Speaker Identification
Speaker 1 - Intro/Theme Voice
Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown
Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones

Speaker 1 - Intro/Theme Voice:
Democracy is a chorus, and it starts with you.

Shadow Politics, let the midnight speak
For the overlooked, the unheard, the strong and the weak.
Senator Michael D. Brown holding open the door,
Liberty Jones saying, "We are silent no more."
From the district streets to the nation’s soul,
Every broken-out voice makes the country whole.
Shadow Politics, turn the dark into sound.
When America listens, justice comes around.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Hello, good evening, and welcome to Shadow Politics, an hour-long grassroots talk show that is on a mission to make America think again. I am your host, Michael D. Brown, United States Senator Emeritus, and along with my amazing co-host, Liberty Jones, we are interviewing the people who are making things happen - not always in front of the camera, but always ahead of the curve.

We are not going to tell you how to feel or who to vote for. We are just putting the information out there, because it is what goes on in the shadows that really makes the world go around. So come listen and learn, because a vote is a terrible thing to waste. Now more than ever, we need everybody listening, learning, and engaged if we are going to make America sane again.

If you have a question or comment, call in at 888-627-6008. Otherwise, I am going to spend the next hour talking to my brilliant co-host, Liberty Jones, and we are going to discuss what we think of America on its 250th birthday.

Let me start by saying that we are the oldest continuous government in the history of the planet. We are the oldest democracy. But are we still the land of opportunity? That is my big question.

So my first big question to my brilliant co-host - first, let me welcome her. Liberty, how are you? Did you have a nice Fourth?

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
Hi, Senator Brown. Thank you so much for having me. I am so grateful to be here. I had a wonderful Fourth. I was able to spend it with my family, which was wonderful. And what a big thing to celebrate: 250 years. How was your Fourth?

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
It was okay. I am living, as I told you, in some limited community that is like being in college with old people. I am living in a 55-plus community. At first, I was like, "Oh," but it is so much fun. One of the neighbors had a party and about 30 people showed up. So we had a party.

But then here, which was the same in Washington, I guess, because of the storm, the fireworks were postponed. We had the most incredible light show. There was an incredible lightning and thunderstorm, and our resident mutt, Ella, went crazy and tried to hide under the couch and the bed. So we drugged her up. Somebody had a dog tranquilizer, and we gave it to her. Then she was like, "Ah, life is good."

So anyway, it was fun. It was very much fun. But let me start right there. What are your expectations? Liberty, you are a first-generation American citizen, and I am not, so I think I probably have a different perspective. I grew up in a different time. I know what my expectations were, and I will talk about them and the reality that I fulfilled over my 72-and-a-half years.

But I want to know, as a 22-year-old who just got out of college, as a deep thinker, what are your expectations? What do you expect from America?

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
I think my biggest expectation right now is for us to persevere through times of division and injustice, and for us to be able to remain optimistic. A lot of people say that a democracy takes 200 years to crumble. China - that was the case for the Chinese dynasties - and the Roman Empire was similar. My expectation is that the United States will not crumble because of this inconsistency of representation. My expectation is that the United States will persevere and move forward. What is yours?

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Mine were the same. They were the same as what you just outlined, and I will talk about my fears in a minute. For me, they were also all over the map.

I was a high-school dropout. I am convinced that I threw my life away when I was 16. I was an orphan, having a lot of problems in life. But I came back from that, got a master's degree, got a second chance, opened my own business, and made so much money as a businessman that I was a United States senator for 18 years, did not take a penny in salary, and was still able to survive, support my family, and put my kids through school.

I am absolutely convinced that there is no other place in the world where this would have happened, where the opportunities would have been there for me to have a second chance, to say, "Yes, I am going back to school. Yes, I am going to work hard. Yes, I am going to do these things. Yes, I am going to do it myself. I am going to go out on my own." I do not think any other place would have given me those opportunities.

I will talk about some of my other fears later, but my greatest fear is that those opportunities are not going to be available for you, for my kids - who are slightly older than you are - and for people coming up in America.

The beauty of the Constitution is that it allows us to modify it. It does not say, "These are the rules forever and ever." Part of its objective is to form a more perfect union. We understand that to form a more perfect union, we need to be able to change, and we need to be able to adapt. The only thing we know for a fact, in the universe, that is universal to every object - rock, living organism, everything - is change. Change is the one thing that comes to everything.

When you talk about the Roman Empire, the Chinese dynasties, and your hope for America, America has to change in order to survive. I think you are right. I think it will change, and I think America will survive.

My reality is that every one of the expectations I had for this country came to pass, and they came to pass in grand fashion, in ways that even exceeded all my expectations. So I hope those opportunities are available for you.

I know that you just got out of college and found a great job. You will soon, probably by next week, be captain of industry, and you will go on to change the world. I have great faith that you can do that. But because I see my kids struggling a little bit, do you think you are going to have to struggle more to get the things you want than I did?

I should also add that I wanted to be married, have a family, and raise children, and I did all that. Do you think all those things will be the same for you? Do you think the options will be there for you?

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
I think that is a difficult question to answer because, on one hand, that is very dependent on the economy, and that is something outside my control. I cannot expect to have the consistency that your generation did. But I truly believe in the world the way my family raised me: that hard work pays off.

I think the same about your kids. From what you have told me, they are brilliant. When they see things are not working out, they think of a new plan, which was the case for your youngest daughter and your eldest daughter. She is living in one of the biggest cities in the world.

I know there must be suffering, because I understand. I am a little younger, but I do understand. But that inspires me. I think when there is a will, there is a way. Even though things are tough, and with social media and the news at our fingertips 24/7 it becomes even tougher, because you are constantly reminded of the demise of our government and the dismay of the economy. It is hard not to be anxious and worried about what is to come.

But I think what is most important is that we cannot be paralyzed by fear. We have to move forward, and we have to believe that when there is a will, there is a way.

I am worried because of the inconsistency of our government. It seems like in 2024 things changed overnight, and I would not like to see that happen again. But at the same time, I am excited because right now my generation is rising to power, and I think we have a lot to bring to the table. I think we were raised by a world of pain and beauty that we are able to look at at any minute, and I think that is truly inspirational.

I truly hope that after these last two years are over, there will be a lot more optimism for young people in the United States. It has always been the country of the free, no matter who was in chains. There was always optimism, and I hope it continues to be that way.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Let me just say that when it comes to particular worries, I do not worry about you, for example, or about Tricia. I think truly exceptional people always make it. People like you, who are active learners, very smart, and very capable.

But I worry about the Michael Browns. I worry about the guys who are smart and capable but also lazy and soft and dull to it. That was me. I had a lot to offer and a lot to bring to the table, but I did not walk up to the table like you do. Knowing you the way I do, you will. I was dragged to the table, against my will.

I worry about those people because I had an older sister who raised me, and she was remarkable. She had all these amazing barriers put in front of her, and she succeeded and succeeded and succeeded. That was because she was so determined and worked so hard.

I see those qualities in you. I see them in my kids, and they are really not the ones I worry about. You personally know Mrs. Brown, the valedictorian of her high school. The values you talk about your parents instilling in you were instilled in my children by both of us, especially her. She was an achiever.

My son, who did very well in college but was mediocre in high school, once said something to me. I said to him, "My God, you come from a tradition of scholarship. Your mother was a valedictorian. She was the best student in her high school." My son said, "Yes, and you were the worst student in your high school, Dad, and I came in somewhere in the middle." That is true. He did better than I did. He was not as good as his mom, but he did better than I did.

So I worry about the people in the middle. There will always be people who succeed. In fact, when I worked at the DNC, the Democratic National Committee, my mentor, when he left, left me a saying from a calendar that had a different saying every day. He said it was a political imperative. It said, "Never forget that the cream always rises to the top, but so does the scum." That is what you have to remember. Exceptional people will always make it, but exceptional people can be either good or evil. They do not need to be good people. Unfortunately, we see too many evil and incompetent ones today.

Can I tell you what my fear is? I want you to really talk about this, because you just made a comment about your generation being up and coming. One of my fears is that I watched the president's speech last night. Did you watch it?

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
Happily, I did not.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Okay. Let me tell you. One thing you talked about was communism and socialism. These are terms that average Americans do not understand. Now, you, as a college-educated woman who studied political science, probably understand what those two terms mean and that they are not the same. But in my experience, most people - especially older people - see communism, socialism, fascism, anything with "ism" at the end, as being the same thing.

My fear with the Democratic Party is that they are not going to stand up to this appropriately. When we talk about democratic socialists, a democratic socialist is just a Democrat who believes that society and government should provide the basic needs of citizens in all regards. They should provide universal health care, food assistance where necessary, childcare, and things like that.

Those things should be provided by the government because our government, our democracy, our system of government, is owned by all of us. It is a group effort. We are supposed to be a big old family. If you are dealing with your family at home, you are not saying, "Well, you can eat the cottage cheese, but I am getting the peanut butter because I bought the peanut butter." No. People buy groceries and share. When you were a kid, your parents did not say, "Look, you live here. There are four of us. You pay 25 percent of the rent." No. Somebody paid the rent and you all lived there.

That is the whole concept. We all have ownership in the government, and we all have a right to our basic needs being fulfilled. I do not think the Democrats are out there saying that. I think they are going to let the Republicans pound this into the ground.

That brilliant woman who is a soulless preacher and is the press secretary for the president has already been on all the top shows talking about how communists are going to take over, and how Mondani has won, and the mayor of Washington, D.C. - the presumptive mayor of Washington, D.C., who you and I both know and like - has declared herself a democratic socialist and said, "Hey, look, the democratic socialists are people like Bernie Sanders. They are good people. They are not Adolf Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, or the people you associate with these things."

The Democrats have to get out there and say it, and then they have to beat it. We were just in a campaign with a person who, in my opinion, was perfect for the office. But she did not fight. Her communications were nice, and she took the high road. It is time to take the gloves off, Democrats. It is time to point these guys out for who they are.

Before I get your reaction, let me tell you what that speech was last night. First of all, I thought it was really, really well done. It was orchestrated perfectly. I was offended because a man who got out of military service by having his dad get somebody to lie for him and say he had a bone spur stood up there with heroes, veterans, and astronauts. To see someone who had proven his lack of commitment to America stand up there with these brave heroes personally offended me.

I do not know about other people, but one of the things I found interesting was that they had a cheering section. First of all, they had all the people in front. The cameras were only right behind the people in front, so you could not see the people on the Mall. You and I know that all week long the Mall has been empty and the Great American Fair has not been able to attract anybody. Artists have been bailing on the concert and everything else. But they had the crowd in such a position that it looked like the place was full.

Then they had a cheering section, and you knew it was a cheering section because you heard the same voices over and over again. They were smart enough to spread them out in the crowd. So when he said, "We closed down the border and kept those nasty immigrants where they belong," the same people were yelling, "Yes! Yes!" Then he said he had done everything and ended every war again, and it was the same people.

So it was well orchestrated. They brought up flags that they probably should not even have brought up because they are priceless. They brought up the flag that flew over the Arizona, a famous battleship at Pearl Harbor. They had a 107-year-old veteran come out and salute it. He was on the ship, and he came out, stood up, and saluted the flag. Who is not going to applaud for that? It was very smart. I do not like this man, but I would have applauded for somebody like that. First of all, anybody who is 107 years old and can still stand up, let alone a veteran, gets applause.

Then they brought out the astronauts from the last mission. Who is not going to clap for astronauts? Who is not going to cheer astronauts? They are heroes. Then he presented them with a flag. This was very smart. Who did they bring out? I do not know if she was a captain or a lieutenant, but they brought out an Army officer in uniform to present the flag. She was gorgeous. She was very pretty. She looked perfect in her uniform. She was not flashy. She was not the kind of woman that he appoints to important government positions. She was the kind of woman everybody says, "Oh, isn't she pretty?" She was perfect.

Then they brought out all these flags. They brought out the flag from - I forget where - maybe Betsy Ross or somebody made it. They had a colonel who was the grandson or great-grandson of Francis Scott Key come out and salute it. It was perfect. They did everything perfectly, and that is scary to me.

It is scary to me that the Democrats are not going to stand up to that. They need to. They need to say this guy is a fraud. He is a con man. He talks about communism and socialism because he wants to scare you. He talks about being a patriot, but he does not know what being a patriot is. Patriotism, to them, is serving a common purpose of America: to form a more perfect union, to stand up for America. It is not preserving your particular lifestyle or attitudes. It is about including everybody, standing up for the country, and putting the country above yourself. One thing you can be sure about with Donald Trump is that he does not put the country before himself. He puts himself before everything.

The Trump administration is being charged with a lot of responsibility. They are not going to tell you what they are doing and what they do. Thomas Jefferson said it when he formed our government: "We hold these truths to be self-evident." Not anything you even have to think about; they are self-evident - that all are created equal and endowed by the Creator with certain unalienable rights. These were given by God, not by Donald Trump, not by Congress, and not by the MAGA people.

That is what chills me. These people call themselves Christians. They make the mistake of thinking that accepting Jesus Christ as your Savior makes you a Christian. I am a Christian. But that does not make you a Christian. What makes you a Christian is following the Jesus of Christ. Christ did not say, "I am retribution." He said, "I am your salvation." He said, "Let those who have no sin cast the first stone." If you are out there and you think Donald Trump has no sin, you have no brains. All he does is cast stones. He also said, "What you do unto the least of these, you do unto me." So let that be a word to all you MAGA people out there. When you hurt a poor person, when you hurt a homeless person, when you look down on people who have less than you, you are striking God. You are slapping God. So be careful when you do that.

That is what really bothered me. The speech hit on Christian nationalism, communism, and socialism, and he is using that to scare people. Meanwhile, they are trying to pass an act that is going to destroy our election system. So that is what I thought about the speech.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
I think that is exactly the problem we have. Right now there is a big span of misinformation. Truly, my heart goes out to MAGA supporters because what we are watching is a production.

I used to do drama when I was a little kid, and the first rule is that the second you step foot on that stage, you are performing until you leave. I think it is rather interesting that you, as a very intelligent politician, chose to spend the majority of your description of the speech on the nuances, on the production itself, on the aspects that were well thought out to truly paint a picture to the American people and Trump supporters. I think that is the problem we are having.

Truly, my heart goes out because I wish we could all be aware of what is really going on. American TV is not good nowadays. People are canceling TV. They are starting to watch Netflix and Amazon Prime, things that are more condensed and attention-grabbing - just like talking about communism, socialism, and immigrants at the border.

We are entering clickbait politics, and our citizens are on the rear end of it. It breaks my heart that so many people, who are so optimistic for a better future, choose to attach themselves to this production and performative theater that we have made of politics in this country.

It is very dismaying. We need to get out there. We cannot sit and wait, in my opinion, for the Democrats to do something about this, because we need Republicans to do something about this too. We need the country to unite again. That is my biggest worry. Two years are over and Trump is out, but is the Republican branch going to be accustomed to these mannerisms and these forms of governing people? That is not something we can have.

We cannot keep doing the good and the bad, the evil and the heroic, because it is going to ruin us as a nation as it has before. Divide and conquer. China is coming - that is something else we have to worry about, not in terms of war, but in terms of power. Truly, I think that for the United States to continue being the symbolic, internationally influential country it has been for these 250 years, we need to accept each other.

I think we need to accept that MAGA is going to be MAGA. We need to accept that they are going to keep getting worse if we attack like we have been trying to. Things will only get worse for Democrats. That is how Kamala lost her race.

We have to rethink this. We are in the middle of his term, and we can no longer attack each other. It takes a lot of putting our egos aside, but I truly think we need to start rethinking this. We need to start accepting that what they are doing is going to continue, and we need to look at this from a different perspective: How can we unite the people again? Not, how can we remove MAGA from power? How can we silence their voice?

They are going to be screaming as loud as they can, as they have for the last two years, because they are the biggest TV channel on the news right now, and they are going to proceed with that. That is how they profit: from playing games and making us angry, because that gives them more power.

So I think we need to stop giving them the attention they want. I think we need to start running into Trump supporters and saying, "Oh, great. This is a version of your best future, and I am happy it is going your way. I wish you would support the rest of the country when we all want something that will please all of us."

Because I am tired of seeing people in pain. I am tired of seeing people suffering. That is my last comment on this, but that is the beauty of the World Cup to me. I saw something the other day that said if politicians did not exist, the world would be one. Look at these teams. They play each other intensely. For a lot of countries, soccer - or football - is their religion. At the end of the game, they hug each other. They cry together for their wins and losses. It is beautiful. I think human nature is greedy, but I also think it is kind.

I think we need each other. I think this theater that we have put in place is trying to make us feel that we do not. We Democrats are no better if we feed into that and put each other down. I think we need to feel remorse for them, and we need to work on our own campaign.

My question to you, Senator, is how can we do that? How can we step into this field, whether it is the midterms or two years from now? How can we go in with our right foot forward to make sure everyone feels heard, no matter how trained they have been to be in opposition, even though right now people are preparing them to go against the Democrats and believe they are communists? Can we unite the country and make everyone feel listened to? At the end of the day, I think that is the goal of politics: to make people represented in society. How do you think we can do that?

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
When you come up with an easier question, like, "What is my favorite movie?" - I do not think anything that has been said tonight is more important than what you just said, because that is the ultimate solution. We do have to bring people together.

I think your soccer analogy is perfect. Why do they hug each other after the game? They hug each other because they respect the ability and the hard work that had to be done for them to be on the field. When you say it is a country’s religion, we know people from so many of those countries, and in many countries that is absolutely true.

When my son played soccer, he did pretty well. He had a coach who was originally from Africa. The coach said, "The African kids are better soccer players because that is all they do." He said, "Your son plays basketball, baseball, and all these other things. In a lot of African countries, kids go out in the morning at six o'clock with a soccer ball and come back when it gets dark. That is it, the whole day."

So, yes, countries invest a lot of themselves in it. But at the end, in the World Cup, they meet on the field of play, on common ground. I think they respect the commonality they have.

I am not a particularly big soccer fan. I did not follow the sport, even though I worked for professional soccer players when I was a kid. I know a little bit about it, but I never played it. I watched the Americans, and I watched that penalty kick at the end. I could not believe it. I could not believe how he got the ball directly in between everybody and into the absolute corner of the net, where the goalie could not reach it. It was the most amazing shot. I said, "Wow, the talent it takes."

I have taken my son to professional games, and when you are down there watching them on the field, you realize how much effort is put out. I think that is the thing they respect about each other. They understand that in many cases the game could go either way, and that their opponents are talented people, just like they are. Of course they want to win, and they might trash talk each other, but there is a certain respect they have for each other. I think that is what we have to find.

We have to refine that respect for each other. We need to find common ground. We all love our children. We need to talk about that. We need to talk about how we love our children and how important they are to us, and understand that the children of MAGA people are just as important to them.

We need to try to see things from their perspective. We need to not only see things from our perspective, but look at the way they look at things and why they stand the way they do. I have been in the Democratic Party a long time, and I know that at one time Democrats were seen as weak on defense. A lot of military people I know are Republican because of that. I understand that, and I try to talk to them about it. I try to tell them what the facts are. The facts are that Democrats are not weak on defense. The greatest military accomplishments of America have been under people like Franklin Roosevelt, just as Abraham Lincoln saving the Union was significant - and he was a Republican. Both sides have contributed so much to this country.

I do not want to digress, but I have to say one other thing. I am sitting here watching people build houses. I live in a new community, and they are building houses all around me. I see these immigrants, these people who have come into our country, work their tails off. They show up at six o'clock in the morning and do not leave until dark. They stand on pitched roofs with nothing to keep them safe, with no equipment other than a hammer, and they work hard. It kills me to hear this man we elected stand up there and call them murderers and rapists.

They are not. They are your grandfather. They are my grandfather. They are every American. I do not know how we got this idea, Liberty, that we all came from landed gentry. We were not all hanging out in Europe saying, "Hey, let’s go to America and see what is up. Maybe we will steal some land from the Indians." No, we were starving. We were the trash of Europe that came here. We all came for the same reason. My forefathers worked hard. Everybody's forefathers worked hard. They are not murderers and rapists. They are the people who have always come here, and they have come for the same reason they have always come. We need to find ways to make people feel secure in that belief.

If they do not believe that, they are afraid. They want to hide behind their guns. I have heard gun advocates say they want their guns to protect themselves against government. How ridiculous is that? I do not know what kind of gun you have, but if the government comes for you, it is not going to be big enough unless you figure you can take on the Marine Corps, the Army, the Navy, the Boy Scouts, the Coast Guard, the FBI, and the CIA. A gun is not there to protect you from that. It is a false sense of security.

Instead of saying to gun owners, "You are wrong," we have to say, "Be brave. Do not do this because you feel you need to protect yourself. Do this to protect your children." Get rid of the AR-15, because they are lying to you. "If you take the guns away from law-abiding citizens, only criminals will have guns" - that is their mantra. But we do not want law-abiding citizens to have AR-15 rifles, because the kid who walked in at Uvalde and murdered children was a law-abiding citizen. The guy who walked into a grocery store in Buffalo and murdered people was a law-abiding citizen. The piece of trash who sat in a church in Charleston, went to a service, and then shot people in the back of the head had no criminal record. The school shooter in Florida had no criminal record. So we need to take these weapons out of the hands of everybody in order to save the children.

That is the thing we need to get across - not because you do not need it, not because it was made for combat, not because what are you going to do with it, go out and shoot gophers with the thing? We need to make sense with these people rather than just being on the other side of the argument. I think we need to stand on our commonality. Everyone who has tried to assassinate President Donald Trump had no criminal record. None of them. So we need to speak through the power of what we need to do, and like you said, we need to do it without emotion.

We need to say, "This is what we agreed to." My favorite line from my favorite movie, The Godfather, is when one of the mafia guys says, "This is the life we have chosen." We have to put up with it because this is the life we have chosen. That is true in America. This is the government we have chosen. We did not choose a government that works on one separate set of principles that are always adhered to. We agreed to a flexible government that includes everybody, where everybody - except for people in Washington, D.C. - gets a vote and gets a say. So you have to accept it.

There was a great commercial, and I am going to stop now because I am starting to ramble. They took it off the air. Larry David was Thomas Jefferson, and a bunch of people were signing the Constitution. Larry David reads it and says, "Everybody gets to vote," which of course was not true in those days. Alexander Hamilton says, "Yes, everybody gets to vote," and Larry David says, "Even the dumb people?" He says, "Yes, even the dumb people."

So we have to realize that you have a college education and you are really smart, but you also need to incorporate the feelings of someone like my grandmother. My grandmother was an immigrant from Italy, very smart, but she probably had a sixth- or seventh-grade education. I do not know what kind of education women got in the 1800s. My grandmother was born in the 1890s, so I do not know what kind of education she got, but she did not have much.

We need to accommodate people like that. She was really, really smart, but she believed every prejudice. She believed the Irish were dumb, Latinos were lazy, and Black people were dishonest and dangerous. She believed all these things because she did not have an experience that was different. She lived in a tight community. She was isolated. She never dealt with those people, so she never knew anything different. She never knew how wonderful people are and how much the same they are.

So we need to be able to deal with everybody. You are absolutely right, and it only comes from a big heart. Let me tell you, I have personal experience with Liberty Jones, and she has a heart the size of the state she was born in, Texas. What do you have to say?

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
Senator Brown, thank you. I think you have a big, big heart as well, and that is why we are together today on this show. You had a huge heart when you met me, and you still do. That is something that inspires me, because it is hard to find that in a politician nowadays, unfortunately.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Yes, that is true. It was not always that way. Go ahead.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
I think the point you brought up about gun violence is really important to consider because it is another example of such tragedy that we normalize and think is normal in our day to day. You can buy a gun before you can vote, or you can buy a gun before you can drink alcohol in this country. That is absolutely crazy.

That is another problem. Drunk driving is one of the biggest causes of death, and still, you can buy a gun, which is only going to be used for death, before you can drink. I think that is an issue.

A lot of things we see, especially in the D.C. community and probably around the whole country, show that the most unfortunate part about gun violence is that it mostly affects children. A lot of communities are raised to believe that the only way to have success is through violence, and it is really unfortunate. I think it is very important to invest in education. I think Mrs. Brown also had a wonderful career being a librarian and influencing kids to learn about the different ways to help each other. That is beautiful.

I truly think that we cannot normalize the reality of weaponizing a child anymore. When you are 18, most people are still living under their parents' roofs. I think that is just a sliver of a bigger pool of problems that we have normalized.

I completely agree with you. I think we need to unite, and it is hard out here with all this turmoil.

If you could come up with a four-year plan for your next presidency in 2028 or 2029, what would it be? What would be the first bill you would attempt to pass? What would be your goals for those four years?

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
I would try to follow through on the idea that America was founded on. I mentioned earlier that the beauty of the Constitution is that it allows us to change. It allows us to amend things. It allows us to push things forward. Both sides have made contributions. I think of things the Democrats did, like the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act. I think we need more of that.

The first thing I would pass is universal health care, because the things that scare people are the things they cannot control. I think I could have made a fortune if I sold parachutes at the airport to people getting on planes, even though they would be useless. If you are on a commercial airline, what are you going to do? Line up at the front door and jump out over the Pacific Ocean? No, there is really not much you can do. But I think people would buy them because it would give them a feeling that they were in control, just like the gun does.

Just like hiding under the gun: you are asleep in your house and somebody breaks in. Are you going to find your gun, get it out, and shoot them before they shoot you? You are more likely to shoot yourself. But that is not it. You feel like you have a modicum of control.

So that is the first thing I would do. I would amend the Constitution to guarantee universal health care to every American citizen. Let me point out, when people talk about all the benefits - I love this - you should not get medical help in America unless you are a citizen or unless you walk into an emergency room. There are no undocumented immigrants on Medicare or Medicaid. They are not there. Only if they walk into an emergency room. And what are you going to do? If somebody who is not a citizen, who was snuck into the country, walks into an emergency room, are you going to say, "I am sorry, you are not a citizen. Could you go out in the parking lot and die, please?" No. You have to take care of them. That is what those guys are always talking about when they say they get more benefits. It is not true.

I also think we have to pass rules about responsibility for what politicians say. If you say something that is not true, there should be some consequence for that. Donald Trump just makes it up as he goes along, and people believe it. I have gotten into arguments with people - like our guest last week - where someone says, "This country was founded on the idea of freedom for everybody." I said, "What are you, crazy?" It was not free for women. It was not free if you were Black. It was not free if you were not a white landowner. It was only free for people who were white landowners. It became free for everybody because it was a concept that we then managed to put into law so that you cannot discriminate against people on the basis of color, ethnicity, or gender.

Those are the things that were lost. We did not leave them up to whether somebody thought he was smarter than a particular ethnic group or gender. That is what I would do. Just like the Bill of Rights was put together as an addendum to the Constitution because they said, "You know, we forgot some stuff. We forgot the right to say what you want and to separate church from school, religion from government," we need to find ways to incorporate laws that make those principles stand so that people cannot come along with an executive order or presidential order and decide that they want to do whatever they want.

Can you imagine, Liberty, right now they are prosecuting an Olympic athlete for sticking his hand in that disastrous Tidal Basin, or reflecting pool, which has become such a disaster? They are going to try to make an American athlete the scapegoat. It is ridiculous. They are putting him out there and they are going to look so stupid, because who cares? We like Olympians. If I were a strategist, I would say, "No, why don't you pick on a Girl Scout, a nun, or the Dalai Lama?" Picking on an Olympic athlete is stupid, but they do whatever they want.

I have to say one more thing: if Stephen Miller is not a vampire, I am not a guy from New Jersey. That is what I have to tell you. It is just creepy to look at him. These people have no conscience whatsoever, and they can compartmentalize. That is something we have to understand about all people.

When I say to you that there are things about Christians I do not understand, people have this great ability to compartmentalize, to deal with the cognitive dissonance that occurs from conflicting ideas. Take somebody like Thomas Jefferson. Thomas Jefferson, in my opinion, was the Shakespeare of American politics. He wrote so beautifully about the spirit of man, liberty, and justice, but he was a slave owner. How is that possible? How is it possible that you believe all men are created equal - you really believe that, Thomas - but not the men you own?

How do you own somebody and still talk about this thing? Because you can justify it to yourself. When you mention that to people, they say, "Oh, well, he was good to his slaves." Then they say, "Oh, yes, he had children with Sally Hemings." I am not sure the average woman would consider having sex with her owner to be him being good to her. Maybe; who knows. But I do not think that was uncommon among slave owners.

How do you own somebody and still talk about this thing? But I have to let you have the last word because you are the smartest person on the show. Go ahead.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
Well, I think you are the smartest person in the world, so maybe we need to have a one-v-one soccer game to decide that.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Oh, yes, I would be a challenge. I am going to go for that.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
I can bring the chair. It will be better than me, my junior.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Can I just ask one thing here? Trash talking. Do not get too confident because my team beat a continent, okay? It does not mean the two smallest, or three smallest, countries on the face of the planet. So we are not so bad after all.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
But you do not have to be a sore winner, because Brazil got eliminated today, so that is a big deal.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Oh my God. By who?

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
By the Norwegians, two to one.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Norwegians? No.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
They have a giant on their team. They have a huge giant on their team called Haaland. Unfortunately, it is a tragedy. But, as I said, I am sorry.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
I would have never guessed that. One of the greatest honors in my life is that I got to see Pele play when he was at his prime, when he played for Santos.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
They say it is the worst World Cup we have had in 36 years.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
I bet. You are always at the top. With my apologies, go on. Now that I know that, I am going to start doing stretches.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
We are not to tell. We are not to tell until the match. Yes.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
Go ahead.

Speaker 3 - Co-host, Liberty Jones:
That is exactly the point. Brazil is already preparing for the next four years, and that is what we need to do. We need to not let the giants in our system make us feel hopeless about the bright future to come. We cannot let him rule the 250th anniversary. We cannot let him rule the liberties of this country.

If we can go about our day to day trying to keep progress going along and accepting everyone, because that is what true freedom for all means, I think we are doing enough for our current times. That is what I have to say.

Speaker 2 - Host, Michael Brown:
That is a perfect way to end the show because you are absolutely right. I hope people will tune in and listen to us as we bring on more guests. Today, Liberty and I decided to talk to you because it is the Fourth of July and an anniversary, and we thought it was very important for us to get out there the way we felt about things and the way we felt about America.

Everything Liberty just said is absolutely true. We need to come together. Thank you so much.

So this song goes out to Liberty Jones and to everybody in America. This is a classic song that I think describes our country better than any other song I have ever heard: Neil Diamond's "America." It also goes out to Bubba, who is the best dog in the history of dogs. We will see you next week.

Speaker 1 - Outro/Theme Voice:
Shadow Politics, make the blue note rise.
Put the unheard city right before the nation's eyes.
Senator Michael D. Brown, Liberty Jones by his side,
Turning conversation into a rising tide.
From statehood dreams to the truth we defend,
From the stranger at the door to the voice of a friend.
Shadow Politics, let the whole room sing.
Representation is where freedom begins.
Leave one light on in the window tonight.
Leave one chair open. Leave one question bright.
The shadows are empty; they are waiting to be heard.
Sunday night, we give the people the word.