In this episode, Ali Nervis and Henry Dickerson, owners of Straw & Wool Hat Company, discuss the importance, benefits, and challenges of Black entrepreneurship, especiallly in Phoenix, Arizona. Then, investigative journalist turned author David Tereshchuk eagerly talks about his new memoir, A Question of Paternity: My Life as an Unaffiliated Reporter, and why he was compelled to write it.
00:00:00 --> 00:00:06 Welcome. I'm Eric Fleming, host of A Moment with Eric Fleming, the podcast of our time.
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00:01:15 --> 00:01:19 the following program is hosted by the nbg podcast network.
00:01:20 --> 00:01:59 Music.
00:02:00 --> 00:02:03 Welcome to another moment with Eric Fleming. I am your host,
00:02:04 --> 00:02:12 Eric Fleming, and I am really, really excited about this particular episode.
00:02:12 --> 00:02:19 One, because you're not going to do any kind of postmortem about the election, at least not my guest.
00:02:19 --> 00:02:23 Anyway, we're going to talk about some positive things that's happening.
00:02:23 --> 00:02:29 We've got some black business men that we're going to talk to and we're going to talk to an author.
00:02:31 --> 00:02:37 Who, you know, was an investigative reporter and biggest assignment was trying
00:02:37 --> 00:02:39 to find out something about his past.
00:02:40 --> 00:02:43 Right. And so he wrote a book about that. So we're going to we're going to get
00:02:43 --> 00:02:46 into that. I do want to say.
00:02:47 --> 00:02:48 The circus has started.
00:02:50 --> 00:02:56 And when we when you hear some of the headlines with with my good friend,
00:02:56 --> 00:03:01 Grace G, and she does her moment of news, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about.
00:03:02 --> 00:03:07 If you haven't been following the news, President-elect Trump has started his
00:03:07 --> 00:03:11 announcements on who's going to be in his cabinet.
00:03:12 --> 00:03:17 And all the folks that we were afraid were going to be in the cabinet,
00:03:17 --> 00:03:19 they're getting in there.
00:03:20 --> 00:03:22 So, like I said, the surrogates has begun.
00:03:23 --> 00:03:26 And as we go on this journey, and I'll have a little more to say at the other
00:03:26 --> 00:03:28 end after the interviews.
00:03:28 --> 00:03:31 But, yeah, let's buckle up, guys.
00:03:33 --> 00:03:39 As T.O. used to say, let's get that popcorn ready because it's going to be an interesting ride.
00:03:40 --> 00:03:44 All right, guys, let's go ahead and get this show started. And as always,
00:03:44 --> 00:03:47 we started off with a moment of news with Grace G.
00:03:48 --> 00:03:55 Music.
00:03:55 --> 00:03:59 Republicans will keep their majority in the U.S. House of Representatives to
00:03:59 --> 00:04:04 give them control of both Houses of Congress for the first time since 2019.
00:04:04 --> 00:04:09 Senator John Thune of South Dakota was chosen as the new Republican leader of
00:04:09 --> 00:04:12 the U.S. Senate, replacing Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.
00:04:13 --> 00:04:16 President-elect Donald Trump announced some of his appointments for his new
00:04:16 --> 00:04:21 administration, including Senator Marco Rubio as Secretary of State and South
00:04:21 --> 00:04:25 Dakota Governor Kristi Noem as Secretary of Homeland Security.
00:04:25 --> 00:04:28 Representative matt gates resigned from
00:04:28 --> 00:04:31 congress following the announcement that president-elect trump
00:04:31 --> 00:04:35 appointed him as the nominee for attorney general
00:04:35 --> 00:04:39 the u.s supreme court denied former white house chief of staff mark meadows's
00:04:39 --> 00:04:44 request to transfer his georgia election interference case from state to federal
00:04:44 --> 00:04:50 court a federal judge paused deadlines in trump's election subversion case as
00:04:50 --> 00:04:54 prosecutors navigate the complexities of his potential return to the presidency.
00:04:55 --> 00:05:00 Massachusetts Air National Guard member Jack Teixeira was sentenced to 15 years
00:05:00 --> 00:05:03 in prison for leaking classified military documents.
00:05:04 --> 00:05:09 FEMA fired an employee who recommended that staff avoid North Carolina homes
00:05:09 --> 00:05:11 with Trump-supporting yard signs.
00:05:11 --> 00:05:15 A federal judge ruled that a Louisiana law mandating the display of the Ten
00:05:15 --> 00:05:19 Commandments in public school classrooms is unconstitutional.
00:05:19 --> 00:05:24 A Texas judge ruled against President Biden's immigration program that aimed
00:05:24 --> 00:05:28 to provide a path to citizenship for certain immigrant spouses.
00:05:28 --> 00:05:35 An Illinois law banning many semi-automatic firearms was struck down by a federal judge.
00:05:35 --> 00:05:40 Raleigh, North Carolina police arrested a man accused of a series of random
00:05:40 --> 00:05:44 vehicle shootings, charging him with multiple counts related to the incidents.
00:05:44 --> 00:05:50 And Judith Jamison, former artistic director of the Alvin Ailey American Dance
00:05:50 --> 00:05:53 Theater, passed away at the age of 81.
00:05:53 --> 00:05:57 I am Grace Gee, and this has been A Moment of.
00:05:57 --> 00:06:04 Music.
00:06:04 --> 00:06:12 All right. Thank you, Grace, for that moment of news. And now it is time for my first guest.
00:06:13 --> 00:06:17 And their names are Ollie Nervous and Henry Dickerson.
00:06:17 --> 00:06:22 And they are the founders of Straw and Hat.
00:06:23 --> 00:06:26 I mean, Straw and Wool. I'm sorry. They're a hat company. Straw and Wool.
00:06:27 --> 00:06:32 Their hat company is based in Phoenix. So let me go ahead and do the intro.
00:06:32 --> 00:06:37 Founded in February 2020, the founders, Ollie Nervous and Henry Dickerson,
00:06:37 --> 00:06:43 have always had a love for style, and each has had their individual experience
00:06:43 --> 00:06:46 with selling men's accessories independently for several years.
00:06:46 --> 00:06:50 With Phoenix being such a transplant town, having residents from all over the
00:06:50 --> 00:06:55 country, many of whom have a deep appreciation for classic hats,
00:06:55 --> 00:07:00 the three came together to create a destination for hat lovers and hat newbies alike.
00:07:00 --> 00:07:07 Genuine interest in their customers and the community embodies who they are as a brand.
00:07:07 --> 00:07:12 Their mission is to bring a sense of style and pride to the Phoenix Valley and
00:07:12 --> 00:07:16 beyond while providing the best shopping experience and variety of quality headwear
00:07:16 --> 00:07:18 and accessories to their customers.
00:07:18 --> 00:07:25 While also supporting the community through various philanthropic efforts from
00:07:25 --> 00:07:28 fundraising to direct donations.
00:07:28 --> 00:07:34 Ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a guest
00:07:34 --> 00:07:42 on this podcast, the founders of Straw and Wool, Ollie Nervous and Henry Dickerson.
00:07:43 --> 00:07:53 Music.
00:07:53 --> 00:08:00 All right. I got Henry Dickerson and Ollie Nervous. How y'all brothers doing? Y'all doing good?
00:08:01 --> 00:08:04 Peace. Great, brother. Much stuff, man. I'm doing lovely.
00:08:05 --> 00:08:09 Now, these gentlemen, for those in the listening audience, own this company
00:08:09 --> 00:08:12 called Straw and Wool, and it is a hat company.
00:08:13 --> 00:08:18 And for those people who know me, know that I like wearing a good brim on a good occasion.
00:08:19 --> 00:08:24 But these guys are like professionals at it. They're the ones that they've started
00:08:24 --> 00:08:28 a business in Phoenix, Arizona. These are black men.
00:08:29 --> 00:08:33 I'll get into that in a minute. But these are black men who have started a business
00:08:33 --> 00:08:35 in Phoenix, Arizona, a hat business.
00:08:36 --> 00:08:45 And I wanted to talk to them about being a black business in this time and some
00:08:45 --> 00:08:47 of the work that they're doing beyond the business.
00:08:47 --> 00:08:54 So, gentlemen, what I like to do at the beginning of the interview is to throw a quote at the guest.
00:08:55 --> 00:08:59 So both of y'all can answer it or whoever you designate to answer it.
00:08:59 --> 00:09:04 But the quote is, black businesses are the heart of local communities across
00:09:04 --> 00:09:07 this country. What does that quote mean to y'all?
00:09:09 --> 00:09:13 What does that mean? The heart of local communities.
00:09:14 --> 00:09:20 I would like to think so. But if that is made as a statement of fact,
00:09:20 --> 00:09:27 that means we might need a pacemaker, because I don't know if black businesses
00:09:27 --> 00:09:35 have a stable enough footing to be able to keep the blood pumping at this point.
00:09:35 --> 00:09:40 Okay, that was Henry. Ali, you want to add to that? Yeah, I would just add to
00:09:40 --> 00:09:50 that and say that they can, we can and we should and we have the potential to be.
00:09:52 --> 00:10:00 Because our will, our determination, our love and our passion for community
00:10:00 --> 00:10:05 has the ability to inspire, right?
00:10:05 --> 00:10:11 And to provide that foundation for the local community across this country.
00:10:11 --> 00:10:16 But as Henry put it, right, speaking as black business owners.
00:10:17 --> 00:10:19 Right, we've come up against so much.
00:10:20 --> 00:10:24 There's been so much that's been thrown at us as a people throughout history
00:10:24 --> 00:10:28 that, you know, the heartbeat is weak.
00:10:28 --> 00:10:33 And so we have to do what is necessary to strengthen our heartbeat so that we
00:10:33 --> 00:10:38 can be that true heartbeat for the community and for the economy, if you will.
00:10:39 --> 00:10:43 Yeah, I want to stay on that for a minute because, you know,
00:10:43 --> 00:10:46 historically, we had no choice, right?
00:10:46 --> 00:10:50 At one point in time in the history of this country, we had to have our own
00:10:50 --> 00:10:54 businesses because we weren't allowed to patronize other businesses.
00:10:54 --> 00:10:56 I like to say my light-skinned cousins.
00:10:57 --> 00:11:01 We weren't able to go into their shops, at least with any dignity anyway.
00:11:01 --> 00:11:06 And so I think historically, black businesses have been the heart.
00:11:06 --> 00:11:13 But to Henry's point, I think once that veil of segregation was lifted,
00:11:13 --> 00:11:21 that has been harder for black businesses to sustain and continue to be as viable
00:11:21 --> 00:11:25 as they were, say, 60 years ago. Is that a fair statement?
00:11:26 --> 00:11:27 It's an absolute truth.
00:11:28 --> 00:11:36 We see it every day. And the the hard the hardest part is, you know,
00:11:36 --> 00:11:41 those who are who are truly, you know, up front about being a black owned business
00:11:41 --> 00:11:43 and being a proud black owned business.
00:11:43 --> 00:11:52 We we we miss out on the on reaching a lot of consumers in the dominant culture.
00:11:52 --> 00:11:56 Right. Whether it's because we can't compete or whether it's because of discrimination
00:11:56 --> 00:11:59 or whatever the reason is.
00:11:59 --> 00:12:03 But we also miss out on getting support from our own community.
00:12:03 --> 00:12:07 Right. Because of what you just mentioned. And so,
00:12:07 --> 00:12:12 yeah, it's a definite fact and something that we have to address or something
00:12:12 --> 00:12:16 that we have to fix if we're going to be able to if we're going to be able to
00:12:16 --> 00:12:19 grow and thrive and succeed as business people.
00:12:20 --> 00:12:24 Yeah, and I would also like to add to it, too, with the statement itself,
00:12:24 --> 00:12:28 the heartbeat of the community, what community are we speaking about?
00:12:28 --> 00:12:34 Because we know that in the dominant community, we're not, you know, we're not even close.
00:12:35 --> 00:12:38 And in our community, we struggle supporting each other.
00:12:39 --> 00:12:43 For, you know, a lot of reasons historically that's ingrained in us and things
00:12:43 --> 00:12:49 that we're coming around from and even understanding that the dynamics.
00:12:49 --> 00:12:52 We still see we got canceled already.
00:12:53 --> 00:12:57 No, no, y'all didn't get canceled. It was just it was just a slight glitch in the thing.
00:12:58 --> 00:13:02 But I think I got the gist of Henry, what you were saying.
00:13:02 --> 00:13:08 So let's so let's let's keep the interview going. And let's let's talk about
00:13:08 --> 00:13:10 the origin of strong wool.
00:13:11 --> 00:13:17 How did y'all come about? Because we understand y'all had a business like in
00:13:17 --> 00:13:23 2017 and then y'all ventured from that business and got into the hat business.
00:13:23 --> 00:13:26 So kind of talk about how you started strong wool.
00:13:28 --> 00:13:31 So where we started was our community work
00:13:31 --> 00:13:34 as as a small business owner
00:13:34 --> 00:13:39 at the time with a product that was specifically for for black people me and
00:13:39 --> 00:13:42 my wife used to travel across the country to find events where there'd be large
00:13:42 --> 00:13:46 galleries of black folk to to sell our products and then one day we decided
00:13:46 --> 00:13:51 we shouldn't have to go across the country to find black people you know even
00:13:51 --> 00:13:53 as you insinuated early on that,
00:13:53 --> 00:13:57 believe it or not, there's black people in Phoenix type thing. But we knew we were here.
00:13:57 --> 00:13:59 You know, we just had to find a reason to bring them out.
00:14:00 --> 00:14:06 So so we got with Ali and his wife and we started a marketplace to showcase
00:14:06 --> 00:14:07 black home businesses locally.
00:14:08 --> 00:14:13 You know, it went like gangbusters. A lot of people was telling us that it's it's not going to work.
00:14:13 --> 00:14:16 There's not a lot of black people there. And we told him we just need enough.
00:14:17 --> 00:14:20 So, you know, we it took off.
00:14:20 --> 00:14:25 And as part of that process, evaluating the landscape, not too many businesses
00:14:25 --> 00:14:27 had things for men specifically.
00:14:27 --> 00:14:33 So after doing some research, landed on hats to just fill the void in the marketplace.
00:14:33 --> 00:14:36 So when men came, they would have something to shop, shop for.
00:14:36 --> 00:14:40 And then in between marketplaces, we would have them like on Facebook marketplace
00:14:40 --> 00:14:44 or offer up or what have you. And we found out that there's a void in the city.
00:14:44 --> 00:14:50 So from that, we did a little pop-up shop inside Ali's bookstore,
00:14:50 --> 00:14:54 which is the only black owned bookstore here in Arizona, which is grassroots bookstore.
00:14:55 --> 00:14:59 And we did our grand opening three days before quarantine.
00:15:00 --> 00:15:05 But we got such a good response from the community. During quarantine,
00:15:05 --> 00:15:06 we built our presence online.
00:15:07 --> 00:15:11 And since then, and putting our foot on the gas, opened our second location
00:15:11 --> 00:15:13 in Los Angeles a couple of months ago.
00:15:13 --> 00:15:18 And I believe we're one of, if not the largest black owned hat company in the country.
00:15:19 --> 00:15:23 So, so, so we, so we bear this flag for our nonprofit and our community work
00:15:23 --> 00:15:26 of some more supporting black owned businesses and just trying to show as a,
00:15:26 --> 00:15:28 should be an example of what can be.
00:15:29 --> 00:15:36 Yeah. So you, you mentioned that y'all started literally right before the pandemic hit.
00:15:37 --> 00:15:42 How did you what specifically did you do to navigate that and what did you learn from that experience?
00:15:43 --> 00:15:47 It cut out for a second. Can you say it one more time?
00:15:48 --> 00:15:53 What I was saying is that the pandemic y'all started literally just before the pandemic hit.
00:15:54 --> 00:15:58 How did y'all navigate that and what did you learn from that experience?
00:16:00 --> 00:16:04 Man, you know, it was it was definitely baptism by fire.
00:16:04 --> 00:16:07 You know we had to learn very quick we had
00:16:07 --> 00:16:11 to we had to learn to how
00:16:11 --> 00:16:14 to how to engage with people online because we weren't able to engage in person
00:16:14 --> 00:16:20 right and so we we literally built our e-commerce platform at that time we started
00:16:20 --> 00:16:25 our social media at that time and we just started to come up with creative ways
00:16:25 --> 00:16:31 to to engage with people online but it really was one of the best environment,
00:16:31 --> 00:16:34 as ironic as it sounds, one of the best environments to start in because,
00:16:34 --> 00:16:38 you know, we were just, we had to figure everything out on the fly.
00:16:38 --> 00:16:43 And so one thing that was also helpful at the time was, you know,
00:16:43 --> 00:16:46 people were at home, but they wanted to shop.
00:16:46 --> 00:16:49 They wanted to get dressed up. They wanted to look nice, even if they were just
00:16:49 --> 00:16:49 sitting around the house.
00:16:50 --> 00:16:56 And so, you know, we were really poised to do a really good business as things,
00:16:56 --> 00:17:00 you know, started to open back up as, you know, people started to go back outside
00:17:00 --> 00:17:03 again and wanted to go out and be amongst other people again.
00:17:03 --> 00:17:07 And so, you know, it was, it was a lot of hard work, but it was also,
00:17:07 --> 00:17:09 you know, really great timing.
00:17:09 --> 00:17:12 And we're fortunate to be, you know, in that place in that moment.
00:17:13 --> 00:17:16 Yeah. I don't, I don't think any of, I don't think where we are right now is
00:17:16 --> 00:17:21 possible if we didn't start when we started, because even the location where
00:17:21 --> 00:17:26 we have our store at downtown Phoenix was another store to close because of COVID. it.
00:17:26 --> 00:17:30 So we were able to come in this prime location in downtown Phoenix and scoop
00:17:30 --> 00:17:35 up the majority of the block to where we now have multiple black owned businesses
00:17:35 --> 00:17:37 on one of the busiest stretches in Phoenix.
00:17:38 --> 00:17:43 And with having that time to, you can't go outside. So, you know,
00:17:43 --> 00:17:45 you got to do something. So we learned this business.
00:17:46 --> 00:17:50 We connected to the greater hat community, as opposed to when we started,
00:17:50 --> 00:17:53 we just planned on being a local hat shop because there was none.
00:17:53 --> 00:17:58 But once we tapped into, like Ali mentioned, tapped into the worldwide community
00:17:58 --> 00:18:00 that allow us to flourish.
00:18:01 --> 00:18:05 And, you know, with having a lot of time on our hands that allow us to strategize
00:18:05 --> 00:18:08 and really position ourselves to win.
00:18:08 --> 00:18:16 Yeah. So what is the significance of you having that business at the Roosevelt Road Arts District?
00:18:17 --> 00:18:22 I've been to Phoenix once and I didn't get to really see the city and all that,
00:18:22 --> 00:18:29 but it seems like being in this particular spot is one of the prime spots in the city.
00:18:29 --> 00:18:34 So kind of talk about the significance of being there in the Roosevelt Roads Arts District.
00:18:35 --> 00:18:41 Yeah, it definitely is. I think it's one of the top arts districts and destinations
00:18:41 --> 00:18:48 in America. It gets a ton of tourist traffic, ton of local traffic.
00:18:48 --> 00:18:54 And so for us to to have our business here, but not just our business here,
00:18:54 --> 00:18:59 but to have a strong presence here for our entire for our community.
00:18:59 --> 00:19:04 Right. As he mentioned, it's there's three businesses, three black owned businesses
00:19:04 --> 00:19:06 that were that were affiliated with.
00:19:06 --> 00:19:12 My Strong Wool, Stardust and Sage, which is owned by by Henry's wife.
00:19:12 --> 00:19:18 Havana and Acres Community Creators Marketplace, which is owned by our nonprofit,
00:19:18 --> 00:19:25 which is a a boutique for artisans, for small businesses to have their products
00:19:25 --> 00:19:28 in the stores, mostly for the vendors that we work with at our marketplace.
00:19:28 --> 00:19:31 Now there's a brick and mortar concept where they can have their product.
00:19:31 --> 00:19:35 Right. And so what it means is.
00:19:35 --> 00:19:39 Imagine going to any city in America, Phoenix, even though, you know,
00:19:39 --> 00:19:42 people don't look at it that way. It's the fifth largest city in the country.
00:19:42 --> 00:19:48 Right. So imagine going to any city in America to a prominent downtown district
00:19:48 --> 00:19:53 and seeing multiple black owned businesses right next to each other or all in the same area.
00:19:53 --> 00:19:57 You know what that means for our community, what that means for black business.
00:19:57 --> 00:20:01 I think it's it's a testament to the support of the community.
00:20:01 --> 00:20:06 It's a testament to what's possible when we work together, because,
00:20:06 --> 00:20:09 you know, we don't do this in a silo. We work with community,
00:20:09 --> 00:20:11 but we also, you know, we have a strongly committed team.
00:20:12 --> 00:20:16 In addition to us who are leading the charge, we have a strong committed team
00:20:16 --> 00:20:19 who are who are alongside us on this journey.
00:20:19 --> 00:20:24 And so I think it is just a testament of what's possible. And this is just the beginning.
00:20:24 --> 00:20:30 Right. We we we need and we deserve much more than this.
00:20:30 --> 00:20:34 Right. But this is just to show. And also we revitalize this area.
00:20:34 --> 00:20:39 So when we came here, all of these businesses were closed, right?
00:20:39 --> 00:20:45 This strip of Roosevelt Road they were on, it didn't have a lot of activity.
00:20:45 --> 00:20:50 And so not only have we opened our three businesses, but we've inspired other
00:20:50 --> 00:20:55 people to come and open businesses right on this block next to ours because
00:20:55 --> 00:20:57 they see what's happening, they
00:20:57 --> 00:21:00 see the activity, and they see the opportunity that exists here. Yeah.
00:21:00 --> 00:21:04 Even the you know, we had to look at the scope a little bit different recently,
00:21:04 --> 00:21:09 too, because, as you said, there's been a lot of people that see the traffic
00:21:09 --> 00:21:10 that we brought here now.
00:21:11 --> 00:21:15 And I'm like, hold up. I need to get a piece of that. So, I mean,
00:21:15 --> 00:21:17 you got one business a couple of doors down.
00:21:17 --> 00:21:22 They spent over a million dollars for their location and they're about to close
00:21:22 --> 00:21:27 pretty soon, too. And some of these businesses that have opened on our block
00:21:27 --> 00:21:30 have not had the success that we've had.
00:21:31 --> 00:21:36 And, you know, and we've looked at this as look at what we've done as black owned businesses.
00:21:36 --> 00:21:43 But in reality, when we look at everything, it's no, we did this regardless of race.
00:21:43 --> 00:21:46 You know, we just happen to be black, but we revitalized this.
00:21:46 --> 00:21:51 So we're not going to look at our success just through the lenses of a black owned business.
00:21:51 --> 00:21:55 We're forcing people to recognize our success and what we've done for this stretch
00:21:55 --> 00:21:58 as vital businesses, period.
00:21:58 --> 00:22:01 So don't just pay us attention to our black history month. You know,
00:22:01 --> 00:22:06 you really need to take notice of what we've done and the tax dollars that we
00:22:06 --> 00:22:08 brought in and the people that we've inspired.
00:22:09 --> 00:22:12 Even people moving here after they come here and they say, oh,
00:22:12 --> 00:22:14 wow, black people really doing it here.
00:22:14 --> 00:22:17 And next thing you know, they their residents here. So we're forcing people
00:22:17 --> 00:22:22 to look at what we do, our success outside of the scope is just a black owned business.
00:22:22 --> 00:22:27 But, no, we really did something that these other businesses haven't been able
00:22:27 --> 00:22:29 to do and still can't do on this stretch.
00:22:29 --> 00:22:34 The property value has raised since we've been here and activating this area.
00:22:35 --> 00:22:39 Like we said, a number of businesses have moved to this area since we've been here.
00:22:39 --> 00:22:45 And, you know, it's unfortunate because we weren't in a position to buy and own. Right.
00:22:45 --> 00:22:51 So we we've benefited the area. But, you know, as as individuals and as a business,
00:22:51 --> 00:22:56 we haven't necessarily benefited from the activity and the revitalization that we brought to the area.
00:22:57 --> 00:23:03 Got you. But and those are incredible points because you you you know,
00:23:03 --> 00:23:09 you want to remind people that y'all are not looking for sympathy or anything
00:23:09 --> 00:23:13 like that or an uneven playing field.
00:23:13 --> 00:23:16 Y'all just want the opportunity to do
00:23:16 --> 00:23:19 what you want to do and you know
00:23:19 --> 00:23:24 you you shot down a myth about property value brother Ali when you talked about
00:23:24 --> 00:23:29 how the value of the property is going up because y'all are there as opposed
00:23:29 --> 00:23:33 to the myth that's always when we show up oh the property value is going to
00:23:33 --> 00:23:37 go down the neighborhood is going to go down and all that stuff if it wasn't for you all,
00:23:38 --> 00:23:41 that area probably would not be thriving as it is.
00:23:42 --> 00:23:45 Right. Right. So let me ask you this question.
00:23:46 --> 00:23:52 Did the exposure from ESPN help y'all or what?
00:23:53 --> 00:23:58 Absolutely. Yeah. Without a doubt, it's been one of the biggest,
00:23:58 --> 00:24:03 you know, boons for our business from exposure to sales, you know, to credibility.
00:24:04 --> 00:24:06 Yeah. 100%.
00:24:08 --> 00:24:12 And sometimes, you know, too much because a lot of people recognize this that
00:24:12 --> 00:24:13 we don't even realize why.
00:24:15 --> 00:24:20 Yeah. You know, and one of the things that we talk about on this show is,
00:24:21 --> 00:24:27 you know, during during COVID was also, you know, the summer of George Floyd,
00:24:28 --> 00:24:29 the summer of black resistance.
00:24:30 --> 00:24:35 And all these corporations were like, oh, well, now we got to we got to do something
00:24:35 --> 00:24:40 for black folks. We've got to recognize businesses and all these different programs came up.
00:24:40 --> 00:24:48 And so to actually talk to somebody who has participated in one of those efforts, if you will.
00:24:49 --> 00:24:55 You know, I'm glad to hear that it did have the impact that it was supposed to have.
00:24:55 --> 00:25:00 My concern is now that that that's not the flavor of the month anymore.
00:25:01 --> 00:25:10 And so do you think that this disinterest now, you know, it's not a continue? It was for that moment.
00:25:10 --> 00:25:16 Do you think that the decrease in the interest is going to have a negative impact
00:25:16 --> 00:25:22 on black businesses or? or is not going to have any impact at all based on how
00:25:22 --> 00:25:24 the business is run and all that kind of stuff.
00:25:25 --> 00:25:30 I think I think that last part you said is the key indicator.
00:25:30 --> 00:25:38 If you have been able to take the additional boost that was given to black businesses
00:25:38 --> 00:25:40 during this time and really cultivate
00:25:40 --> 00:25:45 that energy into building something sustainable, then you'll be fine.
00:25:45 --> 00:25:50 I always tell people if you build support is anywhere in your in your business
00:25:50 --> 00:25:54 plan, you're going to fail because support only lasts for so long.
00:25:54 --> 00:25:58 It's up to you to get on your feet and create a viable product and support your customers.
00:25:59 --> 00:26:05 And that's something that we focused on from the beginning was to not really
00:26:05 --> 00:26:08 be business that is dependent upon support.
00:26:08 --> 00:26:12 It comes, obviously, because, you know, we've put a lot of work in the community
00:26:12 --> 00:26:16 supporting them and they support us in return. So that's greatly appreciated.
00:26:17 --> 00:26:21 But, you know, the business that we get online and all the places that we ship
00:26:21 --> 00:26:23 to that they don't know is from Adam.
00:26:23 --> 00:26:29 So we just try to make sure that we're a viable product. We we give a good service
00:26:29 --> 00:26:34 and we stay consistent with with quality service and products.
00:26:34 --> 00:26:39 And at that point, I don't really see whether somebody wants to pay us attention or not.
00:26:41 --> 00:26:48 We're trying to be like Levi we're going to be here 100 200 years from now and not based on.
00:26:48 --> 00:26:53 You know, any, any, any outside factors other than good quality product or service.
00:26:53 --> 00:26:58 Yeah. I just said it would, it, it depends on the outlook of the,
00:26:58 --> 00:27:00 of the individual, right?
00:27:00 --> 00:27:04 If, if that's something that, that you're dependent upon, then yeah,
00:27:04 --> 00:27:06 it's going to hurt you, right?
00:27:06 --> 00:27:11 We, we saw organizations who would, were, who were getting rained on with checks
00:27:11 --> 00:27:15 and opportunities, you know, during that period, right?
00:27:15 --> 00:27:19 And then when the money dried up, you know, either their work dried up or,
00:27:19 --> 00:27:22 you know, something had to, something had to end.
00:27:22 --> 00:27:26 Right. But we, we can't be dependent on that.
00:27:26 --> 00:27:31 As he said, if the opportunity comes, if they have a mindset to do something
00:27:31 --> 00:27:35 to help black folks and help repair all of the harm that's been,
00:27:35 --> 00:27:39 you know, inflicted over the past several hundred years, fantastic.
00:27:39 --> 00:27:42 Right. But we, we can't depend on it. We're not going to expect it.
00:27:42 --> 00:27:46 We got, we have to do what we have to do regardless. right
00:27:46 --> 00:27:49 and so again if it's if something's gonna
00:27:49 --> 00:27:52 come hey great fantastic we weren't expecting the espn thing
00:27:52 --> 00:27:55 they emailed us we thought it was spam right and so
00:27:55 --> 00:27:58 finally you know we backed out to them it's like okay you know this is a real
00:27:58 --> 00:28:03 thing cool right they created for for the blessing right but we're gonna we're
00:28:03 --> 00:28:05 gonna put it to work and we're gonna keep doing what we're doing and i think
00:28:05 --> 00:28:10 that's the mindset that all of us have to have of not expecting the dominant
00:28:10 --> 00:28:12 culture to do something for us.
00:28:12 --> 00:28:15 Especially not something that's going to truly empower us.
00:28:16 --> 00:28:20 Right. It might be something, you know, something a little boost, a little a little token.
00:28:21 --> 00:28:24 Right. But not something that's going to truly empower us and truly help us
00:28:24 --> 00:28:27 liberate our people. Right. That's that job is on us.
00:28:28 --> 00:28:33 So that leads into this question. Now, according to the state of black Arizona
00:28:33 --> 00:28:36 and the greater Phoenix Economic Council.
00:28:36 --> 00:28:39 Black businesses account for just one percent of
00:28:39 --> 00:28:42 all businesses in phoenix so i
00:28:42 --> 00:28:45 said i was going to ask y'all a political question here's the political question
00:28:45 --> 00:28:51 what do you think government can do to help change that or do you think government
00:28:51 --> 00:28:57 can't do anything what's your thoughts i mean there's a lot that government
00:28:57 --> 00:29:00 can do to to to change that,
00:29:01 --> 00:29:07 and and a lot of other things right a lot of other challenges and issues that
00:29:07 --> 00:29:11 we face right but does government have the will to do.
00:29:12 --> 00:29:16 You know, I think the biggest thing that that we know that everybody knows that
00:29:16 --> 00:29:20 we need is capital. We need we need access to capital.
00:29:20 --> 00:29:25 Our community has been divested and exploited for hundreds of years.
00:29:25 --> 00:29:28 Right. There's no there's no mystery as to how we got into this position.
00:29:28 --> 00:29:31 It's a wealth canyon that exists in this country.
00:29:32 --> 00:29:38 All right. I study a lot of entrepreneurs, listen to a lot of podcasts and all
00:29:38 --> 00:29:42 these multimillion and billion dollar corporations. A lot of times it's just
00:29:42 --> 00:29:45 the seed money that they get in the beginning.
00:29:45 --> 00:29:50 If you can go to your family and raise $200, $300 for your granola bar
00:29:50 --> 00:29:54 business idea or for some, you know, some cockamamie idea that you have and
00:29:54 --> 00:29:58 your uncle is, you know, a professor at Harvard and all these things.
00:29:58 --> 00:30:03 Right. It takes the guesswork out. It makes it makes there's a system in place
00:30:03 --> 00:30:07 that makes it a lot easier for these businesses to succeed.
00:30:07 --> 00:30:10 And so we just we don't have those things in our community. So if government
00:30:10 --> 00:30:14 was truly interested in seeing a change and this type of change.
00:30:14 --> 00:30:16 Right, they would institute things.
00:30:16 --> 00:30:20 They would hold banks and financial institutions accountable that discriminate,
00:30:20 --> 00:30:23 you know, but that takes courage.
00:30:23 --> 00:30:28 That takes will and it takes, you know, some serious intention to see change.
00:30:28 --> 00:30:33 And, you know, the government has never, never shown to have the appetite to do that. Yeah.
00:30:33 --> 00:30:40 And I'm willing to bet that on that report that other quote unquote minorities,
00:30:40 --> 00:30:46 racial demographics or whatever are higher than us, whether you're speaking about Asians,
00:30:46 --> 00:30:48 whether you're speaking about Hispanics or whatever,
00:30:49 --> 00:30:51 you know, maybe the native Americans are below us, but who knows,
00:30:51 --> 00:30:55 but I'm willing to bet of all those were probably the lowest on that,
00:30:55 --> 00:30:59 on that list. So when we look at that.
00:30:59 --> 00:31:04 We've got to stop having BIPOC programs, BIPOC funding.
00:31:04 --> 00:31:10 If we are actually going to gain ground, we can't be grouped up with people
00:31:10 --> 00:31:17 who already have an advantage on us just from either a, a homeland or B, a plan when you got here,
00:31:17 --> 00:31:21 you know, we're in a unique, unique situation that we're still trying to climb
00:31:21 --> 00:31:22 out of the hole from that.
00:31:23 --> 00:31:25 You know, there's somebody at the top of that hole still kicking dirt,
00:31:25 --> 00:31:30 you know, So stop grouping us in when you when you release these programs and
00:31:30 --> 00:31:32 these fundings and these opportunities.
00:31:32 --> 00:31:39 We don't we're just the B that the B has a unique story than those other letters,
00:31:39 --> 00:31:42 then the minorities, then the people of colors.
00:31:42 --> 00:31:48 So in order for us to gain ground, we need very intentional and very direct.
00:31:49 --> 00:31:54 Initiatives that support just us is this is like Ali said, it's not hard.
00:31:54 --> 00:31:58 You know, nobody else has that story, but yet we're grouped in with everybody else.
00:31:58 --> 00:32:02 So, Henry, let me let me let me hit that real quick.
00:32:02 --> 00:32:08 So having been in a position, elected position before, if somebody comes to
00:32:08 --> 00:32:11 you and says, well, Brother Henry, I hear what you're saying.
00:32:13 --> 00:32:19 However, we can't really navigate the law like that. If we pass something or
00:32:19 --> 00:32:24 we create a government program, it can't be just for one group of people.
00:32:26 --> 00:32:30 So what would you what would your response be to an elected official like me
00:32:30 --> 00:32:32 that would say that to you?
00:32:32 --> 00:32:36 I would I would ask you to explain the Asian hate crime.
00:32:36 --> 00:32:40 I would ask you to explain Native American benefits.
00:32:41 --> 00:32:45 I would ask you to explain the money that we paid to other countries for damage
00:32:45 --> 00:32:47 that was done to them, not by us.
00:32:47 --> 00:32:53 I would probably want an understanding of why other groups.
00:32:53 --> 00:32:59 Racial or not, have received benefits based on their very specific demographics
00:32:59 --> 00:33:05 and repairing them from things that had nothing to do with America to understand
00:33:05 --> 00:33:08 and just try to understand your statement.
00:33:08 --> 00:33:12 But I'm not even going to push it back. If you can explain it to me in a way that makes sense.
00:33:12 --> 00:33:17 But we seem to be the only people that that narrative applies to.
00:33:18 --> 00:33:21 And I think it's getting old at this point. It's getting it's past time.
00:33:21 --> 00:33:26 And I would have to flip the question to the politician to say, how do we fix this?
00:33:26 --> 00:33:30 Right. In the confines of this system that we're in, how do we fix it?
00:33:31 --> 00:33:33 Right. Because the problem is not going away.
00:33:34 --> 00:33:37 We know the solution. We know what's needed. Right.
00:33:37 --> 00:33:40 But we can't keep kicking the can down the road saying, oh, you know,
00:33:40 --> 00:33:44 this is how my hands are tied. Well, then what do we need to do to fix?
00:33:44 --> 00:33:49 Right. Do we need to do designation? I've been studying the speaking of the natives.
00:33:49 --> 00:33:56 I've been studying the casino industry when when they when these investors want
00:33:56 --> 00:33:58 to invent, want to build a casino.
00:33:58 --> 00:34:01 They lobby the government to they can create a tribe.
00:34:01 --> 00:34:05 They can lobby the government to get land. Right.
00:34:05 --> 00:34:10 To get to start a new reservation and they can, and then they invest in the casino and.
00:34:11 --> 00:34:14 Right. Build a casino, invest hundreds of millions of dollars and then reap
00:34:14 --> 00:34:16 massive amounts of profits.
00:34:17 --> 00:34:22 Right. So they're they're operating within the system, but going around certain
00:34:22 --> 00:34:27 things, there's loopholes that they're exploiting in order to to to get what they need.
00:34:27 --> 00:34:31 Right. So why are we the only ones that are being told, oh, this is the way
00:34:31 --> 00:34:33 the system works? I know it's whatever.
00:34:33 --> 00:34:38 Right. We know that that that the laws in this country have never been lawful. Right.
00:34:38 --> 00:34:43 They just they just been put in a in a institute in a way to benefit certain people.
00:34:43 --> 00:34:47 Right. So that would be my question to elected officials was knowing what you
00:34:47 --> 00:34:50 know about the system and knowing what you know about our condition.
00:34:51 --> 00:34:55 How do we fix this? And on the same note to to that statement,
00:34:55 --> 00:34:57 we're not asking for something that's based on race.
00:34:58 --> 00:35:01 We're not asking for something for black people. We're asking for something
00:35:01 --> 00:35:06 for people that have a lineage of people that built this country that have a
00:35:06 --> 00:35:08 very specific designation.
00:35:08 --> 00:35:12 So it's not race based. Same way these tribes are lineage based.
00:35:12 --> 00:35:17 The same way the the every other group is lineage basis.
00:35:17 --> 00:35:20 It's not a discussion of race. It's a discussion of lineage and history.
00:35:21 --> 00:35:27 OK, and that's that's a good way to put it, Because I think when we get into
00:35:27 --> 00:35:31 the discussion of race and we won't dive into it too deep, but we understand
00:35:31 --> 00:35:36 that race was a construct to divide and conquer.
00:35:37 --> 00:35:41 And but when you make the argument based on lineage, as far as ancestry,
00:35:42 --> 00:35:47 as far as generational contributions, because as I referred to him earlier,
00:35:47 --> 00:35:50 my light skin cousins, they brag about the fact that.
00:35:51 --> 00:35:54 Here in Georgia, they're like an eighth generation. And I said,
00:35:54 --> 00:35:56 you do understand that Georgia was set up as a debtor's prison.
00:35:56 --> 00:35:59 So you're bragging on the fact that your great, great, great,
00:36:00 --> 00:36:02 great, great granddaddy was was a was a criminal.
00:36:02 --> 00:36:07 Right. In the eyes of the king of England. But they use that to justify why
00:36:07 --> 00:36:10 they should get benefits and privilege.
00:36:11 --> 00:36:15 And it seems to be a problem when African-Americans or black folks,
00:36:15 --> 00:36:18 however you want to describe yourselves.
00:36:18 --> 00:36:23 When you make that same argument, it's like, well, I don't know, and all that stuff.
00:36:24 --> 00:36:29 It's really interesting. I think that's a challenge that we're going to have
00:36:29 --> 00:36:36 to seriously address moving forward as Generation X and Generation Z become,
00:36:36 --> 00:36:41 and the millennials become more of the power base in this country.
00:36:41 --> 00:36:47 All right, so let's get into, and this may be a segue, let's get into the foundation
00:36:47 --> 00:36:48 work that y'all are doing.
00:36:48 --> 00:36:52 Talk about the foundation, why you felt you needed to start that up,
00:36:52 --> 00:36:54 and what is the objective?
00:36:55 --> 00:37:02 Yeah, so the foundation work was really born out of a need that we observed
00:37:02 --> 00:37:09 over and over again to provide resources and support and education to businesses in the community.
00:37:09 --> 00:37:15 Again, we've been operating our marketplace for now for eight years,
00:37:15 --> 00:37:18 but at about the four or five year mark, right?
00:37:18 --> 00:37:21 We noticed that our businesses weren't growing.
00:37:22 --> 00:37:26 Right. Our businesses would people would come in, they would get inspired and
00:37:26 --> 00:37:30 would bring their idea to the marketplace. We consider it one of the best places
00:37:30 --> 00:37:33 to start because you can come, you can you can set your your business up,
00:37:34 --> 00:37:35 whether it's a product, service, whatever.
00:37:35 --> 00:37:40 Right. And but we noticed that there were gaps, you know, whether it was knowledge,
00:37:40 --> 00:37:43 whether it was capital, whether it was exposure.
00:37:44 --> 00:37:47 Right. Whatever those gaps were. But we know that we had a certain level of
00:37:47 --> 00:37:49 experience, you know, being business owners.
00:37:49 --> 00:37:54 And but we also knew that there was a lot of experience that was out there,
00:37:54 --> 00:37:58 a lot of knowledge that was out there that, you know, people just weren't accessing,
00:37:58 --> 00:38:01 whether it was from people in the community or outside of the community.
00:38:01 --> 00:38:07 And so we know that business is is a vital tool to build wealth,
00:38:07 --> 00:38:12 to create jobs, to create opportunity, you know, to to help elevate us and help
00:38:12 --> 00:38:14 move us forward as a community, as a people.
00:38:15 --> 00:38:20 And so, you know, we saw the need to create something that could bridge that
00:38:20 --> 00:38:21 divide, that could bridge that gap.
00:38:22 --> 00:38:24 Right. And so that's the whole idea behind the nonprofit.
00:38:24 --> 00:38:29 And so we continue to do our marketplace. But now we have the retail store.
00:38:29 --> 00:38:32 So now instead of somebody coming out once or twice a month,
00:38:32 --> 00:38:36 you could be generating passive income every single day of the week to the retail store.
00:38:36 --> 00:38:41 Right. We do classes now. We do workshops now. We do networking events now to
00:38:41 --> 00:38:44 bring community together so that we can do business with one another.
00:38:44 --> 00:38:48 We can rebuild that trust, rebuild that true sense of community.
00:38:48 --> 00:38:51 Right. Because we say community. Right. But we're still very segmented.
00:38:51 --> 00:38:52 We're still very divided.
00:38:52 --> 00:38:56 And so the more we're in communication with each other, the stronger our relationships
00:38:56 --> 00:39:01 are, the better we can support each other in every aspect, but definitely in business.
00:39:01 --> 00:39:06 And so and we have a whole bunch of things planned. We just we just secured
00:39:06 --> 00:39:11 a 13 square foot facility, which is is right in East Lake Park,
00:39:11 --> 00:39:13 which is a historically black neighborhood in Phoenix.
00:39:14 --> 00:39:17 And so it's going to be our headquarters for our nonprofit. It's going to be
00:39:17 --> 00:39:21 office space for other nonprofits that serve businesses. It's going to be a
00:39:21 --> 00:39:24 co-working space, going to be incubators, going to be event space,
00:39:25 --> 00:39:26 going to be a whole bunch of things.
00:39:26 --> 00:39:32 And so so we're just we're just charging hard, trying to trying to show what's possible.
00:39:32 --> 00:39:36 Once again, trying to lay the groundwork for the people who are coming behind
00:39:36 --> 00:39:42 us, who have brilliant business ideas and need that support,
00:39:42 --> 00:39:46 need that foundation, you know, and need those need the resources that,
00:39:46 --> 00:39:48 like we said, a lot of other communities have.
00:39:48 --> 00:39:52 And so we view it as our responsibility to help gather those resources and bring
00:39:52 --> 00:39:57 them to our community so that we can continue to grow and do what we need to
00:39:57 --> 00:40:01 do. Yeah, because we can speak firsthand about the opportunities and the money that's in the city.
00:40:02 --> 00:40:06 And unfortunately, you know, on the flip side of it, after, you know,
00:40:06 --> 00:40:12 after doing the work for what was it, like five, six years as just out of love, funded it out of pocket.
00:40:12 --> 00:40:17 And then like, OK, we need to become a nonprofit in order to get access to more
00:40:17 --> 00:40:20 resources to serve as a better resource to these businesses.
00:40:20 --> 00:40:25 And once we became a nonprofit and we realized how much money really was out
00:40:25 --> 00:40:28 there, that's getting bottlenecked by gatekeepers.
00:40:29 --> 00:40:33 You know, it kind of changed the mission a little bit, because at that point
00:40:33 --> 00:40:36 we realized that we weren't fighting a battle.
00:40:36 --> 00:40:43 We need to support them, but we're fighting a legacy actions within our own.
00:40:43 --> 00:40:46 I hate to call them community or even our own people, but people that represent
00:40:46 --> 00:40:51 us, you know, to the dominant society. So they get the checks cut and those
00:40:51 --> 00:40:53 resources don't make it to the community.
00:40:53 --> 00:40:57 And after seeing that, you know, it kind of put a different fire up under us
00:40:57 --> 00:40:59 because now we're fighting two battles.
00:40:59 --> 00:41:02 We're fighting the battles to make sure that these businesses have what they
00:41:02 --> 00:41:04 need and we're there for them to build this foundation.
00:41:04 --> 00:41:10 And over here, we're fighting to be seen by the same people that are cutting
00:41:10 --> 00:41:14 the checks to the to the people that have been there when the checks have been
00:41:14 --> 00:41:19 cut, but have not done the right thing with those resources to benefit the community.
00:41:19 --> 00:41:24 So, you know, we're kind of trying to dismantle the system and build a new one at the same time. Yeah.
00:41:25 --> 00:41:28 So let me, this is my last question.
00:41:29 --> 00:41:33 And it's very personal with me and I don't, we don't have time to get into the
00:41:33 --> 00:41:39 story of why it's personal with me, but it's a word called pace, right?
00:41:39 --> 00:41:44 So it's like, y'all got this successful business going.
00:41:44 --> 00:41:48 You've got a couple of other ventures going. Now you got the nonprofit going.
00:41:49 --> 00:41:54 How do y'all pace yourselves? Because I I think that's very important for black
00:41:54 --> 00:42:03 businesses, business people to understand about extending yourselves or overextending or whatever.
00:42:04 --> 00:42:10 How do y'all deal with the issue of pace and, you know, when is the right time
00:42:10 --> 00:42:12 to move in this direction? When
00:42:12 --> 00:42:16 is the right time to kind of stand pat or even pull back a little bit?
00:42:16 --> 00:42:19 How do y'all address that? Cause I think that's very important for us.
00:42:20 --> 00:42:22 You're not the examples.
00:42:25 --> 00:42:26 I don't know.
00:42:30 --> 00:42:34 I'd be interested if I wish we had time to understand why it's personal for
00:42:34 --> 00:42:37 you. but it's different for us, right?
00:42:37 --> 00:42:41 For, I think for a lot of us, because it's not just business, right?
00:42:41 --> 00:42:45 It's not, we're not just doing this just to get money or something like that.
00:42:45 --> 00:42:47 Like it's a, it's a, it's a mission.
00:42:47 --> 00:42:52 It's an assignment that we, we, it's placed on a lot of us to,
00:42:52 --> 00:42:55 to, to, to do this work, right.
00:42:55 --> 00:43:00 And, and to, and to serve our people and to build something that our people can be proud of.
00:43:00 --> 00:43:03 Right. And so how do you pace yourself?
00:43:04 --> 00:43:08 When you when you're when you have that calling on you, when you feel that calling
00:43:08 --> 00:43:11 on you, how can you possibly pace yourself?
00:43:11 --> 00:43:14 Right. So because because you're always going to feel like there's more than
00:43:14 --> 00:43:19 we can do. Right. We have a limited a limited window to do this. Right.
00:43:19 --> 00:43:23 And look at look at and we're and we study the history.
00:43:23 --> 00:43:27 Right. We study our ancestors. Right. And so how did they pace their self?
00:43:28 --> 00:43:32 Right. The sacrifices that they made in the times that they were in.
00:43:32 --> 00:43:37 Right i don't know that's that's an impossible question to answer right but
00:43:37 --> 00:43:42 i but i think you know that for me personally balance doesn't look i always
00:43:42 --> 00:43:43 tell people balance doesn't look like this.
00:43:44 --> 00:43:48 Right balance look like this that's balance
00:43:48 --> 00:43:52 right when i realize okay i'm way overextended i
00:43:52 --> 00:43:55 haven't spent any time with my children i haven't spent any time with my wife
00:43:55 --> 00:43:57 i haven't been sleeping my health is suffering okay all
00:43:57 --> 00:44:00 right now i gotta try to pull back a little bit right and
00:44:00 --> 00:44:03 regain some of that balance but as soon as I'm here
00:44:03 --> 00:44:09 I feel like I have I can't stay here right I have to go back to this because
00:44:09 --> 00:44:15 that's the time that we're in so I mean I'll yeah like I said we're not the
00:44:15 --> 00:44:21 best examples for that because it's hard it's hard to face yourself in a time like this yeah it's.
00:44:21 --> 00:44:26 This is one of those things I meditate on every morning, and I'm looking for
00:44:26 --> 00:44:29 the answers because if you were
00:44:29 --> 00:44:34 to look at our plate, it would look like a to-go plate from a barbecue.
00:44:34 --> 00:44:39 You put everything as much as you can on that plate, and you're trying to walk out with it.
00:44:39 --> 00:44:42 That's like literally what our plate looks like. And actually,
00:44:42 --> 00:44:44 we're probably just going to take the 10 pan.
00:44:44 --> 00:44:51 That's what our plate looks like. But like Ali said, it's like what we do is is is not business.
00:44:52 --> 00:44:57 Money is the the the last priority because we know it's going to come if we
00:44:57 --> 00:44:58 just continue to do a job.
00:44:59 --> 00:45:05 But the impact that we know we can have and we have had that that is the most
00:45:05 --> 00:45:08 important thing that that we work for.
00:45:08 --> 00:45:11 And I mentioned that we're fighting two battles and actually we're fighting
00:45:11 --> 00:45:14 the third battle, which is the most important, which is time.
00:45:14 --> 00:45:18 Phoenix is growing at such a rapid rate, the cost of living,
00:45:18 --> 00:45:23 the opportunities to to establish a business, to establish yourself, period.
00:45:23 --> 00:45:26 I grew up a good part of my time in San Diego.
00:45:27 --> 00:45:32 Growing up, San Diego was nice, slow town. And then I watched it grow.
00:45:33 --> 00:45:38 And then by the time it got to where it was, there was nowhere for anybody black
00:45:38 --> 00:45:43 to participate in the greater economy. And I saw that and I did not have the
00:45:43 --> 00:45:47 examples outside of the hood of black businesses doing what they do.
00:45:47 --> 00:45:51 But once we landed where we landed now and we see what's there,
00:45:52 --> 00:45:58 we have we're trying our best to not just hold the line, but gain more ground.
00:45:58 --> 00:46:04 And every piece of ground that we gain, we're bringing other people in to be
00:46:04 --> 00:46:06 able to capitalize on this opportunity that we've brought people.
00:46:07 --> 00:46:12 So the imbalance is, I don't know, imbalance feels like balance to me because
00:46:12 --> 00:46:14 if I have a free moment, I feel like something is wrong.
00:46:15 --> 00:46:18 I'm not saying that that's healthy. It's probably very unhealthy. Yeah.
00:46:19 --> 00:46:23 And I'm, but it is very unhealthy. I know you can tell by these bags,
00:46:23 --> 00:46:26 but, but we just, I don't know.
00:46:26 --> 00:46:30 It's, it's, it's, it's, it's a lot of work. My grandfather was a coal miner
00:46:30 --> 00:46:35 in West Virginia and I know he worked hard and I know his, his,
00:46:35 --> 00:46:37 his father, his grandfather was, were enslaved.
00:46:38 --> 00:46:43 And I don't know what their balance was. So when I look at what I do compared
00:46:43 --> 00:46:45 to the people that paved the way for me,
00:46:45 --> 00:46:49 it's hard for me to really complain if I'm dead tired on my back from working,
00:46:50 --> 00:46:53 talking to people all day, because that's what they cleared this path for.
00:46:53 --> 00:46:56 Yeah you you sound you sound like
00:46:56 --> 00:46:59 my my grandfather you say you can sleep when you're dead
00:46:59 --> 00:47:02 you know i'm saying right now you gotta go to work but i
00:47:02 --> 00:47:05 appreciate that honesty i i really do and maybe
00:47:05 --> 00:47:11 we'll get some time to to talk about why what was my motivation motivation for
00:47:11 --> 00:47:18 asking that but look we gotta go and so tell people the name of the non-profit
00:47:18 --> 00:47:25 how people can contribute to it how people can do business with strong wool. Give me the full pitch.
00:47:26 --> 00:47:32 All right. So our nonprofit is ACRES, which is an acronym for Archwood Community
00:47:32 --> 00:47:34 Resource Empowerment Strategy.
00:47:34 --> 00:47:39 We're commonly known as Archwood or Archwood Exchange, named after the intersection
00:47:39 --> 00:47:41 in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Archer and Greenwood.
00:47:42 --> 00:47:47 So Archwood Exchange, our ACRES, archwoodexchange.com is our website.
00:47:47 --> 00:47:50 And there you can find about find out about everything that we do.
00:47:50 --> 00:47:54 We're starting a big fundraising campaign to complete this project that we're
00:47:54 --> 00:47:55 working on for the community.
00:47:56 --> 00:48:00 And our business, this business is strawandwool.com.
00:48:01 --> 00:48:06 We are located in downtown Phoenix and in Los Angeles on Pico in Mid-City.
00:48:07 --> 00:48:11 Got the largest selection of hats that you can find in store and online.
00:48:11 --> 00:48:16 And the majority of them we design and manufacture ourselves because my favorite
00:48:16 --> 00:48:20 quote, I put it in everything I do, is Marcus Garvey said, what man has done,
00:48:20 --> 00:48:23 man can do. So we trying to do it all.
00:48:24 --> 00:48:28 Ali, you want to add anything to that or we good? No, we good. That's everything.
00:48:29 --> 00:48:34 All right, guys. Well, look, Henry Dickerson, Ali Nervous, I appreciate y'all, man.
00:48:34 --> 00:48:39 I appreciate y'all's honesty. I appreciate y'all's candor. I appreciate your energy.
00:48:39 --> 00:48:43 And most importantly, I appreciate you setting aside some time to come on the
00:48:43 --> 00:48:45 podcast. Much success to you.
00:48:45 --> 00:48:50 If you can cater to big head folks like me, you know, you'll probably see me
00:48:50 --> 00:48:54 dropping in the order pretty soon because that's always been my big challenge
00:48:54 --> 00:48:56 is getting something to fit this big old head I got.
00:48:57 --> 00:49:01 So if y'all can work with me, I can work with y'all. Say that again, Henry?
00:49:02 --> 00:49:06 That's why we started our own brand because the other brands didn't do it.
00:49:06 --> 00:49:10 So yeah, we got you in the big head. You got a lot on your mind. We got you.
00:49:11 --> 00:49:15 All right. All right, guys. We got you.
00:49:16 --> 00:49:19 All right, guys. We'll catch y'all on the other side.
00:49:19 --> 00:49:39 Music.
00:49:39 --> 00:49:48 All right. And we are back. And so now it is time for my next guest, David Tereshchuk.
00:49:48 --> 00:49:50 David Tereshchuk.
00:49:51 --> 00:49:56 He is a journalist working mainly in broadcast media, but also for magazines
00:49:56 --> 00:50:01 and newspapers. New York Times, The Guardian, New Statesman, for example.
00:50:02 --> 00:50:05 He spent two decades with British commercial television reporting,
00:50:05 --> 00:50:08 producing and making documentaries before moving to the United States,
00:50:08 --> 00:50:14 where he worked for ABC, CBS, CNN, Discovery, A&E and the History Channel.
00:50:15 --> 00:50:18 His earliest work included coverage of the guerrilla war in Northern Ireland
00:50:18 --> 00:50:22 and then extended into international issues, especially in the third world.
00:50:23 --> 00:50:29 Since 2012, he has been a producer and correspondent for PBS concentrating on ethical issues.
00:50:30 --> 00:50:34 He broadcasts a weekly public radio dispatch of media criticism,
00:50:35 --> 00:50:38 the media beat and writes an online column by the same name.
00:50:39 --> 00:50:42 A graduate of Oxford University. He has been a U.S.
00:50:42 --> 00:50:48 Citizen since 2002 and lives in New York City and Ireland. He is the author
00:50:48 --> 00:50:53 of the memoir, A Question of Paternity, My Life as an Unaffiliated Reporter.
00:50:54 --> 00:50:58 And our discussion today will be based off of that book.
00:50:59 --> 00:51:03 So, ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct honor and privilege to have as a
00:51:03 --> 00:51:07 guest on this podcast, David Tereshchuk.
00:51:08 --> 00:51:18 Music.
00:51:18 --> 00:51:22 All right. David Terrestrup, how you doing? So you're doing good?
00:51:23 --> 00:51:25 I am well today. I hope you are too.
00:51:26 --> 00:51:27 I'm doing good.
00:51:28 --> 00:51:35 I'm doing good. I'm still in recovery mode, but we're not really here to talk
00:51:35 --> 00:51:37 about that. We're here to talk about your book.
00:51:39 --> 00:51:48 And let me see. The name of this book is a question of paternity my life as
00:51:48 --> 00:51:54 an unaffiliated reporter and this is this is basically your your life story,
00:51:56 --> 00:52:01 So I want to do it justice in asking the questions and all that,
00:52:01 --> 00:52:05 because you've had a pretty, pretty interesting life.
00:52:06 --> 00:52:13 When I read it, it was just kind of like, even though you were not in the United
00:52:13 --> 00:52:20 States, it seemed like a typical life for your generation.
00:52:22 --> 00:52:25 And i don't know if that's a fair assessment but
00:52:25 --> 00:52:33 just you know the the coming of age stuff was pretty interesting and i said
00:52:33 --> 00:52:38 i could read you know with my mom and my dad i kind of thought yeah they probably
00:52:38 --> 00:52:42 they were doing some of the same stuff not as colorful as you,
00:52:43 --> 00:52:49 but they were doing kind of the same stuff so and i found that fascinating so
00:52:49 --> 00:52:51 let's start like i normally do with a quote,
00:52:51 --> 00:52:59 I cannot say what portion is in truth, the naked recollection of that time,
00:52:59 --> 00:53:06 and what may rather have been called to life by after meditation.
00:53:06 --> 00:53:08 What does that quote mean to you?
00:53:09 --> 00:53:13 Well, that's a quote from Wordsworth, Eric, my favorite English poet,
00:53:13 --> 00:53:18 I think, greatly influential on me in my teen years and thereafter.
00:53:19 --> 00:53:24 And what he's pointing at, I suppose, is that difficulty we probably all have
00:53:24 --> 00:53:30 in figuring out what's true about our memories and whether or not.
00:53:30 --> 00:53:36 What we remember is the truth, and how much of it is an actual memory embedded
00:53:36 --> 00:53:42 in us at the time, and how much of it is something that what he calls after meditation,
00:53:43 --> 00:53:45 you know, thinking about it in retrospect.
00:53:46 --> 00:53:51 And I can't really tell. I just, you know, I'm the last person to be able to
00:53:51 --> 00:53:57 judge what I'm remembering and what I might have rationalized somewhat in retrospect,
00:53:58 --> 00:54:00 long after the event, looking back.
00:54:00 --> 00:54:08 I mean, I'm 76 now, and I'm talking about events that essentially start in my infancy.
00:54:08 --> 00:54:10 And, you know, that's a long time.
00:54:11 --> 00:54:16 And an awful lot of fading can have happened, and an awful lot of embellishing might have happened.
00:54:16 --> 00:54:21 But I'm trying to be as honest as I can to my recollections.
00:54:22 --> 00:54:29 And as you say, right at the beginning, I'm quoting Wordsworth and saying, But beware that,
00:54:29 --> 00:54:34 you know, a lot of this might be the result of me mulling it over all these
00:54:34 --> 00:54:38 many years and perhaps shifting my attitude over time.
00:54:39 --> 00:54:45 Yeah. So, you know, people ask me, Eric, why don't you ever write a book?
00:54:45 --> 00:54:53 And I tell people, I don't think my life is worth somebody paying 30, 40, 50 dollars to read.
00:54:53 --> 00:55:01 I think that I've been very blessed to have lived a life, and I like the memories
00:55:01 --> 00:55:05 and the encounters I've had, but I've been always kind of reluctant to share them.
00:55:06 --> 00:55:09 I don't know if it was because of your journalistic background or whatever,
00:55:09 --> 00:55:14 but what made you feel compelled to say, yeah, I'm going to tell my story.
00:55:14 --> 00:55:17 I want to put it out there for people to read.
00:55:17 --> 00:55:23 Well, I share the same kind of reluctance as you do. I've been a writer all
00:55:23 --> 00:55:27 my life, in a way, in different ways. I've been a journalist all my life,
00:55:27 --> 00:55:32 and that would mean writing, obviously, about things I discovered.
00:55:32 --> 00:55:39 And I wrote about just about everything from the local parish sewing circle
00:55:39 --> 00:55:43 through to grand international conference tables,
00:55:43 --> 00:55:51 and wars and disasters and great political doings at national level in my own
00:55:51 --> 00:55:53 country and in foreign countries, but.
00:55:54 --> 00:56:01 But the one thing I'd never written about was myself, and I took on the task with some trepidation.
00:56:01 --> 00:56:06 But the reason I did it, even though I was a bit unwilling to begin with,
00:56:06 --> 00:56:12 was that I think there's a kind of paradox at work in my life,
00:56:12 --> 00:56:17 which might be of interest and even some use to other people.
00:56:17 --> 00:56:23 The paradox is this. It's my job as a journalist to go around the world and
00:56:23 --> 00:56:27 ask people questions and get answers on the public record,
00:56:28 --> 00:56:34 often from people who don't particularly want to be pinned down and, you know,
00:56:34 --> 00:56:39 the leaders of countries who are being evasive about the truth very often.
00:56:40 --> 00:56:44 So there I get my answers in the public realm.
00:56:44 --> 00:56:49 But in the private realm of my own personal life, there was this big question
00:56:49 --> 00:56:52 but never had an answer. Who was my father?
00:56:53 --> 00:56:56 And that made me think, well, two things.
00:56:57 --> 00:57:00 One, I ought to find out because I'm a journalist and I'm good,
00:57:01 --> 00:57:03 supposedly good at finding things out.
00:57:03 --> 00:57:12 And secondly, that whole paradox was in a way a story in itself and a story
00:57:12 --> 00:57:18 that might be helpful to other people who have paradoxes and secrets in their
00:57:18 --> 00:57:20 life that they might want to resolve.
00:57:23 --> 00:57:26 So it seems like when you were at Oxford,
00:57:26 --> 00:57:35 it seemed like that was when you discovered this talent, because you talk about
00:57:35 --> 00:57:39 that you were more of an introvert, if I can say that.
00:57:39 --> 00:57:43 I don't know if that's a way you would describe yourself. Oh, absolutely.
00:57:43 --> 00:57:48 I was frightened, I think. I was very ill at ease with myself,
00:57:49 --> 00:57:52 all to do with this secret background, not knowing.
00:57:52 --> 00:57:56 I mean, I think it was to do with, certainly, that was part of the mix,
00:57:56 --> 00:57:59 that I didn't know who my father was, and it was a big family mystery,
00:57:59 --> 00:58:05 and I was unsure about whose I was, and therefore, in a way, about who I was.
00:58:05 --> 00:58:08 And I was shy. That was the word at the time.
00:58:09 --> 00:58:13 I was reserved. I was inward looking and certainly not very outward going.
00:58:15 --> 00:58:22 Yeah. And so you found your, you seem to have found your voice when you started
00:58:22 --> 00:58:27 working, I guess, with the school paper in Oxford, and then you ended up on the TV station.
00:58:28 --> 00:58:32 Yeah. Well, initially, while I was still at college college,
00:58:32 --> 00:58:36 It was, in fact, a deliberate prescription for myself.
00:58:38 --> 00:58:43 I'm not quite sure how I figured it out, but I don't know why it occurred to me that it might work.
00:58:43 --> 00:58:47 But it was an interesting effort.
00:58:47 --> 00:58:49 I decided it was a decision.
00:58:50 --> 00:58:55 I decided that to get over this shyness and awkwardness that I felt,
00:58:56 --> 00:58:59 I had to make myself go out and talk to people.
00:58:59 --> 00:59:05 And the route to doing that was to become a reporter on the school newspaper,
00:59:05 --> 00:59:06 the student body newspaper.
00:59:07 --> 00:59:11 And, you know, I wouldn't be able to get my stories if I didn't go out and talk
00:59:11 --> 00:59:15 to people and be outgoing in that sense.
00:59:15 --> 00:59:21 And it kind of worked. I became pretty adept at getting stories out of people.
00:59:21 --> 00:59:28 And that went on when I found myself at the ridiculously early age of 19 on
00:59:28 --> 00:59:32 a regional television station. And they actually put me on screen doing that
00:59:32 --> 00:59:35 all the time, interviewing people and getting answers.
00:59:36 --> 00:59:41 So, yeah, you're right. I found a way of dealing with my own problems.
00:59:41 --> 00:59:46 And I ended up doing a useful job of work in the world at large with the talents
00:59:46 --> 00:59:47 and skills that I developed.
00:59:49 --> 00:59:52 So what was what is this the
00:59:52 --> 00:59:55 the story the interview
00:59:55 --> 01:00:04 that really highlights your career is it the first story you did with what am
01:00:04 --> 01:00:09 I trying to say it was a young lady and she got kidnapped by the KGB I think
01:00:09 --> 01:00:14 or something like that and then was it that's because I think that That was your first big story,
01:00:14 --> 01:00:17 or was it something in your career?
01:00:18 --> 01:00:24 Yeah, no, no. I think my head was definitely turned by this extraordinary story
01:00:24 --> 01:00:30 I was able to pull off in the border country between England and Scotland,
01:00:31 --> 01:00:34 which is where I was originally brought up, incidentally.
01:00:34 --> 01:00:39 But I went back there at the age of 19 and got that job in the original TV station.
01:00:39 --> 01:00:46 And I found myself there. And 1968, this was the year, and.
01:00:47 --> 01:00:51 The Russians, the communist Russians, the Soviets, with their tanks,
01:00:52 --> 01:00:59 rolled into neighboring Czechoslovakia, part of their Soviet empire, if you like.
01:00:59 --> 01:01:05 But at the time, they were attempting some liberal changes, and the Soviet powers
01:01:05 --> 01:01:10 decided to crush this liberal attempt by force of arms.
01:01:10 --> 01:01:15 That's what they did, the 1968 Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia.
01:01:15 --> 01:01:21 Now, we had a local angle on this in the British border country, oddly enough.
01:01:21 --> 01:01:28 I happened to have interviewed a few weeks before the daughter of one of the
01:01:28 --> 01:01:32 leaders of the Czech Communist Party.
01:01:32 --> 01:01:37 She was a student at the time herself, the same age as me, I think.
01:01:37 --> 01:01:42 And she was on an international work camp doing voluntary work,
01:01:42 --> 01:01:48 digging ditches, in fact, in our area, helping to improve the infrastructure
01:01:48 --> 01:01:52 of our rather benighted part of the country. Not very well developed.
01:01:53 --> 01:01:59 She had pretty good English and I did an interview with her about that job of
01:01:59 --> 01:02:01 ditch digging, basically.
01:02:02 --> 01:02:09 And it was a good local story for us, these Floriners coming in to help us out.
01:02:09 --> 01:02:16 But then suddenly, I realized that her father realized this on the night of the invasion.
01:02:17 --> 01:02:24 The Soviet communists had waved a piece of paper saying that the Czech communists,
01:02:24 --> 01:02:30 in the person, in fact, of this girl's father, Vasil Vilak was his name.
01:02:30 --> 01:02:35 He was the secretary of the Czechoslovak Communist Party. He had,
01:02:35 --> 01:02:39 quote-unquote, invited the Russians in.
01:02:39 --> 01:02:43 So he was a vital part of that invasion process.
01:02:43 --> 01:02:49 But what had happened, I only discovered this after a phone call from the volunteer
01:02:49 --> 01:02:51 work camp that came to me that same night,
01:02:52 --> 01:03:00 was that the young daughter had been taken away from the volunteer camp by two
01:03:00 --> 01:03:03 guys who pretty obviously were Russian agents.
01:03:04 --> 01:03:10 And had taken her to the local railhead and got the train down to London and then bundled her.
01:03:10 --> 01:03:16 Apparently, according to eyewitnesses that saw this, she was reluctant but evidently
01:03:16 --> 01:03:25 in a rather drugged state and was hustled onto an aeroflot, the Russian state airline plane,
01:03:25 --> 01:03:31 and flown to Moscow to join her father, who, of course, by then was in Moscow,
01:03:32 --> 01:03:35 the safest place for him to be in these circumstances.
01:03:36 --> 01:03:41 And that was an incredible cloak and dagger spy story for me.
01:03:41 --> 01:03:45 And with my little local angle in the Scottish border country,
01:03:46 --> 01:03:49 my story was featured on the national news.
01:03:49 --> 01:03:55 And as I say, I was 19 years old and there I was on the national news in Britain.
01:03:55 --> 01:04:01 And I couldn't be more happy about the way my job was going.
01:04:01 --> 01:04:07 Yeah, so that was pretty much the kind of the spark, but since,
01:04:07 --> 01:04:17 and you've had an extensive career in it, what story do you feel was the one
01:04:17 --> 01:04:20 that moved you the most or the one that you,
01:04:20 --> 01:04:23 you know, had a bigger impact on you?
01:04:23 --> 01:04:28 Of all these people you've interviewed and all these places you've been throughout
01:04:28 --> 01:04:34 the globe, what story resonates with you besides that very first one?
01:04:34 --> 01:04:37 Well, I think it's a body of work, Eric, to be honest.
01:04:38 --> 01:04:43 I pretty doggedly stuck to a reporting of one area of interest,
01:04:43 --> 01:04:51 which was very strong for me, which is the last vestiges of white supremacy in Africa.
01:04:51 --> 01:04:57 There was a recalcitrant body of white supremacy in Southern Africa,
01:04:57 --> 01:05:01 especially, that lingered on and on through the 20th century.
01:05:01 --> 01:05:07 Essentially, countries like South Africa, with its notorious policy of apartheid,
01:05:07 --> 01:05:13 white control, institutionalized and militarized in a horribly oppressive way,
01:05:14 --> 01:05:20 and similar kinds of oppression in Mozambique, which is a so-called colony.
01:05:20 --> 01:05:25 A possession was the phrase that they used of a European power,
01:05:25 --> 01:05:29 a white European power, in this case, Portugal.
01:05:29 --> 01:05:35 And there was also the country that we now know, Zimbabwe, but at that time was called Portugal.
01:05:36 --> 01:05:41 Southern Rhodesia. There were two Rhodesias, both colonies of Britain,
01:05:41 --> 01:05:43 named after a Brit Rhodes,
01:05:44 --> 01:05:55 the man who has instituted for us as modern-day people, looking back to him.
01:05:55 --> 01:06:03 Founder of the, at least the name, the man for whom is named the Rhodes Scholarships
01:06:03 --> 01:06:10 that enable people in the English-speaking world to go to Britain to do their college education.
01:06:10 --> 01:06:20 So a whole sort of atmosphere of British imperial domination of the world was
01:06:20 --> 01:06:24 exemplified by these last remnants of the empire, really.
01:06:24 --> 01:06:27 There was northern Rhodesia as well, which we now know as Zambia,
01:06:28 --> 01:06:31 and that was a long liberation struggle as well.
01:06:31 --> 01:06:37 In southern Indonesia, it was complicated by the white settlers setting up their
01:06:37 --> 01:06:41 own government in rebellion against their own imperial country, Britain.
01:06:42 --> 01:06:51 And the same was true of a former German colony, which ended up being controlled by a sort of proxy rule.
01:06:51 --> 01:06:56 Germans called it Southwest Africa. We now know it as Namibia.
01:06:56 --> 01:07:00 And there was Angola, another Portuguese possession. And
01:07:00 --> 01:07:05 I reported in all these countries because I think I was really enthralled by
01:07:05 --> 01:07:12 this determined struggle of African people to throw off these final shackles
01:07:12 --> 01:07:18 that were still remaining in that part of Africa and establish final liberation.
01:07:18 --> 01:07:24 And I'm glad to say in my lifetime, I saw it happen in all these countries.
01:07:24 --> 01:07:29 And that was exhilarating, really exhilarating to pursue that struggle and report
01:07:29 --> 01:07:31 it fully for the Western world.
01:07:32 --> 01:07:40 Yeah, so let me ask you, because that kind of gets me to a question that usually people ask me.
01:07:41 --> 01:07:50 Why do you think now that we in the Western world, and I say,
01:07:50 --> 01:07:56 well, let's just say the United States, because I don't know how extensive it is, you know,
01:07:56 --> 01:07:58 with the BBC and all that.
01:07:58 --> 01:08:07 But in the United States, why do you think that we don't cover Africa like they did, you know,
01:08:07 --> 01:08:14 during the moves of independence and even really, really since apartheid ended?
01:08:14 --> 01:08:20 Why do you think that we don't focus in on those stories as much as we focus
01:08:20 --> 01:08:22 in on other parts of the world?
01:08:22 --> 01:08:24 Yeah africa on the
01:08:24 --> 01:08:28 whole tends to be a forgotten continent continent in
01:08:28 --> 01:08:33 uh in american media that's true it's
01:08:33 --> 01:08:41 less true of britain and much of europe on the other hand you can see that it's
01:08:41 --> 01:08:47 it's low on the agenda compared with other parts of the world it's interesting
01:08:47 --> 01:08:52 at the moment for instance that in terms of conflict reporting,
01:08:52 --> 01:08:56 which is a large part of my portfolio too, but nowadays,
01:08:56 --> 01:09:02 you'll find even really sensible newspapers like the New York Times and the
01:09:02 --> 01:09:08 Washington Post talking about two major wars going on in the world at the moment.
01:09:08 --> 01:09:14 Israel and Gaza, and of course, Lebanon and Syria too, as sort of side fronts
01:09:14 --> 01:09:21 in that same war, and the war of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
01:09:21 --> 01:09:28 What seems to be forgotten is that there's a horrific war going on in Sudan,
01:09:29 --> 01:09:30 in North Central Africa.
01:09:31 --> 01:09:36 And why is that the case? Why is that forgotten? Largely forgotten,
01:09:36 --> 01:09:39 I should say. I mean, there are reporters who...
01:09:40 --> 01:09:45 Reported afterwards that do still report it, but it's not the mass media in
01:09:45 --> 01:09:47 general that's covering it at all.
01:09:48 --> 01:09:53 It's low down in the totem pole of stories of interest.
01:09:53 --> 01:09:57 And why is that? I think I have to put it down to history,
01:09:57 --> 01:10:00 that institutions in the
01:10:00 --> 01:10:03 West have always downplayed africa
01:10:03 --> 01:10:07 it was was historically an area
01:10:07 --> 01:10:11 that was exploited and then
01:10:11 --> 01:10:13 eventually gained its freedom from that
01:10:13 --> 01:10:20 exploitation for many people in western media that's in a sense the end of the
01:10:20 --> 01:10:25 matter and africa is not that important anymore which is extraordinary because
01:10:25 --> 01:10:31 apart from anything else just in the West's own self-interest,
01:10:31 --> 01:10:38 you would think it would be good to maintain relations and remain in fruitful
01:10:38 --> 01:10:40 contact with such a huge,
01:10:40 --> 01:10:44 and I would say in modern-day terms, capitalistic terms,
01:10:45 --> 01:10:48 potentially profitable area of interest.
01:10:48 --> 01:10:53 But is that interest expressed in journalism and in media generally?
01:10:53 --> 01:10:56 No, I'll have to admit that you're right. It's not.
01:10:56 --> 01:10:59 Yeah, I just wanted to do that.
01:11:00 --> 01:11:04 I'm not going to go down that rabbit hole with you too far, but I just wanted
01:11:04 --> 01:11:07 to kind of get your view on that.
01:11:07 --> 01:11:15 So one of the things you talk about in your memoir is about your struggle with alcoholism.
01:11:16 --> 01:11:24 Now, you know, the way that you kind of how you the way I interpret it is like
01:11:24 --> 01:11:31 you kind of talk about how you were introduced to alcohol in kind of an innocuous way.
01:11:31 --> 01:11:36 You were you were like one of the many young folks in England at that time.
01:11:36 --> 01:11:38 Y'all were involved in the music scene.
01:11:39 --> 01:11:42 I forget what instrument. I knew you played guitar. I didn't know if you played
01:11:42 --> 01:11:45 lead or bass guitar. Yeah, absolutely.
01:11:45 --> 01:11:49 And so part of your payment. Rhythm guitar. Say that again. I'm sorry.
01:11:50 --> 01:11:53 It was rhythm guitar. Rhythm guitar.
01:11:53 --> 01:12:01 So part of your payment for a lot of times was the local beer that was being sold.
01:12:02 --> 01:12:06 Absolutely. And so just kind of talk about why you felt that.
01:12:07 --> 01:12:12 I mean, it's part of your story. I get it, but why you felt it was important
01:12:12 --> 01:12:18 to really highlight it and then kind of ease us into it the way that you did.
01:12:19 --> 01:12:25 Well, I didn't want to. I was reluctant to write one of these recovery memoirs,
01:12:25 --> 01:12:32 you know, which have become so prominent and, I guess, popular. They sold well.
01:12:32 --> 01:12:36 They were a part of the publishing scene in the last couple of decades.
01:12:37 --> 01:12:40 But it's unavoidably part of my story that
01:12:40 --> 01:12:43 i was that i that i am an alcoholic and
01:12:43 --> 01:12:46 i was an active interesting word active alcoholic
01:12:46 --> 01:12:52 active alcoholism is is when you when you drink alcohol even though you shouldn't
01:12:52 --> 01:12:58 that's what being active in those terms is is all about and it's an important
01:12:58 --> 01:13:03 part of my story i think it's one of the defining features of my makeup that
01:13:03 --> 01:13:05 i'm powerless over alcohol,
01:13:05 --> 01:13:11 and my life is unmanageable if I keep drinking.
01:13:11 --> 01:13:15 So inevitably, I got to the point where I had to stop drinking,
01:13:15 --> 01:13:17 otherwise I would have been dead.
01:13:18 --> 01:13:28 And that process, that realization, took me to some dark places, but it also took me.
01:13:29 --> 01:13:38 A long time. I drank helplessly, out of control, eventually, for 27 years.
01:13:38 --> 01:13:42 And mercifully, that's way behind me now.
01:13:43 --> 01:13:49 It's 33 years since I last had an alcoholic drink or any kind of mood-altering substance.
01:13:49 --> 01:13:56 And I can tell you, quite honestly, I prefer it this way than when I was in thrall.
01:13:56 --> 01:14:01 I was a slave to alcohol for 27 years. Yeah.
01:14:02 --> 01:14:07 And I know you were, you, you, you, you described one instance because most
01:14:07 --> 01:14:09 people, when they're going through that,
01:14:10 --> 01:14:15 you know, as long as they're functioning, they think they can kind of hide it
01:14:15 --> 01:14:17 or, you know, get past it.
01:14:18 --> 01:14:23 And I think it was one instance you said you were talking to a colleague and he said,
01:14:23 --> 01:14:26 yeah, you didn't slow your words that much today and that
01:14:26 --> 01:14:30 was your first realization that other people knew that you
01:14:30 --> 01:14:33 were it came to be a lot of those
01:14:33 --> 01:14:36 instances yeah people got very very
01:14:36 --> 01:14:43 well aware of my uh incapacity and and yeah you're right i thought i was getting
01:14:43 --> 01:14:49 away with it people like me often do in a way i guess i did get away with it
01:14:49 --> 01:14:54 for a while but you know i couldn't do it forever. It's unsustainable.
01:14:55 --> 01:15:01 Alcoholism is a progressive disease, and it has a certain progress which it has to go along.
01:15:02 --> 01:15:05 That's how diseases work.
01:15:05 --> 01:15:09 And it's getting worse and worse. And in the end, it couldn't be concealed.
01:15:10 --> 01:15:16 And I had to opt for the opposite course. I had to try and give up. And it wasn't easy.
01:15:16 --> 01:15:23 You know, for a lot of people, it's not easy. I was highly dependent upon alcohol, but mercifully,
01:15:23 --> 01:15:28 I somehow rather got a break, and eventually, the whole idea of recovery and
01:15:28 --> 01:15:31 staying away from a drink, an alcoholic drink,
01:15:31 --> 01:15:36 one day at a time, managed to stick, and those days turned into weeks and months
01:15:36 --> 01:15:40 and years, and now, as I say, it's 33 years.
01:15:40 --> 01:15:50 Yeah. Well, congratulations on the sobriety and for having the courage to talk about it.
01:15:50 --> 01:15:56 One of the other things that's compelling about the book is you,
01:15:56 --> 01:16:01 because the way I like, because you don't hit the readers over the head,
01:16:01 --> 01:16:04 you just kind of take us on the journey together.
01:16:05 --> 01:16:12 And and it's like part of your journey was that you drifted away from your upbringing
01:16:12 --> 01:16:14 in the southern borderlands.
01:16:14 --> 01:16:20 It was almost like any anything was kind of an excuse to kind of distance yourself from it.
01:16:21 --> 01:16:27 And then and then eventually you decided, yeah, I need to find out some stuff.
01:16:27 --> 01:16:32 So what what was the compelling thing without giving too much and making sure
01:16:32 --> 01:16:38 that people read the book? What was the most compelling thing that you decided,
01:16:38 --> 01:16:40 I need to reconnect with my roots?
01:16:42 --> 01:16:49 Well, I don't want to give too much away in the book either, but I can say this.
01:16:50 --> 01:16:55 I mean, it's interesting that you should bring up the alcoholism because I didn't
01:16:55 --> 01:17:01 think that I was making too much of it in the book, but it was an undeniable thread.
01:17:01 --> 01:17:06 And the important point came, I suppose, when I had stopped drinking,
01:17:06 --> 01:17:10 because then I was in a wholly new situation. I was in a wholly new situation
01:17:10 --> 01:17:15 in many different ways at the same time as it happened. I stopped drinking.
01:17:15 --> 01:17:20 I'd also changed countries. I'd moved from Britain to the United States.
01:17:20 --> 01:17:23 I was having to find my feet in a wholly new setting.
01:17:24 --> 01:17:28 And also, just as if this wasn't enough for me, I decided to get married, too.
01:17:29 --> 01:17:33 I fell in love with a wonderful woman who was originally from California,
01:17:33 --> 01:17:35 but who lived in New York.
01:17:35 --> 01:17:40 And here I was in the media capital of the world having to remake my career.
01:17:41 --> 01:17:47 So there was a lot going on. But as part of that mix, a really important part
01:17:47 --> 01:17:52 of the mix was the mindset that you get as someone who's relying on alcohol
01:17:52 --> 01:17:55 for a long time previous to this.
01:17:56 --> 01:18:00 I suddenly had a clarity that I didn't have before.
01:18:00 --> 01:18:08 And I also had this sense that it was important to look at life square on instead
01:18:08 --> 01:18:13 of avoiding its difficulties, like I think alcohol was helping me do.
01:18:13 --> 01:18:19 And indeed, my own psyche up until that point had been prompting me to do.
01:18:19 --> 01:18:25 I mean, I told myself I internalized the secrecy of my family by telling myself
01:18:25 --> 01:18:29 it wasn't important to know who my father was.
01:18:29 --> 01:18:34 I'd obviously been warned off the topic as a kid. I don't remember it ever being
01:18:34 --> 01:18:39 spelled out to me in so many words, but the message clearly was that we don't
01:18:39 --> 01:18:42 talk about this question of who your father was.
01:18:42 --> 01:18:46 And I told myself, I think, I don't mind. I don't care.
01:18:47 --> 01:18:53 I'm not particularly interested in who my father was. That's what I was telling myself inwardly.
01:18:54 --> 01:18:59 But with that new clarity that sobriety brought, I think I realized that this
01:18:59 --> 01:19:04 was all a terrible fiction that I had to do without.
01:19:04 --> 01:19:12 And I needed to pursue the question that the clarity of mind had opened up for me.
01:19:12 --> 01:19:17 And that's why I think I decided, well, I more than think I am absolutely certain.
01:19:18 --> 01:19:20 That's why I started the search in earnest.
01:19:21 --> 01:19:28 Yeah. And so if you notice, I deliberately kind of avoided asking questions
01:19:28 --> 01:19:32 about directly about the search for paternity, because I want people to read this.
01:19:32 --> 01:19:40 I think it's it's it's very, very compelling to listen to your life or read
01:19:40 --> 01:19:44 your life story and how you got to that point where it's like,
01:19:44 --> 01:19:48 yeah, I need to find out who I am. Right.
01:19:49 --> 01:19:54 And and and and and I want people to get the book to see if you got the answer.
01:19:54 --> 01:19:59 So the name of the book is, again, a question of fraternity.
01:19:59 --> 01:20:04 My life as an unaffiliated reporter and an author who I've had the privilege
01:20:04 --> 01:20:09 of talking to for the last 30 minutes or so is David Terescik.
01:20:10 --> 01:20:13 And I've probably said his name 15 different ways.
01:20:13 --> 01:20:16 Uh but and
01:20:16 --> 01:20:21 it's open to interpretation it's open to it and you and you've got a really
01:20:21 --> 01:20:26 good actually though eric it's terrorist trick and that's that's the thing i'm
01:20:26 --> 01:20:32 trying to get in my mind this terrorist trick chuck it's terrorist truck and
01:20:32 --> 01:20:35 so david it's been an honor to have you on.
01:20:36 --> 01:20:41 I i vaguely you know i was a news junkie when i was young so i i you know having
01:20:41 --> 01:20:45 seen you now I was like, yeah, I remember seeing him, you know what I'm saying?
01:20:45 --> 01:20:51 And on the TV pop up every now and then, but it's really been an honor to talk
01:20:51 --> 01:20:54 to you and I wish you really much success on the book.
01:20:55 --> 01:20:59 And before I let you go though, there's two things I usually do.
01:20:59 --> 01:21:03 I usually ask people how folks can get the book and all that.
01:21:03 --> 01:21:11 But one question I usually ask folks is that what, what do you want the reader to get from your book?
01:21:12 --> 01:21:18 As they go on this journey with you? Well, I think a question of paternity as
01:21:18 --> 01:21:25 a book title sort of sums it up, but it applies to more issues than just paternity.
01:21:25 --> 01:21:31 I venture to suggest, I hope that this book is of some help.
01:21:31 --> 01:21:36 If people are living in family situations where there is some dark secret,
01:21:36 --> 01:21:39 which is making life difficult for them.
01:21:39 --> 01:21:43 I really hope people will ask questions.
01:21:43 --> 01:21:47 Questions are really important to me. That's almost inevitable.
01:21:47 --> 01:21:52 I'm a journalist. But I think it's really important to ask questions when you're
01:21:52 --> 01:21:57 in a situation, a family situation, especially when things are being kept from you.
01:21:57 --> 01:22:04 And I would suggest that I hope And this book is an illustration of how asking
01:22:04 --> 01:22:12 questions can lead to an easing of that kind of secrecy,
01:22:12 --> 01:22:16 the toxic kind of secrecy that many families suffer from.
01:22:17 --> 01:22:22 So where can people get the book? How can people reach out to you to talk about
01:22:22 --> 01:22:24 the book or other things?
01:22:25 --> 01:22:30 The book's available on Amazon in both paperback form and an audio book and an e-book.
01:22:31 --> 01:22:36 And my own website is the best way to reach me. It's themediabeat.com.
01:22:37 --> 01:22:41 The Media Beat, which is my weekly commentary about the media.
01:22:42 --> 01:22:45 Themediabeat.com. And you'll find details of the book there, too.
01:22:46 --> 01:22:51 All right. Well, David Tereshchuk, I greatly appreciate you coming on the podcast.
01:22:52 --> 01:22:56 Thank you. Thank you so much for that. And again, I wish you much success.
01:22:56 --> 01:22:58 Thank you very much, Eric.
01:22:59 --> 01:23:01 All right, guys, and we're going to catch y'all on the other side.
01:23:04 --> 01:23:14 Music.
01:23:14 --> 01:23:22 We are back. So I want to thank my guests, Ollie Nervous, Henry Dickerson,
01:23:22 --> 01:23:27 and David Tereshchik for coming on the show.
01:23:31 --> 01:23:39 As you kind of figured out, it wasn't another post-mortem show about the election.
01:23:41 --> 01:23:50 And what I'm going to try to do, you know, I may get some guests coming on to give some assessments,
01:23:51 --> 01:23:58 but the main thing I think we need to focus on is going forward, right?
01:23:59 --> 01:24:05 I've stated my opinion. If you listen to a lot of podcasts, you've heard a lot
01:24:05 --> 01:24:09 of people give their opinions and analysis and all that.
01:24:11 --> 01:24:17 So it's time to move forward. Time to figure out how we're going to navigate this.
01:24:18 --> 01:24:28 A couple of pieces of advice. I don't think you can go after somebody politically and, in effect,
01:24:28 --> 01:24:34 hinder their opportunity to advance and then come right back and ask them for a favor.
01:24:35 --> 01:24:41 And I would love for people who are doing that to come on a podcast and kind
01:24:41 --> 01:24:46 of explain what your thought process is, because if you didn't want that person
01:24:46 --> 01:24:49 in office, you don't need their help.
01:24:51 --> 01:24:56 Because if they had gotten elected, they would have been in a better position to help.
01:24:56 --> 01:25:02 But since you actively campaigned against them, there's not much they can do.
01:25:02 --> 01:25:06 At this particular point in time, this is kind of like what we call the lame duck period.
01:25:07 --> 01:25:13 Now, you know, we still have a function, and I think people are going to fulfill
01:25:13 --> 01:25:19 their obligation the best they can. But you've taken away a great deal of leverage for them.
01:25:21 --> 01:25:27 And even though they tried to warn you that if you go with the other option
01:25:27 --> 01:25:32 or you allow the other option to win, that road is going to be a lot harder
01:25:32 --> 01:25:35 for you to achieve what you wanted to achieve.
01:25:36 --> 01:25:44 But there's an old saying in the black community, a soft ass is a cure for a hard head.
01:25:45 --> 01:25:51 And sometimes you're just going to have to get your teeth kicked in in order
01:25:51 --> 01:25:58 to understand allyship, in order for you to understand big picture.
01:25:59 --> 01:26:04 If you get emotional about it and not rational about it, no matter how pissed
01:26:04 --> 01:26:07 you are, you're not going to succeed.
01:26:08 --> 01:26:13 Emotion can only take you so far. It may give you an adrenaline boost.
01:26:13 --> 01:26:16 It may give you a small victory.
01:26:16 --> 01:26:21 But in order to win the long game, you got to have a strategy. You got to be rational.
01:26:21 --> 01:26:28 You got to read the room. You got to see what's going on and then plan accordingly.
01:26:29 --> 01:26:33 There are some people will say, oh, you're directing that one particular group. No, no.
01:26:34 --> 01:26:42 There were different interests that made decisions based on emotion leading into this election.
01:26:42 --> 01:26:47 They weren't thinking rational at all. And now here we are. Right.
01:26:48 --> 01:26:56 The other thing is, as we're looking forward, understand how things are being set up.
01:26:57 --> 01:27:03 President-elect Trump said, hey, you know, maybe the Senate doesn't need to
01:27:03 --> 01:27:05 be in session for a while.
01:27:06 --> 01:27:10 Maybe y'all need to wait. You know, y'all come in and get sworn in and all that,
01:27:10 --> 01:27:14 and then y'all just go on recess until I get everything set up.
01:27:14 --> 01:27:18 And especially after January the 20th.
01:27:20 --> 01:27:23 And, you know, people initially was like, what is he talking about? What is he doing?
01:27:23 --> 01:27:28 Well, there's a strategy behind that. So the strategy is if there's no Senate,
01:27:28 --> 01:27:32 then we have a provision kicking in called a recess appointment.
01:27:34 --> 01:27:38 Now, that was something that was done back in the day because,
01:27:38 --> 01:27:41 first of all, the inauguration wasn't until March.
01:27:42 --> 01:27:47 It wasn't always in January. It was in March, like the first week or whatever.
01:27:49 --> 01:27:54 And the Senate wasn't full-time. I don't think Congress was full-time.
01:27:54 --> 01:27:57 I don't think the House or the Senate was full-time at one point.
01:27:58 --> 01:28:04 So it's like if the president had to make an appointment and the Senate was not in session,
01:28:05 --> 01:28:10 then it was like they had to have a recess appointment for that agency or that
01:28:10 --> 01:28:15 office to function until the advise and consent procedures could kick in when
01:28:15 --> 01:28:16 the Senate was convened.
01:28:17 --> 01:28:19 But now the Senate is full time.
01:28:20 --> 01:28:25 So there's really no need for recess appointments, not unless something happens
01:28:25 --> 01:28:28 during one of their breaks, their regular breaks.
01:28:29 --> 01:28:35 But what Donald Trump wants to do is that he wants the Senate to be out when
01:28:35 --> 01:28:37 he gets sworn in on January the 20th.
01:28:38 --> 01:28:41 So he can put all these all these people that you're seeing on the news,
01:28:42 --> 01:28:49 the list of at least the phonics, the Tulsi Gabbards, the this dude that a Fox
01:28:49 --> 01:28:51 News guy that is now going to be the secretary of defense.
01:28:51 --> 01:28:52 All these people he wants, he
01:28:52 --> 01:28:56 wants to be able to put all these people in and get them to go into work.
01:28:56 --> 01:29:01 And even more importantly, Matt, get Gates, Gates, Gates, Gates,
01:29:01 --> 01:29:01 however you pronounce it.
01:29:03 --> 01:29:09 They want all these people in so they can start doing what project 2025,
01:29:10 --> 01:29:14 Trump 47, however you, wherever your plan, you want to call it.
01:29:14 --> 01:29:18 I'm going to start implementing that stuff, especially Christie Noem and the
01:29:18 --> 01:29:21 Homeland security. They want to get all that stuff kicked off.
01:29:22 --> 01:29:27 And then the Senate comes back and, you know, go through the process or whatever
01:29:27 --> 01:29:32 the case may be, because he's going to need some legislation passed,
01:29:32 --> 01:29:33 so they've got to come back.
01:29:34 --> 01:29:39 And at that point, those hearings will take place, but they've already started their work.
01:29:40 --> 01:29:46 Well, if the Senate is in, then that means that the Democratic senators,
01:29:47 --> 01:29:52 especially those on their respective committees that deals with certain appointments,
01:29:52 --> 01:29:53 they'll get to ask questions.
01:29:54 --> 01:29:58 He don't want that. He don't want that at the beginning of his term.
01:30:00 --> 01:30:09 He wants these folks to get in smoothly. And then once the ball is rolling down
01:30:09 --> 01:30:12 the hill already, then, okay, you can come in and have the hearings.
01:30:12 --> 01:30:14 And at that point, well, they already got a job.
01:30:15 --> 01:30:18 His folks then reached out to all these Republican senators.
01:30:18 --> 01:30:23 It's like, yeah, you need to support these people regardless and make it happen.
01:30:24 --> 01:30:28 He wants to railroad this process as much as possible. Now, I don't know how
01:30:28 --> 01:30:33 to read the tea leaves when the Senate didn't pick Rick Scott,
01:30:33 --> 01:30:36 because Donald Trump said that's who he wanted.
01:30:38 --> 01:30:43 And Elon Musk said that's who he wanted. But those men and women in the Senate
01:30:43 --> 01:30:47 and the Republican conference said, no, it's going to be John Thune.
01:30:47 --> 01:30:54 And John Thune was the senator from South Dakota who was being groomed by McConnell
01:30:54 --> 01:30:57 to replace him. That's who McConnell wanted.
01:30:58 --> 01:31:02 Everybody in the Senate knew that on the Republican side, and so they voted
01:31:02 --> 01:31:04 accordingly. They didn't really care what Donald Trump thought.
01:31:05 --> 01:31:09 Now, we don't know if that's a sign that the Senate is going to do what they
01:31:09 --> 01:31:16 want to do in this term with Donald Trump or they're going to capitulate.
01:31:17 --> 01:31:18 Right? Don't know.
01:31:20 --> 01:31:26 It's really, really hard to tell. So I would like to think it's a sign that
01:31:26 --> 01:31:31 they're going to do what they think is best to try to maintain the democracy
01:31:31 --> 01:31:34 on their end as much as they can.
01:31:34 --> 01:31:37 But I don't trust that. And neither should you.
01:31:39 --> 01:31:43 Nonetheless, we'll see. The other thing that's kind of going around on social
01:31:43 --> 01:31:49 media I wanted to address is I've noticed there are some folks that are mocking
01:31:49 --> 01:31:57 Senator Tim Scott out of South Carolina and Representative Byron Donalds out of Florida saying,
01:31:57 --> 01:31:59 where's your cabinet position at?
01:32:00 --> 01:32:04 Thought y'all were supposed to get one. Y'all did all this and y'all not going to get nothing.
01:32:06 --> 01:32:10 I haven't checked the news today before I started recording,
01:32:10 --> 01:32:14 so I don't know if Secretary of Housing and Urban Development has been picked
01:32:14 --> 01:32:18 up, but that's usually the black cabinet position.
01:32:19 --> 01:32:23 That's usually one kind of reserve. He's already broken tradition with,
01:32:24 --> 01:32:30 well, the tradition that President Biden was starting to have a Native American
01:32:30 --> 01:32:33 in the interior position.
01:32:36 --> 01:32:40 But housing and urban development, basically, since its creation,
01:32:40 --> 01:32:43 has had an African-American.
01:32:43 --> 01:32:48 So if that position has not been announced yet, then that's probably one of
01:32:48 --> 01:32:50 those two will be offered that.
01:32:51 --> 01:32:54 Now, they may have been offered it and they may have said, look,
01:32:54 --> 01:32:59 we want to we want to stay in Congress and do the work.
01:33:00 --> 01:33:03 Makes sense. They both got rid.
01:33:03 --> 01:33:09 I don't think Scott was up, but I know Donald's was up and he got reelected. So why not stay?
01:33:12 --> 01:33:17 So, you know, I get it. You know, folks on social media are going to do what they do.
01:33:19 --> 01:33:25 But I wouldn't be surprised if he hasn't picked a HUD secretary yet.
01:33:25 --> 01:33:27 One of those two will get it.
01:33:29 --> 01:33:36 And there may be some conversations being had. It's like he has a list of people, right?
01:33:36 --> 01:33:43 Which is why the Matt Gaetz pick was a surprise because Gaetz wasn't on the
01:33:43 --> 01:33:46 list until the morning of the announcement.
01:33:47 --> 01:33:48 Supposedly he met with...
01:33:50 --> 01:33:54 President-elect Trump and President-elect Trump said, oh, yeah, okay.
01:33:55 --> 01:34:06 And then Gates resigned so that the investigation that was being held on him would disappear.
01:34:07 --> 01:34:13 And you're like, well, you know, he resigned from his job like that just because he got appointed.
01:34:14 --> 01:34:19 He ain't been confirmed and it's going to be issues and all that. He got reelected.
01:34:20 --> 01:34:21 So he resigned.
01:34:22 --> 01:34:26 Don't know if they're going to have a special election for like five minutes.
01:34:27 --> 01:34:31 Don't listen to Marjorie Taylor. I don't know if they're going to have a special election.
01:34:32 --> 01:34:35 The Senate might, but I don't know if they're going to have a special election
01:34:35 --> 01:34:41 to finish out this term that ends the 1st of January, basically.
01:34:42 --> 01:34:46 Because, you know, you've got to have so many days to have the election and
01:34:46 --> 01:34:51 get people to sign up and register, all that kind of stuff. I don't know if
01:34:51 --> 01:34:51 they're going to do all that.
01:34:52 --> 01:34:59 They might, but, you know, I don't know if they're going to do that because
01:34:59 --> 01:35:02 there ain't really nothing they're going to be trying to push between now and
01:35:02 --> 01:35:06 the start of the next congressional session.
01:35:06 --> 01:35:11 So, but he's okay, because even if he doesn't get.
01:35:14 --> 01:35:17 For whatever reason, he doesn't get to be attorney general. He'll still be a
01:35:17 --> 01:35:20 member of the House because he got reelected.
01:35:20 --> 01:35:25 So he'll get sworn in with the new group first week in January.
01:35:26 --> 01:35:29 So that's that. But the main reason why
01:35:29 --> 01:35:36 he resigned was to shut down the investigation, which I guess is smart.
01:35:38 --> 01:35:42 But it just kind of shows the kind of people that we're dealing with and we're
01:35:42 --> 01:35:44 going to be dealing with for the next four years. years.
01:35:45 --> 01:35:49 We've already been kind of dealing with them. Now it's about to go to a whole new level.
01:35:50 --> 01:35:54 And I need y'all to be prepared for that. And I need y'all to be ready to do
01:35:54 --> 01:35:56 some work when the call is made.
01:35:57 --> 01:36:04 And for those of you who realized, oh, I made a mistake, which I don't really buy into that, right?
01:36:04 --> 01:36:08 You voted for who you wanted to vote for. You did what you wanted to do.
01:36:09 --> 01:36:15 So let's not say mistake. Let's say regret. But then when the call is sent out
01:36:15 --> 01:36:21 this time, if you know better, you do better, then we expect to see you, right,
01:36:22 --> 01:36:25 if called upon.
01:36:26 --> 01:36:33 Because I don't know how real or how long the sabbatical from black women is
01:36:33 --> 01:36:37 going to be as far as fighting for causes. I have no idea.
01:36:37 --> 01:36:42 I don't know if it's just a few that are influencers or it's a general consensus
01:36:42 --> 01:36:43 in the community. I don't know.
01:36:44 --> 01:36:48 Nobody's really talking about it like that. We do have one sister that's out
01:36:48 --> 01:36:54 there with a Black Project 2025, and I'm going to do my best to get her on the podcast.
01:36:55 --> 01:37:00 But, yeah, I don't know how long it is, so you might have to do the work yourself.
01:37:01 --> 01:37:05 But if you're called upon and you really feel the way that you feel,
01:37:05 --> 01:37:07 we expect you to come forward.
01:37:08 --> 01:37:14 Because, again, words and bracelets and trinkets and whatever else is not going
01:37:14 --> 01:37:16 to cut it. It's all about action.
01:37:17 --> 01:37:21 It is all about action from this point forward. So, you know,
01:37:21 --> 01:37:25 when the call to arms is raised, we'll see who shows up.
01:37:26 --> 01:37:29 Bottom line, that's where we are.
01:37:29 --> 01:37:37 Instead of pointing fingers at other people, we need to be pointing in which direction we need to go.
01:37:38 --> 01:37:44 And I know we got to do the autopsy and figure out what went wrong and all this stuff and all that.
01:37:45 --> 01:37:50 You pretty much know. You don't want to say it. But you pretty much know what went wrong.
01:37:51 --> 01:37:54 America is what it is. The question is,
01:37:55 --> 01:38:01 how can we navigate America now that you know what it is in order to get leaders
01:38:01 --> 01:38:07 to take it to another level where that everybody has rights?
01:38:07 --> 01:38:09 Everybody has freedom.
01:38:10 --> 01:38:16 Everybody has peace. Everybody has prosperity. Not just the opportunity.
01:38:17 --> 01:38:21 We've been playing that game for a long time. Now it's time for results.
01:38:21 --> 01:38:25 As Dr. King would say, it's time to cash the check.
01:38:26 --> 01:38:30 It's time. So that's where the direction needs to be.
01:38:31 --> 01:38:39 I'm with my team, ride or die, but my podcast will be open for anybody that's got ideas.
01:38:40 --> 01:38:42 Doesn't matter if you're a Republican, doesn't matter if you're a Democrat,
01:38:43 --> 01:38:47 doesn't matter if you're an independent, green, liberal, I mean,
01:38:48 --> 01:38:50 libertarian, whatever.
01:38:51 --> 01:38:55 You know, whatever expertise you'll have on particular issues,
01:38:55 --> 01:38:56 you're welcome to come on.
01:38:57 --> 01:39:00 Because I'm going to be here and I'm going to say what I got to say.
01:39:00 --> 01:39:02 But if you got something to say, you can come home.
01:39:03 --> 01:39:06 Because the only way we're going to get through this, the only way we're going
01:39:06 --> 01:39:11 to go forward is that everybody has their say. Everybody works through it.
01:39:12 --> 01:39:18 And we come up with effective solutions to get us to the next level.
01:39:20 --> 01:39:27 You know, in video game terms, it's like, OK, we got to defeat this boss. This boss is hard.
01:39:28 --> 01:39:32 He thought we had passed his boss and we get to another level. There's his boss again.
01:39:33 --> 01:39:38 So we got to defeat this boss on his terms, in his room.
01:39:38 --> 01:39:45 We got to defeat this boss for good and then go to the next level. That's where we are.
01:39:46 --> 01:39:50 And I hope that you're willing to be a part of that journey.
01:39:51 --> 01:39:57 All right, guys. If there's nothing else, thank you for listening. and until next time.
01:40:00 --> 01:40:45 Music.
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