From the Kitchen Table: The Duffys - Q&A With The Duffys: Managing Halloween On A Budget

Episode Date: October 28, 2023

Sean and Rachel sit down as they answer questions on hot topics of the day, from China ramping up aggression in the South China Sea to Congressman Jamaal Bowman (D-NY) accepting a plea deal for pulling a fire alarm at the Capitol during a House vote.  Later, Sean and Rachel talk about how to have a great Halloween without breaking the bank, some of the homemade costumes Rachel has made for her kids, and they weigh in on what they believe is adults taking over the holiday. Follow Sean & Rachel on Twitter: @SeanDuffyWI & @RCamposDuffy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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BetMGM.com for terms and conditions. Must be 19 years of age or older to wager. Ontario only. Please play responsibly. If you have any questions or concerns about your gambling or someone close to you, please contact Connex Ontario at 1-866-531-2600 to speak to an advisor free of charge. BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. Hey, everyone. Welcome to From the Kitchen Table. I'm Sean Duffy, along with my co-host for the podcast, my partner in life, and my wife, Rachel Campos Duffy. Hi, Rachel.

Sean, it's so great. It's the end of the week, but it's our favorite time of the week. It's Q&A. And we've had some really good questions come through. Some of them very topical because they're Halloween related. Yes. Which is really fun. And we're all getting ready for that in just a few days. In fact, we're going to a Halloween party this weekend with our kiddos.

And then next week they have Halloween. There's a lot of Halloween, by the way, with our kids, because they have they have to wear certain things for school. Then they have something for the Halloween party. Then they want to be something different on actual Halloween. It's crazy. A lot of Halloween. A lot. That's a lot that I have to go through. I'm going to talk about how I save money on Halloween costumes. I know a lot of people are talking about that. We're also have a conversation about candy. on Halloween costumes. I know a lot of people are talking about that. We're also going to have a conversation about candy. But before we get to Halloween, some people have asked us our question, some questions on some of the hot topics that aren't being talked about. So there's so much

going on with the war in Israel. And actually, this first question is related. And that is these China provoking our military right now. And they want to know what we think about this. I know you covered this yesterday on the bottom line, Sean. So why don't you lay out what China is doing and then we can talk about why they're doing. Which, by the way, is a great show on Fox Business from 6 to 7 p.m. Monday through Friday. So if you haven't checked it out, check it out. If you're watching, Brett Baer, just switch over to the business channel and watch Sean instead. Don't tell Brett.

Don't tell Brett that, though. OK, so the South China Sea, international waters, everyone has the opportunity to sail or fly through that area. But China trying to flex its muscle, I said, oh, no, contraire. That's not international waters. We're going to claim this area for China itself. And so they've been doing that for a while. Right.

So remember, Marco Rubio, this has been like one of his big issues, right? Where he's saying. And so the U.S., to make sure that they don't cede that point to China, we continually fly and sail through the South China Sea, which is important. And so just a couple of days ago, the U.S. was flying a B-52 bomber through the area and China set up one of its fighter jets. And this fighter jet was flying in front of our B-52, right underneath our B-52. These are going hundreds of miles an hour. And the Chinese fighter jet came within 10 feet of our B-52. I mean,

you can't come that close when you're flying that fast, and it can't be considered by anyone at all safe. And China sent this, put this statement out, it said, China will continue to take resolute measures to maintain its national sovereignty, security, and territorial integrity. So again, China's saying what the world recognizes as international airspace and water, they say, oh no, it's ours. And if you try to fly through or sail through, we are going to harass you. And I think this goes to the broader point. We've seen an emboldened China. They have a larger navy than we have right now. They're building more ships. They steal our technology. So the advancements they've made with regard to their airplanes

and missiles and aircraft has advanced dramatically over the course of the last 10 years. But their economic advancement as well has had a huge impact on their ability to feel like they can threaten the United States. And by the way, we did that. We made them rich. We decided, I think it was under, wasn't it Clinton, who decided to basically bring them in fully into the World Trade Organization. Thank you.

And now we're totally integrated with them and dependent on them. Yeah. And so they have they they currently have, I think, 500 nuclear warheads. We project in the next 10 years they'll have 1500. So their ramp up militarily is significant. And what's concerning is communism loves chaos. Whether it's in the United States, the communists love chaos because they can continue to expand and grow and do things that would not pass.

But China as well loves it. So the chaos with the Russia-Ukraine war, the chaos in the Middle East, they love that chaos because it allows them to sit back and continue to exert power, grow, expand. And all the while, the United States is getting weaker because we're spending the same time to the tune of billions of dollars when we're already $33 trillion in debt. We're a broke nation, but continue to fund multiple wars. And if you're China, I'm sorry, I'll let you get in here in a second. But if you're China and you want to take

over Taiwan, and the Taiwanese have purchased weapons from the United States, but because the U.S. is giving so many weapons to Ukraine and to Israel, we don't have the stockpiles to actually deliver on the orders that have been put in by Taiwan so they can defend themselves should China attack. China loves this. This is exactly what they want. Yeah. I mean, it's interesting. It's not just that they're exerting their power over the South China Sea. And as we talked about earlier, they've been trying to do that for a while. Were they trying to build islands or something out there? They're building islands, right.

They're building islands and they're trying to sort of start to own that area. And now you're seeing them be really aggressive and belligerent with our people. Go ahead. I know you want to say something. When they built those islands, they said, these are just for commerce. This is for our ships to have way stations to stop in. And by the way, the technology in which they pulled up sand from the ocean floor to build the islands was remarkable. Wow. But we called their bluff on that. And what the U.S. said was coming to pass actually did. They're military bases, military bases that they've created out of the ocean floor in the South China Sea. It's hard to believe how naive. I mean,

I felt like that was just something that was driving Marco Rubio crazy for years. He was like this lone guy screaming about this. And I know a lot of other Republicans were trying to bring attention to it. But there are so many commerce interests with China that they're able to exert power economically over people who make decisions that we weren't able to stop it. And to me, it just seems it seems crazy. You think about how dependent we are on China and how afraid so many of our businesses and even our political leaders are ticking off China because of that dependence. We would have never allowed ourselves to be this dependent on, say, the Soviet Union during the Cold War. And yet this is a much greater threat. I mean, you talked about their military, their economic. I mean, Russia wasn't wasn't in comparison, like nothing in comparison to this. in the country. Republicans, Democrats, independents, liberals, and conservatives viewed China the same way. We equally saw them as the rising threat that they are

and a threat to our democracy. But that's not the case. I'm going to make two examples here. One, you have Hunter Biden, who went over to China, cut a bunch of deals. We believe, and we think the evidence will bear this out, that Joe Biden was making money off of his son Hunter's deals in China, which means Joe Biden is compromised and can't be strong against China, number one. But number two, Gavin Newsom just took a trip to China. He was just over there and he met with Xi and he was riding around in their electric vehicles. Basically, it was an infomercial in China about Chinese products. Basically, it was an infomercial in China about Chinese products. And I think Dagan made this point yesterday on her show, and she said,

China is involved in EVs not because they care about the environment. China doesn't have oil and gas. They do have coal. And so if you're going to have coal-burning power plants, and you have cars that run on coal, which is what you have, and you can move away from oil and gas, which you don't have. This is a strategic play for China. This is not an environmental play for China. And they're the worst. Let's just be clear. They are the worst environmental polluters in the world. And when we put ourselves into the Paris Accord, remember, Trump famously took us out of the Paris Accord saying, I care more about Pittsburgh than Paris.

And everyone lost their minds. And he was 100 percent right. And then he put us on the road to becoming we were energy independent. And then, of course, Joe Biden gets elected and then puts us back into the Paris Accord. But when that Paris Accord happened, China was given exemption from all the rules that the rest of the Western countries were, because they said, we're just a third world country. They're a developing nation. We're a developing nation. We can't afford these changes.

Such BS that we bought it. The person making those deals, overseeing them for the United States, of course, that idiot John Kerry, who continues to embarrass our country by, you know, putting us on the path to EV vehicles, along with Gavin Newsom and all the rest of the green energy. It's a big green. A lot of people making money, not just China. There's a lot of Democrat donors who knew this was coming down the pike and have invested big time in all this green stuff that is actually going to put us at a disadvantage, make us more dependent on China, make us weaker on the global stage.

And now back to the original thing, Sean, here we are with two wars, you know, Ukraine, potentially a bigger Mideast conflict. I just saw just before we got on the air, started recording this podcast that there's, you know, all these attacks that Iran has done on our forces, attempted strikes on our forces in the Middle East. Or Iranian allies are sending missiles in to try to hit our bases. And that's right. They've injured, a couple days ago, 22 U.S. service members were injured in those attacks. Right. And so we're getting provoked into this other conflict. China's sitting back going, this is great. This is going to be when you're right. They're going to strike with Taiwan. The other thing that's happened in the last week, week and a half, is something that you and I predicted would happen when we decided to get

involved in Ukraine war and thwarted every single effort by the Israelis, by the Turks to bring a peaceful negotiation and draw down that war, we didn't. We interfered with those peace negotiations because we wanted to take on Russia. And now Russia and China are partners. And so last week, a week and a half ago- And China's a partner with Iran as well. That's right. Putin went to the Soviet Union. They had a very, I mean, went to China and they had a very, we believe, productive meeting there, strengthening the alliance. Productive thing, folks. Yeah, very productive. That should be not good for the U.S., in quotes. But yes, so we are seeing these alliances form because I think

the Ukraine war in the very start was such a bad idea for us to get involved in. There were nefarious forces that got us involved in it in our own military industrial complex. I'm so sick of it, Sean. I'm so sick of all the people making money off of war and getting us entangled and weaker. I wish I had leaders that were clear eyed. And it goes back to my original point. When Joe Biden has sold out to China and Gavin Newsom is doing infomercials for China, you don't have a unified American political system that understands the threat. Democrats are willing to sell out to China, whether it's because they're going to make money or because they think China is going to go green or they have the technology for the U.S. to go green. Whatever the reason, Democrats are soft on China and Republicans are hawks.

That'll never work. You need both parties showing resilience against China. We don't have that right now. By the way, you would never see. So Gavin Newsom is, I mean, he's the governor of the biggest state in the country. Huge GDP. And he goes to China and basically is cozy and laughing, selling their products, how wonderful Chinese products are. You would never see a top Chinese communist official

come to the U.S. and go to Ford and giggle and laugh about how great Ford or GM vehicles are. Doesn't happen. They project strength and America projects weakness. And again, just the tone matters, Rachel. The tone of the president matters. You have a bumbling idiot who can barely walk as the president, doesn't garner respect within his own administration, within his party, but with anyone around the world, Joe Biden doesn't garner respect. And when the president doesn't have respect, the country doesn't have respect. And then you see the chaos that we see in the global stage. It is, and by the way, it's the fault, it is the fault of these young people. By the way, there's TikToks. All these young kids are like, we're not going to be drafted. We're not going to go to war, which by the way, there's no draft right now. And there is no war right now. But all these young kids are saying they're not going to go to war. The problem is they voted for Joe Biden. Joe Biden put them in a situation where they're even talking about potentially being drafted and going to war. It's their fault because it's their votes that put America in this place. Well, there's a lot of people responsible for the chaos that we

see right now. It's not just the people who put Joe Biden in the office. It's the people who put Barack Obama, who, by the way, is running this operation, from his mansion in Colorado, D.C., his big mansion that he has his people, his holdover still in the Biden administration, going back and forth and doing his bidding. We would not be in this situation with Iran were it not for Barack

Obama's obsession with giving them pallets of cash. Remember that? The billions of dollars that were flown over there in unmarked bills so we didn't get to know whether they were going to terrorish or not. And we can assume they were. And track those dollars. Yep. Thanks, Barack. We could not track those dollars. We could not make sure that they weren't going for terror when we know they're a chief sponsor of terror around the world. Then he continued. When Donald Trump was in office, this is one of the most untold stories, and it really is so nefarious. When Donald Trump was in office, Donald Trump basically reversed that Iran policy. He was like, this is dumb.

And he started working on isolating Iran and getting Israel and Saudi Arabia to partner together and isolate Iran. While that was happening, unelected, John Kerry was having secret talks with the Iranians and saying, just hold tight. Just wait. We got a plan for the next election. And boy, did they have a plan. We still need to know what happened in the Jewish Americans who I wonder if they are right now regretting their decision to vote for Barack Obama for this historic moment that has put us right now on the brink of World War III. We're going to go to candy at Halloween in a second. I know. I'm so sorry. It's so heavy, but so much. Someone would ask us a little question. We all get all bothered. Sorry. Don't ask about China if you don't want me and

Sean to go off because we are deeply, deeply worried about it. Donald Trump on Iran, he imposed Operation Maximum Pressure to cut off all their money. And so we had sanctions on, specifically on the oil. That's the main source of revenue. They got the pallets of cash from Obama, but Trump was like, we're going to shut down their oil sales. And with Operation Maximum Pressure, they did. And now Joe Biden hasn't enforced those sanctions. And Iran has made about $40 billion off of their sales. Selling oil mostly to the Chinese. Yeah, about three million, three and a half million barrels a day they're producing and selling at a discount to China. And the other point is, and they're selling that oil at higher prices because Joe Biden has attacked American

energy and gas. Rising the price of oil means Iran gets more money per barrel that they sell. of oil means Iran gets more money per barrel that they sell. So this is making them rich. This all comes back to really bad, stupid policies from Barack Obama. Energy policy is national security policy. I don't know why liberals can't get that through their heads, but it is. We'll have more of this conversation after this. Help turn off hesitation, turn off doubt, turn off fears. With your support, the YMCA of Greater Toronto helps people turn off

whatever's holding them back so they can let their potential shine. Help turn on confidence and connections and possibilities from youth shelters to job training, mental health counseling,

and beyond. The YMCA offers hundreds of programs that empower people to shine their brightest. See our charity's impact at YMCAGTA.org slash charity. Here's another question about, now this is another one that's going to make your head explode. It made my head explode. But that is Jamal Bowman. So if you recall, Jamal Bowman is a representative who, when the Republicans

had that big vote on the budget, Sean, you're going to get the name of the budget deal. So there was a continuing resolution. And it was on a Saturday and it was going to fund the government for 45 days. Right. By the way, that was the bill that Matt Gaetz used to throw Kevin McCarthy out of Congress. So go back before all the speaker mess, go back to that vote. The Congress was the government was funded through the end of September. They had to pass a bill to fund the government for 45 more days and continue to work out what

their spending cuts would look like. And we mentioned this on a previous podcast, but Democrats thought in the House they were going to be able to jam Republicans and shut the government down and have Republicans get blamed for it. So they they wanted to have they wanted the Republicans to have egg on their face. And House or Senate Republicans did not join Chuck Schumer to pass Chuck Schumer's bill, which would allow House Democrats to jam House Republicans. That's confusing. I know. But I know it's crazy. Anyway, the purpose of what Democrats were doing on this Saturday was they needed to stall. They needed to prolong the vote on the floor because they didn't know what the Senate was going to do.

And you had Hakeem Jeffries, who was giving a long speech in the House, kind of like a House filibuster was what he was doing. And as they were trying to forestall the vote, one squad member, Jamal Bowman, pulls a fire alarm. Right. By the way, disrupting official proceedings. Now, there's much debate. Jamal was like, well, I was trying to get to votes and I pulled it by accident. I thought it was a door, not a fire alarm. That's red. And by the way, he was a principal. So he's done fire drills before and knows what a fire alarm looks like. But obviously, a move meant to disrupt an official proceeding. He wanted to postpone that vote so they could see what the Senate was doing. And he pulled that alarm. And then they the Capitol Police put out a picture of him just kind of facing the wall. police put out a picture of him just kind of facing the wall. Well, it turns out that the Capitol police had in their possession, obviously, the video. And that was just released this week. And what the video shows is that he pulled down like a piece of paper that said.

So two signs of the door warning that you couldn't go out that door, right? And so he grabs the warnings off the door, so he knows he can't go out. And then he walks over to the fire alarm, and he pulls it. So the video completely tells an opposite story of liar Jamal Bowman, what he told at the start when this actually happened. Yeah, like that it was a mistake. Like, you pull off the sign that says, don't go through this, that you can't go through this door, and then you pull the fire alarm and run away. And so here's why it's interesting to me. Because one, the charge that he is being charged, he should be charged with is disrupting an

official proceeding, which is indeed what he was trying to do. And we need to get the cell phone records to see if there was any coordination between him and Hakeem Jeffries, the minority leader of the Democrat caucus. We need to see if there was any coordination between him or any of his Democrat colleagues to see about that. The reason why that specific charge bothers me that he's not being held accountable. So he was charged with a misdemeanor, pulling a fire alarm, and has a $1,000 fine. So in essence, that is a slap on the wrist.

Slap on the wrist. Thank you, Sean. Most minimum charge and fine he can get is what he got. Go ahead. They used the disrupting an official proceeding felony charge, they slapped that on all the January 6th protesters who were around and inside of the Capitol that they wanted to. They used that to harass, intimidate, I mean, scare the crap out of people. They showed up. There were so many people that were there at the Capitol that didn't do anything that said, OK, fine, FBI, I'll show up at the meeting that you want me to come into to talk about what I did. And even though they may have a meeting on Monday, on Saturday, there was a surprise visit by the FBI with guns pulled, banging down their doors, just total intimidation.

down their doors, just total intimidation. So these and some of these people are sitting behind bars in prison for years now. Some of them have been officially sentenced. And this guy, a congressman who absolutely knew better and is caught lying, is going to get away with it. And here's my question to you, Sean. The new speaker has just been elected, Johnson, from Louisiana. Do you think that, because Bowman, by the way, has been confronted about this new video in the halls of Congress, and he's yelling back at people, at the press, who's asking him questions. Thank God,

it's probably just Fox News asking it. But he's yelling back, this is what you're worried about. We have war in Israel and Gaza, and you're asking me about a fire alarm. So he's going to try and deflect this. So let me just take this back a second. So yes, there was a January 6th protest. And yes, grandmas on the lawn of the Capitol have been prosecuted, young kids prosecuted, some who didn't go into the Capitol, some who walked through the doors that were open, gave themselves a self-tour. Many of them have been prosecuted, going to jail for a long period of time, right? And you might go, well, Jamal Bowman, he's a member of Congress. That's different than a ruffian who came onto the lawn of the Capitol on January 6th. But remember this, Democrats,

they didn't want to leave it to just people who came on January 6th. They want to go to members of Congress who are colluding with the rioters and the protesters. And you recall that Scott Perry, who is a congressman from Pennsylvania, leads the Freedom Caucus. He was going through the airport and he had three FBI agents confront him and his family to get his cell phone records, which, by the way, huge problem. There's a separation of powers that the FBI from the executive branch would go get a cell phone of Scott Perry. He handed it over. He gave it over. He gave his phone number. But they wanted to make a connection that it was members of Congress who were colluding to shut down those official proceedings. Members of Congress on the Republican side were not excluded from scrutiny at all.

And if they could have shown a connection, Democrats could have shown a connection, or prosecutors could have shown a connection, make no mistake, that Republican member of Congress would be charged with a felony. They would be in prison. They'd be removed from Congress. Jamal Bowman has done the, not that he was including, he's actually the the main actor pulling a fire alarm to literally disrupt an official proceedings and he gets nothing. So when we talk about a double standard in America, a if a Republican had pulled that fire alarm to disrupt a Democrat proceeding on the House floor, they would be in jail. Number one. The second point is, why in the hell are we getting the videotape from the Capitol Police after Jamal Bowman pleads to the charge? Right. So the case is over. And then they go, oh, here, by the way, is the video where you can see him grabbing the signs off the door and then pulling the fire alarm. Why did they give us a still shot? Is the Capitol Police playing politics? Of course they are.

The Capitol Police is meant to protect the Capitol and the members of the Capitol. And if crimes are committed, they have to show the video of the crime. Turn it over. Let us all see it. But they played political games here. No, we can't see the videos from January 6th without... They have not been put out to the public and they should. And that's another matter. But here's the deal. One, I believe Marjorie Taylor Greene has a bill, right? Or a motion, I'm sorry. Jamal Bowman. Yes.

And I think Speaker Johnson will bring that to the floor. Good. And that vote should take place. He should be censured for that. But what if he gets censured? What does that mean? He's scolded. Right. But it's embarrassing. Right. You don't want to be censured in front of the House. He's not going to lose his seat over that. He should. But again, he's a liar. Democrats would not have censured. They would have removed. Exactly. They would have prosecuted. And this is what I'm saying, Sean. We can't stop the DOJ and the FBI and the Biden administration from this double standard that you so aptly talked about. There is absolutely one set of rules for Democrats and one set of rules for Republican. We can see it in Hunter Biden. We can see it in the way Joe Biden's treated. We can see it in Hillary Clinton. You just go down the line, the protesters in 2020 versus the J6 protesters. There is a double standard. But now the Republicans have one little tiny bit of power, and that is in the House. They are still in the majority in the House, and they have a new speaker. I believe that it is imperative for Republicans, even in the midst of World War Three, that's about to break out, that they throw the book at this guy to make a point that we are. against every conservative voter and every conservative member of government, then we're

going to throw the damn book at you wherever we have it, because only mutually assured destruction will end the fact that we now don't live under a system of equal protection under the law. I don't like I don't like this new America. I don't like the politics behind prosecutions. I don't. And if you ask me, I had a magic wand, I'd say, let's not do this. But I'm going to say when I have power, I'm going to live by the rules

that you set up. You made these rules. You tried to prosecute and go after Republicans claiming they were colluding and you were pushing that hard. Okay, those are your rules. We'll apply your rules to you when you violate the law to shut down official proceedings. That has to be the standard that Republicans use. You don't have a set of rules for us. And then we have the old 1980s standards of decorum that we use for you. Yeah, well, I'm sorry, Sean. If you don't have the standard, we'll use that same standard against you. I feel like the only people who are willing to play like that, play hardball in response

to them playing hardball, are people like Marjorie Taylor Greene, who you know is highly marginalized within that conference. Matt Gaetz, you know, let's see. But Donald Trump plays this game right back. Donald's see. Donald Trump should play that game. But let's see if if this Johnson, new Speaker Johnson will will will do what needs to be done, because if you poll if you poll conservatives more than anything other than the economy, and I think in some polling it's it's as high as the economy or beats the economy. And that is among conservatives is the fear that we now have two tiers of justice, And that is very top of mind. It's not talked about a lot, though. I don't you don't you don't see people. It's kind of like, you know, those quiet Trump voters in 2016 that, you know,

everyone was so surprised because people just wouldn't put a sign out. But they went to the ballot box and they voted for Trump. This is an issue that flies under the radar because people don't like to talk about it. They're concerned about it. But they are deeply worried about what's happening. And it's important to talk about Jamal Bowman as it relates to our next topic because this story, the Jamal Bowman story has penetrated. And you know stories penetrate when you actually have costumes. That's right. Of people. I remember when Paul Ryan was the vice president, there were costumes for Paul Ryan. The Donald Trump masks were used, Barack Obama masks are used. And so now there's Halloween costumes that reflect on the story we just talked about with Jamal. Yeah. So apparently one of the hottest costumes in D.C. this year, and this is a true story,

it's a weird place. We're going to talk about grownups and Halloween because I think that's a whole other issue. But one of the hottest topics is Jamal Bowman as a fireman. Yeah, I bet only conservative kids or adults are wearing the Jamal Bowman red fireman costume for Halloween, but well done. That one would be fun. But Halloween, you know, this year has its own flavor. So one of the things that people are concerned about this year, and we talked about, we're just talking about the economy as a big concern. Candy is so expensive right now.

Yeah, it is. So this is a story that we pulled from NerdWallet. Love NerdWallet, by the way. Do you go to the site often? I do. So you can calculate your taxes. On NerdWallet? NerdWallet, yeah. I go there, they go, if you? I do. So you can calculate your taxes in taxes. On NerdWallet? NerdWallet, yeah. I go there, they go, if you live in this state, how much do I pay in taxes? By the way, if you're in Florida or Tennessee, you don't pay very much. Or if you're

in New Jersey or Wisconsin, how much do you pay? And you pay a lot more. NerdWallet. Now I know what you're doing with your time. Okay. So we're going to use government numbers here. And you and I have talked about the government numbers on inflation. Inflation's much higher. Over the last year, they'll say inflation rose at 3.7%.

I don't buy that number, but we're going to use that number at 3.7%. Candy has gone up 7.5%. So it's gone up twice what inflation is up. So the question is, why is candy up? Well, the cost of sugar has gone up twice what inflation is up. So the question is, why is candy up? Well, the cost of sugar has gone up.

So you're paying more for sugar. Sugar's in candy. Also, you have the process. We have laws that say you have to process that sugar in the U.S. And therefore, that drives up costs. But just quickly, not everything has gone up with regard to candy, right? So hot tamales, they're down in price. Mounds, Heath, Rolos, and Duds, they've dropped in price since last year.

However, Airheads, Babe Ruth, Candy Corn, Payday, and Tootsie Rolls, those have all gone up in cost. So if you're looking at trying to save money, go to the Mounds or the Heath or the Rolos or the Milk Plots. Also, Reese's is down, Milky Way, and Kit Kat, which is always a favorite. So all of those are down. I like the Reese's peanut butter cups, frankly. I love the Kit Kat. I always get the Reese's or the Reese's Pieces. But Reese's I get to give away to the kids at Halloween, which means I'm going to eat the candy for Halloween.

So when Sean goes shopping for candy for Halloween, we find out what he likes. Right. Because that's what he buys. Which, by the way, if you're trying to save money and save your physique, getting candy that you may not like might be a really good choice. So if you get candy that you don't want to eat, but you'll give to kids, better option for you not to eat it. I'm just going to tell you, under the Trump economy, kids did better on Halloween. Yeah, they did. People were more generous because they had a little more money in their pocket and they bought more Halloween. And so instead of just giving one or two candies, they'd just grab a handful and dump it in their bags. You know, I do miss

the Trump economy. Let's talk about it. So when we talk about, again, that is a really tough times for people. And kids oftentimes pay the price. But I love the idea that if you work hard on Halloween and go to all these houses and spend hours at work, you actually get rewarded with a lot more candy. But also, we talk about Halloween costumes, and they can be expensive. Whether you're going to Amazon or you're going to Walmart and getting costumes and you have a few kids, that gets to be pretty expensive. So how do we manage the cost of Halloween costumes in our home to make sure? Because again, a lot of kids. Yeah, I do have a few hacks.

That gets expensive. It does. So here's my hack. So first of all, we had nine kids over the span of 20 years. So with the early kids, I bought nice costumes that, and they've lasted, I save all of them. And so I am repurposing costumes. I have two giant bins full of costumes. And so those are the first ones we go to and what they've held up. I mean, think about it. They only wear them once or twice a year. And, and so, you know, these costumes can last. Last year, And and so, you know, these costumes can last. Last year, my daughter wanted to be the Tin Man and we made the costume.

I got a box. We cut we, you know, painted it, cut we cut it out. We sized it for I bought her just a pair of little she she wore like a silver. She wore silver tights. I got for super cheap on. It was like a bodysuit, a silver bodysuit. And then the box went over her body. And I made her a little hat, like a cone on her head. And she had some little silver boots already that she had. So she was the tin man. So that was a super cheap. I probably spent $10 on that costume because that's probably how much that body suit cost. She has something else on her face. I might have put like silver on her face.

But whatever. I mean, I made that costume. You can make costumes. You can repurpose costumes. You can get together with a neighbor or friend who has costumes so you can trade off like, okay, maybe your kid wants to be, yeah, you can barter through or borrow through that. So I think there's a lot of ways to do it. And also, you know what? I've bought costumes that are really super nice that were maybe a little more pricey before. The one I made last year is the one that Marguerite is going to remember when she's 30. know, 30. The other

thing, Sean, that I thought I think is interesting is just how much adults have taken over Halloween. So it's really become an adult holiday, which I kind of hate. I really think that we're not enough of a kid-centric society to just turn over Halloween to grownups. I'm sort of annoyed by that. But what's happened as a result of a lot of adults getting involved in Halloween and turning it into this billion dollar business is that, you know, there's a lot of Halloween parties. It's also causing a lot of consternation for businesses who, you know, companies sometimes like to have, like, let's have a Halloween party at the office and people will dress up that day. And it seems like a fun

thing to do. And a lot of these sort of like, you know, young adults like that because, you know, they like it. They want to be kids. They want to be kids again. The adolescence continues to extend, but it has brought up some possibilities. There's articles now about litigation being an issue because people are super sensitive about Halloween and nobody has a sense of humor. So what you wear, especially if you're an adult on Halloween, has some consequences. So much so that CNN now has an app where you can basically input into their app your Halloween costume idea, and the app will come out and tell you whether, you know, at the end of the series of questions about your costume,

will let you know if this is a politically incorrect costume or not. Yeah, and so... Of course CNN came up with that. I would expect no other network but CNN to come up with that kind of deal. So it says, should you wear that Halloween costume? Question mark. This is on CNN. A helpful guide.

And then it starts, you have to answer questions to get into the right place where CNN can give you the right PC answer on whether you can wear this costume or not. Is it a creative take on current events? Jamal Bowman, maybe? Firefighter? A sexy version of an otherwise normal thing or a hilarious visual gag? So you have to select one of those. Then it goes through prompts and it'll tell you whether your costume is appropriate or not.

And I'm like, is this where we're at in America? That we can't judge. Because Halloween and Halloween costumes are made to push the limit. Maybe to be a little funny, maybe be a tad bit offensive. And everyone gets the joke on Halloween. Don't be offended if it's a little offensive. If it was a lot offensive, you know, you can grumble, you can mumble, but then go back home and eat some candy or drink a beer, do what you do. But all of this oversight on the PC

police, making sure that we wear the right costume. Again, it comes back to this fundamental idea of free speech. Let me do what I want. And if you're offended, that's not my problem. That's your problem. But if you were an offensive costume, make no mistake, That's your problem. But if you were an offensive costume, make no mistake, someone can get a picture, you're going to get posted online, you're going to get canceled, and you may get fired. Your spouse might divorce you. Who knows?

All kinds of bad things happen. And Halloween is just a perfect example of all the things that have gone wrong in this country with these woke left no funners. Yeah, I was just going to say, it's not to me, it's not even an issue about free speech. It's like they just liberals take the fun out of everything. You know, they're the ones that ruined Christmas concerts for kids where you couldn't you could only sing. You know, you can't sing. You can only sing about Frosty or Rudolph. Anything, you know, all of our beautiful, you know, old Christmas songs,

you know, can't, in fact, most concerts aren't even called Christmas concerts now, they're called winter concerts. You can go on and on and on, on how liberals and woke ideology have ruined the fun on Halloween. So I guess the lesson here is- It's called fun burglars. They're fun burglars. Don't listen, have fun. By the way, make it a kid holiday again. It's centric. It's centric. They deserve it. To make the experience for the kids better. I do that. I dress up like Mary Poppins. I do it for my kids. You're not going to the bar. You're not going to some party. You're like, you're dressed up to be Mary Poppins and go trick or treating. I know a lot of Christians

have problems with Halloween. I know a lot of adult Christians who never experienced Halloween because they weren't. I'm not like that. I kind of love Halloween. I don't mind it at all. Life's so short. Just have fun. Get dressed up. But anyway.

It's a good round of set of topics. I'm looking. I'm doing the bottom line. I don't get home in time for Halloween this year. I'm so mad. I've been talking't get home in time for Halloween this year. I'm so mad. I've been talking to you about wanting to take that day off. I enjoy being part of the whole operation of Halloween. It's so fun.

Rachel's gonna have to do it on her own, which she's not happy about, but I'm sorry. Sometimes duty calls. Coffee has to work. Well, I don't know. Maybe you should talk to your boss today. See if you can take Halloween off. Halloween's a federal holiday in the Duffy household.

Is that what you're saying? There should be a rule. If you have more than three kids. Under 10. Under 10. You have to have Halloween off to help your wife or your husband. That's not going to fly. We'll see.

Listen, great conversation. I hope everyone does have a great weekend, whether you're watching football, starting the World Series, or you're prepping for Halloween or going to Halloween parties. We are on Sunday. We are. Can't wait. Enjoy yourself as we roll in from fall going into winter. We appreciate you tuning in to The Kitchen Table. We love doing our Friday Q&As. If you like our podcast, you can rate, review, subscribe, wherever you get your podcasts please subscribe as Rachel says you always get a

notice when our podcast drops we drop Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and we always appreciate you Sharon you usually have a cup of coffee I didn't have one today which is kind of a bummer but a little coffee in conversation so thanks for being with us and until next week have a good one

bye everybody for being with us. And until next week, have a good one. Bye, everybody. Listen ad-free with a Fox News Podcast plus subscription on Apple Podcasts. And Amazon Prime members can listen to this show ad-free on the Amazon Music app. The Fox News Rundown.

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