So originally I was gonna go to art school in Colorado, but it was really expensive I didn't know that much about the GI bill or like specific branches of the military at the time My wife at one point in her life was gonna join the Air Force reserves And then I also grew up next to Buckley Air Force Base So all three of those things kind of equated out to me joining the Air Force like finding this YouTube channel finding other YouTube Channels, I'm just getting as informed as I can and it just led me down that path of this is probably the best branch for me And like the best thing for me in this season of my life for job security and then focusing on other things outside of the Air Force To set up a good future I've been in the Air Force for two and a half years now. I joined February 2017 and I'm an A1C So my job is cyber systems operations. The AFSC is 3DO X2 I got this job in depth. I waited about maybe a month or two for the contract This was the second job on my like pick 10 list or whatever And this ended up being the job that I wanted to do because after I was already in my number one pick with cyber surety And I actually saw what they did and I liked this job a lot better So I guess you could say that I did get my number one job So cyber surety like I just said was my number one pick But that's because my recruiter wouldn't let me put the actual jobs that I wanted to do on there He said that they just weren't really getting people and getting contracts for those right now But I really wanted to do a graphic design job. I forgot the AFSC actually was but when I went to meps They told me that they just dropped that AFSC And so then my other number one was photo journalism because I love like photography and stuff like that But that didn't end up working out either because he said I couldn't go that route I also had some like medical stuff on there like dental and some other things IT isn't something that I wanted to do but it's something I ended up being kind of used to and so it's kind of the direction that I went I Signed a four-year contract six years was a really big commitment and I wasn't I wasn't ready to do that Tech school for cyber ops is at Keyslight Air Force Base in Biloxi, Mississippi Tech school is basically four months unless it's changed which I don't think that it has But it's basically four months long. So from basic through tech school It's pretty much just a six-month process Tech school was amazing Keyslight Air Force Base has like the best defects in the Air Force So like we talk about it all the time at work. Just just kind of looking back at it And it's not so fun when you're there But since you're all there together with people who are kind of a lot like you It's easy to make a lot of friends and it just kind of you just kind of go through the same things together And so you have pretty much anybody and everybody to talk about it with but all in all it was a really good time It's just kind of something you have to experience alone tech school in Mississippi is super humid because it's like right in the Gulf So once you get past that stuff, it's really not the big of a deal. The ocean is cool. It's like a man-made ocean It's not super bad. There's a lot of fun stuff to do around there, too So it was all in all it was like a it was like an 8 out of 10. I'd give it an 8 out of 10 So it's cyber ops you can pretty much go anywhere in the Air Force And I think you can also go places like to other army bases and stuff like that It's a really versatile job You can pretty much get you can pretty much end up doing in this IT like cyber career field in the Air Force with this job specifically we're system administrators, but Sometimes you get pulled to do other things as well. So the job goes literally anywhere So there's two main things for cyber ops and these are kind of the two main things you learn at tech school I would say you learn a lot about cybersecurity which takes you into sec plus Which is assert by comp tia that you end up getting to graduate tech school So you learn a ton of stuff about vulnerabilities getting hacked viruses and stuff like that And then the other side of things is system administration So if you don't know what that is, it's like server administration keeping websites up and running keeping applications up and running Pretty much anything that you're accessing online is on a server And so we have to keep those alive so that people can continue to access them from other remote locations Our job starts with like it's kind of like a nine to five. So we show up at work at seven o'clock We go home at four o'clock Monday Wednesday and Friday is PT So we show up at seven o'clock do PT for 30 minutes to 45 minutes And then we go home change shower and we come back to work at like nine o'clock And then it's from nine to four our job is really general So you can end up doing pretty much anything like I said before but That's like the the bare minimum of that job. It's a it's a pretty cool job You do a lot with virtual machines, which are computers There's a ton of computers on one computer. You would you'd have to look it up. It's kind of complicated But yeah, that's pretty much what we do So if a new airman showed up in our shop The first thing I would tell them is that they should get their CDC's done as fast as possible That's like a really big thing that leadership wants new airmen to get done So once you get those done, you can kind of move on to on the job training And you can actually get hands-on with servers and with your job that you're doing on your base, whatever it is That's probably the biggest thing because CDC's really take up a lot of time and they're really they'll put you to sleep They'll put you to sleep pretty quick too So the sooner you get them done the sooner you can actually do your job on a day-to-day basis And that's when the Air Force kind of turns into the Air Force And you really break away from that like training tech school BMT mindset Another thing is that there are a lot of negative people in the Air Force So the first thing I would say is don't be one of those negative people and the second thing I'd say is just kind of take it one day at a time Maybe don't go in if you want to do career. That's awesome But go in with the mindset that anything is possible and that there could be new opportunities doors opening and doors closing everywhere So just be as optimistic as possible and then just just don't let people drag you down That's like the best advice that I can give So I make Air Force videos as well. My YouTube channel name is skate gnarly. That's SK 8 G N A R L E Y My title for that channel is Jonathan Sullivan. I don't really go by skate gnarly anymore My Instagram and my Twitter are exactly the same So make sure you go check me out on there and subscribe to my YouTube channel


Okay, everybody Here we grow again I'm gonna start the show off with a clearing and it's my favorite is clearing ever I Do it all the time and it's for self love We have unconditional love for ourselves. I get it. No, we're gonna start clearing that we like ourselves I get it. No, we're gonna clear that Okay, that's where we're starting today in a minute in a minute. I don't know where I'm going with that I just feel like singing today I'm going to start taking collars before I take collars. I want to let everybody know I Am available for private sessions, but I will never ever reach out to you. I say this during every single show Because on YouTube Instagram Facebook and other social media outlets.  So um, I will never ever reach out to anybody for a For a reading a healing for anything Uh, if if you want a session with me, you have to go to my website t-o-n-i-g dot i-n-f-o And then call my business number four one four eight nine seven two eight six nine. That is the only way To get a session with me. Um, I will not email you. I will not Put it in my uh comments. None of that is happening. Believe me None of that and if you knew the level of um, I don't know what I would call it the level of like faith. I have and people are coming to me I don't chase people. I don't chase money. You would know. I am not chasing you for And that's not a bad thing. That's just a thing like I don't ever um Think anybody should be texting somebody you need a reading blah blah blah I don't I just don't I don't believe in that if somebody needs something they will Find the right person. Okay. Um, the next thing is hey stevie stevie's my little brother for those of you who are new Love him to pieces He is hilarious. Um So steven is on tiktok and he does these dances. There's a video of him and it looks really bad. He's trying to Cushion serve He's on a cushion and he's trying to go down a flight of steps at this cushion The first time I saw it. I'm like, oh my gosh, did he break his neck? But he didn't and when you realize he's okay The video is really funny. Um But stevie loves to dance and rap and he has some tiktoks on that now I I don't know what his tiktok thing is But if you go to my tiktok, you'll find his tiktok tiktok. Anyway I'm going to be answering questions online On the youtube chat and via phone calls It's always best to call in because I can tap into your energy individually when i'm on the phone with you On on on the youtube chat. I don't always get to tap so So, uh, I'll get your energy, but it might not be as strong as on the phone if you want to join the show live If you're watching on one of the television stations or podcasts or radio stations that I air on and you want to join us live If you have questions if you want to connect with loved ones on the other side You can do that. I'm here every monday and wednesday from at noon central And you can join us on youtube if you do join us on youtube and you like what you see, please hit that like And uh, maybe follow so if I do a pop-up show or when whenever I come on, you'll know And you can post questions in the youtube live chat if you want to call in and ask a question The number is<PHONE_NUMBER>. Let me say that a little slower I I don't I yeah see right there eight four five two seven seven nine one three one I want to say hi to everybody who's joining us Joining us in the chat Patrick. Thank you so much for your kind word and I cannot wait to eat your pie The pie you baked Thank you. Um, amy. Hey, what's going on heather? Um, fun. Thank you all for joining me and then we have some new people Mears Mars Mari Maris Maris.  I massacred your name. Just now lolly. Hey, lolly um So that is who is checked in so far. I know um, there are some people who watch every single week And they don't always check in and uh, me me scott Um Jess cindy. Hey guys. Love you all so very very much I'm gonna start taking callers and then I hey franke. What's up? And then I'm going to go back and forth between callers and um And youtube questions and again if you want to call in And ask your question. It's eight four five two seven seven Nine one three one. I'm gonna be on for an hour today Um, I'm going to Try to get every single caller today. Okay Um, here we go. The first caller is seven zero three seven zero three. What's your name and where are you calling from? I'm calling from virginia Hey there, how can I help you today? Um, job interviews do you see that maybe one of them will come through or or a different one? Yes, okay. One of the ones that you've already done is coming through and um But there are two more that you're going to do and the next You're going to get a total I know you're gonna get An at least one offer, but you might get more than one offer. I feel like you might get two or three offers Um, and and here's a thing sometimes once we get One offer and we accept that offer. We don't even entertain the other offers While we're in the uh dating process the dating Stage of a job meaning we're just getting to know the job. We haven't really settled in Um, it's okay to look at other offers you may get And if something better comes along, it's okay. Yes. So please even energy we work out. We we fly on energy So here's what happens when we don't have a job when we when we get laid off or whatever We go into this um, like panic or fear mode and then as soon as we have a job even if it's a whatever job Where we feel somewhat safe and then we we pull that energy and if we have money coming in we keep money coming in Yeah, I want you to consider a couple of things That's that's a lot of people do but not eyes Yeah, I I and here's a couple things for you to consider the first thing to consider is I'm hearing there might be a banking Position for you even if it's not in the I feel like it might be on the business end of banking Maybe not the mortgage end of banking But business end of banking and not like running the business Window at the bank that there's nothing wrong with that But I feel like that's Excuse me. I feel like that might be coming in for you And a number of other things just keep going Until you find what you're looking for and I do feel like Well In a month you will have a position that's so much better than the last position that you had. Okay um, and don't Even if you get another position or when you get this other position Find a company that allows you to freelance mortgages Okay, this is really important for you Find a company that allows you to be kind of an independent Mortgage person So those people that you worked with before or you know, you already know this Do it independently even if you work for a company that Maybe isn't doing mortgages or whatever you're doing Find a company that allows you to freelance in your free time You're going to be so happy you did that. Okay, sweetie Okay. Yeah, I feel like one of these Interviews I have three interviews with one and a phone interview on Monday So I really feel like one of these two would be really great, but I'm still applying. Yep. You can't stop applying Absolutely. Please keep going keep looking Even after you get this because I do feel like that's going to be good and please don't forget um to keep To find some place that will let you independently do mortgages. Okay, love. Okay Thank you. So very much. Thank you. Oh, absolutely my pleasure and thank you so much for calling in Please keep us posted and let us know what happened.  Absolutely. Thank you Thank you so much. I want to tell everybody on Monday. I had a caller that um She she had talked to me about a month ago and she asked about a job And I told her by the end of the month by the end of October. She'd have She'd be employed and then um She called in on Monday and said that she was one of the two final for This position and she got it and I'm so grateful for her and I know that like we have such Awesome people on this show. I know you guys were rooting for her. So thank you for sending that energy to her I want I just want everybody to know she did get the position She is gainfully employed and good for her. I'm going to go.  I'm sorry that I don't know how to pronounce your name Um, marina marina. Thank you. I'm sorry if I would have read three lines down I would have had it. I'm going to answer marina's question first. Do you see me? In my current job for a long time or will There be changing jobs will they be changing jobs? I get paid good, but I want to become financially independent Okay, first of all marina Most people don't become financially independent working for somebody else if you want to be financially independent Most of the time unless you're in your high level job You also have to do something on the side for yourself where you are not capped in your pay okay First and I always if you if this is your first time here.  It wakes up your creativity. It is amazing Okay, now that I've said that I yeah, I do think you will be at this job for a bit of time I do think you should keep your eyes open and Again, I I do say also If something comes along that can give you more of what you're looking for don't hesitate to Do it I do feel like um I do feel like November some things are going to come in for people Um, there might be um some shutdowns Now I've I've been saying for a while to people privately because I know how people get collectively um They've already started the governor of Illinois signed the mask mandate until november 14th I am calling this round electionitis Because November I believe it's november 8th or 9th are the elections and amazingly All of a sudden Guess what's back? Um, yep, it's back It's like a bad boyfriend. It won't go away. It just keeps coming back Um, anyway, I'm I'm totally kind of joking And in order to get certain things The agenda whatever we want to call it we might have I know what's going to happen I've been talking about it to people privately you guys know on On platforms. We're not allowed to say What's actually going on even if they are saying what's actually going on? So what I'm going to say is um anything that goes down it will be back up, you know by february Hopefully sooner. Okay. Here we go. So um Fawn I need to know when you say east or west give me specific areas east or west I can tell you which one's best for you. I'm going to go to the next caller 904 904, what's your name and where are you calling from? Hey, wendy. How can I help you today? You cannot generals are um a little too long So on the show I I work on specific questions and or specific Connections to loved ones on the other side. I'm sorry about that. No, no, it's okay. I didn't announce that Yes, okay, so wendy I swear to goodness. I don't want to be my own sound effects person anymore I need to get some sound effects because I'm hearing ding ding ding ding um What I'm going to say for you something is coming in and it's coming in hot and fast So be ready. It is in the area that you want it to be in I am going to say I I don't I don't know for sure I I feel like in a week you're going to hear something And I see you like At a comp at a computer. So for whatever that means love Is I hear I hear in a week give it a week give it a week But keep looking keep keep it somebody up here is saying keep it pushing keep it pushing keep it pushing Now i'm also going to tell you when you started when when I said no um somebody on the other side for you Right away stepped up and said she needs to talk about her relationship No Now here's what I'm going to say It is it's a woman and she was at one point in her life She was a little bit full figured of a not a big big woman, but you know She was a healthy woman and she no fuss no much She she had her finger flying all the time. I'm just saying oh my goodness when she is Strong she's I'm hearing large and in charge, but she is a strong woman And she is saying You okay, so I'm just going to give you her message because I don't want her jumping in me talking You know what I mean? I don't I don't don't want that So I'm going to tell you what she's saying and you just do whatever you want with this. Okay, sweetie Hey Okay, folks If you've not been here before I do channel loved ones on the other side, which means they pretty much say what they want and and it's always with love You need to talk about your relationship. You need to be eyes wide open um Wendy I'm just going to ask you I know people think that I'm a psychic. I should just have all the answers. Um, that's not always the way it works, especially during This where I'm just doing trying to do one question. Are you already in a relationship with someone? No, okay, thank you You know Yes Okay, I'm gonna tell you this right now and I feel you like you cannot even imagine I'm just going to tell you this right now There's so much I could say but I'm going to try to compact this into a a quickie for you Um, which is exactly the same thing he wants to do by the way That has been from from your loved one He wants to compact this into a quickie for you. What I'm hearing is Somebody and and and this is coming from your loved one But I also have figured this out recently if somebody is 100% Wanting Something serious with you. There is no ambiguity in it. They will be straightforward. They will let you know They will be honest and upfront and tell you the things that you are You are Needing to hear to know that you're going to be safe and secure in this situation Somebody who's coming into play not so much. They're going to kind of do the work around statements Oh, can't we just see where this goes?  Yeah, yeah, we are so they know what they want They just can't tell us what they want because what they want is to play They are just in their let's play mode Hmm, there are girls that work by the hour for that stuff. That's all I'm saying on that If all you want is to hit it Go find somebody and I have nothing against girls that work by the hour just for that purpose So that those of us who are looking for something serious don't have to put up with this. Okay I'm just I'm just going to say to you Keep it pushing. Keep it pushing. Keep it pushing Do not entertain this person from the past because It will not last he's coming in as a lot of people say for a good time. Not a long time. I'm here on saturday night I'm gone on sunday morning. I don't know when you're gonna see me again Because uh, I and then I hear that song papa was a rolling stone, but my boyfriend sure the hell won't be Okay, okay Okay, and let me let me say this to you and and and and You know at some point if we are just you know when we go into it We think it's a relationship or it's going towards a relationship if we're looking for a hookup We're not looking for a hookup with that. Okay.  I might be your dream hookup, but you might not be my Dream hookup man. Amen And every girl out there knows what I'm saying And so do most of the guys. Okay. So what I'm gonna say right now is your loved one on the other side All she wants to say to you is keep it pushing if you Get past this and it's for for for everybody. I'm just saying male female if you let go of that one That's just kind of hanging on to that one little string of your your shirt And won't let go if you can cut that string and you can move yourself on You are going to be In energy of all new coming in you're going into a new career Make sure you're also going into new energy with relationship. Don't bring anything from the past. Okay um I'm I'm seeing this person on the other side She shows me a broom and she's saying just just sweep it outside and let the wind take that that that uh Kirk Kirk Kirk I I am away Just sweep it outside and let the wind swoosh it away for you and you you won't even have don't even entertain this With a little back and forth funny flirting because it'll turn into Something else and when you do communicate Even responding to the text you're giving energy and it's building that that energetic things stronger. So just um Let it go Um and and move on to to something much better and no she wants to tell you there's a gentleman coming in Okay, so I guess you are getting your general reading by the way there's a gentleman coming in There's a gentleman coming in and this person coming in is coming in in december And I see the 12th on the calendar now. It could be the second it could be You know a different day. I see the 12th being a really Significant day for this you might meet him before this but this gentleman's coming in in december. He's professional He has his poop in a group He's good to go.  He's ready for that next level relationship. Now I am going to say this now just because you know this don't skip steps Take your time right men love Their dream car because they had to work really hard for it They beat up their hoopties, right?  God. I haven't heard that statement in forever heard that What is that like from the 90s? Round the round the way anyway, they they will they will use and abuse The one that's not the one the car. That's not their dream car The one they didn't have to invest in but the person they have to invest in and that that doesn't mean financially That means time energy actually working on Setting things up. That's the one that they will They will have the long-term situation or relationship or marriage with Now don't get me wrong Men know within a certain period of time if you're the one or not And they might not know the first okay first week first month But but there is a time when they know And when they figured out where you are in their life if you're the you know the girl until the woman If they figured out you're the actual woman You're gonna know because they're going to talk about they're going to serious. I'm not talking about love bombing They're going to seriously talk about What they want in a relationship with you you won't have to bring that stuff up You won't have to ask are you serious about me? Do we have a future? Where is this going because they're going to be Bringing that up in conversations and talking about it with you The content of their conversation is going to be more about you and less about what goes on in the bedroom area The content of their conversation is going to be more about You know, I have this coming up. Would you be interested in joining me that?  Okay, so that is one way we can tell the difference between the guy who's serious about us and the guy who's seriously wanting to get to get into our Want the guy who just wants a jimmy or jam. Okay. That's that's one way. There are a lot of other ways We can tell but that is one serious way. Okay, sweetie. Um, this guy is coming in in december not just Now the higher you hold yourself The more respect he's going to have for you. So keep yourself keep keep Keep yourself As high as you can be In every moment. Okay Okay, okay Okay, sweetie. Thank you so much for calling in I so hope this was helpful for you And um, and uh, please keep us all posted because we're gonna want to know what happens with this. Okay You are so welcome. You are so welcome nine to nine.  Um, my two girls are Estranged after a disagreement over a trip last summer. Do you see them repairing the rift anytime soon? Yes, I feel right around the holidays. They're going to start to repair the rift. Don't push it Don't take sides. I know you wouldn't but i'm just saying um I do feel like something's going to come in at the holidays. That's going to help them Kind of repair some of it and from there will be a slow build. Okay Allow them to work it out in their own way and I know it will Slowly come back together. Thank you guys so much for being here and joining me and And being part of this journey It's such an honor to to have each and every one of you and answer your questions And if you did not get through today, watch for the pop-up show or call in at monday at noon and I will try to get to you um But until the very next show, please enjoy your life Just do what you need to do to have some joy and happiness in your life


We've now made it to mid-March and mid-March sees shorter days, we've moved into autumn weather. However, this week again we've got the potential of very high to severe fire danger in the western side and central parts of Victoria. And that's all due to the fact that there's going to be temperatures in the 30s in the northern part of the state. And we then see very strong winds. The winds will be 40, 50 kilometres through Wednesday afternoon, Wednesday evening, through the night and into Thursday. So I think the key thing to stay tuned this week is the fire danger ratings for Wednesday and Thursday. We'll then move back into milder conditions but people should still be aware certainly in the western side and central part of Victoria that the fuels are so dry they haven't had the rain. The rain's been Melbourne based and it's been eastern Victoria. So although we've shared the excitement of a lot of rain over the weekend in some parts, there are other parts of the state that have remained dry and will remain dry which means the fire danger rating will be the key part to it. The message again is stay tuned, stay connected to information that you need to get. Know where to get the information but more importantly know where to get it early. Make those decisions early about your safety and we're nearly to the end of what is the 2012-13 fire season but there's still a couple of weeks to go before we'd be happy to say that it's over and in particular this week again just focusing on Wednesday, Thursday.


Big news for the Yankees and a game-changer in terms of Garrett Cole. Yeah, this is a mammoth move This is an epic day in Yankee history. They had targeted Cole They made him their number one priority and then they went out and hunted down a way to get him to sign with them Nine years three hundred and twenty four million He is the highest-paid pitcher in major league history and to me This felt like a move George Steinbrenner would have made and that George Steinbrenner would have loved He was a big believer in going and getting stars getting those marquee players Bringing them to New York the biggest stage and allowing them to perform It was house nine burner and the rest of the Yankee organization that made this move and that has made Yankee fans Pretty excited. That's a huge commitment and a lot of money And there's always pressure on the Yankees team to succeed and win a championship But I think there's more now than ever in acquiring Garrett Cole and when you look at things that you look at their rotation now You have Cole Severino to knock a Paxton and if you're not excited about that, there's probably something wrong with you That is one heck of a rotation and if you've asked yourself How do you make a hundred and three win team better?  Yeah, I think we've talked about the Yankee organization the last couple of years And how disciplined they are in making decisions. This one felt a lot different, right? This one was Let's go get this guy. Whatever it's going to take and from a player standpoint The message is clear now you have a number one guy in your rotation Meredith brings up a great point All of a sudden Severino to knock and Paxton look a whole lot better in the middle of your rotation instead at the top of it You have the best bullpen and baseball probably the best rotation and baseball and a lineup that can hit a lot of home runs There now is no excuses. You have to go find a way to win a world series Yeah, and a lot of people would say well the expectations you talked about them pressure It's what the Yankees are built for. I mean that's what they preach throughout the minor leagues He struck out 40% of the batters he faced. I mean think about that balls aren't put in play He's got those two nasty breaking pitches the curve in the slider And you see right there almost 14 strikeouts per nine innings And it just takes so much pressure off of your bullpen even though it is a very good bullpen He's a guy that can go out there and can eat up innings and as somebody that's in that clubhouse every day I can tell you this Yankees team has been hungry. They have the desire They want to win a world series and this is only going to add to it And we've seen some of things on social media from players coming out about how excited they are to get this type of addition in December, you know You can look at all the numbers and the statistics and the strikeouts per nine for Garrett Cole and they're all impressive But I think back to the postseason last year, especially what he did against the Yankees. I didn't think he had great stuff We were watching his at bats and thinking there are a couple of mistakes in there And when I watched Garrett Cole in his body language, he was recognizing that he said I don't have my a stuff today and he still found a way to shut down a powerful Yankee lineup That's the difference between a guy when he has his a stuff He's going to dominate when he doesn't he's a competitor that will find a way to beat you anyway That's why he got paid nine years That's why I got paid three hundred twenty four million dollars because when he doesn't have the a stuff He still finds a way to win games


dystopian time. There's a lot of issues right now going on when it comes to leftist politics, and I brought all of you on because I think that you have really interesting and unique perspectives. To me, the question that I'm about to ask, I feel like there's no right or wrong answer. There's just a lot of gray area, and it's kind of messy, right? So the answer has to do with the extent to which electoral politics matters. This is, you know, something that we'll see discussed from time to time on the left. It even gets relatively divisive. So the question that I want to pose to the panel is, should the left, after losing in 2020 and 2016, should we focus more so on direct action and mutual aid as opposed to this hyper focus on electoral politics, or should we focus on actually obtaining real political power, getting involved locally, running for Congress, actually trying to build power, or is it a combination of both? Do we need to recalibrate to make sure we focus more on one or the other? So this is a question that I think is really interesting, and I don't really have a strong answer. My instinct is to say both, but I think that it's a lot more nuanced than that, and I kind of want to take some time to play around in the gray area. So the first person who I want to go to is Professor Harvey J.K., because you always kind of ground your political ideology and history, and I think that that's really important because if you want to know where we're headed, you kind of get a little bit of a roadmap by looking at where we've been. So what is your take on this issue of electoral politics, Professor? I can't imagine an either or to this. I really can't. I can't imagine a political party system that isn't propelled for better or worse any number of directions by anything less than serious social movements. I mean, it's very hard to imagine otherwise, but in those terms, I'm not going to talk very long. I'm going to just lay this out because this is kind of old left view, but I'm a labor unionist. I've been a labor unionist for many, many years, and I still believe that however much we can run into unions that may well be obstructing of what we would think of as a left agenda, that there will be no serious left until there is a serious left labor movement. And I can base that on historical arguments and contemporary arguments. In fact, I'll even go so far as to say that on occasion recently on various shows, I do a weekly thing with a guy named David Feldman, one of his shows. And I've been saying recently that no labor movement, no left. And I've even gone further and said, I don't even know if there is a left right now. I know there are lots of diverse lefts, but I don't know if there's a left. Yeah. Yeah. I've seen a lot of factionalization. I mean, that's kind of for part two of the panel. But yeah, it kind of seems like, no, no, I think that that's really important because it feels like we're kind of all going into separate directions. And this is why I really wanted to ask this question, because we all have different ideas. Like for me, I am a news YouTuber. And so I'm almost hyper focused on electoral politics to the detriment of direct action and mutual aid, whereas folks like actual J kind of do a combination of both. You talk about current events and whatnot, but you also have this really strong focus on mutual aid. So what's your take on this? Because what I'll usually see is people say, Mike, you focus too much on electoral politics. It doesn't matter. Stop talking about politicians. Stop directing people how to get involved locally, nationally. What is your opinion on this? Because it's kind of hard to walk that fine line. Yeah. I definitely think we can do both at the same time, like walking through bubble gum sort of thing, because you have to, there are situations where someone needs $300 by the end of the week, not Medicare for all in two years. You know what I mean? And that's super important all the time. So in my community, not just my community, there's tons of lefty communities and not even, you know, even liberal communities that do some form of at least charity stuff.  But, you know, we also try to like pay rent here. But yeah, I think electoral politics are frustrating and slow and it's very deliberate. And we live in an age where we can be very, very quickly satisfied via technology and from pretty much everything else. And so it can feel, especially for our generation or younger, that things just move incredibly slowly. But I have to remind people, now I don't have Harvey's background here, but I am also, I went for history.  But, and I just, just the trends do show that like life doesn't prove, and we do slowly win ground all the time, especially socially. Now, obviously, this isn't like the goal, we're not trying to just barely dig trenches for like World War One and get 20 feet forward. We want to win-win more often. And so I think really the answer is if we want, and I know this is sort of a little bit of the next conversation, but it applies to this as well. If we agree pretty much that both are very important, we need apparatuses that deal with both of those things kind of at the same time regularly. So specifically electoral politics, we need to figure out what's the next thing we need. What is the next like leftist thing that will help the most? And I think that's probably healthcare, but you could also make a very strong argument right now for housing. So one of those two things probably needs to, needs to topple. And we need to win that one. We need to focus on that in America specifically. Now, I don't know about Canadians and what your problems are over there or Australians or anything, because we are very American centric here and we have a lot of problems, but I think we can talk about a lot of the other stuff. We could talk about what specific leftism we want to end up being whether you're an anarcho-communist or whether you're, I don't know, a sock damn. It doesn't really matter because we all want the first basic step. So we have to start there first, in my opinion. I think we get ahead of ourselves a lot of the time. Like what's the ultimate goal? Well, we can't get there. We don't have healthcare. We can't get there if no one has a house. So that's kind of my thing. Yeah. You know, what I kind of noticed is, and this is just, this is maybe a projection because this is my feelings, is, you know, overall I focus more on electoral politics myself in terms of priorities, but depending on my mood, I'll kind of go back and forth. Like for example, you know, after Bernie lost in 2020, that was where mentally I'm like, all right, waving the white flag. What's the point? It's just there's so much disappointment. There's so much distress and distraught. But then I think, you know, if I focus only on mutual aid, that's, that might solve some issues, maybe in my area, maybe online, but then we're still not solving the structural issues that need to be addressed. So it feels like almost a cop out to, to go from one to the next. And really, to me, this is about like trying to do both, but in a healthy way. And I wanted to go to Hector, who has kind of been on both sides here, right? So you ran for Congress. That's how you and I first met. And now you're doing a lot of direct action and mutual aid in your community. So how do you find that balance if you do believe that both are necessary? Yes. So echoing what a lot of has been said is that I don't think this is an either or where I see the genesis of this question coming up is that in a lot of leftist spaces, you have people who question the efficacy of participating in electoral or giving energy to electoral, specifically when there are so many people with immediate needs right now, right? Who need things. They can't wait, like you said, for Medicare for all. They can't wait for a jobs program to get them somewhere. They have to take care of things, literally today or tomorrow or they'll be evicted or they'll be homeless. They'll have, you know, food insecurity. And so to me, I think it is about having a healthy balance where we're not deprioritizing one or the other. I think there has to be a healthy getting both done at the same time. And I guess what I always want to say is that we can't deprioritize one or the other. There is utility to participating in electoral because we need a long-term strategy. We need things to look forward to. And that's what I think the utility that electoral participation has. You know, I'm honest with people, although I do, you know, I'm all for direct action. Like I said, I was arrested a couple months ago for a direct action against the county executive in Hudson County, which Harvey will tell you is not a safe thing to do in general. But at the end of the day, I am trying to get you to vote. I am trying to get you to participate in local politics. One thing that I'll say just sort of to end my thing is that I look at a lot of vote totals. And when you look at an election result, you always party, you see that the top of the ticket always gets the most votes. The president gets more than the senator who gets more than the congressman who gets more than the mayor. But the fact of the matter is that your mayor has more of an effect on your life than any president will ever have. So if we had the sort of leftist participation that I'm trying to foster is it would be reversed. And your mayor would be the person getting the most votes and less people voting up the chain because those people don't have a direct action on what your life is going to be like. Can I ask a follow-up question there? Sure. I'm wondering if a part of electoral politics and the problem of it in America specifically is the way we vote. Like obviously there's a ton about voter suppression and stuff, but what is like just because of your view on it, what do you think the most effective way to actually vote is it can't be how we do it now. I feel like it's ranked choice, but at all levels pretty much. But how do you feel? Yeah, I mean at the end of the day, I love that question because we need a lot of democratic reforms to make the system more responsive to people. But right, but we have a problem of like our participation level is so low that those things would be nice, but it's not going to fix the problem. What we need is like 80% participation, which is a ridiculous number, right? Like I'm just like shooting for the stars. But if we had 80% participation, our government would look so much different than what it looks like right now. So to me, we have this huge flood of people who have just given up on the system. Another sort of like kind of touching up on that of things that I've seen of people who are so cynically like disgusted with the system that for New Jersey during my election, we had all mailing, right? So every single person got a mail in ballot, right? Great thing. Some people wrote the most ridiculous things in the right end.  And this person took the time to fill that out, put it in a mailbox and send it in to tell your elected officials like I so have so much disdain for what you were doing that I will literally send a ridiculous ballot back to you. We have to fix that problem of like people just don't have any faith in the system itself. Yeah. And one thing that I've noticed just covering politics is when it comes to just views and I use views as a gauge for how engaged people are, especially young people because my audience is usually younger. So usually during election times you see lots and lots of people tuning in for the first time ever getting involved in politics. And then when the election is over views kind of fall off a cliff. And I view that as an indication of people losing interest in politics more general. Some people just need a break. I totally get that. But I feel like there's a lot of people that kind of like they jump in and then they jump right back out. And my question is because it really seems like the panel is gravitating towards so far with who we've heard that, you know, you definitely need a healthy dose of both. But it's really easy to become, you know, just overcome with cynicism.  How do you keep them engaged? Because this is a question that I've been asking myself and I genuinely have no idea. Like I try to hello fellow kids them as much as I can throw in fun memes and stuff. But at the end of the day, sometimes it's just like too painful in a way to like be aware of all the horrible things climate apocalypse global pandemic. So like what do you do as a as a Twitch streamer to try to keep people engaged because I find this to be one of the most difficult things ever. So first off, I totally relate with the Bernie Sanders and like feeling hopeless because that's basically where I was in 2020 after he got knocked out of the primary. And you know, I went and voted Biden and whatever.   And it turned out a lot of people wanted to listen. And it's not just young people who come to watch my panel. I have I have older people across the spectrum. I have parents who watch me who talk about their struggles raising their kids.  And the the amount of support that I have seen around this community blows me away. And I think what it really comes down to is tapping into what fundamentally made Bernie Sanders so powerful and influential. And that's giving somebody out there hope. Because like like to what Hector was talking about, a lot of people are just absolutely crippled by hopelessness and despair.  And what I've found is building these communities where people can talk about their problems, where people can get both emotional support and if needed, you know, financial support to like there are members of our community who've talked about how they've gone like a week without food. And my community comes together, make sure that those people get fed, you know. And so the important thing is that in in this world where we do have a climate apocalypse where we do have kind of this a rising specter of fascism, is to be able to correctly identify those problems, but then to give people actionable things that they can do that that are going to make a difference, either in an electoral sense, or in a mutual aid sense, which is why I you cannot disconnect these two things. The mutual aid is important to mobilizing electoral support. And the electoral support is key to getting mutual aid support. These two things feed each other. And when we're when we're talking about that, I mean, if you can't get people to do something as simple as going out to vote, it's going to be a lot harder to get them to do things that are harder. And a lot of mutual aid is really hard. So you got to be able to do both things. And different people are good at different things, you know, what is your skill set, you know, and that's what I talk about on my channel a lot, you know, think about what you can do and how that can benefit people. And if that's more on the electoral side, you know, there are ways you can get involved here, like X, Y, Z, here are things you can do to get involved at a local level, or even higher levels. And if your skill set is more like, I don't know, like cooking ribs or something, like there are ways you can do that too, to help in your communities. And so it's just giving people things that they can do that give them a sense of agency and a sense of hope. Yeah, it goes back to what Harvey said before about unionization, you know, there's there's really no strong left without unions. And I feel like in a way, these communities that we've all kind of built individually, either online or on the ground, they kind of serve that social role that unions and like more community support served before, where, you know, it's helping at least a little bit. We're in a way we're also like somewhat isolated in our own bubbles. But I do feel like leftists have built communities, they're relatively fragmented. But at the same time, I do think that that is a really important and insightful thing that you that you mentioned for Jack, I wanted to bring in pics here with the Australian perspective, because we talk about like people jumping into elections and then tuning right back out. And this always kind of brings me back to how do you increase participation? And to me, I feel like the number one way to do that is to model our voting process after Australia is more so when it comes to compulsory voting. So in Australia, you have to vote. So I mean, can you explain what does that do? Like, what effect does that have? Because I know you have a higher participation rate in your country. But do people kind of just like vote and then tune back out? Or do they stay engaged because of them being required to vote? Like, can you speak to this here? Because I'm trying to think about like, what does keep people engaged, just forcing them to stay involved in politics help? If so, then maybe we can advocate for that? Like, what's your thoughts on this? You know, it's actually really interesting. And it's a bit of a spectrum, because while it is kind of compulsory voting, you have to enroll to vote when you turn 18. If you don't enroll, it kind of just like goes under the thing. But a lot of people, even though there is compulsory voting, are still extremely disengaged. And we'll still do the kind of generational voting thing where it's just like, Oh, my parents voted Labour, so I will vote Labour. That being said, we do have a actual Labour party here in Australia, which is kind of centre left. But even though there is kind of a pretty strong, there's a stronger union movement here in Australia, I think, than you see in America. It's still a very divided left, right? Because we have the Labour Party and we have the Greens Party. And all over the spectrum, in every state, there sometimes can be a Greens person that is more progressive than a Labour, or they can be a very progressive like Labour senator, or, you know, there's all sorts of kind of mix and match throughout all of the parties. So even though you can be engaged to like a specific level, you have to be really following it to like learn about the policies of these people. I think one of the things where we get really lost in regards to like electoral politics in general is the frustration that people feel that their vote doesn't matter, right? Even if it's a compulsory vote, people still go in and they're like, that's the same, it's the same side of a different coin. Which is why I appreciate everyone's opinion on this panel so far because I think what is key is the motivating of people to really feel like they are engaged in their community. And in order to be able to do that, there does have to be this sense of hope for change. And I think by encouraging people to really commit to at least politics on a community level is something that would be really important going forward in an American context, through mutual aid, through electoralism. But it's really focusing it down to the community level where things are tangible, where you can see differences, maybe you're affecting the environmental policy in your local area. And I think that helps people stay involved a little bit more than what you see on the internet where we're all having these big global conversations that are also divisive because it's so good for the algorithm for people to have strong opinions on different things. Whereas we're all arguing for the same 95% of things, we all want the same. But we get really kind of different. So I just love the nuance here and I think that you can't leave power on the table. But in order to motivate people to be engaged, you have to kind of participate in mutual aid kind of organizations. Yeah. Yeah, no, that's really insightful. One more thing. You can also basically just bribe people to vote with a democracy sausage, which is kind of what we do here.  Here you go. Well, okay, I was going to say we should incentivize voting. That was exactly what corrupted American democracy in the 19th century. People would show up to vote and they'd get a beer before they voted. Yeah, I wanted to get Hilde's perspective as well because you're from Canada. I know there's an election taking place currently. And you've kind of always done both. You've done direct action. You've also participated in electoral politics. What's your overall take in this? Because you're raising a new generation of anarchists. Like you said that you came from multi generations of anarchists. So what is your take here on this? Well, I live in Helbert, Canada. So my perspective is a little bit different. It doesn't really matter where my heart lies. It's because the air, the writing, they're called writings in the United States. You have districts in my writing. It has always voted conservative. My vote really doesn't count. And that's because we have first passed the post system and it's broken. And I have done both. The mutual aid, absolutely, there is a place for that. And I fully endorse that with respect to direct action. Yeah, it moves the needle. I get it. However, I feel, and despite having value in that, I feel though that we should consolidate our efforts in both. But I think I would lean towards more to strategically place people in key positions, whether it be school trustee, city councilor, get on any types of boards, councils, be a mayor, get in the legislative assembly, be a member of parliament, any one of those things. Get appointed as a judge. Those are key positions and basically stack the deck. It takes so, so many leftists to apply to get elected so that one person can actually be sitting at the table. There's right now going on anti-abortion groups who are incredibly organized, incredibly strategically motivated. They are putting people in all of the parties because we have a multi-party system. It's not like United States where you basically got your Republican and Democrat.  We have a variety here. They're almost all right wing with the exception of one. That's basically all that we have. The left in Canada has literally nowhere else to go. With these anti-abortion groups that are getting together and placing people strategically in all the parties or in municipal elections so that they can sit on council, so that they can be mayors, so that they can be on swim boards or hockey boards or what have you. That is incredibly terrifying to me because you guys in the United States will remember back when in the olden days when the Tea Party was in and the damage that that did. People were motivated years before the Tea Party came in. That's going on right now. There's a lot of anti-abortion and basically when voting comes down to the nitty gritty, it's always on abortion. And so I think we need to be smarter on the left by doing this. I think that we need to be more aware. We need to engage more. We need to rub elbows with those that are doing the direct action so that we can put ourselves in specific and strategic places of power. There was a poll that came out. Nearly 40% of the Federal Conservative Party of Canada that were elected, nearly 40% were endorsed by these anti-abortion groups. And these anti-abortion groups are incredibly funded. They are very motivated to get monies and they will back a lot of people whether it's somebody who wants to be a mayor candidate. And I mean, right now it's so depressing living in Alberta. It really is. It's so, so, so depressing. And in fact, just last night I was contacted by one of the parties and I was asked for their support and they said, you know what we need? We need you to back us by maxing out your credit. And I'll use that in quotes because that's a direct quote. Maxing out my credit. And I'm thinking, where have we gone? This is not right. The right is basically not playing the same game that the left is playing. We need to get in the game and we need to be strategically smart about it. Otherwise we're going to lose because we've been losing for a long time.  And I wanted to bring in Dan because, you know, there's this question, you know, is the Conservatives everywhere just better at politics? Like, I mean, the fact that we're having this conversation about does electoralism matter and to what extent doesn't matter when like basically 100% of Republicans, they all believe it matters and they still participate. They're still effective. Like, is there something that I'm missing here? Like our Conservatives just out-politicking us. Like, what's your take on this? Because I feel so frustrated and I feel like if we could replicate what the right did, albeit on the left, then maybe we, you know, could be successful, but then like to replicate that we'd need what they have, which is capital. And we just don't have that. So I'm like, it feels relatively hopeless kind of speaking to what like Hilda was talking about. But what's your thoughts on this, Dan? Many thoughts. I think the kind of the answer to the first part of your question about why is the right getting so powerful. I was just talking about this on Power Report with one of my regular guests, a brilliant person, Yasmin Aliakhan. And she was talking about how in Texas on the state level, Republicans have just been running a war path. And it's not just like in Texas alone in this. There's a lot of states where on the state and local level, Republicans have just gone gangbusters politically. And so not only are they like doing gangbusters politically, but they like you alluded to have the capital to be able to anytime they need to bust protesters to a given area to protest any little bit of leftist action, they're able to do so. And of course, they have the police behind their back. And as we mentioned earlier, of course, they have the local state and local officials behind their back. And so, of course, this isn't, I'm not teaching this panel anything because we've all kind of got this pretty clear. But the idea of the dichotomy between do you do electoralism versus direct action? I've got news for you. No Republican asked themselves that question. No one on the right asked themselves that question. They do it. They do it. And that's why they're effective. And one reason though, I think one romantic reason that's partially true about why, because I wrestle with this all the time and people on camera and off camera wrestle with this all the time of like, why is it so hard for the, you know, the left to accomplish what the right is accomplishing, right, at least in gaining political power. And the romanticized answer to that is, well, on the left, we're coalition based, and we very much care about our coalitions. And on the right, they're willing to fall in line. They don't care if Donald Trump isn't a real Christian and doesn't live very Christ. Like Mike Pence can still build coalition with him and won't say a word about it and won't talk about the blaring hypocrisy there because everyone in the evangelical side is supposed to understand the political gains that can be made if you just let Donald Trump kind of in, for example, right? And so, on the left, you're supposed to say, oh, well, we're not that coalitionally focused, but I think to criticize the left a little bit, sometimes ego gets in the way of our ability to see the chessboard and like kind of where we are on the chessboard, how badly we're using the game here. And I think I'm very much an and person. I'm glad we have this conversation of it can be both electoralism and direct action. But I think there has to be a balance of not sacrificing anyone's status or marginalized groups or individuals like abilities to have their say and have their voice, but also being able to realize, okay, we need to be strategic in certain times when how we gain power, because ultimately we do want the same things, we want to achieve the same things and achieve a more equal just society for everyone. And so in coalition building like that and putting our individual egos aside, as much as we put our identities and our politics within those egos, only then can we start to gain power. Because we like to consider conservatives as like being full of egos and things like that, but at least they can set their own personal egos aside for the whole coalition to gain power. And that's a tough pill to swallow for the left, but I think that's the best at least I've articulated it as to where we need to kind of figure it out, if that makes sense. Can I add a little bit to that too? I was going to do. Sure. Because we talked a little bit about abortion. And I think that there are fundamentally different motivators for the left and the right in this country and elsewhere too, right? Like, if you are willing to believe that your political opponents are killing millions upon millions of babies every year and you believe that with all of your heart, right? You're going to show up to vote. You're going to show up. You're going to mobilize to do these things. And I don't think we necessarily have the same kind of fire under our bellies, you know, that a lot of these pro-life people, sensibly pro-life people do, right? And like this goes into how like the Southern strategy tapped into how the religious fervor and belief of evangelicals, and that is something that has remained really elusive for the left to emulate in any way. And I think it is worth having a conversation like can we can we do the same thing that the right has done? And if we can, I don't think it looks the same as the Southern strategy, you know, like the left can't tap into QAnon, you know, like we can't peddle in conspiracy the same way, which frankly hampers us because it links us down to reality in a way that the right doesn't necessarily have to for its political figures. It's also very uncomfortable to criticize the right because sometimes you feel the need to be like, oh, you're getting diddled by a conspiracy, right? And that comes off condescending. So it's very much how do you even get on a platform to have these conversations, you know, like they can kind of just go.  I mean, to to Riverboats point, I mean, if you really if you really feel that being pro-life is voting for Trump or whatever is a matter of, I mean, saving unborn babies, you can't just call these people crazy.  But you have to take into account that they really truly believe that if you are watching Fox News all day and they're beating you over the head with this idea that, you know, actually critical race theory is super racist.   Then they say, well, you know what, Laura Ingram warned me that you were going to say that. And this is actually true that I'm right. Yeah, we have a we have a big problem also with letting letting like the idea of like the perfect candidate get in the way of like a really good one, we get super, super picky. And I don't understand that at all.  But like, you know, Bernie Sanders having a summer house is not one of those things that we need to worry about yet that is that comes up when he runs. So like, I don't I don't know why that's a thing that that we engage with. I think there's a there's a big problem with branding as well. I think just like the way we talk about things, there's a lot of people who really want to get into the nitty gritty of like, like, I don't know, Marxist, like theory with people that don't even understand like the basics of capitalism and yet are still like, like, I'm a full capital like we need to calm down on some of the stuff that we we think we know about, like, we feel like we're smart and a lot of us are very smart. But like, we really want to tell people we're smart. And I don't so to the ego thing, like, I don't know what that's about. There's we have to be able to communicate in a clear way that doesn't use scary words, like the like the idea of anarchy. What do people think of when we say I'm an anarcho anything, they think Molotov cocktails. And frankly, maybe they ought to. But sometimes, but sometimes that's not beneficial to the to the idea of just being like, Oh, I'm pro anarchy. Like, and I think most people, if you tell them what it is, like, if you didn't give them the title, they'd be like, Oh, that sounds like kind of fine. This sounds like a nice community and whatever. But like, we have a huge problem with with just the way that we we have disparate messaging, Republicans have like this vast news apparatus. I mean, just conservatives at large, where where they they're kind of always on the same message. And they do this thing where a lot of us consider it a grift and it is definitely down once you get down to the YouTube level. But like Ben Shapiro will make a video and then everybody in the Daily Wire will make that same video. And then everybody on Fox News will pick up that video. And then everybody on Twitter is talking about that same topic. And so you'll see no kink at pride discourse for a month. And it's like, this isn't important. This is obfuscating like the actual important things. Meanwhile, they go and they pass like, like really harmful things and in national Congress or the Texas bill that no one was really talking about that until it happened. Like, we were like, Oh, this might come down the pipe or worry about the Supreme Court and stuff, like when Trump was there. And then it sort of went away for a little bit, because people get complacent. And I think we need some sort of, like, counter propaganda. Because I mean, really what Fox News is and all of that is like, just a propaganda arm of the Republicans, whether they realize they're working for them or not. It's like, we could get by CNN is not doing it. You know what I mean? MSNBC is not doing it for leftists. Definitely not. So, yeah. To quickly just like, sorry, just real quick.  And it's just, I think that part of the rhetoric that a lot of people on the left engage in overly focuses on hypocrisy, because it makes us feel really superior to be like, ha, that Republican just did something very hypocritical. And it's, you know, it's funny in like a Twitter ha ha sense, but like, it has gotten to the point where it no longer feels really real to people. Like it's not like a real criticism. And it feels abstract from reality. And because it's not proposing like an actual criticism other than, ha, you said one thing and did another. And we need to make things real for people, whether that is in the conversation about direct action and mutual aid and how it relates to, you know, electoralism, whether it is in our rhetoric for trying to reach liberals or unradicalized folks, or whether it's talking about Republicans, you know, like, we need to move away and improve our rhetoric and critique in these regards. What I was going to throw into the conversation is like, Mike, you asked, why is it that Republicans have held onto so much power for so long? And the left seems to have this intractable nature of like, not being able to be as successful. And I think that held it really hit the nail on the head as to where the left goes from here, and what the future holds for us. And like, for, for Bojack said, is like, we have to nail it down to reality. If you look at your community, there are all these like really unsexy positions on your zoning board on your school board on your, like I myself, after the election, was able to get appointed to the planning board in my municipality. There I can fight for affordable housing. I can fight back against developers who are gentrifying. That's how the right was able to hold onto power, like we need to send the left into your communities and take over all these local board positions and 10, 15, 20 years down the line, all of a sudden now we have a leftist government because we've been sort of getting in at the ground level of all these places. And that's where I think personally the left goes from here. And that's how we get the power in the future that the right seems to have now. Yeah, really, I just really fast on that. Like, I, while we're focused on what the left doesn't have and what we're talking about that, and just as Hector was coming into what the left can actually combat with this, because I love presenting solutions, especially in this space where we have audiences where we're talking to them on the internet. We love these audiences, but ultimately, it can feel like it's just us, the person on the other side of the screen in the screen, we want to kind of give them solutions, at least I want to try to. And what I sort of going towards local action, direct action, this is now the before times, but for folks who are on the panel who have done door to door knocking and canvassing and things like that, you'll actually understand there's something beautiful in the fact that no American has any consistent political opinions, like they're all all over the place. Or I think maybe the same thing is true across the board, like no one fits neatly, usually except for extreme hyper partisans in a left or right box, you can kind of talk them into any sort of direction. When you like kind of remove the least crazy people from, you know, the Fox News and SMBC CNN echo chambers, because in reality, these echo chambers, Twitter is only used by 3% of Americans. The best night of Rachel Maddow or CNN is still half of like a boring sports sporting event. In reality, not many people are paying attention to this. So you can kind of use the leftist opportunities as a blank canvas to show people, like by doing school board, by doing any kind of local thing like that, how leftist government can actually work so that people have a living example to go against the propaganda that you see online and also just like the connection between mutual aid and people say, oh, mutual aid direct action, do this, Venmo this person cash out this person. It's kind of less about what you're doing online. It's all important because like these people's lives are tangibly improved by this. But when you when you are visible in a community and you're helping them out, whether you're like passing out frozen water bottles to unhoused people in the like hot summer or whatever, you are visible in a community and you are building trust with that community.  I know like we've been like hanging out and we start going to know each other and we start to know about the things you care about. Do you trust me on supporting these people who I trust and will make your lives better? That's where the mutual aid, the direct action starts to combine with the electoralism and you can actually do both. So I encourage anyone watching this convince other people like that's the connection that needs to be made to turn the tide with these things. One more tiny little thing is also the language that we use. Like the language that we use is so important because sometimes conservative language is so much easier to digest, it's fear based, it's simple. And sometimes I feel like there are people who aren't overly engaged in leftist discourse, who might not even know what the term mutual aid or direct action even means, which is basically just like helping those in need. That's it, right? So we really need to focus on simplifying the language. And I think that's something that Bernie Sanders was attempting to do in the Democratic primaries. Like he really did simplify his language. And that's why Trump was so appealing to the Republican party because he was speaking to a group of disengaged people who could understand what he was saying in very simplistic terms.  What? A lot of other people were sitting there being like, oh, okay, that makes sense to me. I can understand that. And I feel like sometimes on the left, we get lost in the theoretical and don't focus on the practical enough. Yeah, I also think maybe getting into politics at a local level can feel daunting to a lot of people, especially on the left, like especially the leftist. A lot of us are labor like laborers, like some of us are streamers, we're very, very fortunate and to be able to do this job. But a lot of people that agree with us are like, you know, poor. And I was very poor. And that's kind of what radicalized me and started to send me down this path is like, this is a shitty system. This does not work. I also think this might not be very popular opinion. Maybe we should stop using words they're scared of like socialism, and maybe just use words like labor, like maybe, and just to warm them up a little bit to the idea because when you say that in America, I don't know how it works other places. But we say it in America, they go, nope, that's the that Mao killed people. And it's like, what are we taught? What are we talking about? I'm not Mao. Do I what like, I'm talking about a totally different thing. I'm talking about like this specific, like, here's what I want. And you're like, just out of sounds like a thing that's bad. And so like, I think if we form it, like, there's already labor movements in the United States in a lot of ways. Like I live in Michigan, which is a huge union place for auto workers and stuff. And a lot of them in the West is sort of like that a lot of factors and stuff, although, you know, dwindled over time. But people like United Auto Workers Union, the UAW is very strong here, to different efficacies. But like, just just the idea of like having a workers union or a labor party, like the idea of that and maybe branding it as as, you know, because it really is it's about labor and about the, you know, the interaction that labor has with capital and all the things all that work its way up. So I don't know, I just I also think it's, like I said, like it's just a daunting aspect for some people to think about the idea of like, all the stuff that's on their plate, they're working like, at least one job, maybe more, to make ends meet paycheck to paycheck to paycheck to maybe run a political campaign to be like their comptroller. Like, so it's, I don't know how to get them all to do that.  Or like, if you if you have an affect that is really resonating in more conservative areas, more rural areas, then maybe you're you're a better candidate to talk to one of those people than I am as a trans lady, you know, like, there are there are people who are better or worse at different things. And we should play to our various strengths, because I think the left has a lot of diverse strengths. And I like just as as off the top of my head, like bow of the fifth column, there's a really good job at reaching like rural more conservative types. And it is through his his word choices and his affect. And that is really successful and something I couldn't do, even though we both do similar things.  Yeah, we're kind of like almost, I feel like this conversation is very productive, because you all are kind of offering solutions to people. And that's, it's hard to, you know, it's hard to get people motivated, like I always say that like, trying to get leftists to do anything is like hurting cats, like it's really difficult. And so the final person that I'm going to bring in here is Professor Harvey.  Has it always been like this? Has there always been like this, I don't know, motivation deficit on the left? Or is this like a new phenomenon that is, you know, the result of like social media? But like, like, what is your take on this? Are we kind of just seeing history repeat itself? Or is this like a uniquely new thing for this era in terms of like people having to really be remotivated and talked up to get involved in direct action? What have you? The first thing to understand is that this is social media is very late to this whole question. I mean, what we've seen has been underway for, I'm going to use around number 45 years of nothing less than class war from above that was very effective back in the 70s in mobilizing as well, Christian evangelicals in particular. So and there are ways in which that, you know, that's a whole lecture basically, but you've got to believe me, this goes back well back into the 70s. And what's really kind of interesting is that there are many public statements and records that doesn't require a lot of research. There was a declaration of war, a declaration of war issued essentially in a number of ways between 1971 and 75, which actually named the targets. Okay, for example, it named poor people's movement, it named the labor movement, it named especially public employee unionism, it named young people, it named the women's movement, it laid out every single movement that came out of the 60s. They laid out as a sort of grand problem. And it was put very most effectively in a little thing called the crisis of democracy. And somebody mentioned conspiracies before, there was no conspiracy here. It was a group called the trilateral commission was made up of literally every single major figure political and business from Western Europe, the United States and Japan who was not at that time currently holding office. And this included George H. W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, it was put together by David Rockefeller as a big new president. This was a major public organization. And the section, basically it was sort of authored from the American perspective by a man named Samuel Huntington, a professor at Harvard. And he said, we have a crisis of democracy because we have an excess of democracy. And what we have to do is we need to reduce democracy. And as I said, he pointed out all the culprits. Now, out of this kind of declaration of war, which had nothing to do, by the way, with the hard right at that time. But in the course of that decade, the Democrats were so utterly emptied of any kind of real politics by way of Jimmy Carter that you had the emergence of both this code of corporate democratic politics, as well as the right wing Republican party immerse. So this all begins back in the 70s, long before anything called social media. Hell, I remember in the early 90s or 80s, whatever was being fascinated by the fax machine. So I don't think it's a matter of that. I think what it is, is that literally they targeted, I don't mean to sound like a broker, they targeted labor in the 70s, the fastest growing enterprise probably in the 70s was the union busting law firm. And the high point of that or the culmination of that was the Patco strike, which was 40 years ago this year, in which Ronald Reagan fired the thousands upon thousands of air traffic controllers who were on strike. It's a whole tragic story in itself. But you've got that war basically on the working class that began in the 70s. And it literally was articulated in a way that it included the war on voting rights. It included a war on women's rights to control their own bodies. I mean, they really were very, very effective. And what was the left? Well, it was in fact splintered. Identity politics splintered it. Young and old splintered it. I've been a member of DSA for as long as I can remember, but I sure as hell wouldn't run around saying vote socialist because it's just not going to win the day. But I do think, and by the way, I think Bernie Sanders blew it when he insisted on calling himself a democratic socialist. I also think he blew it because he literally was an FDR Democrat and ignored the whole tradition. What I'm getting at is that the left is such a mess. It is such a mess. And I'll just close because you guys are the young ones who are the young left media. The young left media is failing itself. Somebody talked about the message goes out. And there's what is it called? You know, the message goes out in every right wing voice. Every right wing voice says the same thing, whether it's whether it's Ben Shapiro or Hannity, it's all the same. Okay. Now on the left is so much diversity on the left, which is in itself great. But it's also the case that there's no there's no there's no vision coming out of the left. Yeah. Okay. I think everything single thing all of you have said is true. I mean, I wouldn't take issue with any one of them. But it's also the case. Tell me what the vision of the left is. What is the vision for the left? What would be the good America or the good Western world, the good global picture?  I actually think we're fortunate to have the one thing Americans desire most from a politician's mouth. And that's the word freedom. I think we offer the most like just livable freedom from our politics that's out there, whether it comes to like, like just the idea of just the health care issue, the freedom to go to any hospital to any doctor in any network that wouldn't exist at any time for any reason without cost out of pocket is more freedom than having a very specific limited insurance and in your specific doctor in your specific space. So even to that, I think we have this thing, the idea of freedom that's been co-opted by the right that I think we could rally around to some extent, most leftists agree. I think that if that was our for lack of a better term, like one of the 10 commandments of whatever we want to run as, if that was like number one up there, freedom to live however your life is. And this goes to the trans argument. This goes to this goes to gun ownership, you know, leftists aren't necessarily against being able to have guns. So that's not even really a thing we have to like rest from, from, you know, it's not like a liberal thing. It's not like Joe Biden or go, they're going to take our guns. Like, okay, have your guns then.  And you can't bully these people. So like there's lots of, there's lots of things that I think we could get out of just co-opting that word. Yeah, I mean, look, I'm going to make a point by way of please do. And, you know, the United States literally led the way in social democracy. I mean, we don't even think how many people were ever told that public education is the first major social democratic initiative in the world. And it started here. How many people were ever told that national parks are social democratic because in most other countries, they were royal parks, right? It begins here. I mean, it's over and over again, this kind of lack of a better way of putting it, this kind of amnesia. But it's also the case. And this is what I'm going to hold against your generation no less is the fact that literally there is no talk of what should be the talk. And that is that there is that what makes America in its better sense as opposed to its darkest sense in the in the sense of this dystopian moment that really, you know, I asked myself dystopian, I don't really think of this as dystopian because it's happened before. But that just means we've had a lot of dystopian moments. And for vast numbers of people dystopian dystopia was the state of the land. Okay. And remains it. But it is the case that look, I mean, we literally have seen tremendous historic, not just historical but historic victories. And and how dare the right hijack history ever since Reagan. And where is it where where is the left in terms of taking back the story that I'm look, I'm not looking for a Pollyanna story. What I'm looking at is, and I'm not going to even I'm not even going to deny the worst exploitation and oppression. That's part of it. But the real story that needs to be told is that struggles do matter. Hey, Philip, you know, I think it was a Philip Randolph, you know, nothing is or Frederick Douglass may have said at first, nothing is one without struggle. You know, or it's a Philip Randolph said, freedom isn't given, it's one. I mean, and but you have to remind people. But by the way, I'm correcting myself about something Walter Benjamin of the Frankfurt School once said, you know, basically, it's not a vision of the future that that will motivate the struggle. It's it's seeking revenge for one's grandparents and what they suffered. That's the thing that always checks my arguments. Okay. But it is the case that that that history is a very powerful, intellectual and rhetorical weapon. And we just aren't wielding it.


It was back on March 25th, I was getting ready to go to work and it was about 11.30 am in the morning and there is a JCB that was coming from the opposite direction. So the JCB driver apparently was talking on the phone. Instead of taking a turn, he just came straight towards us and we did not have any place because we were right next to the wall. Since we did not have any place, my husband had to bend the bike and when my husband bent the bike, the blade of the bulldozer cut my leg off and I was thrown on the road. The impact was so hard that it threw my husband 30 feet away and I was thrown right next to a pole that was there on the way. Neelam is a 29 year old IT professional who presented to us in March this year following a road traffic accident. She sustained an open injury to her right knee which is a great 3C open fracture which basically involves a fracture of the knee with extensive soft tissue injury combined with injury to the blood vessels supplying to the knee. And then when I turned and looked, I can see my husband coming from like little far away distance he was running and coming towards me and all he did was he just asked me, are you okay? And then I looked at him when I realized, when I was trying to see from where the blood is coming, I can see my leg is just cut and the blood is oozing out from my veins and then I just had no words, what am I supposed to be doing? My veins, my arteries, my bone, everything was like cut.  The moment I came here, they took me to emergency ward Manipa Hospital Whitefield, they took me to emergency ward and I can see two or three doctors around me I can't remember very well because I was half unconscious and I was just conscious half way through. She was immediately seen in the emergency department and a combined approach, a multidisciplinary approach was applied plastic surgical team along with orthopedics and vascular surgical team were involved in the initial care of this patient She was immediately taken to operation theatre within three to four hours of arrival and vascular repair was done, followed by plastic surgical input and external fixator application was done from the orthopedic department They did an x-ray for me, they did MRI scan and then the radiology and they did many scans and then finally they told me that we are taking you to operation theatre, you will be given general anesthesia I asked will I be able to walk again and then the doctor promised me yes you will I promise you that you will, that's when I relaxed myself that fine no matter what pain I had to go through I know that I will get my leg back Later on she recovered very well she had multiple procedures during the hospital stay of about ten days during which the external fixator was readjusted wound closure was performed by the plastic team and then later on a definitive fixation was done after four weeks from the time of initial injury She has developed, she gradually improved with the help of physiotherapy exercises and she is now back to her regular activities now following four to six months following the injury and this clearly depicts a prompt and multidisciplinary approach helps in limb salvage surgery and this is a classic example of how a team approach can give good results even in worst case scenarios but once I woke up from ICU I can see my leg was like so much swollen and I can see all the rods on my leg they have given me external fixators I thank Manipal Hospital Whitefield majorly that they are doing such a wonderful job they are saving people's life which is after this accident to me is such a big thing it's only because of this hospital that I've got my leg back I'm able to stand on my own feet today it's only because of the hospital primarily and then the doctors doctors here have done an amazing job I would personally like to thank Dr. Anoop Dr. Ramni and Dr. VG Rajan majorly for giving me my leg back for giving me my life back literally to tell