PAs, midwives are gonna be able to do abortions without any supervision. So that's a change. New York has passed legislation that says that if you have any maternity coverage in your health insurance plan, it has to include abortion. So we're seeing the lines and the differences between our states being even more stark in terms of what's gonna be permitted and protected and what's gonna be prohibited. Another thing that's happening, I think it's gonna increase in 2023 is the legalization of recreational marijuana and expunging and eliminating prior convictions for convictions based upon possessions of small amounts. I think that's happening as we speak and it's gonna increase in 2023. Again, looking at the polarization around the country, in some states like Florida, you're gonna see more investigations in the school libraries, pulling books out, more censorship going on, probably in Texas and other places like that. For me, that's really disturbing that there are gonna be school-aged kids in different parts of the country that are not gonna have access to the same kinds of materials that other students do. That's, to me, that's very troubling. And another takeaway from last year is that oil and gas producers record profits doubled last year, approximately $4 trillion in profits. So if you're wondering who made out during the pandemic, oil and gas producers are the good place to start. They made tremendous amount of money. It's not just because of the pandemics because of Russia cutting off the supply and demand going up, being able to ask for higher amounts and get them, but that's a stunning amount of money to double your profits in a year. And now we're talking about, again, approximately $4 trillion. And particularly for entities that are provided many mechanisms for avoiding having to contribute proportionate tax revenues to those profits. So what do you see ahead for 2023 that either gives you hope or cause for concern or elements of both, please? Well, I'm thinking of the fact that, in what ways we're taking, we have taken two steps forward in the past. There's gonna be challenges in the future. And specifically, for instance, on ESG issues, diversity, inclusion, equity issues, things that some of us feel are important, mom and apple pie issues of corporate responsibility as well as multiculturalism and diversity. And as David said, what we're seeing are pushbacks against that. There's word in Congress about legislators who wanna push back against company or investors who are advocating for companies to follow climate sensitive corporate responsibility type of principles. And we can see perhaps with the growing, the great profits of the oil producers, that's probably one area where there is gonna be a push from lobbyists for that kind of thing. And we're seeing that in the, as David mentioned, the pushback against boards of educations and libraries to limit the ability, to limit the access to a variety of reading materials. Those things are troubling to me and just underscore the need to be vigilant and to continue to make the case and educate about the need for social, corporate responsibility and accepting many points of view being advocating for diversity and a multicultural approach. Yeah, one thing that's, I guess, troubling. You could say this is what's supposed to happen with federalism. We're supposed to have states moving in different directions, trying different things, see what works, that's the benefit of federalism. Okay, kind of having this deregulation at the federal level let the states do what they wanna do. So on the one hand, the pickup on something that Louise was talking about is that Rhode Island just passed a pay equity law that bans employers required wage history and require an equal pay for comparable work. That's an improvement. And the whole idea of requiring wage histories, that's a way really to cement kind of past discrimination because if you're gonna pay somebody based on their prior wage history, we know that the market has been sex discriminatory and those discriminations will get locked in for the future. So prohibiting people from asking for that, I think is really a good thing. But those kinds of movements are happening inconsistently across the country and we're moving in different directions. So kind of going back to where I started the idea, well, let states try what they wanna try and see what works and let's embrace this idea of federalism. When it comes to human rights and equity, that theory is a troubling. That's one area where I don't like the idea that we move in different directions and that there's maybe some states trying to eradicate and eliminate and minimize past discrimination and others are doing a lot less. So I guess that's, I'm encouraged that some states are taking proactive measures but the scourge is that not everybody is. Looking ahead, one thing that people will be talking about this year, I'm sure, sports betting. There's about 30 states that are permitting it.  Do you want them doing it at the college level? And we're really concerned now about there's so many college games going on and now there's corruption and people throwing games. But that's, we're moving in that direction. The majority of states are now permitting it. So that's gonna be an ongoing topic.  We don't know how it's all gonna work, but it's promising. And the fact that we could finally get something done I think it's very encouraging. And it does a couple of things. One, it does have a positive effect for the world, but also it increases our position in terms of an influencer in the world. If we can say we were able to get this done and here's what we're doing, maybe it can encourage other countries to do the same thing or maybe even more. And those are really great insights. And there are some common underlying themes from the 2022 takeaways and the 2023 hopes and concerns that focus on which rights and whose rights are going to be protected and safeguarded and which rights and whose rights are going to be eroded and suppressed or restricted. And we see that in the areas you've mentioned in educational freedoms and they're all balancing tests, educational freedoms versus first amendments and parental control, gun controls versus public safety, including especially in schools for our children, healthcare protections generally. In your experience, which are the areas where you see the greatest cause for concern facing us now and in the short-term future, Louise? Well, I'm concerned about the impact of the geopolitical situation, the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine for which there doesn't seem to be any end in sight and the impact of that on energy, the cost of energy, what businesses decide to do. I think one of the reports I heard recently was that one of the reasons that financial services industries, for instance, are looking at retraction and perhaps as well as tech is that there's less appetite for going public these days as people kind of hoard their or conserve their capital and perhaps don't take big business steps. To change their, you know, people are wanting to be careful. And what that means is that perhaps, you know, the hiring binges that went on in order to prepare for this kind of transactions are going to be retracting this coming year. You know, I've heard that, as I mentioned for Goldman Sachs, I'm starting to hear that for with some law firms where, you know, they're starting to contract their mergers and acquisitions departments. So I think the economy and recession are big issues that we're going to be facing and having to deal with in 2023. Yeah, I got, you know, I haven't watched the circus with the election of the speaker and the House of Representatives. So I am definitely concerned about the ability of the House to govern. You've got an unopposed candidate that all you have to do is approve that candidate. They can't do it, it takes a week. And finally, the only way they can do it is making concessions to a very extreme small minority in ways that take a lot of power away from the position. And it's going to put people that are very extreme positions in leadership positions on committees. So yeah, I'm concerned about what's going to happen in the House and whether it's going to be able to govern it all. The Republican platform was, you know, we're going to look at inflation. You know, we're going to look at corruption. And we're going to work for the American people and so far all they're doing is kind of protecting themselves. You look at, when I think about what's coming up in 2023, it might be the year of the big lie. The stupendous lie, the incredible lie, the unbelievable lie, because you look at who just got elected in New York and the endacity is beyond belief. It's like everything this guy said, Santos said about his life is apparently untrue and exaggerated and he made all these crazy claims about different successes. And I don't hope that's not becoming a modus operandi that now that's the way we're going to operate is just tell the craziest biggest lies we can to see if we can get away with them. But one thing I'm hoping is that he doesn't get away from them with them, that there's going to be sanctions, that he's going to be removed from Congress. He defrauded the electors of New York. I think if they had known the truth that he wasn't who he said he was, he probably would not have been elected. He doesn't belong there. And I hope that that is removed. Well, then the question is what happens because in some states, if a member of one party is displaced, someone like the governor may be able to replace them with another member of that same party, but that may not be the way things work in New York, particularly if it's fraudulently procured election results that may under their laws require a new special election and that could throw things into even more doubt. Yeah, I mean that margin is so thin, but I tell you, when I think about Marjorie Taylor-Green, you know, in the rules committee or wherever she ends up, it's like, you know, and Matt Gates taking leadership positions, this is very disturbing going into 2023. You know, the other thing that's disturbing and we talked about a little bit is, you know, we now have far more guns than people in the United States. I don't know what's happening where you're at, but you know, we have record gun violence in Minnesota. I think that's true in a lot of states. I think that's gonna be a continuing issue this year as more and more people are affected by gun violence and I just become unable to ignore it any longer that people who've been on the sidelines, I think, and hope that increasingly they'll step forward to say that something has to be done. It's just too much tragedy, too much loss that we've got to intervene. Yeah, to me, the, you know, the intractable national issues that I would, you know, would be nice if we can start addressing this year our gun violence and gun control immigration. You know, nobody's wanted to touch that. We finally have the president going down to El Paso, but there's talk about how, you know, maybe he didn't see the worst parts of El Paso in terms of homelessness and displaced people and the like.  You know, we need to. And on the other hand, we have indications in the house that they're gonna spend their time not on legislation and moving things forward, but on, you know, political theater. More investigations, retaliatory investigations, and now, you know, making a big deal about the classified documents issue on both sides, although, you know, even some of the media has tried to distinguish the situations of voluntarily disclosing as opposed to making the government go after you. So I am concerned about our ability to make progress when you're faced with so many intractable issues. And then sort of switching, talking about the big lie. Then we have Brazil and certain factions there trying to redo or, you know, do a remake of January 6th. Will that be a lesson to nations to, you know, I guess correct or just do something to dispel these lies? Or will it just encourage people to do more crazy things? You know, I do hope it points out to people that we need to get back more on to a track where things are truth-based and evidence-based. We'll see. That was heartbreaking. I saw some video on split screens. You saw it was happening at the capital, our capital on January 6th. Oh, God. And it's like, it is too similar. It's like, we have provided the template in the example of how you react if you don't like an election. This is what you do. And that was very disturbing. And to kind of walk that back, I think it's gonna be hard. So yeah, this whole idea of election denying and the appropriate response is something we need to be worried about. Well, and that's a great insight because that both of you have had because we need to understand that the whole election denial framework that's so essential to the entire right-wing Republican approach, it really takes two manifestations. One of them is the violent uprisings, the attempt to literally shut down the peaceful operation and transition of our systems of government and institutions. But the other is the legislative approach to dismantle voting rights, to engage in serious gerrymandering as numerous political commentators have pointed out, Republicans would not have that slim majority in the house were it not for the gerrymandering and voter suppression and restriction that they were able to get through in a number of states where that did make the difference for them. So serious concerns. And perhaps that, in a bad way underscores the need to plan for the long game, right? This gerrymandering has been an issue for years and now it sees its manifestation and some of the election results that we're not too happy about. I think that goes back to about making sure that we are, people are getting educated about our democracy and legal principles and civics and that we also get judges who are going to rule and go by the rule of law when they see machinations like this go on with voting rights. One thing, I've heard commentators, Democrats saying that that whole situation trying to like the speaker was great. It was great theater, it just shows how incapable the Republicans are from governing and the next two years will be wonderful because they will be so inept that we will reclaim the house in the next election cycle. So all of this is okay and I'm not sure it's all okay because we have two years coming up where a lot of things are going to happen in those two years. So I'm not gonna celebrate failures in the house because that means that we're not governing and there's gonna be horrible repercussions and implications for the country and that worries me and the fact that it may make for a stronger election cycle for the Democrats in the next round isn't enough. It's comfort for me and I'm worried about the next two years. And your perspectives have really highlighted the truly essential need for Americans to stand up, speak up, speak out and protect truth in education and truth in elections. Those may be two of the key areas. How we can do that. Any last thoughts, Louise? Well, I think it goes back to, well, what fair reporting. We have to have a media that speaks, goes on evidence-based reporting as opposed to political oriented stuff we're getting from Fox, for instance, education. Reporting on things like, okay, what is the aftermath of the Brazil incident gonna be? Hopefully it is prosecuting those and having consequences for those who acted out improperly as is happening in the US.  So as much as I was unhappy with how the media kept harping about the midterms and the bad things that was gonna happen, it does underscore the need for a free and fair and evidence-based press that helps tell the truth. David, last thoughts? Yeah, I think that all of us need to make a concentrated effort to try and point out inconsistencies and truths and to do it without raising our voices, without using derogatory terms, to just try and make fact-based arguments that the reason why we're moving in a bad direction is because these are the facts, not the facts that have been explained to you or presented to you as facts, but these are the things that we can verify. And it's up to us in a democratic country to pay attention to facts and take responsibility for our votes and understand. Now, when you elect people like Brobeck in Colorado, this is what you're gonna get. Sometimes I've got Republican friends who, when I say to them that you have to take some responsibility for what these legislators do, they say, oh, no, it's not my responsibility. I didn't do it, I have no connection to that. And I think we have to make a concerted effort to explain to people you do have responsibility. You're electing people as your agents, and when they do something that even you disagree with, there's gotta be some accountability. And when the next election cycle comes along, you need to keep that in mind and you need to change direction. So vote, vote is important, remains important. Absolutely, and that's a good place to wrap us up for today. That responsibility at the individual group and community level may have to take a much more dominant role over the failures of leadership at the upper levels. That's the hope for 2023 and beyond. Thank you all for joining us on Think Tech Hawaii. Time for responsible change. Lee Zing, David Larson, thanks so much for joining us and sharing your insights and perspectives. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you so much for watching Think Tech Hawaii. If you like what we do, please like us and click the subscribe button on YouTube and the follow button on Vimeo. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and donate to us at thinktechhawaii.com. Mahalo.


Hey guys, welcome to Higan Irruthill and this is the end game. Just joking. We're actually towards the end game already. How to prepare for the end game? How does it look like currently? I'm currently at Shroop level 92, which is high already. It's really difficult to go up every level. And I just want to share with you guys how my roster looks like at this point. So I have this roster. I'm developing multiple rosters already because I'm playing PvP team. So that is actually one thing that you have to prepare once you're towards the end game or near the end game. So I'm actually developing Basil at this point. I have to kick out somebody here. I just don't know who. Probably not sure. Siakum probably we'll see. But this is my 13 man lineup. So three teams for team PvP are here. Most of them are at 70. Some are still lagging behind like Basil. Some of them are over 70 already, which is actually difficult to do. So difficult really to ascend from 70 because these ones, although now it's obtainable, it's really difficult to farm these because some of them, once you use this option here, so let's say for example if I use that one, they're still craftable. So just have to move forward until you run out of craftable materials.  So you get to craft them from smaller type, smaller similar type materials, then going to this type. Get my drift. So just to produce one of these, this is your complete crystalline chip. You will need three of these double crystalline chips. So that's a lot of farming just to go over 70. So at this point, I'm just limiting myself to four. Probably go to five eventually. I'm not sure who to... This is actually my main team. So you get my main team, Surslit, Rita, Gildan, and Nunu. And also, it's really difficult to farm these materials because from level 70 up, you're going to be using these only exclusively to farm from 71 and up. So this is the only currency that they will allow you to use. You can no longer use these currencies when you are going up from 70 to 71. Okay, so that is basically a buffer. So a lot of farming to be done in the end game, definitely. This is my roster, guys. Comment down below on how my roster looks if it's good enough. So far, I'm happy with this. Main DPS would be Surslit and Rita, Gildan would be my tank, and Nunu is my main healer. Okay, so so far, as far as the tasks is concerned, I usually clear daily weekly, clear growth already. Main story, this is just because I lack the energy. I'm currently finishing the Phoenix event, the Burning Phoenix event. This has 16 hours to go. I'd like to finish this tomorrow as I wake up in the morning. I'd like to finish this because I'm already at, in terms of the gotcha shop, I'm actually in the last, I have 30 poles here. So I need to farm, you know, farm the feathers here for, you know, to redeem at least 3000 more. So again, for adventure, that's for the task. This one, I've been, you know, I've been lazy actually in doing this, but this is very doable already at 39. I'm at 57 power, I think for the four. So I'm at 57, so more or less I can clear this. I'm just reall, I reall, not, not that I'm lazy, but I'm reallocating resources because again, energy is so scarce here. I'm reallocating resources to the Burning Phoenix event. I'm actually catching up here. I need a lot of catch up to do this event. Actually, if you haven't finished it, this event is nice because it gives a lot of, a lot of resources here. It gives these resources. If you're actually looking for resources to upgrade from 70 to 71 onwards, then you'll, you'll get these in the Burning Phoenix event. So try to farm, they're not guaranteed drops, but most of the time you get a lot of them there. Unlike that event, you need to farm and chances are you'll get only a few. So adventure, I'm nearing the end of that. What I, I'm supposed to do is to finish all of the stages here. This also needs to be finished. So as you can see, I still have, because I'm only playing this if I'm farming. I'm not going over and getting the rewards. Probably going to do that after the Burning Phoenix event. Okay. So again, for the roster guys, you'll be, you'd need to develop multiple teams for Team PVP also for PVP because not only Team PVP, but PVP because PVP and Team PVP, these are your content really for the end game. These are currently, sorry, keep on pressing the wrong button. So director showdown, there you go. So this one will far, will, will get you a lot of summoning currency, single fight and team fight. Again, this will be end game content. You have to develop your, your, your, your roster for this one. Multiple teams, probably theme teams in the future, Inclusion Cold. You have your Ignite teams or Fire teams. You have your, what's the other team? I forgot the other team. So my point is you'll have to develop multiple teams, probably theme teams that will fit each of the stages moving forward. Sorry, wind or animal teams will also have their theme as well. So those will carry over to the end game. And I just want to take note guys, if you haven't noticed this, there's a weapon icon here. It's actually no use. It's just an icon at this point. But in the previous incarnations of, of this game, the weapon was actually upgraded. So if this was upgraded, this was part of your stat. I'm not sure if they're bringing it back, but it would be nice if they would bring this back and give more buffs to your, to your heroes. So again, weapon might be one of the end game upgrades that we will be having. So at this point, what to prepare for the end game? So you will have to farm better place, play sets. You'll have to farm play sets and where to farm them. You'll be farming them in here, Outland. And you'll be farming them in your mesmerizing labyrinth. So this is where you'll have to end up. You'll have to complete this. The last stage, this is actually one of the best stages for farming. And you have to also prioritize on the days that you need to farm. Sorry, this one. So just clicked on it. So for each day, there's a different drop, a priority drop. If you want to save it for a specific drop, be my guest, but more or less, it's ideal that you don't save as much because sometimes you don't, you can't finish everything. So again, farming better play sets is going to be key for the end game. Also, what you need to prepare is in your place. Let's say for example, for Sir Slit, I'm not changing her plays anymore. So this is going to be her specific play. This is her. So again, upgrade is one of the things that we're doing. Exalt is going to be harder because you need copies or a Sublime Muse to use it. Adapt, however, is going to also play a key. So you need to make sure that you use the gold ones. The gold ones actually have four slots in them. Purple ones have three blue ones. Like for example, this one, the blue ones only have two random slots. So more or less go after the gold ones or the SSR ones because you'll be, you'll have to get more stats for your heroes eventually in the end game. So again, Adapt is going to play a significant role. Also for sign, you'll have to sign, if you're confident that that play is going to stay in that specific hero of yours, then you'll have to sign because there's an increase of 10% effect only for the signer. Okay. So basic stats will have an increase. So currently for, for her for searchlet, she already has signed. So end game upgrades will be important, guys. I, I'm not kidding you, they're going to put you through more content in the future and to be able to walk through, to go over content in the future. Also, weapon might play a part. I'm actually thinking that they might, might add upgrades to weapons. So again, just gonna repeat that for you guys. But there would be content that I think they need to open yet. One is the union. Union is guild type, probably boss fights and lots of rewards. I'm actually hoping that that is the scenario for the guild. I'm excited for the guild because a lot of people asking me to create a guild, which definitely I will when this opens. But again, this is one of the content that we are looking for in the end game. I'm glad that they locked this so that we could just finish up, you know, warming up to the game for the first three weeks or the month and probably they could open union for us. And so that we could play guild battles with other guilds with bosses. And I'm really, really looking forward to this for the end game. So for the troop, there's also one content here that hasn't been opened yet. The rehearsal hall. This is, I've seen this before. It's like a piano room. We're in rehearsal. I haven't really gone through rehearsal hall, but and let's go back to the lobby guys and go through Outland one last bit. There's another content there that needs to be unlocked as well for the end game, which is translucent domain. So again, I just really, really hope that the end game content is going to be worth all the grinding that we have at this point. There are a few things that I think that they should, you know, address the energy system. Because again, if they really want us to spend, I really do hope it's in someone's not and not in spending energy. So guys, devs, please make changes in the energy system because they really lack energy here in this game. Right now, we're spending summoning currency for energy, which is a bad thing. At this point, I don't really like the setup. They should change that. Farming also for, you know, Dobryostals would, you know, be a good improvement in the future if they could, you know, have, sorry, consistent ways to farm Dobryostals. That would be good. And also, in terms of the banners, again, I get that you want to put out a lot of banners, but the way that banners have been put out have been such a crazy pace. The only reason why it's such a crazy pace, I think, as well, is that they plan to release new characters right away. And they're releasing, you know, like now, Cheryl is out. Then the next banners live, which is a current character. So at this point, I'm not really, it's not really a problem. But again, a lot of banners is going to give the community a bad taste in terms of not being able to save for a specific banner. I know that not every banner, not every hero in this game, you'll get in every banner. But again, players need to save, at least give them a chance to save for the next banner before you roll them out. So again, hopefully I think there will be collabs in the future for this game. So hopefully in those collabs, we can save more at this point. But who knows? So that is the end game content, guys. So what do you think of the end game? What do you think? I need your comments. So again, prepare for the end game, upgrades, upgrade all as much as possible, develop your teams, prepare for, you know, theme teams, or what do you call this, or specific teams, if I may say. And again, there are a lot of, you know, content still available to be unlocked. So I'm looking forward to what do they open next. Okay, so now that I'm in the end game, I'm just finishing up everything, polishing my account. And there you go. Thank you very much, guys, for staying this far.  This is The Warden and I'm out of here.


Journaling seems to be pretty much all the rage these days but a lot of people think like I once thought that journaling is like this 16 year old girl in the high school musical movies where she's writing about her heartbreak and her feelings and they get turned off, right? I certainly was. But since then I've actually learned that journaling has many different methods, there are many different ways to do it and in this video I wanted to share a couple very useful ways that you can start journaling today. Hey guys, Alex Hein, author of the book on Habits, Master of the Day, so I've included down below this video a free journaling worksheet as well as an email series you'll get every week on how to use journaling to figure out what to do with your life and find the direction going forward. You can check it out, it's the first link below this video. The way I got into journaling was pretty much the way that a lot of people get into journaling. You're usually hitting rock bottom, you hate something about your life, you're confused about what to do next and you're feeling a lot of negative emotions internally. For me it was around 2012 where I'd just moved back from China which I thought I was going to move there and stay there for 10 years, become a monk, a mystic, a kung fu master and then come back when I was this ultimate sage badass. Now when that journey ended after just a year, I came home and I moved back home now in my mid 20s and now I'm like well what do I do with my life? I have no friends, I don't know what steps to do next, I feel embarrassed because I'm back with my parents and I feel confused and just all these negative emotions every single day and I felt afraid of making the wrong decision but unfortunately for me that just resulted in me making no decision. So that is the time in my life when I started journaling and that's probably maybe something that you're going through now especially everything that's happened this year but I wanted to share a few of the ways that I've used journaling since as well as my very very brief morning journaling routine. So at that time for me the number one use of journaling was to get my confused thoughts on paper and I still think that's one of the best ways to use journaling. If you have a lot going on in your head about a specific part of your life or this moment in your life write it all out but there's three other ways that I typically use journaling a lot. So the first way is journaling to systematically reach your goals. Now if you've done any kind of long-term goal that takes more than a month this is one of the best methods to stay on track. For me I've used journaling extensively in the process of building my business and trying to become a business owner. I didn't know anything about business. Every week I was discouraged for literally years and it never ended up being as big as I wanted it to be. So every week I would journal my frustrations, I would journal one thing I can improve on and I would remind myself of my vision and the path going forward what I really needed to do what I really needed to work on. The second thing you can use journaling for is just journal to generate ideas. So let's say for example your goal for this year is to lose weight or find like a loving relationship find your dream person.  How can I have more social interactions in my life this year?  So journaling to generate ideas has been a really really useful thing for me and the third thing is journaling to track your progress and not get discouraged. I've shared in my videos how I've had a lot of digestive problems and health problems unfortunately in my life even though I take good care of myself and for me journaling the healing process the healing journey has been so useful when you don't feel like you're making any progress you don't feel that well you're wondering when it's all gonna end you can use journaling to track your progress and remind yourself oh three months ago I was actually in a really bad spot even though I don't feel great now three months ago I was way worse so the things I've been doing have been working so keeping it almost as like a ship's charter log right like hey we're here we're here we're here we've almost made it and you're just incrementally tracking that progress journaling can be super useful for that so getting started I would recommend just find one journaling exercise that you can do daily that's simple that's related to your goals and what you want to do and then do that repeatedly predictably every single week or ideally every morning so for me for example in the mornings these days my morning routine is pretty simple but the journaling aspect of it is I just write down my intentions for the year and then I write down my main goals and then any ideas that come to me on how I can actually reach those goals you know for some days my morning routine is I'm tired as hell I don't feel that rested all right I didn't sleep well so a lot of it is just inventing the complaining and the frustrations and when is this going to happen and how is it all going to work out and then I just remind myself of my goals and intentions so some days it is like morning pages where I'm venting and complaining and other days it's just generating creative ideas now for me I start with the intentions for the year which if you've seen my previous video are sabbatical meaning rest my health fun and connection so I start with that as the banner at the top to remind myself this is the intention of this page what can I do what outcomes will come if I do these specific things daily and then I just write and if a new exciting idea comes to me that's what I'm putting down on that paper and that's what I'm finding a way to track in my day-to-day life and finally just like with any other ritual commit to a daily plan around it for me these days in 2021 my morning routine is very streamlined I do 20 minutes of qigong or exercise I journal for 20 minutes using this exact method this is what I want this year to look like am I on track is what I'm doing working what other new creative ideas do I have to do and then finally it's either listening to an audiobook while I go for a walk outside in some fresh air or it's reading a book that's growth oriented personal development oriented or something that just really gets my head focused in the right place and just by doing that journaling can be a really good focal point for my day to stay focused and consistent with my goals and my intentions the more crazy life gets the more you have to be disciplined about doing this so I hope that helps it's a super beginner really basic journaling routine that can help you again I've included a free journaling worksheet down below this video the first link you're also going to get a weekly email a journaling series on how to use journaling to kind of design your dream life so you can check it out right below this video and I have two related recent videos on this topic right over here


Maybe we think there's going to be a step up. So let's say that wages are the same. And then like in June, let's say we're planning a pay raise. So June, let's go to June and say, we're going to increase it here by 1.1. It's going to go up by 10%. And so this is going to be times 1.1 times 1.1. OK, let's undo this whole thing. I don't know what is happening. Let's go into this again. This is going to be equal to prior 1 times 100% plus 10%, 1.1, going up by 10% in June, enter. OK, so that's a step up. So notice I'm not going to continue it going up 10%. Now I'm going to say it stayed the same up until here. And then it's going to go up by the 10% going into after that point. Let's actually do it in July. I think I want to do it in July. So now I'm going to mess it up again. So I'm going to say let's delete it here. And then I'm going to do it in July. So I'm going to go in here times 1.1. And so I'm also going to do the wages. So I'm going to go into the wages here and say this is going to be that times 1.1. So now the wages are up to 7, 6, 8, 2. Now we have a similar relationship notice between the taxes and the wages that we had because these are payroll taxes as we did when we looked at the cost to goods sold and the sales, meaning as wages go up, you would expect the payroll taxes to go up in some similar proportion. So in other words, if I look at the relationship between these two, 486 divided by the 6, 9, 8, 3 is 6.9%. So I could have done this. The other way I could have done this is say I believe that 6.9% should stay basically constant. And I could put this equal to this times 6.9%, right? Or I could just have it increased by the same amount as we did here. So now I have the 5, 3, 5 divided by the 7, 6, 8, 2 and still 6.9%. So we still have that relationship, the point being as we increase wages, you would expect payroll taxes, which is our portion of the taxes, not the employee portion. Their taxes will go up too, but that's not our expense. That's their expense. These are our portion of Social Security Medicare and FUTA that will go up. OK, so that's that. All right, so let's keep going. Supplies, I'm going to imagine that's the same. You would think that if the revenue goes up, then supplies might go up, but it also might be in material depending on the industry you're in. So I'm going to say it's either the same or possibly in material, not really relevant to decision making possibly. Telephone, again, I'm going to say that's somewhat the same. Maybe the telephone goes up when revenue goes up, but usually telephone will go up in this staggered kind of way like we had here, right? Because we might have to get a higher plan at some point, in which case you're going to have a step up in costs. Similarly with utilities, you would think it would be much the same unless we needed to level up a whole another shop or something where the utility bills would go up, in which case it would go up in a step up. The gain on sale of investment, because these were actually a one time thing, we had short term investments that we sold. I don't expect this to repeat at all, so I'm actually going to delete this whole thing and remove that one. And then we have depreciation. Depreciation is something that you could get directly from the depreciation schedules, and it might not be uniform if you're using something like an accelerated depreciation method. But if you're using a straight line method, you would expect it to be somewhat uniform. So you could make that kind of more exact at this point in time. It would be significantly different or change if you plan on buying more equipment. So note that if you're doing a full, a more expansive budgeting process, then you would also have a cash flow budget that would include equipment purchasing budgets, which could help you to then calculate your depreciation, depreciation being something that would be on an accrual basis. And you'd also might be have a cash flow budget, which doesn't include depreciation because cash is not impacted with depreciation. But we're going to keep it the same here going forward, so we'll just let it roll. And then the interest expense. Interest is something on the loans. So you could think, well, if I've already financed the business and I'm not taking on any new loans, then the interest expense would be somewhat standard, but you can actually get the exact interest expense from the amortization tables, because it should go down each month according to the amortization tables. We're just going to estimate it here. Let's try to do another method. We might say the interest, I think, is going to go down. Let's just imagine it goes down by a constant rate. So I'm going to take the prior period times 95%. So I'm going to say the prior amount times 0.95, same concept, but this time it's going to go down each time instead of increasing. So we'll do something like that with the interest. And then, so let's go ahead. So we did that one. I'm not going to do anything for the rest. So that's going to be basically it. So let's close this. We're going to say, hey, hold on a second. So that's going to be basically it. OK, so now let's just kind of clean it up. So I'm going to select this whole bit right here. Let's put brackets around it. I'm going to go home tab font group. And we'll put brackets around it. We could put brackets around this side as well. Brackets, I'm going to ungreenify it. And there we have it. Let's put an underline here, home tab font group underline. Let's put an underline here, home tab font group underline. OK, so at the end of next year, we're looking $125,000, $126,000 almost on the net income. That's what I'm talking about. As long as that advertising goes the way it's planned. And who would doubt the genius of this lady that we hired after her skills in the entertainment in Hollywood and then with the beverage people? Anyways, I don't know. We're just the accountant.  OK, OK, we're going to make 120 revenues going to soar, people. It's going to soar. According to the data input we got. OK, so that's going to be it. So in future presentations, we're going to take this stuff, put it back into QuickBooks so that we can then generate our budgets in QuickBooks, allowing us to do comparisons between actual and budget.