Live from the Pathway Studios in Johnston proper. You are live from the path. Well, you're listening to Live From The Past. We're coming from the Pat Boys Studios here in Johnston Proper. Left to the right. That's how you get here. That's not those are legit directions. Yep. Good luck.

Hey. Welcome to the show this week. And it's it's an interesting show. We we were just I had a couple of things that I wanted to cover. I mean, maybe I'll hit up a couple articles. But Dan's got, like, this giant question. And he tried Facebook. And I'm not Dan, I don't know if I'd say it was a disaster, but I'm not sure it it actually moved anything towards solving what you were asking. I I think it just proved what I was saying. Yeah. So so what what what's what was the basic question? I mean, basically, I say, hey. What's what's the endgame in in in America right now? Like, everybody hates each other. There's there's no neutral. You're you're good or bad. You're evil. You're terrible. You know, everybody wants to shoot each other. Yep. Like, where where are we going with this? And then people start taking sides. I'm like, no. Wait. I'm just this is my point is, like, maybe we need to get along, you know? Did you think that, like, just by putting it in such a stark reality, people would step back and go, yeah, man. This isn't getting us anywhere? I guess. I thought.

I know. I had some little phrase in there that people one guy was like, well, I can't believe you you you said this. That shows what side you're on. I'm like, I I of course, I have a side. I'm a thinking person, but Right. That wasn't my point. You know? Like like, we really need to get along. I mean, we need to I don't know what it is. Every half the people always think that whoever the president is at the time is illegitimate or they stole the election for the last several elections. Right. This is not a new conversation. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And both sides. You know? So it's not like, boy, those Republicans are idiots, those Democrats are idiots. We're idiots, and we all hate each other. Yeah. How many people were in The United States do you think I wonder what the population of The United States was in like 1,800. Can you look that up, man? Yeah. Okay. Let me find out here. Yeah. Yeah. You go. Yeah. I've been wondering that myself for unforeseen reasons. I couldn't write a paper on that the other day. In 1,800.

Okay. Hold on. Google says, woah. This is a crazy specific count. From the eighteen hundred hundred census, it was five million three hundred and 8,483. Okay. How many people we got now? Today's population k. Well, the so we're in the middle of a census, so this is gonna be old. Current US population is gonna be it's like 330,000,000. Right? Three three hundred twenty eight point two as of 2019. We've grown.

I mean, here's my question, is we're gonna set aside the thing that you brought up just for a second, and just maybe look at some facts here. Probably the last three election cycles, we've been pretty split, right? Like electoral colleges calling the winner of the populist vote is pretty I mean, for all intents and purposes, it's fiftyfifty, right? A lot of the lawsuits and a lot of the challenges are coming from trying to count three eighty million votes, or however many people are actually voting, right? So if the population in, say, 1,800 was 5,000,000, and I don't know how long the process was to count votes back in 1800, I'd assume it was longer than a day.

But if we've set the bar, let's say 50% of the country votes, is that pretty close? Well, it's like 150,000,000. It's like 72,000,000 for yeah. Right. A 100 I mean, just the sheer amount of work that we're trying to get done in a total of like fifteen hours, and then we go, hey, man. There's a discrepancy here and there. I mean, do I expect us to be off a count or two here and there trying to move a 150,000,000 pieces of information in, like, fifteen hours, I think I I I find that reasonable. I don't expect us to be off, you know, a 100,000 or so. That seems a bit extreme. But, I mean, I I think what I'm getting at is maybe we're asking more out of the system than the system can even allow. It doesn't matter what kind of whiz bang machinery we come up with that's supposed to count dots and digits and whatever. There's that's just a lot of information to move, you know, in fifteen hours.

Don't you think? I think it's a it's a well, I think it's a mammoth undertaking that has been exacerbated by our demand for, hey, man. I need to know who the president is before I go to sleep tonight. Instant results. And then when you find out, they're like, oh, well, that's our new president. No. Not for three months. Just give it a minute. It's not time yet. And not really. It's just what the news thought. Right. Right? Yeah. It's what x news organization thought or y news organization thought. And, like, I get it. Like, there's for notions of planning, you kinda wanna get the gist of what's going on. Oh, stop acting like two days is gonna be that big of a deal to you. They're not. No. Not to me. I mean, the the oncoming president, perhaps. I mean, still two days. Seriously. I don't know. I think we should be able to do it, though. I bet you the guy at Visa headquarters every night sits and pushes a button and says, Woah, good sales today.

And it's pretty accurate. I mean, isn't that the gist of it? This is where we start talking about levels of government, right? But part of this is involved on the state level, how they're gonna do it, what they're gonna use to count it. Look at our own caucus this year. Was embarrassing. That's a good point. The guy at Visa controls his entire infrastructure. A federal election relies on hopeful cooperation Yeah. On

countless counties and municipalities who are gonna count votes however they want to. Like, it's kind of the it's the protection within our system. It is the kerfuffle within the system. They're talking about that for the vaccine too. They're like, hey, man. We can get these vaccines, and we're gonna get them on planes. And the UPS and FedEx are gonna shake hands and hug each other, and they're gonna distribute this through these two different sections. And they're like, soon as you fly into a state, it's a freaking whole different ballgame. What does Montana wanna do? Yeah. Because the federal government doesn't dictate that. And you don't want the federal government dictating that, but it also means it's not as easy as I control the whole infrastructure. And voting's like that. And so I mean, I'm not saying that it's actually not part of the question that you ask, but I think some of our expectations are a little wild here. You know, on the way that the We're more pressed for expediency than we are correctness.

Know? Do you think that we'd have a lot of the battles, like all the recounts, you think we'd have them anyway if you said, look, you're gonna get the results in a week? Yeah. Because it's not about that. People want their person to win. Well, I mean, that's probably true too. Like, I mean, anybody, if you really want your guy to win and you think and you're like, hey, man, I wanna recount. Just check it. Double check it. Make sure that there wasn't something and then, if you have mistrust for people on the other side, then you're gonna want them to count it again. Actually, I do that with my bank account where it's a little lower than I think, I'm like, review the statement. Yeah. Check it again. Something something went afoul, and then you read through the details and you oh, hot dog. I did spend all that money. I did that. I I sure did. Yeah. Well, that money is certainly gone. I've never I don't think I've ever found an error. Felt one time one time in my adult life have I found an error on a bank account where, like, some sort of online company charged me for something. It was like a dating website. And that was difficult to explain to my wife of three years at the time. Zazzle or something like that. And I'm like, what the flying heck is Zazzle? And like, I I don't know how it happened, but somehow they charged me for some sort of membership. And so we got it cleared up. That was it. Every other time between you and me and the dog here,

my bank account has gone under many a time. And I said, boy, what's happened in here? Something's gone wrong. And I thought, I looked at it just like Mike said and said, yep, sure enough, I spent every dime of that. I sure did. Yeah. I suppose maybe the difference is is in the past three election cycles, even after you reviewed the bank statement, you went, no. No. An error has to be. There has to be one. It's gotta be. Gotta be wrong. And and and every time we drag this out, and it breeds nothing but mistrust for the new incoming administration, and and and to Dan's point, and to the question that we're asking is, look, what's the endgame here? What do we try do we think that eventually I mean, if we're theoretically split right down the middle and no one gives an inch, then what do we think is gonna happen here? You know, where do we think this train's gonna go? Do I have to keep hating my neighbor? Yeah. I mean, I don't want to. That takes a lot of energy. Here's the thing is that the I have a hard time bouncing between

like a healthy amount of understanding and then just straight apathy. Apathy is easier. Right? Look, I just don't care about this anymore. I'm I'm done getting all worked up about it. I don't even wanna talk about it. I just think it's dumb. Or, you know, can we reasonably try to understand each other and see if we can get some common ground? Apathy actually turns easier, and then in the middle is, let's try to get common ground, and then there's just, we're not I'm not moving. I will sit in this couch until the day I die and stand where I think I should stand, and then there's no discussion. So so you know what's interesting is that this whole this whole question about, hey, man, like, what's the end game here? Like, do do how do we have to keep treating each other like this? Or how how will this ever stop?

It's very much like a dear life from the path where someone calls in about their spouse. Because like, if you notice, it's played itself out ever since Bush versus Gore. And then something goes on in the presidency and then the next the next cycle, the other party gets elected and they and so someone goes, hey man, Now now let's all rally behind this president. And the other side goes, I don't wanna because you didn't rally around my president. And so like, you're allowing the person who you perceive to be your enemy to dictate your behavior

Mhmm. Every time. Hey. Hey. Like, you know very well that someone goes, hey, man. For the good of the country, let's figure out where we can agree. Let's let's be clear about where we can't, but let's figure out how we can, for the good of the order, get this thing moving in the in the right direction, give people a chance, or whatever that you're gonna do. Yeah. And but but like, I I've not seen a coherent argument. I didn't see it from anybody on the Trump side in this election, and I didn't see it on anybody on the Democratic side when Trump was elected. They just said they didn't give a coherent argument as to why they wouldn't support or try to find some level of unity. They just said, you didn't, so I won't. And that's embarrassing.

Mhmm. Because like, that that's not a moral center. That's letting the that's that's letting your enemy and that's the harsh way to put it, but like, it's it's letting the person you are who is opposed to you be the teacher of how you are to act. And like how you don't feel foolish doing that, I cannot figure out. I I I cannot understand. And like and that's exactly what this notion that's that's why we have this very clear separation is to say, I hate this guy, I hate people that support this guy, and you're telling me that I should be the higher, the more gracious character, and I refuse. And I'm not going to do that. And then they spend the first two years of their administration tearing down whatever the last guy did. And so whatever you thought you were gonna get done in four years, actually, now you're down to by the time you're done tearing down what the guy did for your first two years, now you're running for reelection by year three and and firing up the campaign trail. And we wonder why we can't get nothing done. Right. Actually, thought that about and here's the deal, it's it's why, you know, traditionally, they warn things about executive order Yeah. Because someone can just come in and do it. And there and it was funny. I I read I read something somebody posted and say, hey, Biden's gonna come in and look at this. Look what he's gonna do. He's gonna come in and within the first hundred days, by executive order, he's gonna reverse this and reverse this and reverse this. And they were all upset. And I thought to myself, that's exactly what I would do if I were him. And the guy before me jacked it up with executive orders from my perspective. The very thing I would do is do my very best to keep my campaign promises in the cleanest and quickest way possible, which is to issue a bunch of executive orders. That's Don't be don't be foolish to act like this isn't exactly what you would want your man to do if he won. Of course, you would,

which is why they shouldn't do it that way. But since no one's gonna take the high road, this is what this looks like, and you're like, Biden's a jerk because he did this. That's exactly what Trump did. It's exactly what Obama did. It's exact I don't know if Bush senior Bush did some. Yeah. But some. I think the executive order stuff ramped up. It got it got a little worse in the back half of Obama's presidency, and then Trump just went full on, and then Biden will go full on to combat it and see what It's just gonna get worse and worse. Yeah. And so but it's that's where that's where I get that's where we need to knock it off. Yeah. Is you look if you look at Biden and go, how dare he? And you didn't look at your guy and go, how dare he? Because if you're not protecting the system, then you're just for a guy. And you're willing to get it in any way you want. And I this came up, I guess, directly. I was kinda praying on this earlier this week just on how to, I don't know, talk to people or because I just wanna yell at people. I was knocking off. But like, what came popped into my head was be faithful in the means God will handle the ends. That's what popped into my head. And I say I say that every week, we sign off with that. And like, how much of this stuff in the political realm is being faithful in the means? It's not. It's dictating the ends. I'm gonna I'm going to force, like, regardless of of whether if there if every indication is that, like, things didn't end up and my guy was not elected, I will force it him to continue to be in power one way or the other, or I will make it a living whole

for whoever's trying to govern from here until I get my way. That's childish behavior, and it's not being faithful in the means. I mean, I can I can even understand people saying, well, I can't compromise with, you know, whatever issues, whatever Certain things? From opposite sides. But at least just say, oh, shoot. I lost. Well, next time just like a sports event. You know? Right. I'm a Hawkeye fan. If they and and if they're playing Iowa State and Iowa State wins, I'm like, oh, man. That stinks. Well, next game. Right. I mean, you know, you just We'll get it next time. We got another election coming in two years, you know, then in another two years, and then in another. You know? So rather than just continually hate each other, that's my fear is we continually hate each other. Yeah. I have people I really like who are on the other side of the spectrum politically than me. Yep. And, like, they've they've banned me from their life because they know I I I think differently than them. Yep. I think, well, that's so sad. That is so sad. I mean, I like people. I I hate some of the stuff they stand for, but I love people. Well, and and here's the thing, is that how if if if you if wanna be in the business of helping change people's minds, you can't do it by saying, will not associate people who don't believe what I believe. That's how Jesus did it. Like,

think of it this way. If one of the great okay, I'm gonna go into a slight bit of detail, but I don't I don't wanna get caught up in the weeds here. But like, I think one of the great mistakes that the Trump campaign made was trying to it was really nailing home the risk in mail in ballots. Now, I think it's an understandable question. The question of of doing it on a scale of which we didn't do and the possibility of manipulation is worth a look. It's worth understanding. But they hammered it so hard that like they actually cut off the people who would be willing to vote by mail for them who couldn't get out that day or like whatever.

Like they would because they mistrust the mail system, they they wouldn't do that. They wouldn't absentee vote. And so, like, that's why all the ballots that are coming in in days two, three, four, especially in states like Pennsylvania, they're not coming in for Trump supporters because no one would absentee vote because they don't trust it. Mhmm. And like, I know what they were trying to do, but like, you you actually made it harder for people who might have voted that way and and who wouldn't because you told them not to trust it but then didn't get didn't get out to vote. It was it wasn't ever going to work out for you because of what you did. And so like, I think that was a mistake by the Trump campaign. I think they think they were trying to do one thing. I think they accomplished the opposite thing. But like, the point is to say, is that like, if you don't recognize where you made a mistake, you can't improve upon that for the next election. Like, if you wanna spend the next four years going, look, we are all about protecting the integrity of the election. Here's the things that Republican congressmen fought to make sure that the that the next election is where you're confident in, feel free to absentee vote all you want, then you've learned some of your lessons. But like, if you've not done that, you're gonna make the same mistake again and you're just gonna blame that the system failed as opposed to the high possibility that you actually didn't do a great job. Like they people didn't elect you because they didn't want to. And like you can't learn that lesson if you're so tied up in one, you hate one guy and two, that the system is so fundamentally flawed that people don't trust it anymore. And like that's not dismissing

legit questions that probably exist around was the integrity of the election good. I think they're legit questions. I think you should figure them out because we should all trust the election. But like there has to be a point where you say, look, it it it was good and we lost and we need to learn something from it. We can't learn from other people and we can't learn from our situations if we simply deny the reality of the fact that like we ended up on the on the side that we didn't wanna be on. And that that's, I think, part of the thing. There's it lacks we were just talking about, like, a month ago. We lacks humility. It lacks humility to go, look, our message wasn't compelling. Look, we didn't have a great we had a great get out the vote strategy in Florida, but we we didn't do very well in Wisconsin, and we needed to do well in Wisconsin. We can't learn from it. Well, I mean, think there's two things at play here, right? Like, one, when you're trying to figure out something, the failure is worth just as much as the success, right? Like, you I was just talking to one of my daughters about this tonight. Like, we were trying to do something. We were trying to burn a CD, right? And it wasn't working very well. It would play in, like, computers, but not on on stereos or whatever, you know? And I said, okay, here's what we'll do. We'll do this. We're gonna try this this different route. If it works in the computer and fails in the car, the failure tells us something, right? It tells us it gives us an idea of what's wrong. And so, like, don't be mad when we fail, be excited that we have we can take something off the list or we can help guide what our our next effort in a different way. So the failure tells us just as much as

a success does, you know? You sounded like Thomas Edison there. Yeah, it's true. Mean, this is my whole day, right? This is what I do for a job. People are always like, did you find the problem? I said, nope, but I can tell you what it ain't. And so that gets us really pointed in the right direction, know, because I'm not out surfing the weeds, you know? But the second thing is is like, I don't know that anybody can actually claim real victory here. Like, we're winning by the skin of our teeth Right. On on every election. We're barely screeching by

that people support you. And then you show up in your suit and you're banned and we play the stuff, and we're like, this is a guy everybody's excited. You know full well that's not true. No. Though 48% of the country goes, nope, this is not what I wanted. And then and and so, like, you we're not winning. America's not winning here. Right. You know? And so There is no mandate that everybody says they have. Right. Yeah. I mean, everybody's like, finally, I got what I wanted. That means you agreeing to be diametrically opposed to half the people in your country. And so I realize that we have to pick, like that your ideas

are gonna navigate you to sides, right, to picking positions. That's just normal. Ease of buckets. Right, no problem. It is a bit of a humility thing and it's a bit of putting others before yourself thing. If you can step back and go, what's the famous JFK thing, right? Don't ask what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country. Nobody thinks like that. Here's what the country can do for me. And

no one can take a step back and go, look, here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna lose on social justice probably. I don't think we should I think we should I love the wall. We should build this wall. I think it's the best thing ever. I don't think that this administration's gonna pursue that. Right? So you can either fold your hands and sit down in a corner and weep, or we can focus on some of the other problems that we got going on and figure out what we're going to do. But the odds of them being completely in step with everything you think, that's not even true in your own party. You fool? Right? No one thinks that. That you can't even find a neighbor down the street that's gonna agree with half the things you say. Well, paint your mailbox pink, see what happens. Right? You're gonna get you're gonna get hate mail from everybody on your circle. So, I mean, you're living in a fool's world. Even think of the even think of the process the of, like, trying to decide who was gonna run either on the Democratic side or the Republican side from from forty years ago. Like, you got 15 people on the stage. And, if they were all the same guy, we wouldn't be having these debates. Yeah. We wouldn't bother having them on there. So like even within the same party, you've got completely you've got different personalities, you've got people who are

who who have different strengths and weaknesses, and frankly, different positions Yeah. On various things within your platform. And so I think that's that's that's key point number one and I think gets to the question to to one of the the realizations that like, where where do we go from here? Is like, one of the ways that you solve the the blockade is a recognition that nobody's nobody succeeded. Nobody like out and out won in such and haven't for years, for for decades. No one has won in such a way that it was a slam dunk that your idea took the day. Like, you were winning by by thinnest of margins. This is why we were talking about differences between electoral college and popular vote. And like,

at at the end of it, like, this wasn't a 90% election and nothing has been. And like, we are we live in in a country of which it never will be. Like, you're not going to run into that, which means that, like, whatever whatever part of this process you took as a build to your own ego because you were associated with this party or you pulled the lever for that candidate, it is mistakenly placed. And the same thing I would say is the is of is the fact is if you didn't win, if your guy didn't win, like, a record number of people voted for both candidates here. And so, like, it doesn't mean your idea it doesn't mean the ideas are terrible. It doesn't mean that that you don't have like minded individuals who can help get things done. And, like, boy, what a power that it is like minded individuals trying to get something done, if only we would use it for good. And so, like, the question is like

what I'm struggling on, Dan, on your question is I suppose is to ask is what would what would the reasonable middleman answer that question as? Like like, what what are we actually trying to do here? Because like, most people are answering the question as what are you trying to do? What the thing that I want and what I want only and disregard that other people don't agree with me, don't care about it, don't want it. I think it's best and I think we should do it. Which is how you which is frankly how most of the time you want your politician act. Again, see first hundred days executive action promises. And so, like, if we don't want people to act that way, I I don't know. How do you get people to change the way that they're thinking? Because, like, the guy did win and that when he has power, he will do what he thinks is right even if you don't agree with it.

But what well, like, how do you un muddy the waters on this thing? Yeah. That's the that's the $100 question. Think I mean, here's the the the answer has to be humility. Yeah. You know I mean, how many times have you come up with an idea, right, and implemented it, and it went so south, and it shouldn't have. Right? I I mean, on paper, you thought, this is great. Like, you know, you decide you're gonna hand out a bunch of here's what we're gonna do. We're gonna pack up 2,000 lunches a day. We're gonna take them downtown, we're gonna feed the homeless with them. This is what we're gonna do. Right? This is a straightforward plan. We make the lunches, we hand them out to homeless people. No big deal. Well,

you get down there, and you start handing out the lunches, and people are taking three at a crack. You know, you're like, woah. Woah. Woah. What's what's going on here? Or or all of sudden, you know, the it's just people who aren't even homeless are are taking the lunches too. Yeah. And then you're like, oh, man. Why isn't this working? It was straightforward. The homeless need the lunches. We made the lunches. We were gonna give the lunches to the homeless people, and all of sudden, it's gone way off the rails. This is what the government happens. Right? You come up with a smooth idea from your armchair, and you're like, this is how it should work. Reaganomics is a perfect example. This is how it should work. If there's money up here, it'll flow down to the bottom. This is exactly how it should work. And then you you let the thing play out over years and you're like, I mean, it didn't quite exactly turn out exactly how I thought it was going to. Yeah. You know? That's government. And and and it's as much as as as I think there are people that probably deserve a black hat in this conversation, I think a lot more of them are gray hats. Right? I think they really are trying to do what they believe to be best for the country, and they don't agree with going about it the same way you would go about it. Some of it is morally wrong, which we can't get on board with. Some of it is just a difference of ideas and approaches.

Right? There's some people that believe that employees have to be managed down to the gnat, otherwise, they will stray. And other people were like, I don't care, man. I trust them. They'll do what their job is, and then they'll come tell me when they're done. Right? Both can accomplish the exact same goal, they're just two different approaches. And I think a lot of what we're fighting about are the approaches. You know, sometimes we're fighting about things that just it's just not your preference. Like I said, there's morality stuff that we can't really bend on, but preference stuff? Yeah, sure. I think we can have a conversation about that, and some of that stuff we need to unclench our fists a little bit and go, Well, if more people were persuaded the way that I think, maybe this election would've gone differently. Or maybe if more people were persuaded that's why we won this election, because people are more persuaded of our approach. And some of it, it really is an approach, not

everything the guy says is gold, you know? It's weird that this boils down to the golden rule. Right? Like Yeah. It's just like and it it goes back to the shallowness of, hey, look how they treated our guy and so I'm gonna be like that. Like, you're just getting you're dragged in you're getting dragged into a mud fight with the with the worst and most vocal of whatever it is you think your opposition is. I remember this about the people who are excited

about the vote count. And and there's there's measures of of people talking about violence related to this, and they're like, hey, man. But look at those people who trashed the courthouses and burned the cities. And I'm like, yeah, that was wrong. But, I mean, what is what's your option? Because that sounds like their option to me. That sounds like you just agreed to join them in the mud pit. If that was wrong then, then it's wrong for you. I get it's not easy. It doesn't make the splash. It doesn't

make the newspaper. It makes it feel like you're not bold to just be faithful in the means. But it is how you solve the problem. And like, I think I think to a certain extent, especially with Christianity as as we intermix in politics, is we feel like it makes us look weak. Like, to to just be to try to handle things in the faithful way, to try to handle things as as being makers of peace. If you're not the guy yelling, then you're got then you're the guy that get that's getting trampled on. That isn't our situation, but that's what it feels like. And so, like, I I that's that's been my biggest disappointment. And the same thing happened between the Obama and and and Trump transition too. But there was a lot of there was a lot of, hey, I hate the way that those guys do things. I'm gonna do the the same things. I'm just gonna do it from my side. I'm like, fail. Fail. You look ridiculous. And like, unless we have some integrity in how we're going to go about some things,

then then it doesn't it doesn't matter. You're you're the same animal. You think you're different. The the extremes of far right and left are essentially the same go they have the same methods of they're just trying to accomplish the opposite things, and neither of them are acceptable to me. And so, like, I I don't know. I'd like I guess, this if the stalemate the the stalemate gets fixed in the middle. Right? Like, I don't think you're gonna fix it on the on the extremes. That doesn't seem right to me. It seems like it fixes in the middle. And frankly, I've seen a lot of middle folks acting weird. Doing weird acted got got weird behavior, like taking on characteristics. Like,

maybe I'll say this to you. If you're if you're a middle ground, and I mean, whatever, just just put yourself not extreme on either side of something. You find you you believe yourself to be a reasonable human being. And let's let's say this, is that like, as you look at it, you're gonna it's it's tiring to be to feel like you're on the wrong side of something. It's it's tiring to to be faithful in the means because you've seen people accomplish the ends in other ways. Ahem, executive order. Right? I'm not saying it's not wrong not completely wrong to use executive order. I'm just telling you it's they're shallow victories that are easily taken away. And see how happy we were if your guy did the thing that you wanted and we celebrated and then you acted like the devil himself took office when those were reversed. You took a shallow route. It's harder to it's much easier to overturn than if we would've codified it into law. And so the thing is is that you're being dishonest. You're being dishonest. You're misrepresenting what's And going it's kinda foolish. Yes. You're being fooled. Right? You're part of a big foolish wheel, like passing a passing a bill and then not funding it. Right? That's the kind of fools parade that you're part of, where it looks like you won something and you look you won nothing? You won absolutely nothing. Yeah. And it's I guess it's just not being there's no don't it's it lacks integrity to claim false victories. It lacks integrity like, hold your people to the fire. So so I'll say this. I'm I'm hit and miss on Trump. It just depended on the day and what was going on.

But, like, there were there were a a good chunk of false victories. There were good where I'm like, that wasn't a win. It was just it was a show. There are some things that were, like, straight up long term victories and that you could reasonably go, yes. That's what I wanted. And that was great, and it was a success. But don't lie to yourself about one over the other. And, like and don't settle for that. Like, hold your just because you end up being bucketed into a party, which I get for convenience sake ends up happening to most people. Okay. Fine. But, like, it doesn't mean you have to behave in that way. It doesn't mean you have to you can't hold your leaders accountable in that way. And so, like, I I I guess the the the staunch I hate you, you hate me, and we're gonna just to see who's the louder hater based upon who's in office. It's a false premise because you weren't the victor. Your ideas weren't the victor. You don't agree with your party all the time anyway. And frankly, a lot of things that you claim were victories. If a different guy was in office, he would have done the exact same thing and they were false to begin with. Like, you're not reading your situation correctly. And I frankly, I find it harmful to Christian witness. I I I do find it harmful, again, both sides of the aisle, to Christian witness

if you look like you're bought and sold. If you look like you don't have a free thinking mind that God gave you, if you can't look at a situation objectively without someone telling you what to think about if you can't if you can't reasonably look at and again, we'll just we'll just lay in the plane here. If you can't reasonably say, I fully expect Joe Biden will come in and do executive orders up the tank for the first hundred days because that's exactly what I wanted my guy to do and go, that's not evil. It's what people would do when you elect them. Okay? Now you may think that whatever he does with the executive action is evil. Fine. You you do what you want. But like, he's not abusing power unless your guy abused power. So, like, at least be objective about this because you look foolish. You look silly when you act that way. We look silly for for accusing Obama the same thing. And so and and frankly, Democrats look silly accusing Trump of the same thing. Either we need to knock it off

or we need to recognize that's part of it. I don't care which one it is, frankly, but, like, you're being dishonest. I care less about your political party. I do. I have seen a lot of Christian behavior that is so disappointing because it mixes religious fervor that you should have for Yahweh alone, and it mixes it up in your politics. And it takes and it and it has there's a lot of personal ego float in it. And it's really disappointing, and it's a losing game. Here okay. Here so here, I'll share what I had. I was reading this morning in in Jeremiah, and like, this is the part this is rough. This is this is part of Jeremiah. It's like sixteen, seventeen, 18.

God is basically saying, you tell them this is gonna go terribly. Like, and I and I'm not not going to relent. Your your spouses are gonna die. Your kids are gonna there's going to be a famine in the land, and don't even bother burying or weeping because I'm not listening. Like, it was it was it was fierce. So in in chapter 17, I'm just gonna read the first part of where this shows up. It says, the sin of Judah is written with a pin of iron. With a point of diamond, it's engraved on the tablet of their heart and on the horns of their altars while their children remember their altars and their Asherim, beside every green tree and on the high hills and on the mountains in the open country. Basically, they're worshiping the wrong thing. They've they've put their focus away from Yahweh and they're worshiping the fake idols and gods around them. I think that is slightly appropriate here. Your wealth and all your treasures, will give for spoil as the price of your high places for sin throughout all your territory. You shall loosen your hand from your heritage that I gave to you and I will make sure you serve your enemies in a land that you do not know. For in my anger, a fire is kindled that shall burn forever. Here we go. Thus says the Lord, cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord. That was the part that stuck with me. How much how much of our effort and our anger and our energy

is is stuck on man sized things? And like, for all the for all the places I've seen, and this showed up on Dan's post, not from Dan, but from people who are reacting to it, but I I've seen it a ton of other places of the concern about the indication

of of the end of the world because of such and such, you know, government is changing or who we elected or whatever. Like, boy, how narrow. How narrow a look on life we have to say this petty government squabble The United States has in 2020 is the indication of an end times when we are frankly guilty of the very things that that Yahweh is talking to Jeremiah about. Also also were not mentioned in the Bible at all. And we've only been a nation for like two hundred fifty years. Yeah. Yeah. Agreed. So but, like, cursed is the man who trusts in man. Like, the thing that you feel like is letting you down is a man institution. It's a human institution.

It was always going to let you down. It was never serving the kingdom of Yahweh. The actions of his people and their faithfulness is irrelevant to the government authority going around you. Hey. It is could could things be different now than they were under a Trump presidency? Yes. Probably. I thought I thought that the end of the world happened when when Obama was elected. The end of the world was we were saved when Trump was elected. It's the end of the world again. This is stupid. This is so dumb. So so so dumb. It is way too narrow of a thing. What what and I was talking about this with the fellows when I came in is I was thinking, like,

we we we're big we're bigger picture than this. We're bigger picture than this. We're gonna function over whatever government is here. And what what what what the the thing that you're so worried about happening, we're already guilty of as a nation. It doesn't this it didn't change with the president. It didn't improve on the last president. K? We're idle factories, have been, will continue to be. We legally allow people to kill their children. Still true. Has been true for quite a long time. Right? So all the big things the big things that you're worried about have been codified as law for the last decade. They didn't change under the Trump administration. And so I I don't know what is it that you're flipping out about here. Hey. I I don't think I'll be able to put the 10 commandments at the courthouse. Yeah. You lost that. We lost already. Hey. The government doesn't doesn't allow the prayer in school. Hey, we we don't get to have the chaplain we want praying at the State House. Lost it all. It's been gone, folks. You're gone. Hey, in fact, it was a farce. It was a farce and it was facade to make it think like the any part of the government in The United States was representing the work of Yahweh. Individual people perhaps,

but like the notion of the government doing that was blindness. It wasn't true anyway. And so I don't even know what we're lamenting here. I think there's an impact of a change of guard. Yes. Yes. And I think it's true, and I think it's real on people, and there's there's there's things that I pray about in regards to that. Frankly, they're not entirely different to things I was praying about in the Trump presidency or the 10 presidents before there. But like, I just I just I I I read that and I thought, cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength. Our woe is right now is almost entirely related to a misplaced trust in man and his institutions. And we need to repent of that. I don't mean we need to just let it go and be involved in politics a little bit less. I mean, you need to repent of your misplaced trust in man. Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord. We need to repent of that directly.

And then deal with whatever may come. Here's what I see. A lot of the things that would that that you may be worried about under a under a new president seem like excellent ministry opportunities to me. Seem like excellent opportunities to say true things, to advocate for being faithful in the means. And and and frankly, I I I had this conversation with somebody. Is it was not different. It's not different than the Trump presidency. Same. Hey. Hey. That guy doesn't always tell the truth. Agreed. Be faithful in the means.

Hey. He does the judge thing that we like. Great. Be faithful in the means. Oh, I mean, what? I just I'm I'm missing. I'm missing it. And maybe I've checked out. Maybe maybe that's maybe I've checked out and don't realize it. But, like, I I don't know. Like, I feel like we're caught up on something. Like, what good let me ask you this. What good does it do to pronounce this maybe the end of the world? To what advantage is that? Why do people do that, Dan? I don't know. Why is why is it we do that? Well well, you know, they they they think I think because what Trump did some good things for for in their opinion for Jerusalem and Israel, you know. Yeah. And and he's somehow connected to prophecy and yeah, so this is like something, the beast is rising up.

Mean, there's just stuff I'm going, woah. Here's the deal. Woah. I really, I mean, I think of the beast as, I mean, a metaphorical impressive beast. Would not say that this election campaign has produced a beast. Right. I mean, revelates, regardless of whether you take it literally or figuratively, it gives the sense that this is a formidable character. Yeah. Mhmm. I mean, are we really saying that the next US president is formidable character? Because I'm not seated. Yeah. 1%. 1% victory. Formidable.

Yeah. I mean, yeah. He's just not I mean, we look silly. I'm saying I'm sorry. You look silly. Stop that. Here's where here's here's where I think that we've that It's a proportion discussion, especially with evangelical conservatives. I think it's a proportion issue. You exist in a land where you have the freedom and probably the duty to participate in politics.

You have allowed that proportion to You grab that freedom and run with it, right? Generally, the way that Jesus deals with other people and the way that Christians serve other people is how they set aside their freedom. Right? And so where you have the opportunity and the governmental right

to support whoever you want to and be involved in politics at whatever level you choose to be, we have taken that and said, normally what I would rather do is minister to God's people. I will set apart my right to speak at the top of my lungs that The United States has given me, and I subdue that and instead serve you in whatever way that I can, solidifying both

the glory of God and to my joy. Right? Like we've basically weighed our citizenship in The United States heavier than we have our Kingdom of God citizenship. Because that's just the troubling part, I think, of the church that I've seen, that church being Christians. Sure. We're so,

so emotionally tied in into the political world that we don't recognize or care or something that our neighbor is literally gonna go to hell. Right. And we're like, yeah, but my guy lost.

Well Yeah. Yeah. Right. So did your neighbor turn. Colonel damnation is a pretty big loss. Correct. Would you rather talk to him about the savior that can change his life forever or get him to agree with your immigration policies? Right now,

I would say you're more pushing immigration policies. Yeah. Okay. So let me ask you this hypothetical question, Dan. Yeah. But let's say I don't know how you would know this, but some means know this. Say, look, 80% of The United States will turn will turn and find love and follow Jesus Christ

in exchange for socialized medicine in The United States. Okay. Yeah. You're in. Right? Yeah. You're totally in. Yeah. I mean, I would hate it, and I'd try to overturn it. Well, sure. But Sure. Right? But, like 80% of the people go into heaven? Okay. I'm in. I'm totally in. Right? And so so, of course, I gave an extreme thing that would never happen. But like, the the point is to say, I could have said anything, really. Yeah. The government will do blah blah blah, as long as it's not a moral indignation towards the Lord, and said, in exchange for people coming to know and love Jesus, and you'd like, okay. Okay. I can I can get on board with that because because you're a kingdom focused man? You say, look, this is what I care about above these other things. And I'm not saying that to say you're blind to government. I'm not saying that you shouldn't be involved in them. I think it's very important to be involved in those types of things. But, like, the question is, what did you what are you selling? What are you giving away and not spending any attention on because you're so focused on who's coming over the border or whether we have socialized medicine or not? And you can walk and chew gum. But, like,

if you have to prioritize one, let's walk. If if walks is the is the the beautiful feet that bring good news, let's let's prioritize the walk and chew gum in context to that, not chewing gum and then and then figuring out, well, maybe I'll walk every once in a while. I mean, there are millions of God's people that don't live in a government that offers all this freedom. Right? Millions of God's people that are existing. And so if you were to back out of politics completely, have you shamed the kingdom of God in any way? I don't know. I think I think there's a way there is a notion of

there is well, it is it is a means. I guess I'm not I'll put that find government, like anything else, is a means, and I think you should be faithful in it. Yeah. I mean, don't hear me wrong. I don't think I'm advocating that we stay out of the arena completely. I guess maybe I'm asking, once again, think it's proportion. I think it's a proportion and a weight issue. Read through the New Testament. You can't really count the Old Testament because the country was the people of God. Right. Right. So you look at the New Testament, when much of the church was under Rome, they just didn't talk about it much. I mean, you got early,

you have John the Baptist, you know, going after, you know, you know, Herod. Herod. Yeah. And then he gets his head cut off. But but but, like, you don't hear the the apostle Paul's not talking a lot of politics, although he talks to politicians. Politicians. Yeah. He goes to the kings. But he's not running around saying, dirty. You know? But he doesn't run for politics. You know what I'm saying? And, like, it's not like Rome was doing any better than our government was. They're doing they did much worse on the morality scale. Yeah. Much, much worse. Yeah. Yeah. Right? And and All he knew was Jesus and him crucified. That's right. That's right. I'm saying how wrong can that be? Keep the Greeks out. Wait. Is it just because of the country you grew up in that you believe that that that that government has weight anyway? I mean, if you if you were if if you were in communist China, you'd like, well, they do whatever they want. We're followers of Jesus. Here's what we're doing. Yeah. Yeah. Certainly. But, I mean, those are the means within our control. You grew up with the But they're not in your control. Well You're losing at every election. Meh. Well

Everyone. I think you have to be faithful in it. No. Here's the thing. I've I've as long as I've been capable of voting, I voted, and never has anybody super impressed me with my vote. Agreed. I've never been like, you know what? Like, that's the best thing I've ever done. I held my nose on almost every one of them, and I was as faithful in the means as were available to me. That's right. I buy Tums. I do my best. Every four years, buy a package of Tums, I take two, and I go vote. Nice. But but like, I get so so let's if you kinda roll up some of these conversations, like, the question is is that one, I I would say what is your endgame? But like, I I I'm gonna pull I don't even care. Like, are you being faithful in the means here? Like

Are you addressing America or Christians? Yeah. Like, when you go, hey, man. Biden was elected. This is the end times playing out. What do you what what is it that you're trying to accomplish here? What? To be the guy who did what? Like, here's the thing. We talked about this when we talked the the ways people read Revelation wrong. Is that like, I actually don't care how wrongly, in my eyes, you read Revelation incorrectly if your reaction is to go share the good news. But here's what I don't here's what I hate. The worst combination of guys is the guy who reads it wrong and then doesn't share good news. He's just the doomsayer. Hey. I just I'm the guy from my armchair who says this is the end of the world. One, you meant you interpreted it wrong. Two, why why aren't you desperately grabbing your neighbor and saying, boy, can I just tell you about Jesus? Instead, you wanna poke the guy in the eye and tell me he voted for the wrong person. Well, even even that group we talked to a few years ago that that thought a certain day, you know, Christ was coming back, man, they were at it. They were all yes. Were doing That's true. Misguided, but still they were like Campers. I mean, yeah. The day's coming. Here we go. We'll tell You're you ready. God bless that ignorant fool. Yeah. Like, was on it. And right. And so, that's what doesn't make sense to me. Like, what type of ego goes, hey, I'm calling it. This is the end of the world. Okay. Shut your mouth. What are you even doing on Facebook if you thought this was the end? Like, go go do something with yourself. And like the same the same, hey. I think the I think the government's in the in the can. Okay. Great. Go out and serve the best you can. If the government is gonna fail everybody in the way that you think it is, then my, oh my, shouldn't you be out there setting up food kitchens? Shouldn't you be setting up like like, can we just agree that it's still appropriate to, oh man, do what is good? Like, what does the Lord require of you but to do justice and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God? Doesn't that still apply regardless of who the president is?

I mean Yeah. And and, like, here's the thing. That's where I get disappointed from listening to my more left oriented friends is for all the complaints I heard during the Trump administration, I didn't see a bunch of action around it. Like, hey, man, he's pulling all these he's underfunding government services. Great. You should do it. And then they didn't do it. They just demanded that the government do it for Here's the deal. I think there's probably you gotta figure out the right way to balance what you do as a giant community versus what you do as a small one. Smart people have been arguing over that for years. But in when your guy's not the guy and your government structure is not what's happening, certainly, you as an individual could have done it. Where where was it? Instead, you you Facebook barrage people with it. And I'm disappointed. And I'm I'm having the same problem on the right side.

I don't think we solved the problem, Mike. I think we just yelled at both sides of the people. Right. Right. But what really inspired that post that I did was there was some guy I can't remember his name. I should know it because he's a super popular guy who was a senator, I think, for a while. Anyway, he's still really well known and active. And he was, like, saying, hey. Maybe it's time to secede. You know? Oh, Yeah. I saw saw saw some of that. Yeah. Allen West? Texas. Yeah. Allen West in Texas. Yeah. Yeah. That was it. Okay. That sounds like an idea. Come out of Texas. And and I've yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Right. And and I've I've just seen murmurings of that around there. I'm like, what is the end game here? Is that I mean, and and the gospel gonna happen either way. So let's say we make two countries. I mean don't care. But but still like, what where where we headed? Right. Is that the gun we're on here? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, okay. So we do two countries, then I guess we you know, I don't I don't worry about what's going on in Canada. I guess I won't worry about what's going on in West America. But I mean, isn't it about isn't it about believing in something bigger than yourself? Right? You know what I'm saying? I mean,

if that was half true, the thing the dude's saying, like, he's he's a child with a with a ball. I'm gonna go home. You don't gotta play the I wanna play Foursquare. We wanna play basketball. We ain't playing Foursquare. I'm taking my ball and I'm leaving. Okay. Well, you didn't really wanna play with me. You just wanted me to do whatever you wanted to do. Right? Mean, you'd have to make the case that we are not functioning under the rule of law. Right? Like and I think that's what the implication is. Yeah. Yeah. We just wanted we wanna do the constitution. Right. No. Let the other people do what they want. No. What was his thing? Here's where I really struggle with this. Is that like our founding fathers said, look, this we're gonna put this in place and we're gonna give you means to keep her updated,

to make changes as is necessary. And, like, from a completely originalist perspective, you say, well, we never make changes. I'm like, well, the dudes made a way to make changes. Now you may not like them. And here's what would be great is the the idea of America is this type of back and forth and and and convergence of thought helps make us stronger. In the compromise, it helps keep us from going too far one way or the other. And like, if no one's happy, everyone's probably better off. That's kind of the notion of it. And that's why all these checks and balances exist. And so to the extent that like, hey, man, this this thing isn't quite going our way and stuff kind of shifts back and forth, like, I think we're mistaking it's a mistake to not see that as healthy for our democracy. Whether it's healthy for my particular cause or whatever cause that you have at any given time,

it's gonna feel like it's not because they're they're they're they're waves. But like, I I just like you would have to significantly pervert the intent and and flexibility that this nation was founded of under for this to make sense to me. And like,

in light of the most recent election happenings, like, that's not even close to me. This doesn't even sniff even close to to direct perversion. It seems like just people are pouting. And I don't you know? Like, you you're all what what? You're, like, one for 50 in these court cases and largely, you know, Republican appointed judges? Like, I I I just you know, this we're not even close to this being a slam dunk for us to kinda get pouty about it and say, well, maybe it's time to break off and succeed. Like, it just Mhmm. That, like, that but but that goes to Mike's point though. Is there something bigger than you? Are we are we bigger than our political party or the idea we have? Even as a nation, even if you threw Christianity out at the moment and just said, look, are we the fight for the structure of which we have, which makes us better but doesn't always serve me the way I wanna be served, is that worth fighting for or not? And to the extent that we say, well, if it doesn't sniff like me, then it's not then it's not the right structure. I think we're making a great mistake on a very grand experiment. Like, that just seems foolish to me. But like I said, maybe it's the same problem. We're thinking to we're too too far in the trenches, letting petty things well, I hate to say that because these are important. The things that people spend get

time on in politics aren't unimportant things. But I mean, isn't it just an arrogance of itself to realize that like if you the freedoms that you're The things that you're rallying against is the thing that allows you to act like a petulant child like this, right? Any other government, you stand up running your yap like this, they'd have just arrested you already, right? You don't talk like this in Malaysia. You don't just go up and go, I don't like that guy, I think he's a crook, they stole the election. This whole thing is the worst. They would just have you put into prison and then you'd be done talking now. And so you live in a country that even allows you to act like that, and the fact that that's true should generally keep you from acting like that, right? Because you have the opportunity to do it, you should have It's just like someone that has what appears to be their parents are pretty

loose on the rules, right? But generally they have so much respect for their mom and dad that they tend to behave because they gave them the freedom. That's I think, maybe how we expected the country to roll is because people have this freedom, they will respect it and honor it enough to behave themselves. Well, that's kinda gone to the wayside. Yeah, yeah. And now people do what they want. And so that's hard to get back. So so maybe back to the the question that Dan had posed. Let me rephrase, is is the choice that people have

like, are do you wanna give up or do you wanna get better? As a nation, as a Christian, as a neighbor, like that's really what you're up against right at this moment.

Do you wanna give up or do you wanna get do you wanna find a way to get better and and find and a find way to improve the situation around you? Because like if you wanna giving up saying, hey, I just hate everything and I'm gonna do what you did to me like a fourth grader, that's giving up. That's not there's no attempt to get better. There's no attempt to improve your relationship. As a Christian to go, well, it's the end of the world, And we're gonna get persecuted under this old turtle looking fella. And so I and we're gonna pout and make a stink about it, and we're gonna go to a different social media platform. Okay? You gave up. You gave up. And so like, I think you're you're faced with a choice that says, look, when when your circumstances

I don't know I sound like Tony Robbins. If your circumstances isn't what you want it to be, are you gonna give up or are you gonna get better? And a lot of us are choosing give up. And like, the the good news doesn't do that. Where do they have to compromise? That's where they're struggling. As far as as far as most folks are concerned, they've compromised as much as they can. Here's the thing. That's a lie. They have not. Oh, no. I agree. I'm just saying that, like, when we talk about different denominations of the church, we say, look, we have closed handed issues and open handed issues. That's right. We do not have to agree on the open handed ones. They're up for debate. That's not a live and die thing. Well, almost every political party associated person I know, all they own is closed handed issues. I can't negotiate on any of this. None of it. None of it is negotiable. That's the first mistake. That is a mistake. I think if we wanted to see some healing, especially within our land, you need to redefine on what you believe to be close handed. Actually, so I'll give you a really good example from the Trump administration. He was totally in for infrastructure projects.

That like, no no That's a democratic move. No reasonable Republican is for spending billions of dollars on infrastructure, and Trump was for it. And, like, the Democratic Party was so didn't wanna give him a victory that, like, they refused to deal with Trump on an infrastructure project. To their blindness, like, that catered to their to their and I know why they did it. They're trying to protect it's a political maneuver as opposed to a to a maneuver. But, like like, a true conservative would go, no. No. Trump's all in. He's like, I love it. Spin it on the bridges. I'm I let's do it. And, like, it could have gotten done. The stimulus thing would have gotten done. Like, government handouts all over the place. Again, ran Paul wet in his pants because this thing's going on, and Trump was all for it. And and and and the stubborn Democratic leadership wouldn't agree to it because they didn't want him to get credit for And so so those those are two examples of where, like I mean, those seem like open handed issues to a president that most most conservatives wouldn't be on board, and you still couldn't get anything done because there was posturing going on in there. And so Including the conservatives that were like, yeah, infrastructure spending. Sounds like a great idea. Run by the government? We're behind it. Man. Man. They were like, where'd you guys come from? Nobody has any integrity anymore. Zero integrity. But but here's here's the thing. I think a reasonable person will go, look. I don't know. I I didn't control everything we got up to this point.

But now we've got a bunch of federal bridges that the that the federal government is responsible for. We got we it's a commerce issue. It is gonna be significant unemployment problem. We may have to bite the bullet and do federal spending on on a thing. I don't love it. I don't my gut says, I don't love this. But, like, can I get there? I could probably get there. You could probably find a means to where, like, this makes sense, and it meets people both in both ways. Like, one's super happy but everyone came out better than they were. I think you probably could've got there, but we didn't. And you probably could've. And so, like, I think that's a really good point is like politics has become a total like, it's a fist. They're not even closed hands. There's a these are fist issues. And like, if you have no open handed issues of what you would be willing to talk to someone in another party, you're part of the problem.

You you are. And and and here's the deal. I don't care whether they would talk to you. I'm asking would you talk to them? Is it an open handed issue with you? I'm I'm a lot more flexible. And maybe this is my generation, but, like, I'm a lot more flexible with amnesty from an immigration perspective. Not because it doesn't solve our underlying problem and I hate that. And so so I'd like to see both. But if you had to if you had to if we found a really good way to solve the underlying

things that are related to immigration that recognized our place in the world, recognizes the need of people, but then recognizes the need to otherwise have security within our country that also said, look, we've got some amnesty that needs to come along with this. Even from a from a I'm just having trouble with my words lately. But, like, the mere statistics of it, you might be easier just to say, yeah.

And so, like, could I could probably get there. And no one gives a crap what I think. But I'm just telling you, like, as an example, I I think reasonable people have to be able to make compromises and think through things and then help come out on the other side. And like, even if you gotta hold your nose while you're doing it because you you got something good out of it, I I just I think there's ways to do this and if all you have are closed handed issue, then really you're just throwing punches. And you're you're you will never move from that. You will never move from it. And and we'll be stalemated forever. And so I suppose that's question number one. You got what are your open handed issues? Here's the everyone's against sex trafficking. Everybody. Everybody. Let's do something about it. Right? Let's we let's let's get it let's get it cheap and easy one. Oh, there was I can't remember what the example was. There was something that's going through congress, like, a year ago, and I'm like, slam dunk, man. Everybody's in on this thing. Nope. It didn't it didn't go. It it failed in both houses. Like, unbelievable.

But, like, I I suppose so so if you're a person who finds yourself in this situation, I guess, maybe what are the how how do you get out of it? You feel like you're in a stalemate and you don't wanna be. Is that number one? You gotta have some open handed issues here. Yeah. Because if you don't have any open handed issues, then you don't have any opportunity to have a relationship with people. Good luck meeting another exact copy of you walking around that's gonna be your friend. Well and even to Dan's point, they don't even have to be open handed issues. It's just not open hostility to people Yeah. For disagreeing on an issue. Like to say and it's it's hard sometimes. Like, get it. We get we get and the importance of the things we believe in is like, how could you possibly think this? But, like, here's the deal. I bet there's 50% of the nation whose position or perspective

on Yahweh God himself does not come from an informed learned position. They haven't spent time thinking about it. They just weren't particularly introduced to it or the the place they grew up or the parents around them didn't make them think about it one way or the other. But like, I know very few people who have come to their particular belief in anything with any that they've spent actual spent time on it. And so, like, even most of the people you disagree with, I would I would hesitate to believe they actually got to a lot of their positions

from reasoned thought. And this is true for even people that agree with me. Like, I'll hear them say, oh, yes. I believe it. I'm like, well, why? And they have no idea. They have no they just believe it. Just this is I think. We are all in the same boat that actually trying to come to reasoned, well informed thought is tougher than it's ever been. Mhmm. There's so many options Oh, to tell you or to skin it whatever way they want that cat particularly skinned, then you're like, oh, I had no idea. And then you read another article, you're like, well, had no idea about that. Yeah. Well, crazy. I think the other way. You know what I'm saying? I it's there's so many avenues of information and so many people trying to influence with half truths and smoky fogginess, you know? I mean, how do you expect half the people to navigate this stuff? Know? They're doing the best they can. And the last news article they heard tilted them one way and they went, You ever seen a guy like, there's all kinds of people that do this but they kinda go on the street and then they interview people and they're like they say something outrageous like that that would offend people. Like, hey, think affirmative action is the worst. And then they get people who are gonna come in there to defend. And like at the end of the conversation,

for some of these things, it was a reasonable conversation. And the guy goes, you know, you gave me some really good things to think about. Because the truth was is that, like, a lot of times when people come to a position, they're defending what they think is a just thing. I'll give you the answer I'll give you an example on the conservative side. It is on the 10 Commandments stuff. Right? We got all uppity about removing stuff from courthouses and the presence of anything related to Christianity

on in government buildings. And we get all excited about it because it feels like what we're saying like what we're defending is, look, we can't let our fealty to God slip away in this country. And so we wanna we wanna hold on to it and like it feels like we're allowing people to eject Yahweh from things that we desperately need want him involved in. Okay. That's what it feels like we're protecting. It isn't ultimately really what we're protecting because that's frankly just a facade. What you wrote on the what you had in front of the building doesn't actually drive what happens on the inner turf. That's who the judges you elected and the people who are part of the juries and whatever else goes But like, we made We felt like we were fighting for the right thing and so we we stood our ground on the thing. And I would say the same thing is true on the more on the more liberal side is a lot of the things that we're asking the government to step in to protect, They're doing so because they're like, because I wanna make sure everyone gets a fair shake. That's what they're worried about. I wanna make sure everyone gets a fair shake. Can I get on board with the guy who goes, yeah, I want people to have equal opportunity? I totally agree. The question is, is the thing that you're trying to to get happen, will that actually result in that? And that is a nice, fun, reasonable conversation. But like I can actually agree on the premise of which they're going for. Actually, this is where the interesting thing comes into me for like socialized medicine. Do I feel like do I want some sort of mechanism of which everyone is cared for? I actually do. I may not think the government should do it, but I'm actually I'm on board with the desire to say,

can we find a way to help people who need it? I'm in with that. And frankly, we largely do have the ability to help people who need So you understand what I'm saying? Like, it's it's it's just we've just made some mistakes on on on and and we've we've set up boundaries that don't exist, and we've codified things and trusted humans and platforms and parties that that don't actually represent these things well. And then we've made assumptions about people that because they're registered Democrat, that they're fully on board with the Democratic ticket and have spent a lot of time thinking about who they're following and what they're doing. Same thing with our Republican friends. It's they've not done that. The vast majority of people have not done that. They're relying on the 05:00 news and tweets to otherwise drive what they think. They've not read a policy document. They've not they bothered to listen to all ramblings about it. Like, I don't know whatever else you're gonna take it in. But, like, I tell you what, it's exhausting. I take in a lot of news, and I keep trying to get out of it. But like, if I'm gonna read any, I feel like I have to read a bunch to try to balance. Yeah. Yeah. Like, I try I'll read the farthest, the most liberal like, if something pops up and I see a story, I'm like, that's interesting, is I'll check like three or four, sometimes even five, six websites. And like on that list will be the most conservative website I can think of and the most liberal one because I'm like, what are they saying about it? And somewhere in the middle of that and the three other sites I'm checking, I'll get what seems reasonably true to me. And then I'll go with the best I can. And like, I get it. But to Mike to Mike's effort,

it's not most people can't do that. And I probably shouldn't be. It's wasting my life. Yeah. But like, I get where we're at, but I just I just I feel like we're being fundamentally lazy and dishonest, especially in relationships with people, and we're allowing simple things like political party and like who you voted for and even basing things up from social media, which is also a shallow representation of a human, to be the means of which we interact in our relationships and that's that's false. That's foul it's extremely fallible. And that's not being faithful in the means. It's being lazy. And I think we gotta get out of that.

I didn't we didn't solve any problems. Shoot. We came close. Dang it. Well, I don't care about any of this, Ben. Like like, you gotta yeah. Yeah. Here's the thing. I do care about it. Well, I don't. I do and I don't. Yeah. I care about it. Actually, so it's that that's the crux of which I was struggling. So I was I was thinking, like, I thought about bringing up this Jeremiah thing on the on the on the show, and I thought, do I even like, no one's listening to me. Who the who the heck cares? You guys knock it off. But, like, it it was the question was, is this even worth saying? Because I I I thought back to Dan's Facebook post, and I thought, like, that was an attempt to ask a reasonable question and, like, if the thing blew up with a bunch of people in their in their in their holes.

It's lobbing grenades at anybody who bothered to respond. Dan Dan knows a nice mix of people on Facebook. I get along with everybody. And so like You used to. Yeah. But it's I've banned a few of them. It's so interesting though because like the question is is like okay. I'm gonna tell what seems like an irrelevant story. We were we were recently sharing at church about people talking about just sharing their kind of life story stuff but but how God works through it. And more than one person mentioned coming closer to Jesus to say, well, a friend of mine invited me to a bible study. A friend of mine invited me to bible study. And, yeah, I was floored because I'm like, who does that nowadays? Is that still a thing? People invite, hey. You wanna come over to our house for a bible study? Like, it just felt like something that doesn't work.

But, like, multiple people had this happen, and they said, yeah. And you would've you would've, I mean, knocked me on behind on my behind, put a dress on me, and called me Wanda that this was working, that people are being invited to bible studies and saying yes. And so the if I think of our if I think of our landscape, I think, boy, I wouldn't even bother mentioning something like this on social media. And frankly, it's probably not even worth talking on the show because how could it possibly make a difference? No one's listening. No one would ever take that conversation in and think about it reasonably. They're they're too entrenched, and they'll never say, yes, it doesn't work. Well, because we've just made everybody mad because

we somewhat said you should like the other side. Right. So now everybody hates us. Now now you yeah. You've and so it makes you feel like, should I even should I even speak? Especially because like I I think people think about that reasonably on social media anyway. Especially if you're like a middle ground type of person, if you believe yourself to be that, maybe I'm wrong, but generally, I feel like that's where I'm at, is that I don't know if no one wants to hear it. Like, because to to the the the notion that you came up to something that seems like you weren't throwing arrows at one side or the other is like, well, but you didn't hear about this. What about Benghazi, Ben? Right? Or what about Hunter Biden? I'm like, okay. Yeah. That doesn't change anything I said. We don't have to hate your neighbor. I care about the kingdom and spreading the news more than I care about this, and it has everything I do has to sit within the context of those things.

But, like, it made me even think, like, do I even we we dodge a lot of this stuff on this particular show for this reason. We don't bring it up. We don't have conversations about it because I'm like, I don't think anybody's listening. And I don't really wanna waste our time. I'd rather spend our time on kingdom things because maybe we can draw you back in. But then again, I didn't think people have said yes to Bible study. So what do I know? Maybe it's valuable every once in while to say, look, alright, I wanna say the thing and maybe it lands with someone. And here's the thing, I don't know that we've we didn't even call for anything tangible except for stop acting like a behind.

Yeah. Like you just Yeah. Just quit acting like a doofus and like, don't get so caught up as if the structures of man are drastically moving your needle. They're just not for most of you. They just aren't. If you think you're guilty of this, you are. Yes, I agree. You hear what I'm saying? If you're even half worried like, hey, this might be me, it is definitely you. Yes, it is. Don't let it I mean, mean, you're being called to repentance, friend. Give it up. Like, seriously, give it up. It's not a I thought maybe I get a little out of hand on Facebook. You're acting like a fool. Like, really is. Today is the day to stop this. It's

bringing no joy to your life. You're not adding to the greater good of the country. You're not even helping anybody. Right? You're just adding to noise. Yeah. That's it, Ben. We're not talking about this no more. Okay. So check this out. No. You're are you circling back around? No. Don't know. I got an article. Okay. Good. No. There's no more articles. You talk for forty five minutes on that. No. I blame Dan. Why? Dan barely said two words. Televangelist televangelist Marcus Lam returns 3,900,000

payroll protection that that's those loan the COVID loan Yeah. Yeah. After private jet inquiry. Oh, no. How much? This guy. Daystar Television Network returned the 3,900,000 it received from the federal government's paycheck protection program after it was probed by a reporter over the recent purchase of a private jet. The Christian network founded by Marcus Lam denied using PPP funds to purchase a multimillion multimillion dollar 1997 Gulfstream five, a luxury aircraft for up to 14 passengers, according to Inside Edition. The purchase came two weeks after it received the PPP loan. Lam says Daystar was able to buy the jet with proceeds from an investment in the sale of its old jet.

I mean, I've I've never bought a jet, but I'm assuming it it probably would take more time than a couple weeks. Agreed. It doesn't seem like a two week purchase. Yeah. Yeah. This certainly smells bad, though, for the church. He has a church that fell under the guidelines of the PPP program. Oh yeah. Yeah. Churches did. Churches could take the payroll protection funds? Yeah. Why? Did do it, Dan? No. No. Did think about doing it? No. Yeah. Yeah. Why not? I figured God can provide, you know, and and I just didn't wanna get in bed with the government. And and I figured, honestly, I thought there's probably people who legitimately need it Right. Businesses. What? And I don't wanna take part of that pie that someone else could benefit from. Not that,

we benefit? Sure. But we didn't need it. You don't even have a place to put a jet, Dan. You'd have to use the funds to build a bigger parking lot and Yeah. Then buy the Boy, you know, it's kinda hard to take in with the separation of church and state fellas screaming at the top of their lungs and then they're like, free money from the government? Sure. Thank you. Boy, that seems like a huge mistake, friend. You're supported by the people who are going to the church.

You're not selling oranges. Right. During Obama years, they had some car thing, they'd give you $8. Cash for clunkers. Yeah. And I had all kinds of friends that did it, I thought, I mean, okay. I'm not gonna blame you, whatever, but I thought it's against my principles. I didn't do it. I I have that's all I've got is clunkers. But I'm like, no. Not doing it. Won't do it. Hey, man. That cash for clunkers is the reason I can't buy a used minivan that's ten years old for less than $6,000. There you go. I don't even know what that is. It took it was trying to it was Really old gas guzzlers and broken down stuff. And incentivize people to go buy more fuel efficient

view vehicles. Okay. Yeah. And so and it played to the the the the it was an environmental plug, and there was there was also a notion of job job creation in there. But, like, but, yeah, ultimately, I like, my van died. Like, a van, there's a it's got a leak, and it and it can't be salvaged, and I don't wanna I don't wanna put a new engine in it. And so I need an a used vehicle, and so I'm looking for a minivan that's, like, ten years old, and, like, they're all $6,000. I make $6 for a ten year old minivan. Even for the same minivan I had, it's $6,000. I paid 4 at half the mileage before that cash for clunkers. Is

that still a program today? No. The program's gone, but it wiped out few weeks. It wiped out all the used car inventory. Yeah. And it's, I mean, it's hanging on. Here's the deal. If you're on that side of the aisle, that was a success. It accomplished what you wanted to accomplish. It's just hosing me. Right. See what you did? There's always unintended consequences about this stuff. Or maybe it was intended. I don't know. But It's actually, it's it I said that that's the first thing that popped into my mind when they talk about student loan forgiveness, and we're like, oh, yay. Hey. I don't owe student loans. But, like, there's people that work servicing student loans. Like, a a really good friend of mine works in the student loan industry. Like, if you forgive all those loans, like, that man doesn't have they're gonna fire, like, half the industry. Look what you did. I mean, yay for you, I guess. But, like, there's lawyers and advertisers and website people and, like That's the stupidest reasoning I've ever heard. What? That's like saying, hey, man. If you get rid of the drug trade, there's all kinds of people that drive it. What are you gonna do with those guys that are currently driving drugs Except for it's not illegal to lend people money. Yeah. But I'm saying that you're propping up an industry just because the fact that it employs people. That's not a good reason. No. That that's that's artificially destroying an industry. If the industry died on its own because people stopped taking out loans, that's completely legitimate. Yeah. Yeah. But, like, to con to go in and blow it up, like, it the the point wasn't, like, lifting up the student loan industry. It's that there's unintended consequences. You're like, oh, well, people who already have are trying to pay these student loans back because, like, the people who don't have jobs are generally deferring. So that these are working people who you'd be forgiving, who would be impacted. Now you just put 50,000 people on the street. I'm just saying, like, it's it's it's a consequence. You can't like it's there's a more holistic picture to it was the point. Cocaine now. They're not traveling cocaine. I don't know why you say that. Dude, I I gotta be honest. I totally grayed out during that political conversation, and I've my brain is I can't can't get a coherent thought going.

More than No. Let's talk more about me. More than 10,000 religious organizations, including a few other televangelists, received over 3,000,000,000 under the PPP, a large chunk of which went to groups affiliated with the Catholic church. According to an analysis of the list of beneficiaries by The Guardian newspaper, nine organizations received between 5,000,000 and $10,000,000. Holy cats. The highest 10 one of these churches is $10,000,000? Okay.

Jimmy Swaggart got 2,000,000? Hold on. Jimmy Swaggart, who leads the family worship center in Louisiana and was earlier defrocked by the Pentecostal Assemblies of God in the early nineties over sex scandals, yeah, got between 2 and 5,000,000. Wow. Somebody didn't go, Juby Swagger, Yeah. Put these guys in charge of the health care. Absolutely. That makes perfect sense. This was this was a a a Republican organization, It's duh. I'm not saying I'm saying government, in general, can't handle suss out what is the right I mean, you think Jimmy Swagger need $2.02 to $5,000,000? I don't care if if Trump handed it to him himself. It was a terrible idea. It was stupid. Listen. You know, there's a there's a culling of things here that I think is alright. Like, I think it's I think it's alright. Like, I this is I think some churches are gonna die with this thing, and I think that might be alright too. Mhmm. Like, you know, if here's the thing. Like, you wouldn't see that from a personal perspective. You're like, hey, man. You gotta prepare for hard times. It's why you you can't just assume things are gonna be great all the time, and then as soon as something goes wrong, you go, oh, I hope someone helps me. I don't know why the church is any different than that. Like,

don't over don't overextend yourself. Be prepared for the economy not going well. Be prepared for someone taking your tax exemption. These are all things you should be planning for. And to the extent that you didn't, I would suggest that perhaps you're not being faithful to me. That's true. You should save for that tax exemption every year. And every year it doesn't happen, you should do an outreach to the community with the money you saved. Yeah. There you go. Yeah. Same thing. Yeah. Yeah. Just say, I'm prepared for it. And then by the time tax time rolls around and they haven't changed the laws yet, you go, looks like hotdogs for everybody between 56th And 37th Street. Jubilee. Every year's a Jubilee until they actually started ministering the tax. Then you already had it built in your budget. Yeah. And if you believe that you're gonna go up in arms, Church of America, when they finally pass this thing, you're a sucker. I mean, you've been waiting this thing out, it's gonna happen, right? And so just prepare yourself for it, and then hand it out to people. It's gonna be great. That's a chip shot win. It will happen in some administration over the next, I would say, thirty years. I can't see any path of which it doesn't. I think it's not wise for multiple reasons. I think there's more to it that people are like, oh, we just give churches special treatment. But like yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think you gotta build that. There's a reason they don't get away with that now is because the thought is the money's already been taxed. Like, I'm giving you money I'm giving the church money that was already taxed? Like, I earned it, and it got tax put on it, and I'm donating it to a church,

therefore, you can't tax it again? It's less about income taxes than it is property taxes. Oh. Like, think that's more of the rub. Because normal charities don't pay It's not that they're paying taxes on donations and stuff. Oh,

it's because they generally take up a lot of space, churches usually take up a lot of real estate and have large buildings, they're not taxed proportionally. Okay, I understand. Okay. Okay, alright, we got some Dear Life from the Path? We got at least one. Okay. Ready? Yep. Dear Life from the Path, I've been married to my husband for twenty five years as of today. We've been a couple for thirty two years. He has done absolutely nothing to commemorate this. I reminded him months ago to save for something because it was very important to me. My friends would have happily helped him do something. Every year is the same old nothing. He asked me to remind him, and I did, but it made no difference. Same with my birthday. Yes, we have been in better positions financially than now, but if something was important to him, he always saved for it. I have money put away we could have used, and he knew this, yet nothing. The only time he shows me any kind of emotion or love slash sex is when he's drunk. But he swears he loves me. I don't suspect cheating. He doesn't care what he looks like when we go places. I always try to look my best. I'm at the end of my rope. This twenty fifth anniversary really hurt me. He said we'll do something when he can when he can. I can't take it anymore. I feel worthy of nothing, like I don't matter. What do I do? Yeah.

He's he's a he's a sloth. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's a rough dude. I mean, yeah. He he I mean, she's right. He he's a jerk, especially when she told him. She made it pretty clear. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I you couldn't get this more wrong. She made this super easy on you not to be an idiot. Did she say what what she wanted to do? Like I think she's just desperate. But didn't she say, what do I want? Oh oh, you mean to him, like, for the twenty fifth? Yeah. I mean yeah. So I mean, put it in more common marriage terms, right? Like, I mean, your wife come up with an idea of what would be cool for your anniversary and then you come up with an idea of what would be cool for an anniversary and you, boy, it's miles apart. You're like, we should go to Omaha for two days. And then she says things like, Omaha is stupid and I don't wanna go to Omaha. And you're like, dang, I thought that was a great idea. That's not what we're talking about here. Right. Right? We're not talking about regular old marriage communication things where you just kinda missed the sniff test. We're talking like you didn't do nothing. You didn't even think about it. You didn't even think about doing nothing. She's had money saved back. This is where the phrase I use this a lot, I suppose, but like, you will do what you wanna do. And that is true. Like, the things that you wanna do, you will do. I have the same conversation with people that have a hard time with

a particular sin. Right? They'll be like, I don't know what happens. I'm like, you know exactly what happens. You did what you wanted to do. That's what happens. And so this is true in this situation. He didn't wanna do anything, and then he didn't. And he's got zero wiggle room, and yeah, he's He needs to come to Jesus' moment. Yeah. Yeah. She is withering up on the vine. I mean, she's wasting away. He is not speaking her love language. She has clearly told him what she wants. I mean, what do you do about a guy like this?

Especially as a wife, what do you do to a guy like this? You start getting the threats out? Look, man. What are you gonna do? I mean, I'll be praying for him to start. And frankly, I would start I would start filling my my life with other things, maybe. I mean, here's the things, you could go on vacation without him. Not as a spiteful, take that, but it's like, look, if you don't wanna go, I do. And I'm not gonna live my life in this dungeon, so you wanna go. At some point, you've you've gotta fulfill your life in Christ. This this will sound like a pat answer, I suppose. But but Jesus is your ultimate fulfillment because you can't help it if he's not gonna do his part. Not Jesus, but the husband. Right. You can't help that. You can want it, you can communicate it, and you can dream, and you can pray, and you can hint, and do everything you can.

But but if it's if he just isn't, I would if I was sitting across the coffee table from her, I'd probably say, you know what? Let let's pour your life into Jesus and and and let's walk in the spirit and and develop that relationship to the point where it will hopefully overflow into the marriage. But if it doesn't, you're still okay? Yeah. Yeah, and I suppose like here's where we're getting concerned here is where she says, I can't take it anymore. I feel worthy of nothing like I don't matter. What do I do? Here's the thing, is that guy can't hold that. He can't hold that weight, one, because he's a doofus, and two, because he's human. He can't help you define your worth, right? So when we talk about pouring into Jesus,

this is the stuff we're talking about. Jesus already determined your worth, and your husband just doesn't have the ability to hold it. And then asking, and frankly, his reflection of that love back towards you will always fail you. That part's not gonna work. So where I can agree that he's a doofus and he's a terrible husband and we have no affirming words for him,

he is one of the seven churches that is very disappointing, but you also can be guilty of asking him to hold too much. He can't hold that part. He can hold up his end of the bargain but he can't hold your worth part. He wasn't built for that. God was built for that. Jesus was built for that. That's it. Yeah. He's a doofus. Yeah. Yeah. I think he's a doofus. I'd see if he would maybe go to a counseling session or two just just so that he needs to hear from someone else

that he's a doofus. He only shows me any kind of emotion or love sex when he's drunk. I mean, what I okay. I'm gonna think this is a shallow thing for me to say, guess, but like, what a real waste of sex only only when you're drunk. Yeah. You're not gonna remember it or like it's your senses are deadened a bit. And, like, I mean, what a waste. I like to be fully coherent for things that are awesome. Yeah. Is that wrong? No. No. That's I'm just saying. Guess I have nothing bad to say about that comment. Okay. Hey, this is an open handed issue. Let's come together on this thing. I think that's right. Political friends.

Segular says, If the only time your husband shows you any kind of affection and attention is when he is drunk, you have bigger problems than the fact that he forgets special occasions. Is this the way you wanna spend the next twenty five years of your life? Receiving gifts does not make a person, quotes, worthy. You need to work on your level of self esteem. As expensive as a celebration might have been, a gift you could both benefit from would be couples counseling. I think it's very it just seems very insensitive to someone who has low self esteem to go, you know what? You need to work on your self esteem. You're an idiot. It seems like a real harsh thing to say. Yeah. Like, I mean, you might have to be a little bit more tangible than If if people knew how to do that, they wouldn't be feeling so low on themselves. Right. Right. Mhmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's like like

I know we didn't get a chance to spend a ton of time, but like this is sad. It's super hard. And, like, it's very difficult to be in a relationship where you're trying and someone is not, especially in a marriage where, like, you're you're you're in a commitment. And but, like, before before you lose hope,

double down on all the things that otherwise provide value to your life and your walk with Jesus. And then only then can you help hope to be in in a in a place that actually might help this person. Because like, I mean, yes, yes, it's a reasonable question to go, is this how you wanna spend the next twenty five years of your life? But like, if this is a person you married and love, can you look at them and go, and this is how I want them to spend the next twenty five years? Like, I don't want that for them either. Mhmm. It's not it's still not just about you and then most people would say it's not just about them. That's why they stay in bad marriages because they don't want to feel like they are leaving someone in a bad situation. But like most of the time, you can't actually influence that

outside of otherwise protect protecting is not the word I want. The walking yourself, basically. I mean, you can answer yes to that question without flushing your entire marriage out of the toilet. Yes. Agreed. I I think that's probably the thing, is like we act like there's only one option. Like the guy rocks or I'm out. You know what I'm saying? And so like, you can say, no, I don't wanna spend the next twenty five years of my life like this way. That's why I joined this group of people. This is why I hang out with these people. I'm still married to this guy, but this is why I started doing some different things in my time. Right, right, right. There's

a million answers. It's not just, well, I don't wanna spend my life like that, so I'm leaving. That's not the only option and it shouldn't be presented as such. Okay, last one, right? Yep. Dear life from the path. My 34 year old daughter lives with me to get ahead on her student loans. Yeah. Let's just take a quick math lesson. My 34 year old daughter lives with me to get ahead on student loans. Yep. Yep. Got it. She's either been living there a long time or went to school late. She has a good job, sweet, pays rent, and has a serious boyfriend. Oh, good. 34. My niece, her cousin, recently died by suicide, and naturally, we're all devastated, but my daughter took the news especially hard. I had to be out of town for three weeks, and during this time, she has been spending time with my sister law's family as they all navigate this tragedy. My niece left behind several pets, dogs and a mama cat with kittens. My daughter called me, announced she had brought a kitten home, and declared that this kitten has helped her in her grief process.

I'm livid that she didn't ask me first. She knew the answer would be a firm no. She's now claiming that I don't care about her grief. I feel emotionally blackmailed, which you are being, and I'm dreading the confrontation when I get home. This kitten has taken this devastating tragedy to a new level. How should I handle this? Boy, that took a weird turn. Yeah. I just didn't see that happening. There's like six different weird things going on here. Just to just to just to get a full picture here, one. Daughter lives with her. She's 34. Yeah. 34 student loans. Got it. Just now gotten a serious boyfriend. This cousin died by suicide, which agreed is sad.

She left behind cats and a dog. The the daughter has taken one of them on as a grief animal. Mhmm. And when she says, no, you can't have cats here, or thinks about saying no, she imagines that her daughter will go, I don't care about your grief. The cat has taken this devastating tragedy to a new level. So what was already a poor situation due to someone dying has been exacerbated by the existence of the kitten. The presence of a feline. Well

I feel like someone handed magnifying glasses to everyone in this family, and they super concentrate on their own stuff just real hard, you know? And then they blow the whole thing up and go, oh, this is the worst. Okay. So maybe maybe we'll take it one question at a time. The first question is is that does does the mom is the mom justified in being upset that she just showed up with a cat? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Agreed. The daughter ain't 12 that you got picked it up from the neighbor's house. You a grown woman at 34. At 34 years old. This woman is older than Boova. Yeah. Older than Boova. Hey. I gotta get caught up on my student loans. Yeah. You what now? You gotta stand on your two feet, man. At our house. And I brought this emotional support cat. And here's the thing. Now hold on. I don't wanna don't wanna dissect this too far, but like, getting caught up on student loans

means you don't wanna be poor. That comes with the territory of taking on student loans, right? When you take on student loans, you are indeed poor for a while. And I feel like you are holding your daughter back from going through basically what is a rite of passage as you get older to be poor for a little bit as you get caught up on your student loans. So I can't suss the whole situation out, but at 34, she should've been getting caught up on these things already, or she's just tired of being poor. But it sounds like she's single and not married, so it's really just her. This is the prime time to be getting caught up on student loans from the age of 25 to 30, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, that's weird. That's an odd tick in the situation too. Yeah. Two.

What was the other what was the other weirdness? The cats? I mean, yes. She's flat out wrong for bringing it into your mom's house. We agreed on that part. She is struggling with the grief. That's understandable. Grief is much like the coronavirus. It shows up in lot of weird ways and does a lot of weird things and a lot of different things to different people. And I could see how a companion cat would be really helpful. Yep. Sure.

But I think this is where it gets tough, right? Like, you want to support people in the way that they feel, but we currently have a culture that runs their entire life based on how they feel. And you can't make

legit decisions that way, right? These are why You run this a lot with people who have addiction problems. They they don't have to skip work because of their addiction. But because they're so invested in their addiction, if they don't feel like going, they don't go. Because I don't feel like going. Where everyone else at the working population goes, it doesn't matter what you feel like, you can't take an emotional day. You have to go to work today because that's what a job is. That's why they pay you to go because it sucks. Otherwise, you'd go there for free. So you have to balance on how much you let people make their decisions based on how they feel. Your feelings can really mislead you, really mislead you, especially and they get you down a wrong path real fast. So

I guess my well, what's the overall advice here? I mean, if the answer's no and she decides to leave in anger, you know? Yeah. I mean, I guess that's the thing about I I think there's there's realms certainly where the cat can make sense. But like if it's a no where you live, then it's a no where you live. It would be true if you if you had an apartment somewhere like It would also be true if the the cousin just had not freshly committed suicide. If she just wanted to get a cat Yeah. The answer would be no. Well, and I think the point is is that like, this goes back to the other thing we were just talking about which is, yeah, maybe that's a way in which you thought this would be solved. It doesn't mean it's the only way to deal with grief. Like, hey, if you don't let me have this cat, then I will never overcome this thing. Like, an emotional support emu is not the only solution to whatever problem you may have. Yeah. And so it's not

a like, it's okay if it's an option, but it's not an option. And so you don't just get one just because something bad happened. And like, I get how you could see that as unfortunate and I see get how you could look at it. I I mean, I don't know why the the mom is so opposed to cats, but I assume she has a reason. And she doesn't have to justify it. But I would say, if you would say, look, you It's classic manipulative behavior though. Right? Where you only give two options and say, if you don't the option that I want, then I'm going to do this. That's manipulative behavior. Right. Either I live with you or I end up on the streets. I mean, there's lot of places you could probably live. Correct. If you don't let me have this cat, you don't care about my grief. Well, I love you and I do care about your grief. You just can't have the cat. All those things can still be true and don't equal me not caring about your grief. It just means you're not gonna have the cat. And so, once again, that is very manipulative. And I don't know that you want to give into that. I don't think it's in her best interest to give into that.

Yeah. I mean, unless you're prepared to change your position on the cat, just in general, like, hey, wish you would have asked me but you know what? It's cute and it can stay. Yeah. Sure. I mean, yeah, you can allow the cat if you want. Yeah. So I mean, I I like, if you're not allergic to it and you just get irritated with cats, I mean, whatever. Maybe change your life. It would be fine. But like other I wouldn't say I I agree with Mike that like it doesn't it doesn't it doesn't create good in people's lives to otherwise accept their manipulation. I've been I've been in this position multiple times where I've basically been given two options and they they weren't the only options. But like, I felt super guilty and I felt super anxious because I'm like, boy, I can't accept either of these options. And it made me feel bad to say, well, I don't want the other thing to happen before I have to be reminded that, like, those aren't the only two options. Someone who is trying to manipulate you only give you two options, but those weren't the only options. And so, yeah, I I agree with that. You don't have to accept the cat. It's okay to say, no. You can't keep the cat here. You wanna stay somewhere else, you're free to. Sounds like she'll go stay with sister. Yeah. Sister-in-law.

Yeah. They love cats over there. Yeah. Yeah. Although I don't I mean, don't know why they gave it away. But, I just it's okay to say no. I think if you wanna say yes, then you probably should. Like, maybe change your mind. But if not, it's perfectly okay to say no. And you're not it's those that's not the only option for her dealing with this better, is the presence of the cat. K. Secular says, while I understand your feelings, handle it by being less hard nosed about the fact that your daughter didn't follow protocol by asking permission before bringing home the cat. Allow her to keep it. And during those times when she can't be home because she's working, encourage her to leave the little furball with her boyfriend. Make plain that the make plain that the creature is and will be her responsibility, meaning she will be responsible for feeding, vet bills, litter box, etcetera. What is she, 14? Most important of all, try not to fall in love with it because when your daughter leaves, Kitty will be going with her. Yeah. I just disagree with that

advice. I think I just disagree with that. And mainly because, like, I suppose the experience that I have in my life, it was much heavier consequences, I think, when I've been presented with these type of options. At the end of the day, it's just a stupid cat. You know? And like like we said, if you wanna if you can be okay with a cat, be okay with a cat. Right? I mean, just because she didn't follow the you know, ask permission or you didn't call or whatever I mean, did you open your house or didn't you? If you can take the cat, take it. If you can't, then just say no and don't worry about I think it's I think it is that simple. And you can't control the reactions of people. If if the manipulative person wants you to do this thing and they decide that they ain't gonna talk to you anymore because you didn't let her have this cat, that's your daughter's life to live. We we will pray that that is not the deal, but it certainly is her option, and she gets to keep it. That's it. Okay. Hey, thanks for listening to Life of the Path this week. Hey, we appreciate it. Look, you're not gonna find us wading to these waters very often. If you hate it, just don't listen. If you love it, I would I would suggest you stop loving it. Yeah. Like,

if this really revs you up, besides the fact that you probably should repent of something, I think that probably exists in the room too for each one of us. Yeah. I mean, yeah. This should excite you to stop spending so much of your time on this particular thing. There's plenty of good work to plenty of good news to bring, and your beautiful feet to bring it. So that that would be our recommendation. I think we do have every intention to continue to broadcast on these Mondays that surround holidays. We'll see if that shakes out, but that's our goal. So pending that, in the meantime, be faithful in the means. God will handle the ends. You've been listening to Live From The Path.