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March 24, 2024 - Stew Peters Show
01:01:18
VA accused of weaponizing mental health to limit veteran gun ownership
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Time Text
Recently in the news, we've been hearing about how our government has been...
Thinking about or intends on weaponizing things like mental health and financial instability as a way to preclude veterans from owning firearms in the future.
Somebody can make the decision that I am not fit to own a firearm due to my mental health diagnosis or the fact that I might not be so good with my money.
Well, today Jason and I are going to have a conversation about this exact same topic.
So stick with us.
Don't go away.
we start now hey everybody welcome here to the next episode of the Richard Leonard show I'd like to, as always, thank you for being here.
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Okay, so today we are going to talk about this insanity that the government seemingly wants to limit veterans who have issues with mental health and are maybe not so good with their money from owning guns.
There's many theories about why this is, and so we're going to talk about that.
So let's bring Jason in here.
Jason, how are you, sir?
Very good.
And yourself?
Very good.
It's good to see you.
I like your haircut, too, by the way.
Thanks for showing that off.
We really appreciate it.
Yeah, the old proverbial quote, I cut all three of them this time, still holds true.
Jason just recently had his ears lowered, so that's great.
Yes, yes I did.
Hey, I did want to say, before we get into things here, it's funny, I've known you for a while, listened to the show, obviously, been on it a little bit.
I've heard you talk about Cortez Wealth Management, and I hadn't actually looked at it until a week ago.
And I am just going to say, as a guy who had had some pretty ardent beliefs in what my retirement could possibly look like, I appreciate you having that.
And there were some ideas in there that I hadn't even heard of through my cycles and circles.
So, again, anybody out there that's hearing this that hasn't taken the time, I would encourage you to go out and take a peek at it.
It doesn't take much of your time to go see what you could potentially have in the future.
So, with that being said, I don't know why, I just had to do it.
Well, I mean, but here's the thing, right?
I think people get nervous about treading in new waters, so to speak.
And we get kind of comfortable in the plan we're in and the things we got going on.
And the truth is that there's a lot of places out there for you to put your money and things like that.
But when you can actually see it work...
It changes your perspective.
And so I'll just leave it at that.
But get over there.
I mean, Carlos is a great guy.
He's an America First fiduciary.
He's a God-fearing man.
He's a husband.
He's a father.
He lives in Florida, and he's an avid hockey player.
I've never understood how people who were born and raised in Florida are avid hockey players.
But it happens.
And it looks like he's pretty damn good at it.
So...
It fits in with the people here up in the North, anyway.
Well, that is Minnesota South, let's be honest.
That's true.
That's very true.
Okay, so weaponizing mental health and what I labeled as financial instability, there might be other terms.
As a way to get veterans precluded from buying and owning firearms.
Right.
What say you?
I don't know.
Um...
You know, and trying to read through it, I don't, you know, like, as with most things, I don't care what the legislation reads.
I know what the intent is, and I want to understand the intent, right?
You know, there are certainly dangerous people all over this globe, right?
That we allow in to this place.
We have people that are dangerous here.
There are certain legal procedures to get in between people utilizing the NICS system, which for anybody that doesn't know is that federal background that you need to pass when you are purchasing any firearm in America.
So the system is already there.
There are certain things that flag it, but every time that there's something that flags it, typically there has to be a judge's order, right?
Something that has gone through a court system, something that's been adjudicated in our justice system, the three tiers of government.
It's something that they need to exercise the entirety of the judicial to deem you Not able to exercise your Second Amendment rights.
And the way that I read things, and correct me if I'm wrong, or if you interpreted it differently, that we were going to lay that responsibility in the hands of bureaucrats.
And I don't know, you know, in what system we have in governance where the government can be the judge and jury.
That's why we have judges and juries.
Well, the problem about this that I see is that bureaucrats aren't really concerned about the effect of the cause, if that makes sense.
The bureaucrats care about whatever's on the paper because there is...
In my opinion, effectively some way for them to justify their existence by saying, well, you know, in order to keep America safer, we think that, you know, individuals X, Y, and Z... Should probably not own guns for their own safety, but as well as the safety of the general public.
And I would challenge that when we get to the issue of veterans for many reasons, which maybe we can get into now or we'll get into later on the show.
But my question is, what if I'm not a veteran?
And let's say as a teenager, and I'm making this story up as we go.
As a teenager, the classic Bruce Wayne story, right?
As a teenager, I was leaving the Ordway Theater in downtown St.
Paul, and we were walking back to the car to go home after a show at the theater, and I watched my parents get murdered.
I'm going to have some mental health issues.
I'm going to have some post-traumatic stress issues.
Things going on.
Some anxiety, maybe.
Who knows?
Do I then go through the same process as they're proposing for veterans?
You know, and so then it gets back to this idea of intent that you're talking about.
Is the intent to, on an even plane, judge Everybody?
Or is this just for veterans who have, mind you, of their own free will, most of us put a right hand up and chose to swear an allegiance and an oath to this country to defend it?
Effectively, the government were the ones that put guns in our hands, even though we chose to join the But the government was the one that taught us how to be expert marksmen, expert machine gunners, expert tankers, all those things.
They taught us to use the tools of war in the most effective way possible to destroy an enemy by any means necessary with all the tools of war given, right?
That's what they preach.
So, on the back side, when I have some mental issues, maybe, and I spend too much money on Call of Duty tokens, or whatever the hell they're called, or Fortnite bucks, and I can't pay my rent because I play too much Fortnite, should that really preclude me from buying a gun?
These are fundamental rights as an American.
They're the same The same rights that we fundamentally signed up to swore and defend are the same rights being stripped, theoretically, if it were all to come to fruition, from the same people who went out to defend those rights.
And I think it's odd, right?
It stinks like s*** on the surface.
Because it is s***.
It's trash, right?
And there's no question...
When you mobilize the military to go do military things, right?
It's kind of like the mess around and find out philosophy.
You know, things happen.
You know, we all come back just a little bit different.
It doesn't matter.
We've talked about that ad nauseam.
And, you know, a sign of strength is showing weakness.
And so, you know, I think the de-stigma today...
Oh, wow.
Okay.
Try it again.
Rewind.
The de-stigmatization of mental illness was number one.
I think it's a good thing to be able to talk about when you're having struggle, right?
But then to potentially be able to use that.
To take away something as important as the Second Amendment rights of veterans is abhorrent on its face.
And I'm certain, again, we're casting that big net and trying to catch 80%.
I'm not talking about the outliers.
If there's somebody that's walking in to a VA facility who is a veteran and they are truly struggling and maybe they've committed self-harm or they've done other things, Okay, let's talk about that, but why don't you actuate through the ways that are already available to you?
Bring that forward to a court and just show that this person is a true threat to themselves and to others, and then deal with that problem.
Help them out.
Maybe work them through it.
But you can't just say, these are going to be these things that we're going to put in, because we all know how they get executed.
You know, not executed, executed, but the execution of the plan or the idea.
So they roll it out and they're saying, oh, it's only going to be for this specific thing.
But then all of a sudden you've got a host of veterans who a lot of us, I speak for myself and I'm speaking for you on this one, brother, because I know we've gone out and shop before.
Everybody loves a flamethrower.
Have a little fun.
Yep.
It's one of those things that some of us decompress with.
We're not going out, we like to hunt, but we also like to just go shoot.
We like to get some primers.
I love the smell of gunpowder.
I didn't right away, I'll be the first one to say it, I didn't really have a strong desire when I got back from my last deployment.
To go out and shoot.
You know, I kind of had lost the love of being around firearms.
Enough was enough.
I didn't really need it.
Well then, you know, that love affair rekindled.
And one of my favorite things to do is just go out and shoot gongs.
You know, the one thing that people are maybe getting some therapy from, now potentially, if you're going in to be treated for anxiety, which would be no different than somebody who has anxiety in the real world, now potentially you have to defend yourself against the potential of losing a fundamental right.
It's flawed.
Well, and I would question...
And this may make me sound like an a**hole, but I really don't care.
But I would question the validity of what some people call mental illness.
With as polarized as this country is.
And as woke as some of these pukes are.
At times, bro, it seems like it's just really convenient to say, oh my God, I'm so triggered.
And I'm so offended.
And my feelings are so hurt.
And this and that and the other thing.
And so...
I don't know that this is a fight that Congress and the Senate and the United States government wants to bring to the doorstep of veterans.
Because I'm going to tell you what.
We're not giving up our guns.
We're not going to do it.
You are not...
Let me center myself for a second.
No, I was going to say, get in the middle of the soapbox, dude.
You are not.
And we just talked about this the other day on Disgruntled.
You are not going to take me in, even though I came of my own free will, and tear me down.
You tore me down all the way to the dirt.
And I was built back up.
And that was built back up by some drill sergeants that I had who were all combat infantry soldiers.
They all had CIBs on their chests, which means they were all engaged in combat at one point or another.
And they taught us.
They taught us What it means to be engaged with an enemy.
And it's not just shoot, move and communicate.
That's how we talk about it.
That's how we say it.
But it's a whole lot more intricate than that.
It's a whole song and it's a whole dance, man.
Combat is like...
I feel like if we could have drones and all these cameras like they have in the NFL where they sweep across the field and they show you the whole battlefield and you could watch a real firefight happen in real life, it's a dance.
It's chess.
With real bullets.
And I don't think that people really grasp that.
And so when we're talking about this mental illness thing, we must also remember that the dance is what you are, not you, Jason, but what you, government, is saying screwed us up.
But we learned a whole lot.
We learned a whole lot about ourselves.
We learned a whole lot about the limits of the men and women next to us.
We learned a whole lot about the limits of the enemy that we fought.
There's so much to learn.
And so, call it mental illness if you want.
And maybe that's why, maybe they call it that because that's the easy label.
They call it that because 22 veterans a day or whatever the number they want to tout now is, kill themselves.
Just outright delete themselves from the planet.
But also understand that these are the things that after 2, 3, 4, 50 times doing, it's not just another action.
It becomes a specialty, and it becomes a...
I guess a specialty is the best way to put it, in my opinion.
Like, if you look at anybody that has done any job for an extended period of time, they're going to do it better than you.
They're going to do it faster than you.
They're going to be more efficient than you are.
And they're just going to get this s*** done.
Right.
And combat's no different.
The difference is, if we're talking about being a mechanic, for example, the difference between the two is that when soldiers go out to perform their specialty, people are dying.
They're laying on the ground, bleeding out.
Their heads are blown open and brains laying on the ground.
And it could be yours, it could be the enemy's, it could be all of the above.
But you never know until the dance is over.
And so I guess it bothers me, this whole idea bothers me because, again, This is what you made.
And now you want to take away my constitutional rights.
The rights that I put a uniform on to defend.
You want to take it away?
But the real question is, for what?
Why after all of this time?
Why is this an issue now?
Yeah, I don't think they ever did it with World War II veterans.
Nope.
Not with Vietnam-era veterans.
Again, we live in an extraordinary time in clown world, where everything that we used to believe, we don't believe in anymore.
The idea, and I don't know, I did a little research, I did a little Google search on this topic, right?
And I think you did too, didn't you?
Yep.
Well, what did you come up with when you searched?
Not much.
Not much, right?
But you would think that something that's going to affect veterans would have caught the eye, something this fundamentally Wrong.
Would have caught the eye of an attorney group, a veterans advocacy group, a veteran group like VFW or the Legion or any of those.
Or a mainstream media outlet for that matter.
Or the mainstream media.
Just anyone would be out talking about the fact that this thing is being floated anywhere and people are being stripped of their rights in the same time where in the last two weeks it was at a federal level judge that said that illegal aliens or illegal immigrants or whatever the verbiage of the day is, they have a right to the Second Amendment.
All right, bro.
I'm not biting.
I'm not biting on that one.
Yes, you're right.
But that's a whole series of other shows.
But yes, you're right.
You're correct.
But that's, you know, I mean, just thinking about that foolishness on its face is enough to drive a person nuts.
The fact that you're going to, and they're not even floating it.
They've clearly written it.
They clearly are working on a pathway to get there for whatever reason, whatever the gain is.
And again, you know, it's like that old adage, right?
Like, whatever saves one life is worth everything we invest in it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Okay.
I don't subscribe to that.
And I know our government doesn't.
There's a reason that a soldier's life is worth $400,000.
Should they succumb in a combat zone?
Yeah.
Guess what?
Life has a number.
Life has a number in this world.
The only time that it doesn't, it seems like when it's...
You know, when somebody's killed or dies in police custody and they get a $400 million payout.
For some reason that life was worth 400 million and a soldier or a marine or an airman dying country and it's 400 grand.
Yeah.
How many hundreds of millions did the family of that puke George Floyd get?
The career criminal that violated and victimized women and other people.
His family got paid hundreds of millions of dollars, if I'm not mistaken.
And I'll say this as well.
When Stu Peters and I were running the streets picking up fugitives, we had to carry insurance policies, of course, in case there was a critical incident.
And we were only required to carry a million dollar umbrella policy.
The cost of a human life, whether we were right, wrong, or indifferent, If somebody died while we were performing our duties, apprehending fugitives, that policy within 12 hours pays out a million dollars.
Something like that.
It was a million dollars.
The time frame, I don't really know, but I think it was 12 hours.
But yet, when I deployed to Iraq the first and the second time, I was only allowed to purchase, I think it was $450,000 of life insurance.
If I die for my country...
We had to pay for it, too.
Yes.
Yes.
No, granted, it's a small dollar.
It's cheap.
It's cheap.
But the price of my life in a uniform that says U.S. Army on it...
It's only worth $450,000 if I choose to purchase it.
If not, I get the basic $125,000 or $75,000 or whatever the hell it was.
Who knows?
The price of a human life on the streets of Minneapolis, St.
Paul, and Minnesota, if a bounty hunter makes a mistake and someone dies, is a million dollars.
But that's just to get them off your back until you go to court and you get through the civil lawsuit.
And then God knows what they award you.
The family of a career criminal who overdosed on the streets of Minneapolis because he didn't want to cooperate with the cops...
That's worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
And why?
Because we don't want to placate to Black Lives Matter and we don't want to offend, you know, the black mayor of Atlanta or whoever the hell it was.
Who knows?
It's all bullshit.
And now, now is the time in our country's history where we tell veterans, hey, by the way, Thank you for your service, but you're not allowed to own guns anymore.
Thanks for coming in and getting help, but good news, bad news.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And then, and then, on top of, thank you for reminding me, and then on top of all of that, they got the balls to say, there's no stigma.
If you have an issue, do not be afraid to come and ask for help.
We have all the help you need.
Nobody's going to judge you.
Nobody's going to do this.
Nobody's going to do that.
We got your back.
Oh, by the way, you want a gun?
Psych!
You're not allowed.
Yeah, that ship has sailed.
Yeah.
You're out.
As a veteran who has issues, that should alarm anyone.
It should alarm people that aren't veterans thinking about this, because what will be the next hurdle?
If we're putting hurdles continually in front of the American people, and we're not putting hurdles in front of anybody else, what's happening?
What's going down?
What do you think would be the response in communities all over this country, Jason, if the federal government came out and said, hey, by the way, we think that we're going to limit the ability of purchasing a firearm.
In fact, we're going to take it away from low-income minority families.
If you make less than $30,000 a year and you have brown skin, you can't buy a gun.
Can't have one.
Yeah.
Or if you're not capable of managing your own finances.
Well, yeah.
No guns.
Or better yet, so we don't run into this problem about racism, right?
Anybody.
Anybody receiving social services, not allowed to own a gun, because clearly there's some issue going on, maybe underemployment or you're not so good with your money or you have medical condition, whatever it is.
If you're receiving social services or you're on social security disability or anything like that, no gun for you.
How about that?
What do you think that would be?
What would the reaction be to that?
Right, and that's how this has to happen.
Anybody that knows anything about anything, it has to be rolled out one way.
A lot of these oddities tend to be rolled out through veterans, right?
Because then you have to have something that you can lean back on and say, well, we put it in place here, so we can put it in place there.
And that's where I say, again, this is ground zero for another attempt at Working out some kinks to take away another fundamental right that we have.
Boy, what a wonderful way for them to start it.
Because it will give them the precedent to lean on elsewhere.
And that's what I'm saying about these veteran advocates.
Where are you?
Where are those voices out there?
You should be on the soapbox talking about this.
This is...
These are boiler point issues for anyone.
It's veteran.
It's stigmatization of mental health.
It's second amendment.
It's the freedom to exercise said rights.
This thing should hit everybody's radar.
They're busy, Jason.
They're busy folding poppies for the fundraiser coming up on Labor Day or whatever the hell it is that they sell those poppies.
Anyway, we've run short of time on the segment, but while we take a break, I want you to think of this.
What might be the psychological attachment that veterans have to their weapon systems?
Think about that.
We'll be right back.
Don't go away.
Hey folks, welcome here to the second segment of the show.
Before we took a break, Jason, I gave you an assignment, homework if you will, even if it was for a split second.
What do you think, and this is a softball, right?
This is a strategic question.
What do you think is the psychological or emotional attachment that veterans may have to their weapons?
Oh, you mean that one thing that, regardless of your duration of time in country, separated you from evil?
And kept you safe, that you would somehow get attached or connected to that thing?
Yeah.
Is that what you're talking about?
I am.
What do you mean, what would be the sentimental connection?
That's a literal connection.
I don't think anybody that's...
Not sentimental, psychological attachment.
Well, I don't...
It's certainly...
Obviously, I think psychological, but I think that's a...
You know, it's almost a physical comfort, you know?
I mean, have you ever woken up?
I mean, obviously, it's been...
Well, how long has it been for you?
Like, it's been over a decade and a half since I deployed anywhere.
I got home from my last deployment in 2012.
Okay, so my last one was an eight.
Wow, I'm old.
Yep.
But...
Yeah, but my first one was 22 years.
So, that's even crazier.
But I digress.
I still have had moments where I wake up and I do the flash dance.
And you know that stuff I'm talking about.
It's like the...
What are those night terrors that people have?
You know, like where you wake up with that paralysis?
It's kind of like the alternate paralysis where you're doing the...
Trying to figure out, you know, where is it?
You know, obviously, reality kicks in pretty quick, but that's happened.
Does that happen to you?
Absolutely it does.
It happens to me when I'm awake.
Not just waking up from sleep.
It happens to me when I'm awake.
Let's say, for example, I get super into a movie, or as I like to call them, a story, and I'm super focused on it.
And like the dog will bark or my wife will say something, you know, talking about the movie and I'll snap too and my first reaction is to look for my weapon.
And she'll go, what are you looking for?
Oh, nothing.
No, it's no big deal.
Okay.
And it's weird to me because when I'm not thinking about it and those things don't just come up out of the blue, I don't think about it.
But I ask you this question because I think that if part of the idea of removing the right for some veterans to own firearms based on mental health is a thing, we're overlooking that attachment to this thing called guns.
And so I think the general public, when they look at a gun, they see this device or this machine or this thing that is, in some people's eyes, pure evil.
It's designed to obliterate life.
And that's partly true.
I mean, the purpose of a gun is to kill things.
But when we're talking about men and women who have been trained and it's been ingrained in your system that you go nowhere, you do nothing without this piece of equipment, whether it's a rifle, a shotgun, or a pistol, whatever weapon you're assigned, it is with you 24 hours out of every day.
You take it with you to the shower.
You take it with you to the shitter.
You take it with you to bed.
You take it with you to eat.
You take it with you to the gym.
You take it with you to call home.
You take it with you everywhere.
Yeah, I don't think civilians actually understand that either.
And it becomes this security blanket.
Right?
And so you have been also trained to use this thing proficiently.
Right?
And so if sh** hits the fan and I need to pull a magazine out of my pocket and lock and load this thing and it's go time, I'm confident that I can do that.
But...
Now, if someone's telling me that I can't do that because I have some anxiety or some PTSD, you're not going to...
Taking away my guns is not going to cure my PTSD. Right.
And we've talked about it before on this show.
If I decide, as a grown man or a grown woman...
That I want to take my own life, whether I have access to guns or not, is not going to stop me from doing that.
Right.
Yeah, that's like getting rid of what's that joke about drunk driving?
Just make driving illegal after bar close?
Yeah.
It's nonsense.
I mean, if you're really worried about suicide, then spend the time to identify the people that are at the greatest risk and start to drive down the 22 a day.
You know, spend some time understanding the issues that are driving their mental illness or that are driving them to a point of exhaustion where they're making terrible decisions and not ones that are positive in trajectory.
You're going to spend all this money, effort and time and it's that input versus output.
Put it in the right place.
You know, get the people that are truly in that position to help that they need.
Just taking away their ability to purchase or procure a firearm, that's not solving any problems.
Go help a vet.
Dude, there's a website idea.
That's better than Three Clicks Media.
Helpavet.net.
Connect vets to helpavet.net.
Genius.
We're going to do this, you know, today.
So anyway, we'll do this after in about an hour.
But helpavet.net where you can get out there and connect Veterans to people that are in the community that they can get some help.
Because maybe it's not the VA. Maybe they're not getting the right meetings with the right therapists, or you're identifying somebody that just seems to be a hard case, and maybe it's because it's the VA that you're just not going to break through.
I know this in myself.
If I'm not willing to make it work, it doesn't matter what I'm doing.
Sometimes it's a change in location.
Spend the resources, the dollars.
Get the people help outside of the system.
Rather than take these Yeah, I agree.
You know, you don't, and we can't have this.
We don't live in a sterile world.
We don't live in a wonderfully balanced Petri dish.
We've got some good, we've got some bad, and you don't create punitive situations for everybody based upon a couple of bad eggs.
It just doesn't work.
Here's my question, bro.
No.
These discussions have been happening for a long time.
In many circles, in many places, in many halls, in many conference rooms, or whatever the hell you want to call it.
These talks have happened a lot, if I had to speculate.
The idea that the least watched Lowest budget podcast about veterans' issues has even a resemblance of an idea that makes a little bit of sense is alarming to me.
If we really want to combat PTSD and depression and anxiety and veteran suicide, guns aren't the issue.
Why don't we take it upon ourselves as a country, and I guess I'm speaking to elected officials and the powers that be in government places, why don't we fix the VA? Why don't we make that process...
A whole lot less painful for veterans with PTSD and anxiety and depression and guys and gals that are suicidal.
Men and women who suffer from military sexual trauma.
Why don't we make getting care at the place where we've been told has been set aside for us, why don't we make that easier?
Because to me, it seems like not such a difficult ordeal.
And I'm sure that there's a lot of things that I don't know about because I'm not a doctor.
But in theory, it seems like it shouldn't be...
You know, it's not like we need to resurrect Albert Einstein and Mr.
Oppenheimer to figure out how to make the goddamn VA work a little bit more efficiently and friendlier to the men and women that need to use it.
Yeah.
Well, and spend the dollars where they need to be spent.
There you go.
But taking away our constitutional rights...
Not the answer.
Is only going to make it worse.
What do you think is going to...
Man, this is a loaded question.
What do you think is the result of some hunyuck coming on the TV and God forbid it's that dipshit with dementia who shits pants on a daily basis, Joe Biden...
Comes on the TV and says, hey, well, you know, after further deliberation, we've decided to limit the rights for veterans to own guns based on mental health and financial instability.
What do you think the response from the community, not only the veteran community, because veterans have a lot of supporters, what's the response going to be?
What do you think?
Well, they would never come out that cleanly with it.
The message, the intent, the intent would be hidden through a delivered message that would be cloak and dagger to appear that they're really solving a very serious issue.
Again, I didn't see any demographic information about this.
But what is this issue?
Well, that's what I'm saying, right?
Like, what is the thing?
Like, nobody's saying what the thing is.
They're not talking about the cause.
Nobody's written anything that says, because of this, we want to do that.
They're just saying, people with this, we should do that.
What was there?
Is it the 22 days?
Are you talking about suicide?
Well, then I want to see the breakdown on suicides.
How many suicides were enacted with pharmaceuticals versus guns versus self-inflicted driving deaths?
You know, the multiple ways that one can take themselves out through hanging or other.
And to see, is it the firearm that's doing the most damage?
Because you don't often hear about people blowing their brains out like the proverbial 1980s and 90s.
You know, there are different ways to do it.
There are less painful ways.
There are ways that, you know, again, I don't know.
This is dark shit to talk about, I guess.
But, you know, when I hear from my friends that are law enforcement officers, you know, when they actually have a gunshot self-inflicted Whatever they call it.
Those are very few and far between.
It's actuating to another level.
Here's the easy path, the number one, the number two, the number three.
Then you've got that way up here.
That's a high barrier.
You are doing a lot of different steps to get yourself there.
You have a lot of opportunities to step back from the ledge.
I don't think that you would see a huge number in suicide.
If it's not suicides, what is it?
Well, nobody's going to ever give us that answer.
And so that's what I'm saying.
If Super Shoes goes and pops out there and he's got something to say, they're going to again.
Wait a minute.
Wait a minute.
Who the hell is Super Shoes?
You haven't seen that?
Is that Jerry Nadler?
No, Super Shoes.
Biden.
They got him some Super Grip Senior whatever the hell zips.
I don't even know.
Apparently they're supposed to help them to stop from tripping and falling all over the place.
Hopefully they got Air Force One grip on them, right?
They got bumpers.
Right.
Anyway, I'm sorry to interrupt, man.
So Super Shoes gets out there and by executive order does this thing.
Like...
We'll never know.
We can only pontificate on why.
And I don't think it's because it's going to save suicides.
I can't think of these situations where you've got massive groups of veterans going out and harming people in their communities.
You know, I'm not here for that.
So what is it?
So if you're doing it, and that's where it gets me back to that idea of setting precedent.
You can set precedent here to do it elsewhere.
You know, we've been known to do that.
You know, two weeks to slow the curve.
Or, you know, six feet of separation.
I mean, we're only three or four years removed from a place in time where they told us that a virus could be spread Or would be spread if you were standing up walking through a restaurant.
However, when you sat down to eat at that restaurant, your mask could come off because then the virus can't be spread.
And nobody, and people didn't question it.
And nobody questioned it.
So that's what I'm saying.
Like, you've literally done the exercise to see, like, okay, can we do it?
How stupid are these people?
Yeah.
Well, on a whole.
So that's, you know, that's what I'm saying.
So if you got a chance, and it's been obvious that the Second Amendment has been under fire for a long time.
And I don't think any of our amendments need to be on record, or that need to, none of them need to be looked at.
Like, they've worked pretty good for a couple hundred years.
Our Constitution is a wonderful thing.
It affords all of us freedoms.
The freedoms to disagree, the same freedoms that the people that we've probably talked about, that are maybe a little, you know, that are woke or different in ideology than us, they're afforded that freedom to have that belief.
You know, you can't push it and ask me to accept it.
Like, that's the beauty of where we are, because I don't need them to accept, you know, the things that I believe in, as long as they're not encroaching on their lives.
And so, what are you trying to do?
I mean, the 2A is a very big thing because the First Amendment doesn't mean shit without the Second Amendment.
Fair enough.
And I'm done.
I'm done.
Mic drop.
Super shoes.
But here's the thing.
If we want to have, if the goal of the government or the bureaucrats or whoever the case is, if they're looking for chaos and they're looking for pushback and they're looking for fighting in the streets, they're barking up the right tree.
And I'm not sitting here calling for veterans to take to arms and fight the government.
That's not what I'm saying.
Nobody will have to say that.
If they come out and say that you are precluded from owning guns for any reason, other than you're a felon, there's going to be chaos.
And I'm guessing that this is not the group of people that you want taking up arms against the government.
Or in some circles, maybe it is the group of people you want taking up arms against the government.
I certainly don't want that.
But that's that whole hypothetical, right?
I mean, you can go into all the potential reasons why you would want to do this or why you would even be traveling down this path.
And again, I think we hit on it before.
I mean, hell, if an illegal immigrant is afforded the Second Amendment rights, I certainly think a veteran with PTSD could be treated the same way.
A veteran with PTSD and depression...
Especially one who has served in the forward area, whether they were actively engaged in combat or not, but were there.
Probably finds more therapy, as you were explaining, Jason, in their firearms than anything else.
Right.
The idea, it's more ridiculous than...
The idea that veterans wake up every morning, possibly, and have thoughts about how they can...
They can perpetrate people or whatever the case may be with their guns because they're veterans, is more preposterous than the idea that cops wake up and put on their uniforms, load their weapon, put it in their holster, and as they're walking out of their house, go and kiss their wives and their kids and go, all right, well, we'll see you later.
I'm going to go shoot some black people today.
That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard in my life.
That's some dumb s***.
This idea is worse.
This one is more preposterous.
I mean, like, it almost gets down to the fact that I'm pissed off that we wasted taxpayer dollars even having a hearing about this.
You would think that anybody that has any testicular fortitude in that goddang room would say, this is the dumbest s*** ever.
Throw it out.
What's next?
It's a waste of time.
And it's almost, almost insulting to the men and women that serve this country.
Especially, and I hadn't heard this, Jason, until you said it.
Especially if we're given illegal border jumpers Second Amendment rights.
The ability to own guns.
After we just seen how many people in the month of February and March up to this point have been killed or injured in an extremely violent way by illegal aliens.
Right.
But there comes that one life is worth it all, right?
Well, if you could save one life by eliminating all firearms, the same could be said about the border.
If one illegal takes the life of one harmless American citizen, then the border immediately needs to be shut down.
It's the same talking point.
So one is worth it all.
Well, how many have we had?
And those are just the high enough priority things for them to have to focus on, for them to have to discuss in the news media cycle.
How many people are raped, robbed, beaten?
How many people that are Americans are standing in the food shelf lines because they're underemployed Because inflation is destroying the money that they do take home and they're not able to provide for themselves.
But because they're not in line at the food shelf early enough, the money, the food is depleted.
It's gone.
And it's going to non-citizens.
It's nonsense.
I guarantee you that when old Aunt Esther decided to donate a box of green beans and canned carrots to the food shelf, her intent wasn't to give it to a bunch of illegals who are going to pilfer it because they just got here.
They just squatted under the fence 12 hours ago.
And this may sound super archaic, Jason, but I'm becoming ever more frustrated and perturbed by this whole deal at the southern border.
And I am quickly becoming more and more of an advocate of my father's way of thinking about this border.
If we start just stacking bodies at these points of entry that they've created for themselves...
It'll stop.
We have wasted so much time and money and resources on this whole thing because Old Super Shoes decides he doesn't want to do anything about it.
Well, you know what?
Start smoking these people.
If I get on a plane and I fly over to Somalia, right?
And start infiltrating their places and sucking off their locals, that's not going to go over well.
No.
If I go to North Korea or South Korea and start sucking off the local government...
And taking things from the people that it was meant for, that's not going to go so well.
Same with Russia, same with Nigeria, same with Brazil.
It doesn't matter.
Well, you can go down to Haiti and go hang out with Barbecue.
Isn't he running the joint down there now?
Who's Barbecue now?
Where are you coming up with these names?
Okay, number one, that's really the name, and I have to say, you know where I get my news, from iFunny.
I'll try to verify it, but, you know, Haiti's in turmoil, and apparently the gang lord that's kind of running the show, his name is Barbecue.
There's a lot of cannibalism going on in Haiti right now.
So the ribs aren't just pork, huh?
I literally was looking at a meme because, you know, 90% and I hope people understand what the meme war really is, right?
Because a meme cannot be picked up easily and shut down, right?
Because it's not written and it's not any of these other pieces.
So it's a picture with the words written into the picture, which makes it harder and more difficult for them to pick up.
But literally, this was led by Barbecue.
I don't know if it was the legend, Mr.
Barbecue, in the picture, in the background, but there's a man eating a charred human leg.
Barbecue.
I looked at this and I said, Alright, that's funny.
It's got to be something else.
I always check.
I go to Fox.
I go to CNBC. NBC and ABC. Just to verify.
What the hell did I just look at?
And there's some chaos going on down there.
And has the government made any moves to get the Americans out of there that are there?
Well, I do believe that I did see that they had, you know, again, another embassy that the U.S. is running from.
I mean, I think they committed $133 billion or not, I don't know how much money, let me just take it back.
I don't remember.
I think the number 133 stuck out.
I was like, oh, great!
Now the same old people that were down in Haiti for a long time taking a lot of money to go fix that.
They really seem to nail it.
I hope they get more money.
Great.
Okay.
We've run out of time.
So let's get to final thoughts.
Jason, quickly, you've got 30 seconds.
Final thoughts on today's conversation, please.
Alright.
We have a constitution and we have amendments for a very specific reason.
To afford every American citizen the opportunity to express those rights.
Anyone who is having those rights infringed upon should be angry.
And veterans and disabled veterans who have mental health challenges or problems If their cases are not brought to a court to be adjudicated to be deemed unfit financially or due to mental defect, and a bureaucrat makes even one decision, that was far too many.
Period.
Agreed.
I agree a thousand percent.
And folks, Jason's getting a lot better at this final thought thing.
Good work, buddy.
I want to recognize that because I think it's important.
I didn't even get mad this time.
There you go.
Okay, so my final thoughts to wrap up the conversation are this.
There are many things that we could be spending time on to make lives of veterans better.
The idea that anybody in the United States government is wasting time talking about taking guns away from veterans who are not felons...
And who aren't seemingly posing a risk to the general public is preposterous to me.
In fact, this could have a completely opposite effect And cause some kind of revolution or some kind of uprising.
And as I said before, this is not a group of people, in my opinion, that you want uprising against you, the government, or anybody else.
The fact of the matter is that men and women who serve this country, they want to be left alone.
They want to be left alone to live out their days in whatever comfort they can find.
And like Jason said, if that becomes that you like going to the range and shooting bottles or whatever the heck it is, then by all means, go do that.
But by no means are any of us, in my opinion, going to sit back and let some politician tell me, well, you know, you have some mental health challenges, or...
You know, it'd be really nice if you were better with your money.
So until you can figure out some financial stability or whatever, we're going to take your ability to purchase guns away.
Go ahead.
And this is truly a fuck around and find out scenario.
And I apologize for my language, but there's no other way to put it.
Stop messing with the men and women that just want to be left alone.
They did their thing.
Majority of us did it honorably.
Just let us be.
Let us ride off into the sunset and just be.
Hopefully, hopefully that'll happen.
But I guess that remains yet to be seen.
Anyway, I want to thank you all for being here.
Jason, thank you for your time, sir.
And we will see you all next week.
Take care of yourselves and have a great night.
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