5.1.2025 -- NLS -- Trump’s Oval Office, AOC’s Disarray, Idaho’s GOP Divide

On this episode with Neal and Julie, the conversation spans a wide range of political and cultural topics, centering heavily around the style and influence of Donald Trump compared to other political figures. Neal describes his experience in the Oval Office with Trump as dynamic and unscripted, contrasting it with previous administrations. The hosts explore Trump's engagement on issues like voting security, trade, and his interactions with party leaders and the public. They also critique the Democratic Party’s presence in Idaho, questioning the effectiveness of aligning with figures like AOC and Bernie Sanders in such a conservative state.

Julie and Neal reflect on the strength and visibility of conservative personalities, emphasizing that the Republican bench is deep with recognizable and potentially long-lasting national figures. They also discuss local Idaho politics, including criticism of lawmakers who appear Republican but vote with Democrats, and the performative nature of “empty seat” town halls. The episode ends with broader commentary on policy purity tests, legislative effectiveness, and how compromise and realism may actually yield better results in governance.

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Transcript

And good morning. It's 807 on Newstalk 178 on this Thursday morning, and without delay, we're going to bring on to the program the U.S. Senator, Jim Risch, joining us from the nation's capital. Senator, good morning. It's always good to hear from you. Yeah, it's always good to be on your show. Thanks for having me. Well, we're thrilled to have you.

And I understand you have a great story you want to tell us this morning, but other than that. Yeah. Another one, I guess. Yeah, well, I do my usual stuff back here, but, it be, every once in a while, you get an invitation to come up to the Oval Office, and when you get an invitation to come the Oval Office, it's politely in said to be an invitation, but it's more of a command performance.

Yeah. Anyway, so yesterday, the president was swearing, was going to have a swearing in ceremony in the Oval Office. For, Warren Stevens, the, ambassador, this just was just confirmed to go to Great Britain, which, of course, is probably the premier ambassadorship. Anyway, so I went up there as I, as I do from time to time and, had it was a great afternoon, you know, it's I wish I could explain to everybody in in plain English.

Would like to, kind of hang out there. It's. I think I've told you before, it's so different going into the Oval Office than other presidents, which were very antiseptic, very scripted, very cold, you know, but you go in there, with him. And Warren Stevens was there with his family, his three kids and their spouses and his wife and the grandkids.

And the kids are running around the Oval Office screeching, you know, the parents trying to control them. And, you know, this this goes on for, well over an hour and, and all during that time, he it's it's kind of a freewheeling sort of thing. You know, people come in for insane papers and people come in to talk to him, and then he's got to take phone calls from a foreign leader, and it just goes on.

But I, I wish America could see this because it is such a different side of him, you know, than, than what you see on TV. You know, I mean, he's, he's so proud of the, of the Oval Office, which he should be. He's got a he's got a, one of the original powers, the Declaration of Independence up on the wall.

And it's got a curtain in front of it that you got to move because they don't want the light, to deteriorate the paint, the ink on it or anything. So he always does. That gives a little speech about the Declaration of Independence, but he gets their picture taken there. And anyway, it's, it's a fun way to spend it.

Just believe me. So, Anyway, I had a little. I had a little time with him. They. And not exactly sure. Well, I had there were a couple of, foreign relations issues we had to discuss briefly, but in. Anyway, on the way out, I'd be happy to hear he said, well, give me anything I can do for Idaho.

And I said, not today, Mr. President, but get your number on speed dial. So, so we're on his mind. You know, a few days ago, we interviewed Secretary of State Phil McGrane. He was on and he talked about how he said, I haven't been to Washington so much, like he's been making frequent trips back there to because of this, I guess this engagement and voting and voting security is an important priority for President Trump.

So he he I guess he went to the the March 17th party the same day. It just seems like Trump has an open door policy. Yeah, well, it's not an open door policy, but he but he is engaged with, a lot of people, particularly people he wants to be engaged in. I mean, it's not it's just an entirely different the feeling the white House is just entirely different than what it was before.

I mean, he's, you know, you don't have Secret Service buzzing around him or staff or anything else. Just, he, he, he, moves from group to group people to people, and you get a chance to engage with him and, bring up what you want, and, he's he's just, it's just a much more open feeling than when you get,

Yeah. So there has been prior administrations. Well, Senator, I know we we only have you for a few short minutes. I'm going to list off the 4 or 5 topics we had for you, and then I want you to pick 1 or 2 that you'd like to talk about. The save act was a big deal. The Democrats shut that down yesterday.

Tariffs the first 100 days of, Trump and, Ukraine. So take your pick. Okay. Ukraine, is a work in progress. It's pretty fluid. The, I, I'm hoping Putin doesn't make another bad judgment as he has throughout this thing, but he, he gets on the wrong side of Trump. And, he's going to be very sorry that, that he did.

And, and he's on the cusp of that right now. Trump is, pretty disgusted, with their, they're not wanting to bring this thing to an end. On the tariffs. Everybody needs to take a deep breath and stay calm. Look, we went through this, the first round, with, with President Trump and, he did very well.

I was in the room we when we, yes. You know, he said when he started, he really hated, NAFTA and the, wanted to redo it and it went on for some time. But I was in the room when they finally brought the thing down and fashioned the Usmca. That's the kind of thing he's going to do.

He uses he uses his position and his power, for leverage and for, ability to do things better for America. And that's what he's going to do with all this. And it's a huge undertaking. This is, you know, you know, with all these different countries, we have different deals with all of them. People think there's a uniform deal on on trade and there isn't.

Every country is different than, and I can tell you that he's got really good people working on this. Bob Lighthizer was his great guy the first term. Now, Jamison Greer, who, by the way, has Idaho ties, is, now in that position. And he was, he was Lighthizer was understudy, smart guy, knows trade. And most importantly, just as you watch the body language and watch how things happen, he has Trump's ear and he has Trump's trust and this guy knows trade.

So I everybody needs to stay calm. You know, we'll we'll get through this and, we'll, we'll be better off, after the fact. Okay. Really quick retrospective on Trump's first hundred days, he celebrated it in style with a rally with an ABC news interview, meeting with the troops. Your thoughts now? I saw that, and he's got a lot to be proud of.

You know, when I went up there, I took with me a little chart because he's always. He calls me night and day on this. Because we're not not moving the, the confirmations, of his appointments as quickly as he, like is no president never does. But, anyway, what I did is I when I talked in the first time, I handed him a chart mentioned, Mr. President's numbers don't lie that he's.

We got him. More confirmation of ambassadors to my committee to foreign relations than than, even close to the last five presidents. So it was a little chart and everything. And can I have this? I had written a personal note, and I said, yeah, but I don't want to see it for sale on eBay. So, anyway. Okay.

Yeah. No, he's he had a great, first hundred days on it, but most people don't understand this. But when, when he left the white House after his first term, they moved, over to another office. And those people were real believers. They really believed they were coming back for another four years. And as a result of that, they spent a good deal of time not just campaigning, but preparing for these four years.

And what you're seeing right now is the result of that. I mean, there isn't a day goes by that he hasn't, signed some executive orders that, has changed things. So if he has made the I don't that we've never had a president change government in 100 days, like like he has, and I don't I doubt we ever will again.

It's, is head spinning and, and you got to run, run fast to keep up with it, but, and at the end of the day, America is going to be a better place. All right. Senator Jim Risch joining us this morning, Senator, got to cut you loose. And you have an important meeting to, to run.

And, we appreciate your time. I'm sure we'll talk again soon. All right. Nice to talk to you. Thanks, guys. All right. 815 now on Newstalk 179. We'll be back after this. It's 819 on Newstalk 1079. Neil Larson, Julie Mason and you, if you'd like to reach us. (208) 542-1079 and, we've got a lot of, audio that we did not get to.

I did like this. Julie. Senator John Kennedy talking about AOC. My personal opinion is that God gave her a Billy goat brain and a mockingbird mouth.

A Billy goat brain and a mockingbird mouse. But it's a lot. I'll play the larger clip here in just a second. But he was talking about the Democrats being in in disarray, that, he doesn't know if Chuck Schumer's in charge or AOC. It's one of the two. He thinks it's AOC, because Hannity sort of pressed him and said, yeah, Chuck Schumer's 17% approval right now.

There ain't no way Chuck's the leader of the party, right? Right. Well, and, I don't know how to help Democrats understand your party is old. Yeah, I can say that. There's a portion of the Republican Party that is old to you, but your party is old. JD Vance spoke at the table. And he claimed he was the youngest one there which got chuckles and he said it with all humility because there's a whole bunch of other people that are right near him.

Yeah, just a few months older or two years old or whatever. That is a picture of youth. Your party is old. So if AOC is your youth or Jasmine Crockett is your youth, that's a swing and a miss. Oh, yeah. You gotta find somebody different. So, Julie, if you, you know, it'd be interesting to do some, like, Google research on how popular different politicians are.

Not so much in polling, but just in prevalence. Okay, okay. And with modern medicine, lifespans are well into the 80s. A lot of politicians stick around in Washington till they're mid 80s, sometimes even longer. But let's just say it's 80 to 85. So if you were to look at everyone, say 55 and younger, that's in the political class right now.

And the reason I say that is because 30 years is a long time to still be in you're still young in politics. If you're 55 and healthy, you could go another 30 years. So that that's longevity. And I say that because that makes us in the young age category. Yeah. So that's we've got 30 years left and right.

We do have relevance. And anyway, so but when you start racking up every one that we have in our party that is nationally known, that is functioning, that is generally fairly well, they may be kind of controversial, but they're legitimate people and they're recognizable name recognized and somewhat respected. Our roster is so much longer and more visible than what the left has, and if you project that out over the next 2 or 3 decades, these are the people that are going to be the icons in Washington in the coming decades.

And it's people like JD Vance, Vivek Ramaswamy, Marco Rubio, Pete Hegseth, Sean Duffy. I mean, we we could go on there are we've got a lot of great people on our side. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. There's a lot more that we could start naming. The left has AOC. I mean, she's young still and vibrant, lots of energy.

I don't know that her messaging is all that all that resonant with the American public at large, but she does have some assets. We'll just say that politically they've got they've got a really small handful. It's nothing compared to what we have. We they are so outgunned by us. Well, and if you look at the people that you listed, I think you could say Pete Hegseth is a little bit troublesome.

Right? I think you could say that. Yeah. It's there, it's complicated. That's a better word. It goes far past. It's complicated when you're talking about AOC and Jasmine Crockett. Oh, yeah, you're talking about AOC and her failed squad. And that that actually became a bad moniker. Not a good moniker to be part of the squad. You're talking about Jasmine Crockett.

That has made fun of somebody in a wheelchair. Yeah, and, has become Kamala Harris. Reincarnate with her words, salads and her, pretending to be different people all of the time. Okay. Those that is far more than a complicated relationship. So I mean they'd be, they'd be doing cartwheels if they could get somebody at the level of Pete Hague set that they were only just kind of managing some difficult situations.

They don't even know what to do with these difficult situations surrounding Jasmine Crockett and AOC. Well, well. And you have to look why are they well known? Why have they become household names? And I will say it's not because they're serious people. And a lot of times we confuse that. We think, well, if I know about them, they must be a serious person.

No, you know about them because they're not they're they're buffoons, bombastic. They're idiots. And and do we have some on our side? Yeah, probably. I mean, if I'm going to be honest, they're probably some on our side that are known for less than respectable reasons. But we have a lot of people that are that are just there doing public service and doing a good job.

And, they've got maybe media careers as well, whatever the case may be. And, we're it's just I think that means you have a full tank or a full bank account, whatever metaphor in a way that the Jasmine Crockett's in the AOCs just don't have. They're kind of a flash in the pan. They'll have their 15 minutes of fame.

I don't think that these are going to be serious people in ten or 15 or 20 years down the road. I especially don't think Jasmine Crockett will. AOC is somehow been able to, ride out the thunder storms. She kind of has ride out those tornadoes that have surrounded her. You know why? Because she's kind of done a Marjorie Taylor Greene trajectory.

She came in in a parade of, like, crazy, wacko ness. But they've moderated. They've realized if I want longevity in Washington, I do need to work with the other, or I need to work with the more centrist parts of the party. I'm not saying that's great. I'm just recognizing what is. And Marjorie Taylor Greene decided, okay, I can still save the bombastic things that made me popular, but in my day to day functioning, I need to be able to to cut deals, and I need to be able to give on some things tonight.

And I think she's actually earned for herself a level of respect that nobody would have predicted for her four years ago. Right now, it could change because we've got a long time before the presidential race. But right now, if I was consulting AOC, I would tell her, keep doing what you're doing, keep pushing off the presidential rumors and primary Chuck Schumer.

Oh, that would be the best trajectory for you. You have time on your side. Yeah, I would agree. I think she could beat Chuck even though she hasn't done a stinking thing for her district. Oh, nothing. I don't even think she goes there. I don't think she spends any time in the Bronx. Yeah, she is entrenched in DC.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. An easy trip home for her. You know what? It's become sort of, I need you to keep electing me, but I'm not doing anything for you. Yeah, yeah. She never talks about her own. She talks about growing up in the Bronx like that's part of her brand. But in terms of actually delivering, you know, good service to her constituents, she's not used to that at all.

I will also say this is sort of pulling this issue down into a kind of the statewide level. I think any prominent Democrat in Idaho that showed up at the AOC Bernie rally is a moron. Because that's not how Idaho that's not what Idaho voters want, even if they're inclined to vote for a Democrat. They don't want people who are aligning with AOC and Bernie like that.

That's not I know you're you're starstruck and you're excited that these prominent lefty Democrat is Bernie a Democrat or an independent that caucuses with the Democrats. He's identified as a Democrat. Whatever he is officially doesn't really matter. It's fluid. Yeah, it is fluid. Good point. He so he identifies on the given day with his pronoun changes here and there.

I it's okay. Yes. So functionally he's a Democrat. He's not what Idaho would want. And you're going to have some like here's the only way Democrats get elected in Idaho is not by getting the Democrats to vote for them. They're going to get those votes anyway. And there's not very many of them. It's when you can, on certain issues, appeal to the center left.

The independent people who maybe for gun rights and they don't really like abortion, but they're a little bit pro-choice, maybe in the first trimester or whatever, but they're okay with big government programs. They always think education is underfunded. Like that's a big that's a pretty good sized chunk of the voting public. Democrats can win those votes over, but you can't if you decide you're going to go get photo ops and and selfies with AOC and Bernie in the background and do the whole rah rah thing, it those center left Democrats or center left independents are going to go.

I don't like AOC and Bernie. That's not who I'm voting for. So I'll live with the Republican there. There are more voters in Idaho like that. Then they realize and they think because they won, they won because they're there. It's a strong Democrat district. I don't think that's true. Well, I think, James Rusty falls in this category, right?

A reasonable Democrat that there's people who who might be a little bit dissatisfied with the Republican Party or they're not liking this or this from those who push a little bit too far to the right, or the independents go, okay, I could get behind James. Rusty, I could do this. Yeah, I could, I could he and I could work together because he's reasonable.

Yeah. And I don't think you'd ever see James Rusty out there. Rah rah for AOC. I don't think. I mean, I could be wrong. I think he may have gone. Did he go? I'll look and see. Did he take pictures? You had you had Todd Achilles. You had a lot of trouble. You had you had I knew that you guys went top Democrat.

I don't know, I'll check and see. I, I don't know for sure, but I think he may have I see that kind of surprises me because he seems more you know, I'm not going to I'm not going to take those kind of risks. Yeah. But also if he did, he's coming off a year where basically the Democrats voice was useless in the legislative session.

And that gets really old for them. Yes. Yeah, it does. Yeah. I don't really see anything. Although he keeps he keeps getting tagged in one of those weight loss before after picture schemes. So I go to him, I go to his timeline, and I'm seeing a whole bunch of. Yeah, lucky him that so. Yeah. He had a block that for sure.

Yeah. But, yeah I don't I can't really tell. Maybe he didn't. Maybe he didn't go. I don't see any pictures of him there. So I mean not even surprised that rebel and and. Yeah. Achilles I that was there back there like backyard I, I totally get that they were there. If you're an incumbent and you're in one of the left or leaning, you know, legislative districts, you're probably okay even if you went like if oh, yeah, the problem is you are you're really harming the Democrat brand.

You're lowering the ceiling for the for the Democrat brand in Idaho, when you align with AOC and Bernie. One of my favorite questions that I would ask Democrat candidates, because for years, the Democrats who had put up token opposition, especially on the House side and one year, Richard Stallings, well, gosh, it's probably been ten, eight, ten, 12 years, something like that.

He ran against Mike Simpson because they they got together as Democrats and said, we can't not have a candidate. We know we're not going to win this thing, but at the very least, we have to have a name on the ballot, for a congressional race. And so, Richard, Richard stepped up and and ran for the platform.

Yeah, he was and and everyone knew it. And we even talked about it, in the interview. And he's just like, I just felt like it wasn't right to not have an opponent there. And I get that, and I respect that. And, funny side story. I'm related to Richard Stallings through marriage. He's my mother in law's first cousin.

Okay. So my mother in law was a Stallings before she got married. And, anyway, I always tell people just to make it easy. I just call him my stepdad.

That's the. I wrote a column saying that one time. Anyway, he's not. But, you know, I know, and but when we see each other, we have a really good conversation. He certainly knows who I am. I obviously know who he is. So we rib each other and. And it's good. But I ask this question. I said, well, when you get in, if you win and you are elected to Congress, will you vote for Nancy Pelosi for leadership?

That's a really hard question for an Idaho candidate to answer, because very few people in Idaho want Nancy Pelosi to be the speaker of the House. And of course, I'm talking in terms of what it was years ago. And, and that's that's a tough question. I feel like it sort of creates the same conundrum when you have Democrats in Idaho showing up at Bernie and AOC rallies like it.

Yeah, I get it. The celebrity thing is a draw. These are people that you see all the time on national TV and national news and who good we get to have them here. So you show up and you're all starstruck about it. You don't realize the problem. You're actually creating for your party's branding in a very conservative state.

Yeah. Is it a healthy? Is it a healthy, Step forward? Yeah. You it's a step. I don't know if it's forward and I don't know if it's healthy. Yes. Right. That's true. Winning. We know which direction to step back. But I also think there's a very good chance they've abandoned the idea of viability in Idaho. Now they're still functioning because that would be totally catastrophic not to.

And and it still serves a purpose for those few legislative districts where they can elect Democrats. But, I think they've probably lost hope of ever having significant influence any time soon in Idaho. Well, right now, their biggest hope, and it's paying off for them in some situations, is to take these, lawmakers in East Idaho because we're the problem child in the state right now.

These lawmakers in East Idaho who who are pretending to be Republicans and have them continuously vote with the Democrats, that's their biggest power move that they've got going on. Yes, that and that is true. They are bigger in number. Once you get past the party label, the Democrats actually have more people in alignment with them than the roster of the legislature would in a again, well done East Idaho.

Yeah, they nail, can we talk about the empty seat town hall they did in, Pocatello? Yeah. Yeah, I think it was last week. Maybe that was designed that that was not a town hall wanting to reach out to those congressional delegation. That event specifically was to try to make our Republican members of Congress look bad. Yes.

It was designed to be the empty seat. I you know, we haven't talked to the organizers. Maybe we had to reach out to them and have them on. That would be interesting. But when you're pitching it as an empty seat town hall, you need the town hall to have empty seats. Yes. So are you actually diligently working logistically to try to get our members of Congress there to answer your questions?

Or are you staging some public performative event to just make it look bad and make it look like they're absentee members of Congress? Well, I feel like the whole thing is a premise of a lie. What is a town hall? If we if we gathered 100 people and said, explain a town hall to me, what they're going to say is people of importance are up on the stage talking, and people from the community are in the audience.

Yeah, that's going to be a basic explanation of a town hall and an empty seat. Town hall misses half of it. Yes. Yeah. So it's a lie from the beginning. Well, and and don't, don't forget when you have, these. Well, like the town hall in Coeur d'Alene, you have Democrats showing up. Their whole point is to be disruptive, not to give not to have an exchange like a productive exchange with your representative.

It's to cause pain and to cause harm. So apparently, some secret memo went out a few weeks ago allegedly telling Republican members of Congress, be very careful doing these town halls, because this is now a leftist strategy to show up and be disruptive. And to. Yeah, and to make you look stupid. It's not their motive does not align with the spirit of what a town hall is, right?

Right. They're misusing it. So I wouldn't do the town hall either. And I would say that if I was in Congress, I would say I'm not doing town halls, because the only thing that these people are trying to do is misuse them. They're trying to use them for their own political purposes. I'm more than happy to show up and talk to my constituents and address their concerns, but I'm not going to have a town hall that gets hijacked by leftists that are only trying to make one side look bad, so I would proudly decline the town halls.

I don't even think it needs to be a secret. And I'll say, when you want to do a real town hall, I'll be there. Yeah, and can we just as a shameless plug for the Neil Larson show, you know, this is that version. You still want to get your message out there, but you don't want to fight the disruptors.

You don't want to have it be, like something that, like roads into chaos. Go on. The place that meets meets the most people, that reaches the most people and have an intellectual conversation. There is a reason why we have. Great. Well, we talked to our elected leaders a lot. They know the audience is gargantuan. There's like one what, like 1.9 million people in Idaho may have hit 2 million.

We have 7 million listeners.

To reach us, like spiderwebs across the United States. You know, that might be exaggerating. Maybe a little. Just a little bit. Yeah. But we do reach a lot of people. We do. And I would I will you know what? I'd go to fisticuffs over this. I would bet you out of any media audience in in Idaho, East Idaho, especially our audience votes in higher numbers than any other audience does.

Not newspaper, not TV, not other radio audiences. This audience, this collection of people listening to this show right now, I bet the rate of voting participation is the highest than any other audience. Yeah, I think that's a fair assumption. Yeah, yeah, not just fair. It's accurate. Undisputedly true is that you miss. You mispronounced undisputedly true.

Well, I the one thing that the Trump didn't go over the top with was when he said, I'm never 100% confident in something. So I would be I would offer up the Trump phrase. I mean, I'm never 100% confident in something, but I'm very confident and I'm there. I am 100% that's going. It's I'm being declared. You know, what's funny is you could probably go back in all the things Trump has said and he's probably said, oh, I'm 100% confident in this thing.

Like I'm like, I'm sure you could find a contradictory statement. We'll be back. It's 841 on Newstalk 179. If you'd like to reach us on the Stones Automotive Group, calling text line, that number is (208) 542-1079 847. On Newstalk 107, I Neil Larson, along with Julie Mason and you. Of course, if you'd like to reach us on the Stones Automotive Group call and text line, that number is (208) 542-1079.

Got a text just a moment ago, Julie asking a question, and I think it deserves an answer. Do you view the Idaho Freedom Foundation as a, quote, far right organization? Well, in order to answer that question, I'm not sure I like the term far right because the left, who loves to play with the language, has successfully attached a whole bunch of stigma to the term far right, because far right has white supremacy connotations, far right has Nazi connotations, far right has.

So I can we agree to set that term aside, use other words whose definitions have not been maligned? Very conservative would be almost analogous to the original definition of far right. Are they very conservative. Absolutely. They're libertarian. They want government to be as small as it possibly can be. So I would say they are a very conservative organization.

However, I would be I don't want to use the term far right in the very same way. I don't want to say if I'm anti-fascist, which I am. I don't want fascism. I'm against fascism. I'm Antifa fascist. But that's one step closer to saying Antifa. I'm not Antifa for sure. That's how they play with the language and and attach ideas and meaning to words that before were just very clear and plain and straightforward.

So very conservative. Yes. Do I consider them in the far right in the sense of the white separatist extremist wing? No, I would not put them in that category at all. Yeah. And, they would I'm about to explain how I feel about the if knowing that members of the ISF would consider that a compliment, I don't think it is, as far as it's not as beneficial as they believe it is.

Yeah. So my description of the effect is people who are full blooded conservatives, but some times are led more by emotion than tactical decisions. Yeah. And when they let their emotion lead, that will sometimes get them into a place that actually harms the conservative movement. Now they would consider that a compliment because they think they should always and you know always make decisions with that passion.

Yeah I get that. But we're fighting a war. And passionate decisions don't always win the war. You're, you're right about. Yes I look at it, my metaphor that I like to use is cities and suburbs. They are very purist when it comes to city proper boundaries. I'm like, okay, let's say Pocatello is the Republican Party. You live in Chubbuck or income?

I'm okay with that. And if you go out and tell people that I live in Pocatello, even though you live in income, that's fine. I don't feel like you're lying. I don't feel like you're being dishonest or unethical. You're. You're giving a person I an idea a very good estimate of where you're at. Okay. The Idaho Freedom Foundation, if if you ideologically are over the line figuratively you're in Chubbuck.

You might as well be in Afghanistan. They don't want you. And you are you are persona non grata the moment you're outside of city limits. And that that to me does not fly. It's a step outside to not. Yeah. Yeah. I mean it it is that the border is that extreme for them? Yeah, that's a great explanation. And, part of the problem is that you.

Because I think because they do approach it like that, it it empowers the other side to do some things they couldn't otherwise. And I think if the Idaho Freedom Foundation and they think that this is their strength, we'd have a really interesting conversation with Ron Nate right now. You have no doubt that that we'd have a great conversation with him.

We would disagree on approach and strategy and tactics. Another part of this, too, is I measure the outcome of a legislator's actions and a policy or whatever it is. What does it mean for average everyday Americans? They measure inputs. And so they look at inputs and say well this is not a this is not the purest idea.

This is not the proper role of government. This is not. And I'm like okay. And the perfect example of this, Julie, is let's say you have you typically I think libertarians are against things like auditorium districts because they don't want an extra tax. I get that and then I can there's nobody wants extra tax. But let's no, let me let me use a different example.

Sometimes cities will build infrastructure that doesn't fit the libertarian definition. Okay. But that's not the proper role of government to build a greenbelt or or, city park or, you know, beautiful this or that, because you shouldn't charge your locals the taxes to pay for those things because it's not the proper role of government. I totally get the argument.

My counter argument to that would be what if you create a city that's beautiful, that attracts so much business there. You broaden the tax base. You actually lower the taxes for individual homeowners because you have a beautiful city that's attracting lots of business coming in. Yeah, that's less of a tax burden on the locals. But because they created these amenities.

Part of the problem is you have lefties in city government that view that as that's our justification for everything we do. Yes. I only want it done if it actually works. I don't want it done because it theoretically could. I want it done because it's proven to work and over time it does work. So I'm I'm not hyper against city parks and green belts and greenways and fountains.

Yeah. If you if you build a super nice place to live and you attract more business, that's going to make my property taxes go down. That's the outcome I'm seeking. They look at the purity of the input and I look at the benefits of the output. And and so that's how we're different. And when it's sincere and authentic, that's the the disclaimer to all that I compete.

Like you said, people are going to use that as a tool or a weapon. Yeah. But when it's sincere and authentic, I yeah, I get him. We could talk forever about cities and the way that they run. But getting back to the if there is plenty of good intent. Yeah. What's the phrase? What's the saying? Road to hell.

Yeah. The pathway to hell is paved with good intentions. Well, your intentions don't always bring about results. Well, I look again in, conjunction with the point I just made. How many of the if supported bills passed this year? If you can't get a bill passed, you're dead to me. Okay. In a sense, I'm not judging you based on your intentions.

I'm judging you based on your delivery. It's a what have you done for me lately mentality? Yeah, I, I when the package gets delivered to my door and it's in my hands. You've done your job. Yeah. Until then, you haven't done your job. And so I would say, does their approach work in producing the bills that they, they want and have and the classic example of this was Ron Nate a couple of years ago, bringing up the grocery tax repeal at every single turn that he could.

And after a while, even the people who wanted it, I would have voted for it. But I recognized your jousting at windmills. Now, like you're not. This is not going to work. And everybody knows it's not going to work. And after a while you are spending good political capital on an outcome that's not going to happen. So you got to save your powder.

And even worse than that, he spent his political capital. But then it also made the situation radioactive. Yeah. So everyone else couldn't spend their political capital. Nobody wants to touch it now. Yeah that's a good point. 856 on Newstalk 1079 we'll be back. Okay. That is our one. We'll have our two just ahead. We'll open up the phone lines as well.

I'm craving a a flagpole today. Okay. We'll do it. Coming up. About 40 minutes ago, I looked at Julie and I said, okay, out of everyone, because every cabinet, every, you know, big white House position, they don't always last for years. There's always turnover. And I said to Julie, who do you think is gone first from the Trump orbit?

Is it Pam Bondi, is it Seth. Is it. And and oddly, here we are less than an hour removed from that conversation. And the big headline breaking news this morning, Mike Waltz is out as the national security advisor. And if I had thought about him, that's not a cabinet level position, but it is a high level appointment.

If I had thought about him, I very easily could have said, it's going to be Mike Waltz. Simply because there was weirdness around that signal. App controversy. Some of the answers that he gave to, especially Laura Ingraham, were just that doesn't make any sense how he's answering this. So to remind everybody, the signal chat controversy was that, a writer for The Atlantic was added to a secure signal chat.

I think it's important to say that word secure there, because we bickered over that back and forth. Yeah, we did a secured signal chat that referenced, some military operations that were going to be happening. Yeah. According to Fox News, Waltz is not the only one out. Even though he was the one who took full responsibility. He told Laura Ingraham, I take full responsibility.

I built the group. It's embarrassing. We're going to get to the bottom of it. And then, Laura, in the presser this morning, Caroline Leavitt was asked about it. She punted and she said, this is not my my information to give right now. Okay. And then there's also Alex Wong. He served as Waltz's principal deputy national security advisor, who he was also detailed in the Signal chat leak.

He it looks like he might be out as well. So there are more. Let me keep reading here. Yeah. It's not just going to be waltz. That's going to be people around them. And there was a little bit of controversy because that gentleman I just referenced one. He apparently was the one that built the group. He built the group?

Yes. Yeah, but but he works for Waltz and Waltz. Should have checked it. And waltz like a leader said. I take full responsibility. Yeah. Oh, okay. So I and I'm going back. This is based on on memory and it's been a few weeks, but I remember when Ingram asked Mike Waltz, how did this guy get into your contact list?

His answer was super sketchy. Yeah. It was very is I and he used some phrase about I don't even know what he said, but I'm like, that's not even a thing. Like, if somebody is in your contact list it's because you brought them in. Yes. It's not because they snuck in. I can't sneak into anybody's contact list.

Like that's what he was sort of inferring. And I'm like what is he even talking about. Yeah. If you could do that, people would be in all of these signal chats trying to figure out what the administrations are doing, including in the Biden administration. Yeah. So that just doesn't it didn't really stand up to the test of what really happened.

So, when you hear, we're going to get to the bottom of this, I've been paying attention to the news every day, Julie, because I don't know, it's my job. I have not seen the bottom of this. No, the bottom of this has not appeared. Yeah. I have not seen its bottom. I've been looking for its bottom, but its bottom has not appeared at the bottom.

Jeans, boots. With the third, the hole club. But anyway. So, sometimes they just break out in song. Here we are. So white, but. Okay. Yes we are. I don't know, I think the thing is, with this, this whole, signal chat thing is the controversy is there needed to be accountability somewhere? Yeah, and we've spent too many years in government not having accountability.

And if Mike Walsh says where the accountability of Alex Wong is part of the accountability, it has to happen. I agree, because we can't ask the Democrats to get rid of their bad players. If the Republicans are not willing to get rid of their bad players. Yeah, I, I agree with that. And I'll say, Julie, I, Pam Bondi has to start delivering on some big, big things like Epstein info.

These days around the country that are tied into Soros, like they're we need to start seeing accountability now. I've given grace because the DOJ is a slow moving ship. It just functionally it is. And they're probably good reasons why it needs to be. But you know what? We're we're three and a half months in, we are months and months into the Trump presidency.

And we have we have seen delivered goods from Marco Rubio. We've seen delivered goods from RFK Jr on banning the dyes and doings, things like that. We've had other cabinet members that are delivering the goods, and there's still a lot of goods to deliver and a lot to clean up. I don't not a lot of goods delivered from Pam Bondi yet.

And, not saying none, but, the big things we need to start seeing some action on. I do think the, Democrats see some weakness there as well. In her cabinet remarks yesterday, she talked about the amount of fentanyl that has been stopped from coming across the border. The way she referenced referenced it is she said with that amount has that has been stopped.

We saved this many lives. That was the wrong wording. She she could have said had that fentanyl been ingested. We potentially saved this many lives. Yeah. Oh did the left leaning media jump all over her yesterday like with claims of does she really believe that many people would die from fentanyl in her math? Is it Matt? Her math isn't math, only because she used a couple of words that probably framed it the wrong way.

Yeah, I took that as they see the weakest link. Yeah, that I think so too. Yeah, I feel like, Well, a couple of things, a couple of things that I've noticed as we watched the landscape change under Donald Trump, Doge has kind of faded into the background, like we're not seeing as many headlines about Elon Musk and Doge and, which may be good because maybe it means he's, you know, made so much reform, it doesn't need to be in the news as much.

And but maybe it's not good. Maybe it's not, you know, we there's still a lot of ways that we need to take care. So I don't know that I've noticed. And then there was one other that I can't remember, but, speaking on Doge and, cabinet meeting yesterday, Elon Musk was present. And, basically got told congratulations for all that you done.

The whole entire, room erupted. Besides, the journalists erupted in applause for him and all the great work that he's done. He was goofy like Elon Musk is yesterday. He had his regular Trump hat on, and then Trump gave everyone a hat that said golf of America. Yeah. So he put one hat on top of the other and made some kind of a joke.

How he wears a whole bunch of hats in his everyday life. Oh, yeah. Yeah. It was a pleasant goodbye, I believe, for Elon. And that doesn't play well to the left leaning media. They wanted it to be chaos. Constant chaos. Yeah. And it just hasn't turned out like that. Well, you know, and and I think, I mean, this kind of was the plan all along.

They did they expect Elon Musk, who owns all these mega billion dollar companies, that he was going to be a daily feature in the white House for four years like it where they county. I think they want him to be because they want that villain. They they want the villain to beat up. But I don't I don't think it was ever the plan for Elon Musk to stick around forever.

No. The whole thing about Elon Musk is you guys are making a big deal out of something. That was never a hidden agenda. Elon Musk was on the campaign trail with him. Doge was a concept before Trump won the presidency, and he won over overwhelmingly the presidency. People voted for Doge. And when the whole thing was established after the win, it was said he wasn't sticking around forever.

Yeah. So the narrative that the left leaning media painted just was never accurate. Yeah. They wanted to pretend like, oh, he's infiltrated the cabinet. He campaigned with him. We absolutely knew he was going to be a part of us. They never hit the ball. You know, and they never hit the ball about when he would exit. Well, I believe it was.

Was it? I think it was Obama. Obama started appointing all these czars and gave them power, bureaucratic power. And I remember the whole conservative movement was pretty upset that Barack Obama did this. Well, we kind of haven't looked back. You know, it kind of became a new way of functioning. And I know it bothers the left now because now Republicans are doing it.

You have a borders. Are you have you know, if you want to call Elon Musk an efficiency czar, that that works too. It was Barack Obama that introduced this phenomenon into the federal bureaucracy. And you know what? If they're going to use it. We didn't like it, but we'll run with it, because that's the only way that, you know, they change the rules of the game.

So now those are the rules of the game. So you know it's super interesting. They highlighted the amount of money that Doge has currently saved a billions and billions. And then Elon Musk said in his remarks to the cabinet yesterday. And there's more billions to come because all of the infrastructure is put in place now. Yeah. It doesn't mean we're finished.

Even if I'm leaving, it's not finished. Well, based on those remarks, I saw comments on X last night of oh, will you promise to find it $1 trillion worth? What a failure. Are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? The standards by which you you live when you place those standards on Republicans, your standard for Democrats was Biden would function from 10 to 4 every day.

Your standard for Republicans is in the first 100 days, you didn't establish $1 trillion in savings. What a failure. Yeah. So, Julie, let's say, I said, hey, I'm going to run to WinCo and get a pound of jelly beans. And I go to the bulk and I get the jelly bellies and I got 0.97 pounds. Yeah.

I'm a liar. How dare you. So should I I guess I don't keep my promises at all. Yeah. So yeah I, you know, I mean I think one of the things that you have to take with Trump and I've never, you know, you parse out the nature of a lie if you want to call it a lie, though, let's just give him the let's concede the word here that Trump's lying.

Then let's look at lying. And there are lies that are motivated by certain things. If you're lying to hide a crime you've committed, that's a different lie than saying, I caught a trout that was a foot and a half long and it was only 15in long. Okay. That's not a that lie about the fish isn't harming somebody.

Yeah. You're. Yeah. You're doing it. You're exaggerating it and you're. And it lies wrong again. I've already given this little spiel but I, I don't advocate lying, but I can say I don't advocate lying. And there are different natures of lies. There are different, and if if you came in in the morning and you said, is my sweater pretty?

And I didn't like it, I would say, yeah, it's pretty. I like it because I don't want to hurt your feelings. And I, you know, there's sometimes there are very, very virtuous motivations for giving out a little bit of truth, like I and and I think you have people that will not recognize that life's complicated, our interactions are complicated, and sometimes there's a higher virtue that you're preserving.

And so you'll say things just to, to make people feel good, like how's your day to. I'm doing okay. Well you may not be. That does mean you're you're lying to hurt someone. You're just you don't want to explain to them that, you know, the server doesn't need to know that your dog died two days ago.

Yeah. And I'm getting my left leg amputated at 3:00 this afternoon. You know, like, to your. Yeah. So you're, Again, we all lie. We all lie for different reasons. And you look at the motivation when I look at Trump and him saying, well, we're going to end the Ukraine war in 24 hours after I'm inaugurated there. We're going to cut the federal bureaucracy by $1 trillion.

He may fall short of those things. And it's any you you have the prerogative to interpret that however you want. And if you want to call it a lie, call it a lie. I look at Trump's personality and, in my mind, he goes in with a ridiculous proposition, knowing that it's probably not going to end the way.

What? Another example, Julie. Let's say you go to a used car lot. You offer a ridiculous low offer. You know they're not going to take it. They tell you a ridiculously high price. They know you're not going to pay that. Are you both lying or are you negotiating. Right. Are you going in and you're trying to find the common price that you both can agree on.

You know, it's not the price you're offering is not you know they're not going to accept it. You know you're not going to be paying that. It's like that. And Trump's always in negotiating mode. So he goes in with these ridiculous kind of ridiculous starting points. Once in a while he gets them. But but quite often he knows it's going to be less than that.

He probably knew we're not going to end the Ukraine-Russia War in 24 hours. But let's go in with that level of enthusiasm, that level of energy, that level of hope. And that's going to do us better in the long run then if we go. Well, this is a complicated war and it's going to be hard to get out of.

And it might take a long time. And, you know, go in, go shoot for the stars. That's what I say. And he knows it's still a victory, even if it takes a while. He knows that, that we're getting closer. I think it's interesting how little we have seen on the the TVs that we have playing in the studio about the inking of the Ukraine minerals still.

Yeah, that's a huge win for America. Yeah. Huge win. Yeah. And so because the mainstream media and I would include Fox in this because they haven't really been talking about it. Because they won't celebrate it. You end up with a man like Trump who is always talking about himself and his wins, and his cabinet wins yesterday and the two hour meeting.

And he talks a lot about the wins because somebody has to get that information out there. Yeah. So we we consider all of this over exaggeration as he talks about himself so much blah blah, blah. Well, if he doesn't talk about himself, who's going to. Yeah, you're exactly right. You're and and that's why it doesn't bother me that much.

Because Trump is just going in. He's got the mentality of a winner and he wins a lot. And once in a while he'll lose one. And the left loves to exaggerate the times that he loses. But yeah, he's just going in and, bragging about Biden. Never had these these meetings. And people can look at that and say that's a personality flaw.

I get why they would say that. You know, you but you I don't know if I'd want to be around somebody that's just bragging about themselves all the time. And, I'm glad I'm that way. Like, it makes me a better person than other people because I'm that way. All right. Are you awesome? I am, I am awesome.

You're awesome. I am so awesome that I don't have to go around saying I'm awesome all the time. That's how awesome I am. But no, you like you. But you look at Trump. They have tried to destroy everything about him. Everything. In my mind he has a wider latitude than I usually will give other people because of what he's been willing to face for the betterment of the country.

Yeah. Well the purpose behind the Democrats in the mainstream media is not only to stab this man as many times as they can in the back, but then to step on his body and step on it so much that they they pulverize it. Yeah. That's the level of vitriol that is thrown towards this man. Is he just supposed to not react?

Yeah. No, you have to react. And he's. This is why he makes a great president. Yep. He's the one that can beat the other side. Yep. And they there is there is nothing they won't do. No. That's what you have to understand about them. Once you understand that there is nothing they won't do then that changes your calculation of what you have to do.

Yes. And that's a I want to point out, is not always just the mainstream media and the Democrats with titles behind their name like Senator. It's also these bad players hidden in the FBI. It's also the reason we still do not know anything about the young man who tried to assassinate Donald Trump. Yeah. Because the day is that thick, that deep and that protected.

And they will do anything to stop this man. Okay. Is that can I. And I love Kash Patel. I think he's great, but does he start? Oh, we got to do something. We need some deliverables from the FBI as well. And that's one of them. Why don't we know more about the young man that that shot Trump? Yeah, we need to know.

All right. Nine. Nine. 26. You okay over there, Neil? Julie. And a case of the hiccups. We'll be right back on Newstalk 170. No lying for Neil, but fisticuffs are okay because you said you'd go to fisticuffs about the amount of people who are listening. Yeah. Oh, okay. When I said to you, you're, Are you awesome?

I actually do this with my grandson all the time. Yeah, I I'll be talking to man face time, and I'm like, oh, you are so handsome. And he'll he'll, like, smile. You know. But, as a complete parenting note, I think it's really important to build self-confidence in, in your kids. Yeah. They also need put in their place every once in a while.

Yeah, but the world is going to put them in their place all the time. So they need the self-confidence also infused. And grandma is a perfect person to do that because I don't have to put him in his place. Yeah. That's true. So I can tell him how awesome he is and how handsome he is. It's a grandmother's prerogative.

How smart he is. You are so smart. That's awesome. Or his favorite word? Impressive. That was impressive. Yeah. You are impressive, ash. Well, guys, it's Thursday today, so we aren't going to have a post show. Gary says you paid for 10 pounds of jelly beans, and if you didn't make it home, don't be ashamed. Because you ate them.

That's why it was less than 10 pounds. That's true.

That's okay. Are we doing a full. You still filling that? Did you move past it? Well, the Mike Waltz story sort of hijacked the I Know Freedom Foundation. Yeah. Let's skip it. But there might be another flagpole.

929 On Newstalk 107, Neil Larson along with Julie Mason. It's Thursday and we, well, the phone lines are open. (208) 542-1079. So I don't you know what, I'll throw it out there Julie. We the our our discussion got a little bit hijacked by the breaking news that the national security advisor, Mike Waltz, is out, three months into the Trump presidency.

And I think it's obvious. Is that signal, chat controversy that, emerged and he is being held accountable? I do hope we get the whole story here. Prior to that last hour, we were talking about the Idaho Freedom Foundation. And I would say that we are ideological. All step siblings. Does that does that make sense.

Like we agree on fundamentally the issues we disagree on approach and strategy and tactics. And I remember this was a couple of years ago. Yeah. Jim Jones, the former attorney general, that guy. And, he hates the Idaho freedom, like hates the Idaho Freedom Foundation. And he has bestowed that hatred on some pretty moderate rhino Republicans that hate the Idaho Freedom Foundation.

Now, I'm going to be upfront. And, Julie, I think you and I are identical on this. We don't really give a crap about the Idaho Freedom Index like this scoring that they do. And I hope that doesn't offend anyone. We don't think that that is the the Bible. We don't think that that is the gold standard of measuring the good that a lawmaker does and how conservative they are.

It might measure how libertarian they are, but it doesn't measure how conservative they are. So we we yeah we'll look at it. But that's not our guiding star for some people. The Idaho Freedom Index is their North star of who to vote for and and what to do. So it's not for us that is not authoritative for you and me and I think you the the metrics are more complicated than, than that when you go to to vote for someone.

So I, I, I agree with them on a host of issues. But agreement on issues does not extend to agreement on strategy. And I think that they have in the past had far more potential to have influence than what we've seen. We've actually seen a split in that wing of the party where you remember that it was weird last year.

So you had people who were diehard libertarians warring against Tammy Nichols and Brian Lenny. And you don't get better conservative lawmakers than those guys. Yeah. And those are people that were fine being affiliated with the if but that purity requirement that I talked about the moment, the moment you step over the city limit into Chubbuck or, you know, you're out, you're gone, don't come back.

It's like, who are the who are the polygamist boys that that they kick out the, the, Oh, yes. Yeah. The ones who. And then they go and live in a different city and they completely exiled from their families. Yes. And it really is a don't come back. Lost boys, the lost Boys. Yes. That was that was a movie.

Well it was a vampire movie. It was also a Duran Duran song. Yeah. Oh no. That was Wild Boys. Never mind. Lost boys had some cute young men in it. That was my era of looking at cute young men. Oh, for the love of Julie's 1986 googly eyes. Just came out for a minute. Anyway, I don't like that, all right, I don't I don't think that's the most effective function to to move forward.

So the flagpole that I floated to you, Julie. And let's do it via text right now, because we got to take a commercial break. And if there's enough engagement on the text, we could open up the phone lines for this. Do you believe, as prompted by our listener from last hour about the Idaho Freedom Foundation, do you believe they are an effective organization?

Not. Do you like them? Not. Do you agree with them? I'm talking about the deliverables. And do you get do are they successful at delivering on your your proverbial doorstep the things that you want, the things you ordered? Yes. The things you searched out on the internet and read the reviews and went, I want that one. Yeah.

Are those things being delivered? Yeah, because that's who the winners are. In my mind, those Donald Trump is a winner because he goes in and he gets crap done. And you know what? He brings in people like RFK Jr and Tulsi Gabbard. And I was surprised. Not that this is an ideological bent. I'm thrilled that it actually didn't even matter that it wasn't even on the radar screen.

I didn't realize that our Treasury secretary, Scott Bezzant, is gay. Yeah, I don't care. He does his job and he does it well. And nobody else cares. And he does it well. You would have thought that the left would have been applauding this. I'll bet you it's probably the first gay treasury secretary the country's ever had. But they don't celebrate those things.

That the issue was, is that he was the most qualified man to do it. And it had nothing to do with his sexuality. Right. And that's why it doesn't fit. And he doesn't lead with that. Yes. Like he just shows up and he does his job. And I think everyone appreciates that. This is the place that I've been wanting to get to for a long time.

Well you don't lead with that woke trait. Well we said in Idaho when is the Idaho Press gonna celebrate the fact that we have our first Hispanic attorney general. Yeah. We're excited aren't we like three years overdue for that. Yes. They never did. And you know what? It's the same thing. You, Raul Labrador doesn't lead with it.

No he doesn't. He has a massive skill set that he knows is his most effective power. Yeah, he doesn't have to lead with it, Scott. Percent. He doesn't have to lead with it. He knew he was qualified to do this. Yeah. And he's done a great job. He actually is really good in interviews. He is explaining difficult situations.

Yeah. He is very Type-A and that's who you want when it comes to money. He's very Type-A and he explains things, very well. I've grown to really like listening to him. And yes, I think he's doing a stellar job at it. And the. But but the point is, getting back to this, Trump doesn't care. Like he's not looking for sort of all this purity stuff.

He's like, will come in and get the job done. And I'm I'm kind of the same way with politics. I'm not sniffing for some ideological impurity so I can kick you out. That's not me. I do think, but rancid food you have to toss, right? Yeah. There is a point at which you go, okay, you're voting with the Democrats more often than your vote?

A lot more often than you are with the Republicans. This is an issue we do need to address. And we get to that. It's spoiled milk, and keeping the spoiled milk in the fridge doesn't help but become fresh again. Right. And you could look at like these thresholds. One threshold is you voted with the minority once. Okay.

You know that I don't think you have to vote with the majority, even if it's your party. Like that's my point is, I don't know that that once or twice or you know, whatever is the threshold. It is a critical threshold for me when you're voting with the other side more often. Yes, than you are with with that, then you're one of them.

And we saw it frequently, by the way. Yes we did. Thank you again for this. The second time today. I am going to kind of gently chide the voters of East Idaho. For those of you who voted for these lawmakers that are put an R behind their name, but they're voting more often with the Democrats. But surely you're proving the point here, because if you just take average Joe and Jane out there, they're living their lives.

They're they're not waking up every day thinking, I'm a Republican or I'm a libertarian or I'm a Democrat. No, they're like, I got to get Billy to the dentist at 2:00 today, and I've got a report. My boss needs by 11, and they're living their lives making ends meet. They're they're living their lives. Right. And they don't think about politics the way you and I do.

Or maybe a lot of our listeners do, when they have to choose, when you force them to make a choice. What's sad is it's not sad. Okay. I'm going to make no moral judgment here, but it it's a disadvantage. Libertarians never hide that they're libertarian. They in fact they lead. It's like the people that run marathons, they will proactively tell you the 26.2 bumper sticker.

Yes, yes, they are. Libertarians lead with the fact that they're libertarians. They are proud of it as they should be. I have no problem with that. You're running against someone who's deliberately hiding the fact that they're left. That they're a Democrat. So when you have a person who's running that's completely transparent about who they are and that's to the right of you, and then you have another person running who's to the left of you, but they're saying they're a conservative and using phrases like conservative not but not crazy or whatever.

They're actually on the left. Okay. They're they're, but they, and that deception for busy people trying to get to dental appointments and the report for their boss done. They don't have time to dive in and really understand why this person's not really a conservative. So when you're presented with those two choices, honest libertarians and dishonest rhinos, you're going to vote for the rhino.

If you're if you're an average conservative. Yeah, sure. Because you're just not paying enough attention. And while they're a nice person and they go to church so sure. Yeah. And I mean, if let's, let's dissect just one race in this conversation that you're having, which is the race that was decided by two votes, Ben Furman and Julianne Young.

Yeah. Okay. Julianne Young was very bold and very open about who she was. Yeah. I believe Ben Furman was very, vague. Yeah. I'll use that word vague, including not willing to answer how he was going to vote on certain things. Yeah, it paid off for him. It did pay off because the average person isn't going to do a deep enough dive to figure out who Ben Furman is.

You know, and the fact that many times in this legislative session, he voted with the Democrats. So I have a it's part of Neal's theory of politics. And it's called the ceiling, the floor to ceiling ratio. And every candidate or every politician has a floor and they have a ceiling. You have some candidates that actually have a fairly high floor, but they have a low ceiling.

And the thing that's going to kill you is a low ceiling. If, if you, if you have a die and die hard core base that absolutely loves you, but the support dies off real quick. Once you get outside of that group, you become a pretty non-viable candidate. Well, if you're non-viable, that means the deliverables aren't showing up on my doorstep.

Yep. And so you have to keep your ceiling potential higher. So I'm not saying hide who you are. I'm saying change how you function, change your strategist, your approach a little different. Be willing to say, you know what, I'm only going to get 80% of what I want in this legislation, and I might actually have to concede a point that I don't want to concede, but in the end, it will be better, for it if you start working that way.

You get Wendy hormones, you get Barbie hearts, you get you get lawmakers that are, still conservative. If you look at their, the work that they've done as a whole, they're still conservatives, but they're they might wander into Chubbuck, they might take a jaunt down to income once in a while, but they're electable. They can continue perennially to go to Boise and deliver good stuff like House Bill 93, which now you as parents are going to have an option to send your kid to a private school.

I mean, it's this is what I'm looking for. In part, those are the deliverables. Yes. Agreed. So the flashbulb we got, are they effective? And that's the question. Let's just do it in text right now. Do you believe that the Idaho Freedom Foundation is effective in Idaho? Yes or no? We'll be back after this. We'll share some of the texts that have come in on the other side.

On Newstalk 107 nine. Yeah, that that floor to ceiling, ratio, is such an interesting because in that regard, who's a good example? Well, I think when you look at people who are fairly close with the effects and their scores are high, like Chad Christianson and Carrie Hanks and others, I think they have a high floor.

I also think they have a low ceiling. The high floor is included. A ton of people who just love them. Yeah, absolutely. And that's that's to their credit. But but in your effort to get a high floor, make sure you're not lowering your ceiling. Yeah. Because then you just have a crawl space and you know, I'm, but but you know what, Bernie?

AOC, they're the same thing. If you they had the exact same floor to ceiling ratio. It's just they it's just on the other side. That's why members of the squad lost their races. Yes. Yeah, yeah. It's true. I think I think Trump has, has a fairly high floor. I think he's got a lot of people. And I actually think his ceiling is higher than it was in his first term.

Oh, totally agree with that. I think people have embraced him more. And you know what? His his numbers may be down. I'm not talking about the week to week approval numbers because those will fluctuate. You have people that will flip on that on a single news story. Yes. Like they're fickle. They're moving back and forth. Well, we've got someone, that that texted in and said their metric is what's happening in the stock market.

Well, if that's your metric, you're not going to like Trump right now. Yeah. That's true. And if that's the only metric you're going to, review or approach, I can't imagine the roller coaster of emotions that you feel. Yeah. But you can that can be your choice. You can do that. Yeah. I, I just choose to to take a more analytical view of it and not put all of my faith in one reporting metric.

Yes. Okay. That person is joining us by zoom tomorrow. Okay. They live in Pocatello. Oh. Gotcha. Okay. Someone just sent. So the Idaho Freedom Foundation is back. Bills like the Medical Freedom Act, which bans vaccine mandates and protects against medical intervention requirements for employment or education in Idaho. They've also supported legislation like House Bill 59, recognizing health care providers rights to refuse service based on beliefs in Senate Bill 1023, which aim to amend Idaho's Coronavirus Stop Act for individual medical freedom.

Okay, how did those bills fare in the legislature? That's what I'm looking for. Did they get delivered? Yes. And and great. How do I say this kindly? Not all delivered goods have that much value. The other day I ordered some serum drops from Amazon. Yeah, and usually the bottle. The bottle that I buy at a local retailer is probably about three inches tall.

Yeah, I didn't look at the weight of what came. I got the mini size. It's about this big. My fault, right? Yeah, but not all packages that end up on your doorstep have the same, importance for value in your life. I also want a lawmaker that's not just a warm body over there. Do something. Yeah, agreed. And if the only thing you can brag about on your Facebook is, a law that actually was accomplishing what your wife wanted done, you didn't do anything for me.

Yeah, like, do something. I think that's why we have such great respect for Barbie Hart and Wendy Horman. I know they deliver over and over again, and it's really effective legislation. Yeah. 948 on Newstalk 179, we had, one text who said, who led with you guys probably won't put this on, which means I'm definitely putting this on.

Yes, you guys probably won't put this on, but I can see what my investments have done over the last two years under Biden. And I can see what it's done under Trump. That's what I understand. And I'm a conservative Reagan type. Okay, so you are they saying they've lost more money under Trump? I'm sure they are. Yeah, I could interpret that another way.

Then stay in the market. It's going to come back. It always does. So I that's it. And I don't I don't want to I don't even know who this person is. All right. So I don't want them to feel like I'm singling them out because I don't know who you are. I do find it sad that money is your only metric.

That's the only thing you care about when national security is at play, when the morale of the country, the level of patriotism that we have, when when our girls have to play against boys on the basketball court, the attack of our culture. Yes. An attack all over on our culture die and corporations. But the only thing, as they've stated that they care about is money in their in their portfolio.

There is so much more at stake about our quality of life in America than just what the Dow is doing today and how much I have in my 401 K. That's I would say that to them and I yeah, it sounds like I'm chastising the I don't even like as they say, it makes me sad. But yeah, you didn't make me sad in the traditional sense.

I feel bad for you that that your assessment of your happiness is not broader than what's my 401 K doing or what's my stock portfolio doing? Yeah, I, I just I wouldn't put myself in that vulnerable of a position. You know the old phrase all your eggs in one basket, those are unrecognized eggs. Yeah. Like they're not even eggs that exist.

Unless you were planning on taking the money out at 8 a.m. the next morning. Those eggs aren't real. Yeah. And you sure? Go ahead sending a text and correct me. The money is real. But it it is a it's a long game. It's always been a long game. Yes. Now, the timing might be bad, the timing might be bad.

And you might have to delay it. Yes, but it will come back. So again I don't I don't want this listener to feel okay. We're not chastised now. I think there are people who that's the only thing that is the deciding factor. And it's the only factor. I had people that, have argued to me before, taxpayers, the only way you should be able to vote is if you're a taxpayer, okay, or a property owner.

Like if you don't heard that, if you don't own property in your school district, then you shouldn't be able to vote for school board or whatever. And I'm like, that's a in my mind, that's a faulty, faulty reasoning. I get why they're saying it, but your child is in that district. Your child is far more precious than the four acre parcel that you own.

Okay. And so yeah I know you're like well I'm the one that pays taxes. Well yeah. But that person is renting and their rent is higher because the property taxes are higher. So they're de facto paying taxes. They also pay sales tax when they go to the store. So everybody everybody's a taxpayer if they've ever been to the store.

So I, I don't know I, I guess I, I struggle with that mentality when it everything gets reduced down to it's the dollars, it's the money. Because money worship is a we've been warned about that. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah I and I would, I would looking at the rest of our text I'd summarize them this way. Almost everybody who who messaged in about the iPhone says they use it as a tool.

That's part of a ten piece tool set. They look at it, but it doesn't determine all of their voting or all of their ideas. Yeah, I think that's great. It's an input for sure. Yes, I, I it should be a tool that's part of a massive toolbox and a great reference. It shouldn't be your North Star. Yeah, yeah I agree that's a broader view.

Yeah. Yeah I like it. 28542107 and 952. Let's talk about town and country gardens for just a moment, because let me just think, Julie, they have now glow in the dark petunias, the firefly Petunia. And you can get one of those. And you, you can see it glow in the dark. It's been a pretty dark room, but you can see it Julie and I did last week.

It was fun. They also have the four step lawn program they have. I'm sure they probably have. You can go in and start buying your garden vegetables. Oh, I'm sure your seeds, your hanging basket. If you need dirt or bark or whatever they've got that they've got everything you need at Town and Country Gardens. I took a big long walk yesterday and frequently on my walks, I'll shoot pictures of things and send them to my two daughters and say, this is what I saw on my walk today.

And sometimes it's funny and sometimes it's it's, you know, a goofy thing or a scary thing. Or yesterday I took pictures of all of the blooms on the trees and the tulips that were up in people's yards. My daughter sent me back a message that said, I want to plant some flowers because she has a new house in Utah.

And she referenced one of the pictures and I said, I know nothing about that one, but I know the bright pink ones can be planted in shade. And I thought about town and country gardens. I'm like, I wish I could tell her to go to a place like Town and Country Gardens because they she could bring a map of her yard and show them north, south, east, west.

And they would say, yes, plant that plant there. It will get plenty of sunshine. Nope. Don't put that there. It's not going to get enough. Those are the kind of experts they have at town. If you if you love a hanging basket, but you say to the person is selling it to you, I'm hanging this in direct sun and they're going to be like, nope, not with those flowers in it.

Let me take you to one that can get direct sun. Yeah, like that's the level of expertise you get at Town and Country Gardens. Love it. Which might be among their most valuable asset there. Some that will break away. 954 by the way, they are south of Idaho Falls on the Yellowstone Highway across from the Budweiser plant. Back to wrap it up after this, but a being, but a being.

Stock markets don't you think? Oh, did you see the one that's funny. If you're not going to retire by June 30th regarding your stock portfolio, shut the Bleep up. It's going to be September before you'll get your first Social Security check. So I, I don't think the Social Security check is what they mean there. But any check that you were going to get eye on cashing in or your pension or whatever, there's going to be a delay.

So that's the point of what that guy is saying. Oh interesting. Was that in the text? Yes. When you said beep, I thought it was the F word. It was hell, actually. That's another great point. I have many investments. We own property. We have money in retirement funds. I have cash. I have gold, right?

Okay. Lots of investments. Somebody said, let's not forget the huge inflation that we had under Biden, which devalued our money so much. My cash doesn't me nearest much. Oh, yes it did. No, it's like he stole some. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So that's a I you have to be clear about. Okay. Well the stock market might look better under Biden two years ago.

Yeah. What about everything else you own? Not only that, it's it's the paycheck you get every two weeks. Yeah. I mean, that's it. Yeah. It's true. And here. All right. 957 on Newstalk 1079 and, lot of good texts and too late. We're not going to open up the phone lines on this one, today, but, it's Friday tomorrow.

Let's do a full fledged flagpole tomorrow. Okay. That was one I was going to do. Like a best 10s. I can't remember exactly what that was about. We'll figure it out. All right, we will. We've got two guests. Yes, we do. Well, multiple guests with our second segment, but our first segment will be at 730. We're going to talk with Justin Smith from the Department of Transportation about the star card.

Yeah. And then of course every Friday studio cover sessions, we have a super cute family band coming in. I had Neil play the song that their cover is so good. Yeah, a lot of fun. We'll do it tomorrow. Clay and Buck coming up next. We'll see you tomorrow, 959.