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June 15, 2023 - Radio Renaissance - Jared Taylor
59:50
Will San Francisco Survive?

Jared Taylor and Paul Kersey report one more nail in the coffin of one of America’s storied cities. They also discuss Starbucks’s $25.6 million hit for anti-white racism, what happens when your house is declared “racist,” and when BLM doesn’t mean BLM. Thumbnail credit: © Michael Ho Wai Lee/SOPA Images via ZUMA Press Wire

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Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to Radio Renaissance.
I'm your host, Jared Taylor with American Renaissance.
And with me, of course, is my indispensable co-host, Paul Kearney.
Today is June 15th, Anno Domini, 2023.
And we'd like to begin with a few comments from listeners.
One says, on last week's podcast, you had a story about Deb Haaland, the Secretary of the Interior.
And this was a story that had to do with one group of Indians saying that land had to be preserved against drilling because the land was sacred.
But the people who lived right close to it, that was the Navajo as I recall, they said, drill, baby, drill.
We want the money.
We don't care about sacred.
And the listener goes on to say, you wondered aloud as to what BLM had to do with freezing the drilling around the Chaco Historical Site.
And of course, like an idiot, I was thinking of Black Lives Matter.
Our listener says, I believe BLM actually referred to Bureau of Land Ah, yes, quite obviously so.
Well, I've got BLM on the brain, I guess, so thank you, sir, for that correction.
Another comment.
I would like to make an observation about Native American virtue signaling regarding the sacred land.
This seems to be an item that really struck the interest of our listeners.
Goes on to say, last weekend I drove down to Harrah's Cherokee Indian Reservation to play poker.
The casino was very nice, but the immediate surroundings were poor, run down, many vacant buildings and homes.
I found it interesting how little pride the Cherokee Nation seems to think in some parts of their sacred land, which resembled ghost towns.
On the poker floor, I did not see any Cherokee faces, but the white dealers joked and complained about how tight management is with their money, and how they would like to see a coffee station, for example, available for employees, but they had none.
I, the commenter goes on to say, would like to see the vanishing Anglo-Saxon put on reservations.
If we could somehow be forced together, we might break out of our individualism and build communities.
I would love to see white people build societies from scratch because, well, we're awesome.
So there you go.
Well, if I could say something real quick.
Please do.
It's fascinating because all across the United States of America there are suburbs that are being built where white people do create communities that are, I would argue, implicitly white.
And the Civil Rights Act of 1964 mandates that any explicit act of whiteness, collectively, is going to be Extirpated by the federal government, and you'll be sued.
I think you can create, momentarily, a glimpse of what America used to be.
I, myself, live in one of those white-topias.
You, yourself, where the New Century Foundation is located, is in a white-topia.
But, again, you just can't because of what Christopher Caldwell noted in his great book.
The Civil Rights Act usurped the Constitution.
There's no freedom of association, and without that, you can't have White people communities.
That's true.
You can have explicit other communities.
Nobody is insisting that... Well, let's see.
I guess there is gentrification.
But when gentrification happens, the blacks who live there can express themselves quite vociferously against it, and sometimes thwart it.
But let's see.
The first story this time around has to do with Starbucks.
You, of course, Mr. Kersey, like many of our listeners, remember that 2018 episode in which two black men entered a Starbucks in Philadelphia, apparently or reportedly to meet a white guy.
Well, the New York Times has a story about this, and they go on to say, and this is a rather misleading explanation of what happened, they said, while they waited, and before ordering, one of the two asked to use the bathroom.
He was refused.
Eventually, they were asked to leave, and when they did not, an employee called the police.
Well, of course, what happened is they refused to order, and they said, well, the fact of the matter is you cannot use the men's room unless you place an order.
They refused to order, and they were warned several times, and then the police were called.
So this was standard procedure at the time.
Was this 2016 or 2017?
2018.
2018.
Wow.
Yes.
Yep.
Okay.
Tempest Fugit, my friend.
The subsequent arrests, captured in videos viewed millions of times online, ended up with the help of certain big media outfits, prompted accusations of racism, protests, and boycott threats, and the company's chief executive apologized publicly, describing the way the men had been treated as reprehensible.
Kevin Johnson, CEO at the time, flew to Philadelphia to apologize to the men.
White people are so good at groveling.
Starbucks then took the extraordinary step of temporarily shutting down 8,000 stores for the day to teach workers about racism.
Yes.
Dear me.
Well, on Monday, that was Monday of this week, in a surprising twist, This sort of thing always surprises the New York Times.
In a surprising twist, a federal jury in New Jersey ordered Starbucks to pay $25.6 million to a former regional manager after determining that the company had fired her amid the fallout from the episode because she was white.
What an idea.
The reward is $600,000 in compensatory damages, that apparently is the damages she suffered, back pay, whatever, and $25 million in punitive damages.
It was a unanimous verdict.
Now, I'd like to make it clear that this is not the lady manager who made the decision at the Philadelphia store to call the police.
This is somebody else.
You remember, it was a woman who called the police when these guys refused to pay and just wanted to sit there.
Yep.
This is not the lady who filed suit and who has been awarded $25.6 million.
I'll get to her a little bit later.
Okay.
At the time of this episode, Ms.
Phillips, that's her name, she oversaw about 100 stores In Philadelphia, South Jersey, Delaware and parts of Maryland.
And she had been promoted to that job in 2011 after what she called her exemplary performance in six years as a district manager in Ohio.
She's quite a veteran of Starbucks.
Ms.
Phillips said in the suit that Starbucks, as part of its damage control after the arrests, had sought to punish her and other white employees in and around Philadelphia, even if they had had nothing to do with the events leading up to the police being called.
She said that she had thrown herself into the company's efforts to restore its credibility
and had sought to support hourly workers, organizing managers to staff stores
and cover for employees who were afraid to run a gauntlet of protesters.
Now, the New York Times says, has no criticism of that.
The fact that people working at Starbucks were afraid to come because of all the people
demonstrating potentially violently against Starbucks.
I guess that's righteous rage of the aggrieved.
Nothing to see here, nothing to worry about here.
Ms.
Phillips said she was fired not long after balking at the order to suspend the white manager who called the police.
Now that was the woman who, uh, she, she was, she was eventually fired.
In fact, she was quite promptly fired, but apparently she, this Phillips lady was asked to fire her and she balked about doing so.
I don't know who eventually fired her.
Maybe Phillips did herself, but she claimed Starbucks started punishing white employees who weren't involved.
And this was to prove that they were handling the incident properly.
She says the firm ordered her to put a white male manager who had worked for the company for 15 years on administrative leave because of a race discrimination allegation against him.
The allegation was based on complaints non-white employees at the store were paid less than white employees.
Ms.
Phillips said she pointed out the male manager didn't ever say in how much they were paid.
So he couldn't have been making a discriminatory decision of that kind.
She objected to suspending him because she said the manager wasn't racist.
She'd never seen him exhibit discriminatory behavior.
And, and this is something that I'd never heard before, She said, the black manager of the store where the arrests took place, that was in Philadelphia, he did not face any disciplinary action at all.
I'd always assumed that it was a white woman who was running the store, but apparently she reported to a black guy.
And the black guy, nothing happened to him.
Now, I don't know if he was consulted at the time.
It's amazing the things that come out later on.
He was probably promoted, actually.
He probably was.
Ms.
Phillips said the black manager's subordinate was the one who called 9-11 after the two men sat down and refused to leave after being told they couldn't use the bathroom.
As I say, I had never known anything about this.
No, this is extraordinary.
Yeah, yeah.
At the time, everyone was piling down on her.
I have often wondered Whatever became of her.
And I've often wondered, also, what she thought to herself when, after this incident, as you will recall, Starbucks decided, okay, anybody can come in and stay as long as he likes and use our restroom.
And not purchase anything.
And not buy a thing, exactly.
Well, later, here and there, they started revoking that policy.
Yes, they did.
Because, as I predicted at the time, and as did you, they were going to turn into clubs for bums, winos, vagrants, and why not?
Why not?
You could just sit there and enjoy free Wi-Fi on your device, which, no matter how bum-no-vagrant you are, you people have to have these days.
In any case, I've often wondered what happened to that woman who was initially fired.
I wonder if she's going to take heart from this and sue Starbucks too.
But $26 million.
Wow.
Now, I believe Starbucks actually subsequently has been closing unprofitable stores all across the United States, predominantly in areas that are heavily black.
In fact, I'm reading a story right now, Mr. Taylor and listeners, that Starbucks CEO on store closings, there are going to be many more.
This was July 19th, 2020.
And this was all due, as Howard Schultz said, because of safety concerns for their employees.
A little too vibrant, these stores are.
Exactly, exactly.
Well, Mr. Kersey, I believe you have a story about the feds forcing a state to manage the sewage of black people.
Now, there's another earthier expression for this sort of thing, but apparently blacks have a civil right to have whites look after them.
Yeah, this is from alabama.com, A-L dot com.
Of course, it's this.
Simple.
The headline is, Feds Force Alabama to Treat Sewage in Black Belt.
Now, there are seven takeaways.
We're only going to read one of them.
The federal government last month agreed to call a halt to a civil rights investigation on the condition that Alabama finally do something about wastewater pooling in yards in rural Lowndes County.
The investigation targeted the Alabama Department of Public Health, and it marked the first ever civil rights settlement between the feds and the state over environmental justice.
And probably the first time a state health department has ever been forced to provide sewer access for people who can't afford it on their own.
The precedent-setting agreement will likely have lasting impacts in Alabama and across the country as the government declares that not providing sanitation for impoverished minority communities is a violation of their civil rights.
Let me repeat that again.
What this settlement does, it states that the government has declared that not providing sanitation for impoverished minority communities is a violation of their civil rights.
This is extraordinary.
States do not consider that their concern.
This is a local responsibility.
What this means, of course, if, say, Jackson, Mississippi, just to pick an example out of the air, if they don't maintain their sewer systems and they all break down, then that means the state of Mississippi is going to have to come in and do that?
This is just remarkable.
Absolutely remarkable.
And this is a civil right!
It is a civil right.
And of course, Jackson, Mississippi is close to about 84% black.
So it's fascinating.
It's a majority, minority, it's a majority.
You know, whites are the minority in Jackson.
It's a completely black-run city with a black-run bureaucracy.
What's fascinating about this, Mr. Taylor, is I've done some research into cities like Atlanta, and there are some very interesting water bill disparities where majority black areas, they never have their water shut off if they don't pay water bills.
Right.
It's a civil right.
Exactly.
We're basically getting to a point now where, okay, Let's take this to its logical conclusion.
Why are minority areas having to pay electrical bills?
Why do they have to pay gas bills?
Well, to me, what's significant here is this is a clear incentive for any non-white community completely to ignore its infrastructure.
Correct.
Exactly.
Allow it to collapse and then guess who has to come in and pay for it?
The state.
The state gets to pay for it.
This is precedent-setting, as you pointed out.
So here are seven takeaways from what we know so far.
I'm only going to read one.
Again, you can access this story by going to alabamaal.com.
It was published on June 9, 2023.
This is one of those stories that you look at and it's like, this is insane.
This is a mind-blowing story.
I believe I saw it last week after our last podcast, where we would have led with this.
And I haven't seen this story get much play, because as you said, we know how many... Think about Flint, Michigan.
Think about Jackson, Mississippi.
Think about Detroit, Michigan.
Just think about... You name the city that has sanitation problems, that has any infrastructure problems.
Any kind of infrastructure problem.
This now becomes a state responsibility.
What has traditionally been up to a city, a community, a county, whatever it is, the state is going to be roped in if you skimp on maintenance.
Environmental justice.
Again, the government has declared that not providing sanitation I'll just read the first one.
A long-standing problem will finally be addressed.
Perhaps first and foremost, thousands of Lowndes County residents will escape an endless cycle of sewage overflows and potential health hazards.
Many homes and lounges are connected to septic tanks or sewer systems that don't work, in
part due to the geology in the area, and some resort to straight piping waste away from
their homes.
These conditions have caused generations of lounge residents to move away, tanked property
values in the area, and hampered any kind of economic development in the area between
Selma and Montgomery.
Now, of course, there are other reasons why there's no economic development between Selma
and Montgomery, but that's the reason why that it is a majority-minority, majority-black
Straight piping.
What does that mean?
I assume that means everything just gets flushed out into the backyard.
I'd imagine so.
I'd imagine it's some form of rigging the pipes yourself to try and have it removed.
And if the septic systems don't work, whose fault is that?
Is that now the state's fault?
This is just insane.
And apparently it is impoverished minority communities that have this right.
Nobody else.
Nobody else.
It's quite clear that it's impoverished minority communities.
So yeah, you think about this can be their problems.
And, you know, Memphis, Tennessee, New Orleans.
Of course, of course, any place.
And this is interesting, too.
The state is, I'm sorry, the feds are not offering to foot the bill themselves.
They're forcing somebody else to foot the bill, which is what the federal government loves to do.
They'll pass some sort of law.
Funding?
Not our problem.
Wow.
In any case, Moving along to New York City.
New York City officials are now suing 30 counties across New York City for refusing to accept border crossers and illegal aliens.
The lawsuit comes after Mayor Eric Adams was shut down when he tried to bus migrants to many different communities.
Since the spring of last year, more than 72,000 border hoppers and various assorted illegals have arrived in the sanctuary city of New York.
It's a sanctuary.
It's still a sanctuary.
But Mayor Adams, as a result, tried to bust these people out of town.
Last month, a New York judge blocked Adams from busing border crossers into Orange County, New York.
Another judge blocked him for busing them into Rockland County.
So this week, he announced he's going to sue 30 New York counties, claiming they are, guess what, exhibiting xenophobic bigotry.
He, of course, is exhibiting no such thing when he wants them out.
He says they're an expensive bother.
But if somebody else says they're an expensive bother, that's xenophobic bigotry.
So, as of this month, New York City's homeless shelter system is housing 81,000 people.
81,000!
The highest level ever recorded.
And just last month it hit a weekly record of new folks marching in the door 5,600.
That's a week.
Adams has now said he may open his mayoral residence to border hoppers, an offer he has not made to homeless New Yorkers.
Now, tell me, what are the chances that he's gonna let in some Salvadoran or Haitian or whoever it is stay in Gracie Mansion?
Very, very, very limited.
Very, very limited.
I bet it's got a lot of nice bedrooms.
I bet it could hold at least half a dozen comfortably with their families.
What the heck?
Come on, Eric!
Do it, boy!
You could remove some of the furniture and get some nice bunk beds from Ikea and you could put a bunch of people in there.
You're right.
You're right.
Wow.
Well, Of course, now he's been suggesting that homeowners in the city open their doors to migrants.
Of course, he was going to pay them.
And as we calculated, you could make over $100,000 a year just housing one illegal for a year at the rate they pay for them in hotels.
In any case, it's costing New York City taxpayers $5 million every day.
Every day.
That's a quick... Wow.
Meanwhile, Biden's Department of Homeland Security is taking millions from what is called the Shelter and Services Program.
I don't know what that's all about.
I suppose, is that really shelter and services?
That is for illegal border hoppers?
I don't know.
But in any case, New York City is getting the largest amount of these Shelter and Services Program funds, more than $104 million.
So, does that mean Eric Adams will withdraw his suit?
I wonder.
Of course, at $5 million a day, that only pays for 21 days.
So, I guess that is just a dent in the problem of putting up with these people.
But it looks like people can be bribed into overcoming xenophobic bigotry if you give them enough money.
So, oh dear, I just don't feel much sympathy for Eric.
And I wonder why he just doesn't stop this, uh, this, uh, I guess nothing.
What do you think it would take for him to end this, uh, uh, automatic, uh, what does he call it?
Uh, the, uh, shelter.
What is it?
The, the, the system they've got?
Anybody who comes in the, uh, oh gosh.
In any case, they shelter anybody who needs a home.
The left is never going to admit the right in any way, shape, or form was correct in their, you know, Pollyanna, you know, Cassandra warnings about the impending doom of having open borders and the consequences because their entire worldview is predicated upon the great replacement of the founding stock being a good thing, regardless of the cost.
And yet, and yet, they're not prepared to put up with the costs themselves.
Well, I mean, I think that's a perfect segue to our next story.
And what is our next story?
Well, our next story is about the consequences of the left just doubling down on their ideology.
We talked about San Francisco last week in a story that astonished you.
I believe you said you had stayed in one of these just gorgeous Marriott properties.
It was a Hilton.
I'm sorry, it was a Hilton.
That's right, that's right.
Well, this story comes to us from Zero Hedge, and this is one of those stories, like the first one we just talked about, the federal right now to civil rights to have clean sanitation.
The doom loop accelerates as Westfield abandons largest San Francisco mall.
They've stopped paying on a $558 million loan.
Downtown San Francisco has been dealt another blow after Westfield and his partner Brookfield Properties made the difficult decision to stop payment on a $558 million loan for the metro area's largest shopping mall after challenging operating conditions.
The San Francisco Chronicle reports.
For more than 20 years, Westfield has proudly and successfully operated San Francisco Center, investing significantly over the time in the vitality of the property.
Given the challenging operating conditions in downtown San Francisco, which have led to decline in sales, occupancy, and foot traffic, we made the difficult decision To begin the process to transfer management of the shopping center to our lender to allow them to appoint a receiver to operate the property going forward, Westfield said.
This comes after Nordstrom, which occupies 312,000 square feet in the mall, is renewing its lease in August after nearly four decades of operation.
Four decades?
Four decades.
Been there for 40 years.
Been there 40 years and now they're being driven out by the mismanagement of the city by these absolute fools.
Yeah, since early 1980s, they've been there.
When Nordstrom closes, the mall will only be 55% least occupancy rate of 55%,
well below the average 93% of other Westfield malls across the US.
Think about that again.
55% occupancy rate versus 93% of other malls that are run properly in these areas
where you can actually have commerce, you know, unrestricted by the consequences of the left,
allowing what?
People can steal up to, is it $950 or $750 without being prosecuted in California?
I think it was $900.
Just under $1,000.
Bloomberg obtained a letter To employees from Jamie Nordstrom, the retailer's chief store officer, who said the closing is due to a slump in sales because of lower foot traffic, adding dynamics to the downtown San Francisco market have changed dramatically over the past several years.
We suspect Nordstrom is referring to the out-of-control crime, Zero Hedge referenced.
Westfield recently blamed unsafe conditions and lack of enforcement against rampant criminal activity in the downtown area for Nordstrom's departure.
It also said the mall's poor performance and crime-ridden surrounding area is an anomaly versus its other properties nationwide.
Westfield and Nordstrom's exodus comes one week after Park Hotels & Resorts ceased making payments on a $725 million CMBS loan secured by two of its San Francisco hotels, one of those being the Hilton property that you had mentioned that is located in the heart of... Pioneer Square.
Pioneer Square.
That is smack in the middle of downtown.
They gotta get rid of that name Pioneer Square.
I'm sure they will.
I'm sure they will.
That's the only problem, you see.
If they called it Indigenous Square, then everyone will come back.
Yeah, it's just like what they've done in South Africa, renaming a lot of the cities African names.
But this is just such a dispiriting story, this city.
I don't know what's going to happen to salvage it.
You lose money like that, and the tax base goes away, nobody wants to live there anymore.
This was one of the most beautifully situated cities in the entire country, I think.
Agreed.
On the bay, with those hills.
And the fact is, it doesn't even have a large black population.
No, it's under about 6%.
Everyone's always bemoaning that fact.
Yes.
Of the lack of, you know, population.
Maybe they will come back.
Maybe they will live.
Maybe they will squat in what used to be the Nordstroms.
Yes, yes.
All that will turn into nice crack houses and wonderful prostitution dens.
Gee, this is just outrageous.
And you are right, by the way.
I believe that it is a majority.
What percentage Asian is it?
I think Asians are certainly the largest number.
I believe whites are, according to this story, no.
But let me just hold that thought.
It's interesting.
I do want to make one thing as I was preparing today's podcast.
San Diego Just passed a law 5-4 by their city council to ban homeless tent encampments.
San Diego is a very well run city.
I believe it's majority white.
And it's the exact opposite.
The nuttiness of the whole state of California hasn't really...
You know, that's one thing I've been curious about.
I was in San Diego not long ago and I talked to some people there and I was very surprised, first of all, that it was not much more heavily Hispanic.
And some savvy people explained to me it's probably because the illegals don't want to stay that close to the border.
They want to head a little further inland so that they can't just be bounced back into Mexico over, you know, just over the local fence.
Also, What people said to me is that this sense of being so close to Mexico has given the city fathers a savvier view of what could go wrong.
And that suggests something about why it has managed to maintain civilization there.
But San Francisco, what a beautiful place.
Now, you look up what the population demographics are while I go back to New York.
As if New York doesn't have enough problems already.
New York has decided to create a commission to consider compensation and reparations for the lingering effects of slavery.
The state legislature just passed a bill to that effect.
State Assemblywoman Michelle Solage said, this is about beginning the process of healing.
Yeah, that's what they always say.
More money, more money.
That's what healing means.
The State Assembly passed the bill after three hours of spirited debate.
I'd be very curious to know what went into that debate.
I wonder if anybody stood up and said, this is crazy.
We don't owe these people a dime.
If anything, they owe us.
What went into the spirited debate?
But New York is following the lead of California.
The commission would be required to deliver a report one year after its first meeting.
The legislature would then be required to take the recommendations up for a vote.
So, they are putting their fingers in the gears.
We'll see whether they're able to pull out before it's eaten their arms and legs and the whole body.
New York Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, who was the first black person to hold that position, called the legislation historic.
However, there is someone who complained.
He's not white, by the way.
This is William Darity, an African-American professor of public policy and African-American studies at Duke.
He said even calling the idea reparations is presumptuous.
Because it's virtually impossible for states to meet the potentially hefty payouts.
He said the federal government has the financial capacity to pay true reparations and that it should be responsible.
So shut up, state reps.
Shut up, cities.
Let's get the feds on the hook, says he.
And he goes on.
My deeper fear with all of these piecemeal projects is that they actually become a block against federal action, because there will be people who will say, there's no need for a federal program.
He adds, if you end up settling for state and local initiatives, you settle for much less than what is owed.
Really?
Well, San Francisco has proposed, what, $5 million?
And the state of California proposed something on the order of $800,000.
I guess that's just not nearly enough.
But, I mean, New York City doesn't have enough money to house its bums.
And now New York State is proposing to splash out money for blacks just for being black?
Yeah.
Wow.
Now this insanity absolutely knows no bounds.
Well, speaking of insanity, knowing no bounds, we have actually done the great replacement data for San Francisco.
Hopefully, the great Gregory Hood will write up a story on this because I think it would be fantastic.
According to the 2022 latest census data, the white alone, not Hispanic or Latino, population of San Francisco was 39.2 percent. Asian alone
is 34.4 percent. The black population is under six percent at 5.2 percent. I believe what is the
uh what's the mayor's name?
Is it London Breed?
London Breed.
Yeah, London Breed, a black woman who, yeah, she's presiding over this just precipitous decline in civility, any sort of social contract that's left there in the city.
But I got to point out, ladies and gentlemen, San Francisco, you go back to 1940, 95% white.
1950, 90% white.
When Dirty Harry was made, when Harry Callaghan was, you know, the great character that Clint Eastwood portrayed in the Dirty Harry series.
1970, San Francisco was 71% white.
It was during that period that we saw the massive de-whitening of the city.
It went from 71% white in 1970 to 52% white, Mr. Taylor, in 1980.
So just, I think what really happened is probably the white working class that was traditionally there was just decimated.
The thing is, the thing is, what is it, so whites are about 39 and Asians 34, so Asians are right behind in terms of, well, the thing about it is, that should be a kind of a sufficient center of gravity for civilization.
75% white, or Asian.
White or Asian, yes.
That's not generally associated with this kind of degeneracy.
But it just goes to show you that with enough insane ideas, it doesn't make any difference who's living there.
Well, and go back to the whole Chess of Boudin recall.
It was the Asians who were the group that was most behind.
Getting the effort there because they were the ones who were being assaulted by, as it turned out, blacks.
Well, but at the same time apparently the Asians cannot get it together to prevent people from defecating and fornicating and urinating and living on the sidewalks.
because the left will never admit that their ideas are wrong,
that their ideas do not produce this utopia where everyone, you know, gets along.
You can see all the videos of just how degraded the city is.
Like the last time I was in San Francisco, degraded, degraded, I'm sorry.
Yeah. But, but the left ideas have done to denigrate what was a wonderful,
what was a wonderful place. Um, I lost some of his in San Francisco was 2010 and um,
I actually was at a restaurant and I ran into, hilariously, Remember him?
Oh, yeah.
He was actually shorter in person than I thought.
Yeah, it was hilarious.
But it was, you know, I went down and I wanted to go see Alcatraz.
And I, what is the, what's the famous wharf there?
The fish?
Fisherman's Wharf.
Yeah, it was, it was, you know, there was still that stigma, but it was, it was, it was a charming place.
So.
I was last in San Francisco, I would say about five or six years ago.
And I was on a job and every day I walked through the tenderloin.
The tenderloin is where all the bums and the hobos hang out.
And it was really quite an amusing thing.
I was wearing a hat and I would go by all of these black people who had just been kicked out of the bum shelters.
They kick them out at a certain time in the morning.
And they would all compliment me on my hat.
Oh!
Yes.
Oh, nice hat!
And I remember there was one lady, one lady who showed up and she had a black trench coat on and she opened up the trench coat and she was bare-breasted and she walked up to me and gave me a big hug.
Big hug, huh?
Big hug.
And she would not let me loose.
And I'm thinking, good grief, what am I going to do about this?
I've got to get to work, and I can't very well.
I don't want to knock her down or be violent with her.
And finally, I was rescued by another black lady who walked up and said, hey, stop your playing!
Stop your playing!
And so she stopped her playing and I was able to go on to work.
Was she trying to shake you down?
I don't think.
I don't know what she wanted.
I don't know.
She just wanted a big hug.
I guess she wanted to press her.
She got a lovely hug from Uncle Jared.
Well, I was not very active in hugging back.
I submitted to this hug, but I didn't want to encourage her.
In any case, it was quite an exciting time.
But moving on to something entirely different.
This is a story about Amazon by a guy who apparently is a very technologically first, an early adopter as they used to call them.
This guy says, I have a smart home.
And my primary means of interfacing with all the devices and automations is through Amazon Echo via Alexa.
Okay.
I guess he can turn his toaster on that way.
I don't know about smart homes very well, but I guess his garage door can open and close when he says, Alexa, open the garage door.
I don't think you'd want to have some other form of, you know, except the electricity, be able to control your garage door.
Well, I mean, but electricity controls it anyway, but the point is, I guess everything in his house runs through Alexa.
Alexa do this, Alexa do that, Alexa flush the toilet.
He says, a package was delivered to my house on Wednesday, May 24th.
The following day, I found that my Echo Show, I guess that's how it all works, had signed out And I guess his smart home suddenly went stupid and so nothing worked.
I dialed the customer service number and I was told that the driver who had delivered my package reported receiving a racist remark from my ring doorbell.
Huh.
He says, actually, it's a Eufy doorbell.
E-U-F-Y.
This guy is really advanced.
He says, I have multiple cameras recording everything that happens on my property.
If the driver's claim were accurate, I could easily verify with video footage.
And I asked what time the incident occurred.
I realized it was practically impossible for anyone in my house to have made those comments because nobody was home.
The Eufy doorbell had issued an automated response of, excuse me, can I help you?
The driver who was walking away and wearing headphones, you got this all on video, you see, must have misinterpreted the message.
Well, I would say he didn't misinterpret anything.
I mean, excuse me, can I help you?
That is racist.
Being polite is racist.
It's white supremacy of the most horrible kind.
You know, he needs to teach his doorbell to say, yo man, what's up?
Then that wouldn't be racist.
But by the following day, my Amazon account had been locked and all my Echo devices logged out and submitting video evidence from multiple angles.
Appeared to have no effect on their decision to disable my account.
Turns out the guy was shut down for six days, and he considered this a grave inconvenience.
I guess he just, you know, couldn't turn the stove on, couldn't open his door.
I don't know.
In any case, it was no fun.
Oh, dear.
Pardon me.
I'll have to stop that.
I beg your pardon, ladies and gentlemen, that was a mistake on my part.
And now he's going to update.
He says, for those saying that it would be okay if this happened to a real racist, He very generously says, he's not.
If someone bought and paid for a device, he should be able to use it as he sees fit.
So, there you go.
I mean, this is quite intriguing to me.
I had no idea that you could have your whole house turned off because your Ring doorbell, or your Eufy doorbell, allegedly said something racist.
I think that's an argument in not having your electricity or any of your devices, smart devices,
connected to where some arbitrary decision can be made by an Amazon or a Google or whatever other companies
you have given access to to lord over.
I bet most people have no idea that they can arbitrarily flick the switch and none of it works.
I know of people, for example, who they can lock and unlock their doors using their touch phone.
Because that's part of the smart house.
I can do that with my, I can open up my garage door.
You can open your garage door?
With my smart phone.
Imagine it saying, nope.
You're a bigot.
Exactly.
You can't come in.
Exactly.
You're locked out of your house.
Or maybe you're locked into your house.
Can't go out either.
Yes, what a... but you know, that's the world we live in.
So, let's see.
Now, this was fascinating news to me.
Were you aware that Illinois has just passed a law that will prohibit book bans in public schools and libraries?
I was not?
Yes.
Governor J.B.
Pritzker, a proud, frantic, lefty Democrat, he called the bill that he signed the first of its kind.
While certain hypocritical governors are banning books written by LGBTQ authors, but then claiming censorship when the media fact-checks them, we are showing the nation what it really looks like to stand up for liberty.
He said at the Bill Signing Event at the Harold Washington Library Center in Chicago.
Now, you know who Harold Washington was?
Oh, he was the first black mayor of Chicago.
Indeed he was.
He died in office, actually, so he probably would have been mayor for a very, very long time.
Yes, in like Flint.
Well, of course, the library is named after him.
The law directs public libraries in the state to adopt or write their own version of a library Bill of Rights, such as the one proposed by the American Library Association, which asserts that materials should not be prescribed or removed because of partisan or doctrinal disapproval.
Books targeted to be removed apparently have dealt primarily with LGBTQ and social justice themes, with some groups objecting to materials on gender and sexuality in books that school children might read.
Efforts to censor books doubled in 2022 over the previous year, according to the Library Association.
It counted 1,269 attempts to remove books, And the report released in March said the vast majority of materials targeted for removal are written by people of color or members of the LGBTQ community.
Pritzker, Governor Pritzker, complained about a vitriolic strain of white nationalism that was behind that.
Really?
Yes!
The Moms for Liberty group?
Of course!
Yes!
Well, boy oh boy.
Well, he must be more attentive to the news than I am, because I was unaware of vitriolic white nationalists running around shutting down the voices of BIPOCs and LGBTQ people in libraries.
Now, to me this is quite fascinating.
Let's read over again the American Library Association's principles on book banning.
Materials should not be proscribed or removed because of partisan or doctrinal disapproval.
Okay.
Now doesn't that mean that they are disapproving of censorship of any kind?
Now does the American Library Association complain when Amazon bans books?
I don't think it does.
But this is all, as Governor Pritzker says, they are standing up for liberty.
So I'm guessing that when the new policy goes into effect next January 1st, that there will be displays of classics on race and IQ, such as Audrey Shuey's The Testing of Negro Intelligence.
I bet there'll be old collections on Holocaust revisionism and vaccine skepticism.
You name it.
I mean, that's what this says.
You can't ban a book for any kind of partisan or doctrinal reason.
It's what it says.
That's what it says.
We'll see if they'll stick to their guns.
I suspect probably not.
Meanwhile...
There was some school course someplace that made white people ashamed to be white?
Yeah!
South Carolina School District halted classroom discussion of a book about racism after white students complained it made them uncomfortable.
The state reported.
That's the newspaper out of...
I'm very surprised by that, though.
Making white people uncomfortable is the point of public education these days, isn't it?
It's the point of any BIPOC-centered curriculum, correct?
Chapin High School students were scheduled to read Tinezi Coates' 2015 memoir.
Between the world and me.
God, imagine the amount of money that he gets just from schools, having to buy his book, and then, like you said, indoctrinate and create uncomfortable situations, scenarios.
Now this is a high school, did you say?
This is a high school.
Chapin High School.
They're going to read his book again.
I've never read this.
I'm not sure if you've exposed yourself to it.
Oh, gosh.
One of my favorite quotes of his is something like, I wish I could look forward to the day when white people end this evil religion of white supremacy and become human.
But I fear this day will never come.
That's almost a direct quote.
Become human.
Yes, become human.
They're going to eschew this religion of white supremacy.
Now, when white Students, high school students, are asked to read that stuff.
They shouldn't feel uncomfortable.
They should be hopping mad, is what I would say.
And it sounds like, according to the story, they were.
Well, they weren't hopping mad.
No.
Because if you're hopping mad, then that's when you get exposed.
And you don't need the Amazon censors to shut off your house.
You basically get sent to an educational gulag where all you're exposed to is Coates.
Well, they're already educational gulags.
True.
But anyway, yes.
I interrupted you.
No!
According to lesson plan released by teacher Mary Wood, students were asked to describe Coates' quote, primary statement regarding identity and your position about his argument.
And to describe, quote, their understanding of systemic racism, and if, why, or why don't they think, quote, racism is a pervasive problem in America, end quote.
But the project was cut short after some students expressed discomfort with two short videos, The Unequal Opportunity Race and Systemic Racism Explained, that were played in class to prepare students for the book.
Quote, hearing Wood's opinion and watching these Videos made me feel uncomfortable, one unidentified student wrote to the school board member.
I actually felt ashamed to be Caucasian.
These videos portrayed an inaccurate description of life from past centuries that she is trying to resurface.
I don't feel as though it is right because these videos showed antiquated history.
I understand in AP Leng we are learning to develop an argument and have evidence to support it, yet this topic is too heavy to discuss.
Well, this is AP language.
This isn't even history or civics or anything like that.
This is AP English.
I'm surprised it's not AP trig or AP statistics.
That's where this book makes more sense to be had as the primary curriculum and teaching mechanism.
Quote, I was incredibly uncomfortable throughout both videos and was in shock that she would do something illegal like that.
I'm pretty sure that a teacher talking about systemic racism is illegal in South Carolina.
As the state points out.
Yeah, of course.
This is a state that has two goofy senators and in Tim Scott who was only elected because and promoted because he was a black guy who could espouse some quote-unquote conservative Tea Party esque views.
And of course, he's the one who United with the senator from New Jersey Cory Booker to push for police.
Reform, justice reform, social justice reform, when George Floyd died of a fentanyl overdose in the aftermath, which was so disastrous for Republicans.
What was Trump's... Was it called the Platinum Plan to try and get blacks to vote for him?
I believe it may have been.
Okay.
The Platinum Plan.
And then, you know, heroically, he realized at the end, this is something that Jared Kushner is pushing on me.
I'm not going to get any of these votes.
Yet he didn't just come out and say, can we stop this?
But anyways...
As the state points out, South Carolina lawmakers passed a bill meant to combat critical race theory in the state schools.
In a letter to District Superintendent Akil Ross, the school board would defend an adolescent plan saying that, quote, "...participation in this course depends on a level of maturity consistent with age of high school students who engaged in thoughtful analysis of various texts."
End quote.
It's a shame they haven't been exposed to If We Do Nothing or White Identity.
Those would be nice texts to see if they're prepared to have a real conversation about race.
No, no, no.
The conversation goes one way.
Yes, it is.
It is one way and it is a fire hose of being exposed to what makes The United States, a structural inequality and systemic racism nation.
Quote, in this culture, everything may be considered controversial to prevent conversations about experiences which exist outside of heterosexual Caucasian norms of both bias and discriminatory and completely antithetical to the development of critical thinking and civil discourse, which is the entire point of an AP language course.
That is what the teacher, Mary Wood, said.
Race undisclosed.
I'd imagine she's white, though.
I'll bet she's white.
I'll bet she's white.
They're quite enthusiastic about this stuff.
Meanwhile, at the UN, I don't suppose you can name our current UN representative.
I couldn't.
I can tell you no.
No.
It was the South Carolina governor under Trump.
Yes.
Whatever her name is.
Oh, gosh.
Why can't I think of her name either?
She's got this lovely Indian name.
Well, she does have that, but she changed it.
Yes.
Gosh.
Well, anyway, by the time I finish this item, you'll have thought of it.
Well, the current UN representative is named Justin Hansford.
He is a black studies professor and racial studies expert at Howard University.
So no, he is not an expert on international relations.
He's an expert on black grievance.
Well, he's now representing us in the United Nations.
Oh, what a great job I'm sure he's doing.
He argues that the UN should set up a tribunal and force the United States to pay reparations to American black people.
That's our UN representative.
Makes a lot of sense.
He told the General Assembly.
So far, we have left it to the scholars of the past, the lawyers of the past, the white scholars, white lawyers, to determine the bounds of our legal imagination, to determine the narrow structures that we will use to determine what justice looks like for our people.
So I come to you today with a novel proposal that we begin to think our own thoughts proper, to propose our own vision of justice and implement that justice as part of the permanent forum on people of African descent.
Apparently there is such a forum and he wants them to set up rules and explain to the United States how much we owe people of African descent.
Wow!
I wonder what the delegates at the General Assembly thought about that.
I mean, I'm sure the ones of the African ones were thought that was just absolutely wonderful.
You know, Jamaica, for example, is really licking its chops the prospect of making the British pay reparations for slavery.
This is all going to be part of it.
But let's see, I believe we have time for you to tell us about the latest developments in the shootings, or I'm sorry, the single shooting of that six-year-old in Virginia.
Well, before we get to that, let me answer the question of who President Trump's ambassador to the United Nations was.
She's also running for president.
Nikki Haley.
Nikki Haley.
Yes.
No, it's actually Nemirata Nikki Haley.
And her original surname was Randhawa.
So Nemirata Randhawa.
Changed her name to Nikki Haley.
And I should point out that her daughter has married a black guy.
Oh, has she?
Yeah.
Well, that's diverse.
I hope Nikki's delighted.
Tell us about the six-year-old.
Yeah, let's go back.
The mother of the six-year-old.
Yeah, so if you guys recall there was a shooting at a school.
What was it in the Hampton area?
Newport News.
Yeah, the Hampton Roads area, which is a very unpleasant area for all of our listeners who are not familiar with that portion of Virginia as you drive down from Richmond Williamsburg to Virginia Beach.
You have to pass the Hampton Roads Newport News area before you get to Norfolk.
Don't recommend getting gas in that area.
Well, the Virginia mother of a six-year-old who shot teacher, white teacher,
to plead guilty to felony gun charges and plea deal.
So the mother of a six-year-old boy, black boy, who shot his white teacher
at the beginning of the year is set to plead guilty to federal felony charges in connection
with the gun used in the attack.
Deja Taylor, 26, has been charged with unlawful use of a controlled substance
while possessing a firearm and making a false statement while purchasing a firearm.
Taylor has also been indicted on state charges of felony child neglect and one count of recklessly leaving a firearm to endanger a child.
Her attorney announced on Monday that she would plead guilty as part of a deal with prosecutors that eliminated the need for the government to take the case to a grand jury.
Our actions follow very constructive negotiations we had with federal authorities, her attorney explained, adding that terms of the agreement, which we believe to be fair in all parties, would be disclosed when we enter the guilty plea.
Taylor allegedly knowingly made a false and fictitious statement to a licensed firearm dealer when she purchased the Taurus 9mm by stating that she was not an unlawful user of a controlled substance, when in fact, she was an unlawful user of marijuana.
While decriminalized in Virginia, marijuana remained illegal at the federal level.
Boy, I wonder how many people do that.
When they buy a firearm, they say, no, no, I don't smoke dope, but they actually do.
Yeah, it's fascinating that she was actually prosecuted on that.
Yeah, that's remarkable.
I mean, that's the way, well, when they want to get you, they'll come up with some reason to get you.
Ask President Trump that.
Taylor, who had no criminal record, turned herself in to police in April and has cooperated with proceedings.
She has repeatedly expressed remorse over her son's action, calling the incident an unimaginable tragedy,
and offering her deepest sympathies to the white teacher, Abigail Zwirner.
Her son had an acute disability that required a parent to be present with him in class,
but that day the parents hadn't been able to join.
Zwirner, who taught first grade at Richneck Elementary and Newport News, was shot point blank in the chest
while trying to confiscate the Taurus 9mm from the boy, I remember seeing photographs of her.
$40 million lawsuit against the school, alleging the administrators knew about Taylor's son's
history of random violence, but did not act appropriately to mitigate potential risks.
Yeah, you know, the mother sounds like a reasonably decent person, actually.
I remember seeing photographs of her, she did not look like the ghetto lout that you
would expect to be involved in a story like this.
But anyway, yes, this six-year-old guy takes a shot at the teacher and nearly kills her.
But I guess he was just getting into training because, as we note, when the Denver Nuggets
in this would have been in the Denver Nuggets were celebrating their team's first NBA title,
quite a few people got shot. Well, as I say, you know, they start young and they keep going.
Denver Police Chief said that people carrying out a drug deal got into a fight with the downtown while the downtown crowds were still there.
At least 20 shots fired.
The police chief said that of the ten injured, five or six were just innocent bystanders.
The rest were involved in the altercation.
Nine of the injured people were men, and one was a woman.
So, we've been very careful to determine what the sexes of the people were.
Do we know the races?
Well, we don't know, but we can guess.
Tens of thousands of people gathered downtown for the boisterous celebrations.
Fans set off fireworks.
Some climbed on traffic light poles.
Police officers found bags of drugs, the shooting scene, and a number of firearms.
Now, at least four of the ten injured persons sustained life-threatening serious injuries, and the police said We could not have planned for a drug deal right in the middle of a celebration.
Well, I would say you should be able to plan for a drug deal just about anywhere, just about anytime.
We're talking about Denver, Colorado, which has decriminalized virtually every, you know, controlled substance to like, you know, mushrooms and stuff like that.
Licking frogs is probably legal in Denver, Mr. Taylor.
Licking frogs, yes.
Well, I do that every morning.
Gosh, we're running out of time.
I'm going to save this next story.
It's such a delicious story.
I'm going to save it.
More delicious than frogs.
I'm going to save it for next week.
But I believe before we do sign off, Mr. Kersey, we should let people know how to get in touch with us because we'd love to hear from you, especially if we make stupid mistakes like thinking that BLM stands for something other than Bureau of Land Management.
I'm sure the Bureau of Land Management bowed the knee to Black Lives Matter.
I bet it did.
But please send your comments, observations, corrections to amren.com, A-M-R-E-N dot com, to the Contact Us tab, and you can reach me or simply go to whatever email provider you use, and in the To field, Send an email to me, becausewelivehereatprotonmail.com.
Once again, real simple, the email address is becausewelivehereatprotonmail.com.
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