Higher Learning with Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay - Dave Chappelle’s ‘Closer’ and the United States v. Texas

Episode Date: October 8, 2021

Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay dig into the divided reactions to Dave Chappelle’s latest Netflix special 'The Closer' (9:05), before welcoming back law professor Caroline Mala Corbin to discuss the most recent developments in the Texas abortion law (41:59). Plus, HBCU funding takes a big cut (1:10:23), then it’s Mailbag Time (1:22:41).  Hosts: Van Lathan and Rachel Lindsay Guest: Caroline Mala Corbin Producers: Trudy Joseph and Donnie Beacham Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hey, it's me, Van Lathen, host of Higher Learning. I wanted to tell you about one of my favorite shows on our network, The Ringerverse. Hmm, it's a really great show. Head to the Ringerverse to stay up to date with all things, superheroes, and nerd culture entertainment. This week, we covered, Venom Let There Be Carnage and the season finale of what if on the Ringerverse.

And let me tell you something about the Ringervverse. You guys can go a lot of places to get your fans. and your nerd culture stuff, but I can tell you, without a doubt, that the hosts on the ringerverse, one host in particular, is one of the best and most cutting edge minds in fandom history.

I'm gonna let you figure it out, but this guy knows everything when it comes to comics, when it comes to stories, when it comes to movies, when it comes to everything in general, he's amazing. All right?

Check them out. Check them out. Everybody's great. Everybody's great on the ring of verse. The ringerverse has the best assortment of talent that you'll ever find. But there's this one guy. He's fantastic. Okay.

You can find the ringerverse on Spotify or wherever you get your podcast. Yo, yo, yo, thought warriors. What is up? Higher learning is on. It is I, Van Lathan, Jr. And it's me, Rachel and Lindsay. Rachel was just telling me about some of the feedback. she's giving from the Sage still situation.

Yes, that story you can tell. Yeah, we're not talking about other stuff. You think I would do you that way? Van, you love to take what we talk about five minutes before this podcast and bring it straight into the top of the show. Yeah, there are several black women in my DMs saying to me,

you shouldn't kick our black sister while she's down. Obviously, you didn't press play because Sage doesn't identify as a black sister. So you obviously weren't listening to what the whole issue is surrounding her and the controversial things that she's been saying over the years.

But that's an interesting little dynamic there. If someone doesn't consider themselves black, do you still consider them black? Like for example. Well, I do. Camille, my friend, Camille Foster. Oh, Lord. I forgot. Yeah, he doesn't see that.

Says he's not black. He says he doesn't want to be defined by his phenotypic traits. Tiger Woods once said he was, was it, Coblation, coblasion. Cablation. If someone doesn't consider themselves black, do we still consider them black? I know we did it with Tiger Woods,

but that's just because he was winning. No, we need him. Oh, copper. Copper a real nigga, though. Yesterday. Said I said what I said. Hey, for people like Camille, I'm very curious. Now, there's always an option where you can check that you don't want to identify what your race is,

you know, when you're filling out certain things. Yes. But at some point, you've got to identify your race. What does Camille do? I don't know, but I know that he is very strong. In words. In words. Like, I don't mean like that.

I mean, like, he's strong with his words as far as, like, he emphatically believes that he is not black. You know, what does he say? I'm a human being. I'm a father. He's a human being. He's a father. He's an American. He's all of those things.

And you also black. He says no. So to answer your question, if somebody doesn't consider them black, themselves black, but I see them as black, they're black. Okay. Now, what about people who aren't black but then consider themselves to be black la Dolazal. Do you give her...

Black is not a characteristic. Well, I mean, I guess it is technically, but black is like, it's not... I figure out my words right for Rachel. How do you say your last name? Dolezal. Dole.

I always want to say like Dolziac, Dolazol. She uses Blasol. Blackness is like a trait, a feeling. A feeling. You know, a sense of being. No, like you don't get to adopt blackness because you are fond of black people, of their culture, of their experiences. That's not, we're not caricatures.

You know, you don't get to play black. You don't get to dress up and do that. Right. And not live every day. Because any day, you could say, you know what, I's had enough. Today I'm going to be white. We don't get to do that. We don't get to peel off our black skin and be.

something else? We don't. It is interesting, though. It is interesting. Do you think Camille is black? Yeah. I mean, I'm not going to call him black because he has a right to define himself of whatever he wants to.

Camille gets to say, hey, I don't want to be black and that's fine. You don't want to be black? You don't want to be black. I'm not going to. So if you were introducing Camille to someone and let's just say you were going to a restaurant and you're like, okay, it's me and my friend Camille. and your friend, whoever, John will say. And John's like, hey, I'm here first, and you're like, I'm 15 minutes late.

But Camille should be there in five minutes. He's like, oh, okay, well, what does Camille look like? So I know how to tell him I'm already here. I know how to spot him. What would you say? I would say he's a black guy, but don't say that to him. I would say, hey, yo, you know, Camille is black, but, you know, don't make any reference to that. Because he's got some really, really interesting.

But look, I don't, this is my thing. If you don't want to be black, black is a descriptor. And as in the descriptor, that's fine. But if you don't want to be black, I take this as meaning this. I take that as meaning this. This is what I take.

So there's a cultural expression that goes along with blackness, just like there is with any culture, right? Like being Italian, means more than just being born in Italy or being able to trace your roots back there. Sure. There's like a whole set of experiences, a worldview, a culture,

a beauty that comes with it. A history, yeah. A history, right? A history and a present. You know? And if you say, hey, I'm not Italian, you're saying no to that. So if you say,

you might not be able to change your skin color, but if you say that, you don't want to be black, then to me, you're saying no to Frederick Douglass. You're saying no to James Baldwin. You're saying no to Nikki Giovanni. You're saying no to Martin Luther King Jr. You're saying no to a bunch of people who helped us define what American blackness is.

And if you don't want to be a part of that, that's cool. I would just say, hey, it's pretty amazing. I would say, hey, good luck with that. Because you got an uphill battle trying to convince people that you are not what they see. It's working out for Camille. Is it? All right. He's cooking.

Shout out to Camille. Shout out to Camille Foster, man. Look, people can do whatever they want to do. They absolutely can. And we can critique it. You can be whatever you want and we have the right to critique it. Do we? Yes.

Sometimes we do. You can give your opinion. Sometimes we have a right to critique choices that people make. Other times it's frowned upon. We got a right with this one. Right, with this one. All right, all right. Later on in the show, we are going to be joined by Caroline Corbyn.

Okay, Caroline Corbyn is a professional of law at the University of Miami. There has been a development on the front of the Texas abortion ban. And rather than us, fumbled through it and fuck it up, we're going to let the constitutional law profession. come on. And that's not to say that Rache couldn't do this. Rachel's a lawyer. I'm not, I'm just saying, for me, personally, I go, Circus of Appeals,

jurors process, they're my brain exposed. So, Caroline did a fantastic job last time. Breaking it down step by step. She's a professor. This is what she does. So why do we need to do it when there's somebody who can do it better than us?

Boom! Higher learning. That's going to be a little bit later. Right now, We're going to take a break and talk a little bit about Dave Chappelle. The playoffs are here, and you can predict the action all the way to the finals with Fandul Predicts. Predict the spread, total points, and even the game winner. Sign up and get a $25 bonus. Offered by Fandul prediction markets LLC, a registered futures commission merchant, 18 plus. Bonus is non-withdrawable and expires seven days after receipt.

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Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Trimphia today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit trimfire radio.com. All right. So Dave Chappelle's latest stand-up special is out. It's called The Closer. Have you seen this stand-up special? I saw it.

You watched it. You watched it. What are your thoughts, Rach? What are your thoughts? I mean, where do you start? It's such a general question. Can you ask me a direct, a direct question? No, no, no, no.

Okay. Okay, I'll tell you my initial thoughts. What's your initial thoughts? I thought, oh my gosh, I'm so excited. Dave Chappelle's got another stand-up. I feel like we found out, I at least found out. Y'all know I'm always late to the party like a week ago. So I wasn't even expecting it.

So I was like, well, Dave Chappelle's got this new material coming out. I'm geeks about it. It dropped and I started hearing rumblings. I didn't see it. I didn't see it the first day it came out. And I was like, well, Dave, that's to be expected. Dave, it can be a little controversial. And then I started hearing certain things.

I was like, oh, he goes once again talking about the LGBTQ Plus community. He's talking about the baby. Oh, gosh, aren't we done with him right now? De baby. And then I was like, okay, I got to sit and watch this for myself. To be honest with you, I stopped watching it. Did you? Halfway through.

Interesting. Okay. And I knew we were going to talk about it. Uh-huh. So I picked, I've finished the other half before this podcast. Hmm. So you stopped watching it because you were so offended by it that you stopped watching. It's not even that I was so offended by it. I, because I, once I finished it, once I finished it, it was like, okay, usually in Dave

Chappelle's stand-ups, he's making a bigger point, right? There's something he's trying to. The whole thing is him telling a story and there's a big point that he's trying to make at the end of it. And I cut it off so I didn't get there initially. So when I got to the end, I said, okay, he had a bigger point to make. I guess the problem with this one more than others is I'm glad I watched it rather than just reading tweets and reading certain articles because there was some context that was missed in a headline, which if you listened to last week's episode, we told you guys, don't just read headlines. But what I think he felt to do this time is he talked about race.

He talked about the LGBT-Q-plus community. But he assumed certain things that he just didn't fully explain. For example, talking about DeBahy, and he said, you know, we were more concerned with his offensive comments to the community than we were the fact that he killed someone. And you listen to that and you're like, wow, why as a society, are we more concerned with the fact that they should either be equal or we should be outraged that he took somebody's life? And then you think, okay, maybe a lot of people don't know that. Then you also think you research it and it's like, well, he didn't just go and murder somebody. his statement is that he was defending his family from this person. So it wasn't like he intentionally just killed somebody.

He has to defend his family. And he felt that there was a threat to where it was either him or them. So that kind of context was missing in some of the jokes and the points that he was making. And I think that's why it became even more offensive to certain communities or calling himself a turf. You know, like I can see why so many people are. outraged by it, I just, if it could have been like a three-hour special and he could have added a little bit more context in explaining certain things and not assume or stereotyped in certain ways, I think people wouldn't be as offended. That's what I gathered from it.

So we should say that based upon Dave Chappelle's stand-up special that's come out, he has been blasted by everyone, glad the National Black Justice Coalition. A lot of people. A lot of people are coming out. Twitters in a frenzy in an uproar. They are getting on him for ridiculing trans people. One thing I'll say about the baby thing. So let's make sure that we don't pull any punches about the baby.

Or in a correlation that Dave Chappelle made about the baby. Let's make sure that we speak openly and honestly about that. Okay, so the baby killed a man at a Walmart in a Walmart parking lot, actually, because he felt like his life was in danger. Let's say that that's not why the baby killed a man. Let's say that the baby was in an argument with someone pulled out and shot a guy. Let's say that the baby shot a guy in a robbery gone wrong, did some time it came out. Would that really affect his career as a rapper?

Sadly no. Of course not. So when you're comparing the baby and saying we, the important thing is who is the we? If the we, if by we you mean white American corporate interests, well then the question I would ask is what are they supposed to do if we as in the community, as in hip hop fans, if we like the baby? See, if we like the baby, then they're going to like them no matter what.

So if we like them, they're going to like them. So if we don't care about the baby shooting someone, then they're not going to care. But can I say this? I don't know if everybody knows that he shot somebody. It doesn't matter if they know or if they don't know. It wouldn't change. Yes, it does. No, it wouldn't.

Not to me. It wouldn't change at all what people think about the baby because the baby. because the baby raps about shooting and killing people all the time. See, and that's the thing. He may, one, he may do that, and it may, he just may be lying about it because that definitely happens with rappers. Or two, you didn't hear that part, that lyric in the song. I don't know every lyric the baby raps. I might just know the chorus and the beat.

So maybe that's, I'm irresponsible for that. No, you know, I'm not saying you're irresponsible. I'm saying that we're, actually fucking like we're completely fooling ourselves if we think as a community that we care about either the violent lifestyles or the violence in the music that go along with hip-hop. Guys in hip-hop get lit up all the time. Guys and look, and I love hip-hop. Gucci got a body.

The baby got a body. Snoop was on trial for murder. Like, and then when they're not, then you have other rappers. and this is not all hip hop by any means. But what I'm telling you is these things aren't disqualifying factors in hip hop. There's just not. And the reality of it is when you say, we don't care, who is the we? The fact of the matter is the baby caught a body in that a lot of people actually like that

because they say, hey, this is a guy who's actually being in real life who he says he is on a record. Not only that, forget about that. Forget about the violence in the Walmart. The baby's been violent with people that have come up to him at clubs. The baby's got an assault charge here and assault charge there. I'm not talking shit on him. What I'm saying is he comes from a certain place with a certain degree of trauma that he feels like he always has to defend himself.

And sometimes in defending himself or in protecting what it is that he has, he's going to do whatever he's got to do, even if those things come off as offensive. I think what Dave Chappelle is missing, and I'll say this about the special in it of itself. The special was hilarious. It was very funny, right? A lot of the things that he said in the special absolutely I understand

how people are going to be offended by them and they should be because he's trying to offend them. I think Dave Chappelle is still funny but a lot of the... Yeah, of course. I think Dave Chappelle is still funny, of course, but a lot of things aren't, they aren't smart.

Because if you're indicting somebody about the fact that we don't care as much about who the baby killed, the people that you should be indicting are the fans of the music because what the gay and lesbian community, what they're saying is, hey, we have a standard for how we're going to be talked to and talked about.

Yeah. Like, we have a standard. Don't cross us. Don't fuck with us. And the reality is that in hip hop, and me as a hip hop fan, I'll say this. I'll copped and someone speak to myself, I haven't set a hard enough standard on the violence in the music.

I haven't set a hard enough standard in the treatment of women in the music. I haven't set a hard enough standard in the homophobia in the music. We accept all that as part of it. So you can't castigate America for responding to a group of people who have said, hey, we are not going to tolerate being spoken to like this. Like you can't be like, oh, you guys care about it. Nah, they don't care about it when we do it because to be our. with you, we don't really care about it.

And the reasons why we don't really care about it. It's true. In my opinion, the reason why I can't get mad at the baby when he's rapping like that is because I know too many the babies. I know too many of the babies who are guys just like that and I hoop with them. Like I play video games with them. You can't get mad at the baby for which part. I can't get mad at the baby for the violent lifestyle that he has.

I can't get mad at the baby for a lot of the stuff that he's done. Like I can't. Okay, I just want you to clarify. Because I understand it. And like I really do. I understand it. The LGBT community is saying, hey, we're not trying to be understanding of homophobia. Yeah.

Like we don't dig it. So don't matter how you meant it, nigga. You know what I'm saying? That's very true. And so for me, I'm like, yo, you know, I get, when I hear the music, when I hear, like, when I hear juvenile say, when I'm in a room with a bitch and a hold on the fuck, like a man, I'm going to beat my meat and get my fucking nut. Like, that sounds like, that sounds like. like gospel to my ears. That's the, that's what he said.

That's, that's, that's, that's, that's, that's how juvenile on fire. That's how it, um, that's how it begins or 400 degrees. I can't remember now. My brain is fried. But when I hear that, I don't think, oh, he's going to pull out his dick and jack off in front of a girl who didn't want to have sex with him in a hotel room. That's what he just said. Like, that's what just, I mean, when I first heard Keisha.

Yeah. Who CD has that on the hot boys or wanes? one of them. I said, oh my God. But we dancing to it. I was not, not, Keisha took it too far for me. Keesha took it too far. I was,

maybe I was too young. I don't know. So if we come back to Chappelle. Okay. And so he told a very moving story in a special about a transgender friend of his who he had a really amazing experience with in San Francisco, who then killed herself. Mm-hmm.

Um, after Dave's Sixth and Stones came out and, uh, this friend defended Dave. And then there was some backlash and then later on this friend killed her, killed herself. And Dave Chappelle says he can't be sure that the friend killed herself because he, because she was getting dragged on Twitter. But it certainly didn't help. And that struck me more than anything. Mm-hmm.

Because his overall point, I guess, in telling these stories was that. that he wants to get to a point to where we can laugh together. And after we've crossed the threshold of being able to laugh together, then perhaps we can get to a threshold where we're all human and nobody's punching down or nobody's punching anyone. We're all just laughing at each other, right? The thing that struck me about it was that his friend committed suicide, which is something that runs rampant in the trans community, because of sentiments

that Dave is talking about or espousing on his stand-up special. Like, in the stand-up special, Dave says, hey, gender is real. Gender is a very real thing. Mm-hmm. he's he's putting concrete around a discussion that trans people are trying to have with America and they need America to take part of the discussion. And when you don't take part of the discussion and you say, hey, this is real, this isn't, what you're feeling is this, it's fine, whatever, but this is what it is.

When it's so concrete and it's so, like when you sterilize it like that, remove the human empathy from it or remove the humanity from it at all, that forces people, in my opinion, into little corners where they feel like, Like, this world just isn't for me. Like, like Dave Chappelle, everybody loves Dave Chappelle. He's up there.

He feels like this. You know what? I just got unlucky. This life isn't for me. I'm out. And, and so I wonder, and I wonder this about everyone

who is, who is like Dave. I just wonder if, if he gets it. Because I don't think, Dave Chappelle is not a bad guy. Like, he's not a bad dude.

Because he's, always been this way, but I just wonder if in this particular instance, if he's actually getting it. You don't think he got it? No, I don't. I don't think he gets it. I don't think he gets it. I don't think he gets, when I say gets it, I don't think he gets what needs to happen

here. I think that things have passed him up. Like, that stand-up special, God rest his soul, that stand-up special is stuff that I would expect my father to say. Like, I think that you have to be dedicated to evolution. And

the real thing is Dave Chappelle, it doesn't fucking matter what you think about gender. It doesn't matter what you think about it. It doesn't matter. No, it, like, it doesn't fucking matter what you think. Who cares?

All right. You think that's that. Who cares? What gives you the right to get on there, get on the stage and give a sermon about somebody else's life? I love Dave. And I was highly entertained by the special, even though there were cringeworthy moments that were all over the place.

I love Dave. I understood he gave it to everybody. He gave a little bit to the LGBT community, a little bit to us, the black community. He gave a little bit to the Jewish community. But I don't know. You know, when it got to the end and he told the story and you see him kind of, I feel like he kind of gets choked up and he's like, I'm not ready to talk about it.

I felt that he blamed himself a little bit for what happened to his friend. And I felt like the only way that he could, I don't want to say make himself feel better. I guess it's like move on or take it in or I don't know, just like, like, deal with it was to continue in the way that he's always done. To make it seem like the jokes that he was making, the point that he was trying to make at the end of this were okay because then maybe he doesn't feel that guilt from his friend that committed suicide.

That's what, I don't know if that's the greater point that he was making, but in the end, I felt like that's what he was trying to do. If he succumbs to public pressure, and the criticism that he's getting about it, it almost makes what happened to his friend his fault. Do you understand what I'm saying? Not really. Okay.

In my head, in my head, I'm looking at you. In my head, in my head, it's making sense. It's almost like he's taking up for his craft. And his friend believed in what he was doing. Didn't get offended. His friend who's transgender didn't get offended by what he was. was doing because he understood that it was all a part of the art form. Then his friend became subjected to the same criticism, if not worse, being a person of that

community, got subjected to that same criticism and couldn't handle it and ended up committing suicide. I think for Dave, this is what I assume, to be able to handle and deal with that tragedy, he almost had to keep going in that line of defending the art form to just, you know, to be able to handle, justify his actions. Does that make, do you understand what I'm saying? I do. Okay.

So this is what I would say. I am assuming that. I am assuming that's what he was doing. This is why I appreciate the space that Dave Chappelle's occupying. Like I appreciate the space where you get on a stage and you just go, hey, these are the jokes that I have. Really, the joke that I really didn't think that any comedian would ever tell would be the couple of Jewish jokes that he told. like I did I one of them was a direct commentary on Israel and I'm like you Dave God damn okay and then said it gets worse and that might have been one of the

worst things he said yeah well look I'm not I'm not you know I just did worse not not worse whatever I just didn't think that someone would say that on the stage when just knowing that you know whatever but so I appreciate the space of the occupies because I believe in saying whatever the fuck you want to say. I believe in saying whatever the fuck you want to say. Of course, I'd say whatever the fuck you want to say. But I also believe in conversation, consequence after those things. And so if I'm Dave Chappelle, right?

And I have a stand-up special. And then the stand-up special ends up in my friend defending me. and the defense of me causes my friend to be held accountable, attacked, dragged, whatever adjective you want to use on Twitter. After that, then the friend commits suicide, maybe not directly related to what happened, but like Dave said, it couldn't have helped. What I would wonder is if I wouldn't have made those jokes about that community,

would my friends still be alive? You don't think he, I think, that's why when you said, does he get it? That's what I thought you were referring to because I think he absolutely, there's no way that didn't cross his mind. I'm sure, look, look, and I'm not taking up for him. I'm just saying, because that would make me pause. That would make me say, it would really make me change what I was doing. But that's me.

And I'm trying to see the other side of it. And I think that he has to keep going to almost make what he did seem not. I explained it the way I did this. You get it. No, I don't. I totally get it. No, no. The only thing I'm saying is, look, man, Dave is not.

I don't think Dave is evil. I don't think Dave is toxic. Dave is just wrong. Can I ask you? this, do you think he's transphobic? Yeah. And he thinks he's transphobic. No, he doesn't.

He did say that. He said it a million times during the special. He says, I'm transphobic. See, okay, I don't know how that passed me because... He said it a bunch of times in a special. To me, he kept going back and saying, like, I love the community and I love this and I'm not against it, but then would make a joke that would contradict that. So I never remember him flat out saying, I am.

I am transphobic. Oh, he said it a bunch of times. I felt like he was saying he wasn't, but then your jokes were saying, your jokes were saying you were. Now, he very clearly is transphobic. I agree, but to me, I didn't know that he said it explicitly.

To me, it was like, your jokes are saying it. If you really weren't transphobic, you wouldn't make that type of joke. Now, the only thing I will say is, I don't know if a lot of people were saying that he was perpetuating violence against the community. I didn't get that. Well, he did have one joke where he talked about...

Was I not listening? I'm not sure. Remember, he talked about... He had a joke where he talked about actually getting in a physical fight with a... Oh, shit. He did. Yeah. He said that he was jabbing a woman in a club.

Okay, I take that back. I totally forgot about that joke. Like chicken cutlets. Yes. I totally forgot that joke. I'm gonna be loud when he said that I laughed because he said... Yes. The whole audience full of...

people at. I totally forgot that he totally did. He made it okay to attack. In that instance. No, I want you guys to go back and I want everybody to what I want the thought warriors to do as painful as it is. I don't want the conversation about this to keep going because this is a conversation

that needs to be had. But I want you to watch the special. I don't think I think the special in it of itself is Dave doing it doing his best to try to be as incendiary as he can be, but also do it with a lighter touch. I think it just fails because of the times we're in. I think it just fails too because so many other things on its face.

I saw a tweet that was amazing. Dave talked about the fact that he left $50 million at the table in this situation. I saw a tweet and I'm going to read the tweet verbatim. Okay. and I really thought to be honest with you that it was an absolutely amazing observation it is from

at the gates of Mel on Twitter Melanie Dion great follow on Twitter she said Dave Chappelle left $50 million on the table left his whole family behind and hit out in Africa because a white man laughed too hard at a nigger joke that he told with the express purpose of people laughing at it. Is that true?

Yeah, of course, yeah. I don't know that's why he ended up leaving going to Africa. Okay. Watch his Oprah interview. I will not believe that he doesn't understand the issues with his specials. So what she's saying is, Dave Chappelle understands that, you know, being a person in

in America that is oft assailed means sometimes it's hard to laugh with people when they're talking about you and he should know that better than anyone because he told the joke and got mad because they were laughing too hard.

It's a fantastic point. It's a great point. Anyway, you guys watch the special make up your own minds. What you're about to say, Rachel? I'm sorry. No, the only thing I was going to say, is if his friend had not passed away,

I think it would have been a totally different special. There you go. He says he's not going to do another one for a long time. Dave Chappelle is one of the finest minds in comedy. But, you know, we just have to be we just have to be

compassionate. I agree. Every single time I'm like, oh, go ahead. By the way, I have friends. in the community trope. Can we fucking...

Okay. Like, I got, you know, like, can we got friends in the community? I got a couple of trans people I hang out with. I'm like, all, nigger. The fuck does I have to do with anything? I love Dave. I don't want to, but...

Yes, he did the I have black friends thing. I always, you know, I always, when it's a community that does not directly, it affects a community that does not directly impact me, I always think how I would feel if it was about being black. that's do you okay you're like but no no no no no I'm blank face because you just something just jumped in my mind I would argue that it is your community because the black trans people the black you know what I mean the black I think that's one of the things no I'm just saying because when you said that I like it jumped in my mind I would argue that I think that's part of it I think the the oftentimes the black trans people and the black gay people they don't feel like they're one with us because they're one with us because they're not you. feel like we other them a little bit when really they are us.

Correct. I more so mean there are issues that affect them that don't directly impact me. And to empathize, I always say, would I be offended if you took out the offensive term towards them and made it against black people? And if my answer is yes, then you know what I mean? Like that's how I always check myself. If my answer is yes, that I would be offended, it's wrong. And I think that's what people need to do sometimes.

Like put yourself in that person's shoes. And if that would offend you, then it's a problem. Yeah, yeah. Like I said, like I said, still love Dave Chappelle, but was I cringe? Was I a little pissed off? Sure. But I think that's what he was trying to do. All right, I want to jump to something here.

We're going to come back to more substantive issues in a second. But before we get to Professor Corbyn and talking about what just happened down in Texas with the abortion law, I want to talk about a story that I love for talking. photographer deletes couple's wedding picks after being denied food Thought wars We need a poll on our thought words about this

Photographer deleted wedding photos After she was denied a break To get something to eat and drink Sparking a whole conversation on social media According to Newsweek The unnamed photographer posted about her experience on Reddit's I am I the asshole for him She said that she had been working for six hours straight

As a favor to the groom and bride as a favor to the groom and bride for a flat rate of $250 which the couple said is nothing for a 10-hour event. I'm not really a photographer.

I'm a dog groomer. Photographer said. Take lots of photos of dogs all day to put on my Facebook and Instagram. It's my thing if that makes sense. She was snapping some photos. She was looking forward to eating dinner and taking a break.

However, the bride and groom denied her request. I was told I cannot stop to eat because I need to be a photographer. Didn't even save her a spot at the table. She deleted all the wedding photos that she took that day. You get no photos after she got played like this. People on social media debated this. Rachel, you are married.

I am not. Yeah. Where do you stand on this issue? I mean, I think everybody stands on the side that you pay the photographer. photographer. Right? Isn't that the issue? No, the issue is not that you pay the photographer. The issue is that the photographer deleted all the photos that they took that day because they didn't let her eat. I would have, I'm on the side of photographer first of all. First off, I believe in paying people for what they do. The fact that it was $250 is insane. You're missing the point. No, I'm not. I'm saying this is why I would be on the side of her. Because they already. they jipped her from the beginning. It's absolutely ridiculous. You can't say that.

What does that mean? Can't say jip. What is it? Oh, is it, is it for gypsy? Yeah. Is it really? TR, toxic rage. Dave Chappelle, Rage.

Wow. I honestly, I had no idea that's where that came from. Learn something new. Keep this in here because I'm pretty sure other people didn't know that either. Keep it in. Right. Sorry to the communities I've ended by that. I've just learned that.

If I were the photographer, I would have passed out, fake passed out. And when I came to, I would have told everybody that they wouldn't allow me to eat and I'm starving. I would have made it a full announcement. When everybody gathered around me, I would have said, well, the reason I passed out is because they won't allow me to eat. So I'm on the side of the photographer. And then you're going to sue after that? No, there's no need to sue. You can fall and then hit your head, too.

You're right. Nightmares. You're right. So this is my deal. I have something called a dick contract. And no, it's not a contract where I have to deliver certain amounts of dick. That's not what it is. The contract of me is this.

Anything that I'm doing can be dissolved by you being a dick. It doesn't matter. Okay. You can be paying me $35,000. $50,000. I'm aware. And if somebody's rude to you? If you start acting like a dick, I reserve the right to buy.

blow the fucking spot up or to not render services. I don't work with, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, if you're a dick to see me, same thing, you're a dick to me. Oh, you mean to tell me I can't have beef or chicken? I can't get a little piece of wedding cake. Which you have, which you would have deleted them. Fucking right. You get no photo.

I hope you, I hope them camera phones is the new iPhone with a little third camera because you get no photo. Why? My thing is why Trump with you? Okay, you're married. You had a beautiful wedding day, I'm assuming. Wasn't invited.

Appreciate that. Before we even knew each other. Should have still threw something out there. Is there any way that you can argue for the bride and groom in this situation? Is there something I miss? Nope. Nope. Nope. First of all, the fact that this woman agreed to $250 is, that's why I keep going back to that.

That is so cheap. I don't care if she's not a real photographer or not. She agreed to basically do the work for free. And then you can't even get her a meal. Now I understand that she might not have a seat at the table, okay? Because you pay for each table setting. There might not have been room for her at the table. But you still could have given her a plate.

That is absolutely ridiculous. Absolutely ridiculous. I can't find any reason why this is okay. Have we heard from the bride and groom? I haven't seen it if we have. I'm sure they'll either they have or I haven't seen it or they'll come out of what works soon. On a level of 1 to 10, how petty is the photographer?

I'm going with three. Slightly petty? Slightly petty. I'm going to go with three because I really don't think it's that petty. Oh, see, I have another rule in life. And this is another rule in life. You guys, if you don't take any rule away from me, take this one rule. This is the rule.

Oh, it's fuck me? No. It's fuck you. That's the number I'm the nicest guy but see If it's fuck me it's not fuck me That's what you only think it's fuck me It's actually fuck you

And I'm gonna show you right now I don't think it's petty at all You know what I mean It's petty Gino McLaughlin told me that I told Gino we were in the argument Gino was Gino said But fuck you nigga

He was like well if oh it's fuck me Well then it's fuck you And then we both laughed That's friends So we're just We are going to take a break and we're going to come back on the other side of this break with Carolyn Corbyn, Professor of Law at Miami University to talk about the recent developments on the Texas abortion ban. Come back on the other side. This episode is brought to you by WeatherTech.

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of all sizes connected with internet, advanced Wi-Fi, phone, TV, mobile services, plus 24-7 U.S.-based support millions of business owners already trust Spectrum business. So visit Spectrum.com slash business to learn more. Restrictions apply. Services not available in all areas. We promise you guys that if there was a development in the fight for women's reproductive rights in Texas that we would update you. But with an expert, Caroline Mala Corbyn, who teaches law at the University of Miami, her accolades are too long to list. She was fantastic. The last time we talked about this Texas law and we decided to have her back to shed light on what just happened. There's been a development in Texas. Would you mind telling us what it is and what it

means? Yes, but first, just a very brief reminder of what's going on in case people to catch people up. Such a professor. All right. But I would try not to be. be a long-winded professor. You're great. So basically, Texas passed a completely unconstitutional law. Basically, a ban abortion at six weeks when the law is quite clear that you cannot ban abortions before 24 weeks.

So everybody knows this is an unconstitutional law, including Texas. And it also knew that if a federal court were to consider the law, it would strike it down before it went into effect. And so what Texas did is it structured a law that would evade review by federal courts. And it did it in a way that made it very difficult to know who to sue. And they succeeded. So the clinics and providers sued to prevent the law from going to prevent the law from going, into effect because that's usually what happens when a state passes a law and it's blatantly

unconstitutional before it goes into effect. They're sued. Federal courts look at this law and say, this is blatantly unconstitutional, you cannot enforce it. But because of Texas shenanigans, it did go into effect. That's when the U.S. government stepped in. So then the The Department of Justice brought a lawsuit against Texas. And so the case that was at issue today was United States versus Texas. And so the United States sued the state of Texas, arguing this law is completely unconstitutional.

And because it's the US of A bringing the law, It was able to overcome some of the procedural hurdles that stymied the earlier case. Okay, so part of the, what Texas had done is it had, so one of the requirements of a lawsuit properly before a federal court is that you have the right people suing and the right people sued. And in the first case, what Texas had done is they had prohibited Texas officials from bringing claims. They had deputized private citizens to bring the claims. And so it was very hard to know who to sue. And the court said, that's partly why the Supreme Court let the law go into effect, because the Supreme Court said, we don't think you bought the right people.

We don't think you sued the right people. This time, the United States was able to sue Texas, so it sued the right person, the right defendant was in court, and the United States had standing to bring the suit, meaning it was the right party to bring the case. So, oh, I'm sorry. Yeah, go ahead. So that's sort of the procedural question. And I'm more than happy to talk about the details about why Texas was the, I mean, why the United States had standing or was the right party to bring the suit.

But I want to get to the exciting part because what the district court said is not only United States, you have met the procedural hurdles, put in your, you have overcome the procedural hurdles, but it actually looked at the law and said, this. This law is crazy. Well, it didn't say that. But it sort of said that in judge speech. But it basically said is this is a blatant violation of women's rights. And it's unconstitutional. And not only that is I'm staying the law. In other words, this law is no longer in effect in Texas.

Which is a victory if you're pro choice. So I want to ask the next question. question. Naturally, people are saying, okay, this is kind of a temporary fix at the moment. So what's next? Okay. So yes. So this decision is good. There's good news. There's bad news and there's more bad news. Oh. Damn it. Damn it, Caroline. So the good news is what you just pointed out is a portion is now available again to the women of Texas after six weeks, and that is major. But as Rachel kind of made clear, it's temporary. And the reason it's temporary is because the federal court that decided this is sort of the, on the bottom of the hierarchy.

There are three levels of federal courts. I'm sorry, I'm being professorial again. There are three levels of federal courts, the district court, which issued the decision. Then it goes up to the Court of Appeals, which is the Fifth Circuit. And they can reverse the district court's decision. And then above that is the Supreme Court. So the first bad news is that this case is going to go up to the Fifth Circuit. And the Fifth Circuit is an a stunningly conservative court. court. And they are well known for their hostility to reproductive rights. And so while abortion is

today available again, once the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals considers the case, they may say, I'm sorry, we are removing this day and the law goes back into effect. What do you feel like? I'm not asking you to to play the psychic here. But just from your guess, would you guess that that's likely to happen? Yeah. Maybe not. Right. I mean, I don't think it's hard to emphasize how unusual what Texas did.

One person described it. This is another person, not me, because as a professor, perhaps I wouldn't talk this way. It's basically like giving the middle finger to the rule of law. Because it structured the law to avoid scrutiny by the courts. And so it knew it was unconstitutional. And yet it's not just that it passed it knowing it was unconstitutional. It passed it trying to avoid a federal court from ever being able to get to the point and say, it's unconstitutional before it went into effect and harmed all the women of Texas who no longer have the security of having access, legal access to abortion.

So it goes to the Court of Appeals, and let's just say, hypothetically, the Court of Appeals sends it back, right, to the state of Texas. Or they say that it is constitutional or whatever decision it is that they make. Okay. Okay. My question then is, does it ultimately then go back to the Supreme Court? So what the Supreme Court punted back to the state of Texas ends up right back in their court again? It may well go to the Supreme Court because once a decision is made at the Fifth Circuit level, the losing party can appeal to the Supreme Court. But what is important to understand about the Supreme Court is that it doesn't necessarily have to take every case that is appealed to it. So there could be a request for the Supreme Court to hear it, but they might say no, because there are thousands of people who want the Supreme Court to review the decision they got in the Court of Appeals.

but the Supreme Court only hears 90, 80, 100 cases a year. So there's no guarantee that it will take the decision. That's if it goes through normal channels. There's also emergency applications, which is another sort of route to get to the Supreme Court. I don't know exactly how this case will unfold. But if this case is unconstitutional, if this law is unconstitutional,

I can't imagine the Supreme Court not wanting to hear it because it directly challenges Roe v. Wade. So you have Texas doing something kind of that the rest of the country isn't doing. You would have thought that this attempt to get around the federal courts would have irked the Supreme Court the first time they were faced with it. And yet they still let it go into effect. The other thing to understand is that the Supreme Court has already agreed to hear a different case challenging Roe v. Wade. And that's already on its docket. So that's scheduled for December 1st. So on December 1st, the Supreme Court is hearing a different challenge to Roe v. Wade. So if it makes a decision in that case, it need not.

necessarily also address it in this one. My last question. With justices on the court like Justice Barrett, Justice Kavanaugh, who are certainly conservative justices, who have not been on fire about keeping around Roe v. Wade or or about their stances on women's reproductive rights, even if it were to go to the Supreme Court. At that point,

how much of a challenge would it face from justices like Barrett and justices like Kavanaugh? And that is the million dollar question, right? What is the Supreme Court going to do about the right to abortion? It is well-established. Millions of women depend on it for their autonomy and their equality. It is part of, and it has been the law for over 50 years. So the question is, is the Supreme Court going to eliminate a right that over half the country needs and depends on?

without a principled reason for doing so. Or are they going to simply keep the right in name, but try and gut the level of protection? Because while I can't predict which of those two options it's going for, abortion rights are not going to be as strong after a Supreme Court decision as they are now. That's the only thing I can say for sure. But you put your finger on it. What are they going to do?

I don't know. I don't know what they're going to do about what it's right. I have an answer. I have an answer to this entire problem. And that is right now appoint Carolyn Corbyn to the United States Supreme. You know that's one of the options on the table is expand. Yeah, yeah. Expand the court.

here's a little constitutional law. While the Constitution says that there shall be a Supreme Court, it does not dictate the actual number of justices on the court. And so it is an option to increase the number of justices. I say put on the court. Put Caroline Corbyn on the court. Thank you so much. Yes.

Thank you for stopping. For helping us make heads of total. Always a pleasure. We're going to be pestering you every time we need. It's great because because of you, you forced me to actually look at the decision. There was one point that I wanted to make that I didn't get to. It's nasty provision of the law that says even if you provide an abortion while it's legal because you've declared it unconstitutional.

If a court above you later says actually it's not like actually it reinstitutes the law, you can still be liable. I didn't say that well. Oh my God. No, we definitely need to get that. Like, so. Let me explain.

Sure. Because the district court has stayed the law, many of the clinics abortion are getting back to work and providing women with abortions even after six weeks. But they're doing it at risk

to themselves. Because there is a provision in the law that says, even if you, abortion is legal at the time you perform it, if the next court above you then reinstates the law, you are liable for that abortion after six weeks. My gosh. Those clinics are trying their best to provide health care to the woman of Texas, knowing

that the fifth court, the fifth circuit might well reinstate the law. and they once again become on the hook for providing health care to women. I'm so glad you made that point because that's something that people really need to know. And that's in the original law. That is the in law. They thought about everything.

They thought about everything. Jesus. Yes. So sinister. Nasty. My God. Well, thank you, Professor. Yes, we definitely need to get that in.

Yeah. Right. Thank you very much. We appreciate you joining us. We'll talk after the Fifth Circuit gets it. We will. Yes, we will. Thank you. For adults with Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis symptoms, every choice matters. Tramphia offers self-injection or intravenous infusion from the start. Tramphia is administered as injections under the skin or infusions through a vein every four weeks,

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Explore what's possible. Ask your doctor about Tramfaya today. Call 1-800-526-7736 to learn more or visit Tramphiatoradio.com. This episode is brought to by the Active Cash Credit Card from Wells Fargo. That's a mouthful, but that's because it packs a lot in. Earn unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases with it, big or small. So whether it's buying tickets to the game and grabbing a coffee, it earns unlimited 2% cash rewards on purchases.

Say it with me, the Active Cash Credit Credit, card from Wells Fargo. Be a 2%ter. Learn more at Wells Fargo.com forward slash active cash terms of play. Yeah, that was, um, start off good, but then, you know, the ending kind of got bleak of that situation right there. The Texas is a boy. I thought, I thought, I don't know.

I thought it was better news, but. She said, I have good news. I have some bad news and I have some more bad news. Right. Yeah. Well, it'll be interesting to see what the Fifth Circuit does. Gotta keep fighting. Is your dad on that?

No, my dad, well, you know, she gets a little shade, a little shade towards the judge. Remember she was like, remember she was like, there's the bottom of the hierarchy. So there's three levels. So my dad's a district judge. And then from there, you get appointed to Fifth Circuit, which governs both our states.

And then Supreme Court. So you can't do nothing to help us? No, not unless it fell in his court. But then again, like, judge in Austin it fell into his court and now it's going to be appealed to the fifth circuit gotta be honest with you i'm a little disappointed in the judge here i'll be sure to relay your sentiments to him yeah tell him we might have to postpone the fishing the fishing trip real quick i'm looking for i was looking for us i was looking for his support on this issue uh Tesla is going

to play a black man a hundred thirty seven million dollars he sued for racial discrimination federal jury in san francisco ordered Tesla to pay a former black contract 137 million dollars. His name is Owen Diaz. Yes. My only problem is that I wanted his name to be a little blacker. No, stop. Owen's black.

I'm not saying he's not black. Of course, we got the Afro-Latina situation. Afro-Latino. But I like it when a nigger wins a suit like this, I like for his name to be Jeffrey Jenkins Jr. Because it just makes it. Gotta keep the junior. It just makes it a little more egregious.

Tesla had to play Melvin Jackson Jr. $137 million. My question to you is this, based upon this. He was working at Tesla, and now they're going to pay him. He said that he was called by the N-word. He was told to go back to Africa. And that employees drew races and derogatory pictures that were left around the factory.

God damn, Tesla, the fuck. For over a year. For over a year, this is going on at Tesla. This is in fucking Northern California. Shit. Free Mont. Freemont. Free.

Free. Yes. Diaz said he complained and that nothing was done to stop it. Okay. 137 million dollars for Owen Diaz. Have you ever experienced workplace racism? No, not like that. Also, I really hope.

I'm going to address that. but I really hope that he gets that money because they're definitely going to appeal that decision. So, you know, Owen might be waiting a little bit, but it's a big that they even decided in his favor. That's what's big, that he was able to actually have proof, which is these are cases are really, really hard to prove. The fact that he could prove the fact that this happened

and they're awarding this much money. And most of it is because of emotional distress is wild. Have I experienced work? place racism. Not explicitly where anybody called me the N-word or, you know, told me to go back to Africa. It was more of, more dismissive as who I was as an attorney as a black woman, as a young black woman at that. So I had being young, being woman, and being black, where I felt like attorneys, I would watch how they would respect the first chair on the case, which was always a white man and then how they would talk to me. Like in a deposition, I had one point where an attorney was

so friendly to the guy next to me, white man next to me, but to me was pointing his finger in my face and telling me what I better do. And I said on the record, I said to the court board, I want I want you to make sure that you get this on the record. And I acknowledge how he was treating me versus how he was treating my co-counsel on the case and that he wasn't giving me the same respect that he was given to me. And I wonder what's the difference. Why can't you talk to me like you're talking to him? So that is more of that what I got. People didn't hold me in the same regard as they did my white male counterpart.

Or I would be sitting in a courtroom because I worked as I worked for a private firm and I did municipal law. So we represent, we were city attorneys for a lot of the suburban towns outside of Dallas. And so I worked as a local prosecutor doing like traffic tickets and stuff like that. and I'd come in and the attorneys come in and they talk to you, right? They're like, oh, where's the attorney? They walk right past me to the judge, to the court clerk, and they'd be like, has the attorney arrived yet? And they'd be like, she's sitting right there.

So they wouldn't believe that I could be the attorney, that kind of stuff. Yeah, yeah. Have you? Of course. I do what I always do. I threaten violence. Yeah. Have you ever not threatened and just,

did it? Did the violence? No. That wasn't violence. I was my friend and I was talking to him. I just fucking talked to the guy a couple of days ago. That wasn't violence. But it was on a set some years ago.

I was on the set and some guys came along. And maybe I was wrong for this. all words. Tell me if I'm wrong for this. Some transport guys were there, like transportation guys, like they're teamsters. Teamsters, they would sit down. They would talk to me. And I was sitting there and I had, there was some salting crackers on my desk, right?

And one of the construction guys walked by, he walked by, he went, he's like, van, let me have two of them white people. He wanted the crackers. And I was like, ha, ha, ha, ha. and I laughed and then the construction guy came up behind me. Were they white? No, this guy was black. Okay.

And the construction guy comes up and goes, you know, I just heard you laugh at that. I could call you something right now. And I said, I'll beat your motherfucking ass. How's that sound? I say, go for it. I said, and I'm going to beat your motherfucking ass right here in front of all of these people. I bet you won't. and then he just he ran

he ran over. He ran away? No, no, he ran over to the supervisor producer and brought the supervisor producer back over here. My blood pressure didn't go up a tick. I was, I was like, she was like, Van, are you threatened to people with violence? I was like, he threatened to call me the N-word.

Yep. He threatened to call me the N-word. I'm letting you know. And I say that, I said, this is for anybody in earshot. If I get called the N-word on this set, I'm a bus, yo. fucking ass. I was only 23. I would have made a joke probably these days, but yeah.

So, nah, but those workplace racism, an inward threat to me is racism on the workplace. And of course, you know. Of course it is. I've never even been threatened. Now, I'm not saying I'm sure I wouldn't call something behind my back, but I've never had explicit racism. Then there was the notorious TMZ shook night inward thing that I think we've talked about on here.

When the TMZ put the poll up, whether or not black people should be called in words or African Americans. Yeah, we have not talks about this. Oh, my God. Okay, so look, but we got back in the day, this guy that's Adam Sandler's pal said the N-word at some bar in Santa Monica, who knows white people flip out and say the N-word once in their life, they all go crazy. Just whether or not we get in on camera is our luck.

And when he said it, when they got him after that, he said that he had been hanging around Shug Knight and Shug Knight gave him permission to say the N-word. Oh. His name is Peter Dante or something like that. I'm sure if you search hard enough, you can all find a black person that'll give you permission. Sure. Of course.

Sage Steele. But anyway, so that video comes out and then Harvey puts the video in the post, writes the story up. And at the bottom of the post on Friday we do polls. and he goes, which word should black people be called? Like African Americans or niggas. He said that? I don't know.

I didn't actually see the poll itself. I only got the- Those were the only two options. Oh, yeah, that's what- And which one-one? We talked to Shug-Night and got Shug-Night. And Shug-Night said, this is what Shug-Night said. It was based on the Shug-Night thing.

Shug-Night said, I don't want to be called an African-American. He's like, I would much rather be called a nigger. That's what Shul Knight said. I'm a nigger, not African-American. And so then we did a post, like, should African-Americans or niggas? I like, and so I was off on Monday show, and this went up over the weekend. Everybody hit me up. This is years ago, maybe like 2015, something like that.

Everybody hit me up. Everybody hit me up. And so when I got back in the office That Monday I fucking let them have it Like in the office and on TV And I and and and I And and everybody was so freaked out

They're like van we're going to give you an open forum on television To talk about all of it I call Harvey stupid to his face on the show And I like and I went out But look it still didn't matter I was still working for TMZ which I did for like four more years after that So whatever it happens. But yeah, I didn't get no $137 million, though.

Good for Owen. Good for Owen. I love you, Owen. I'll tell you who didn't get money. Who? Negro colleges. So sad. It's very sad.

Biden, Biden a little shaky right now. Biden a little shaky. The funding for the Negro colleges, the HBCUs, It's going on down. Oh, yes, it looks like the HBCU funding is falling from $45 billion to $2 billion under Joe Biden's latest spending plan. Historically black colleges and universities, we're looking forward to $45 billion in funding. But they may be faced with just under $2 billion, $2 billion under the Biden administration's multi-trillion dollar spending plan. That happens because there was democratic infighting that is going down.

The $3.5 trillion bill was set to include $45 billion for HBCUs and other minority serving institutions. Newest iteration has brought that down to $2 billion for educational programs and the infrastructure of HBCU. So it's not that this was money that they were getting. This was money that they were going to be getting. There's been a lot of back and forth in different wings of the Democratic Party over this spending bill, the moderates versus the progressives.

and the number is coming down and it looks like that they're cutting out of the money that was going to be going to HBCUs. They didn't just cut it. It's like they slashed it. They demolished it. You go from $45 billion to $2 billion and who knows how long.

And it seems like if you read the article that this has been something that's been in discussion with the administration for a while. So I can only imagine that these HBCUs have been figuring out what they're going to do with this money and how they're going to allocate these funds. And why are you laughing? Why are you laughing? Because I'm just thinking, a HBCU presidents everywhere that was like looking for Ferraris and shit. I'm over here.

I'm trying to have a serious conversation. Are you talking about that? I was just thinking about the dudes at Texas Southern. You know what I'm saying? And it's like, oh shit. Why don't you do us like that? It's lit. I'm telling you, man, Texas Southern Southern, Southern,

grambling everybody, man, it's about to be fucking lit. Now, they shit, they can't go to Cancun now. Stop, stop, stop. I will not let it. Stop, stop, y'all. Please ignore my co-host as we talk about this subject. They be stealing the money, though. That's all I'm saying.

That's a stereotype. That is not every president. I'm just joke. Stop. Stop. Remember, they're going to take what you said and be like, well, Van said that the reason, come on now, somebody will cut it. Take it. He's kidding.

He's kidding. He's kidding. He's kidding. He's Dave Chappellelling. But you were saying, though. I was saying that these college and universities, these historically black college and universities, I'm sure we're already figuring out where the money was going to go, how they were going to recover from the pandemic. because they're statistically showing that they less students were applying. Their endowments have dropped.

Like they have suffered completely because of the pandemic and how that's affected education and funding. And they were depending on this money. And from $45 billion to $2 billion, that is not a lot of money to go around when you're spreading it out across all the HBCUs. So it's really disappointing that when it comes to cutting, that's what you decided to cut.

And plus, it's one of the things that President Trump was bragging about how much he helped HBCUs. Now here you have the Biden administration. It was a talking point. Now here you have the Biden administration when something's on the chopping block. The first thing you do is you cut the money to the HBCUs. I don't know. It just like helps with the Trump. That's one of the first things I thought of.

We should say they're cutting money that they were going to be getting. Yes, that they were going to be giving But this was obviously an ongoing discussion You know, they didn't just say Hey, we're going to give you 45 billion They had to have been talking with presidents And administrations within HBCUs And trying to figure out the need

That they needed to fill You know what I mean? And then all of a sudden to say, Okay, how much do you need? Okay, maybe we can do this. To now say, actually we're thinking of cutting it back to this number. It's pretty heartbreaking.

Yeah. So I got a message for the Biden Kamala team What is it? We need a fucking win. We should keep a chart up. We should keep a chart. We're going to keep a chart.

We need a fucking win. Y'all talked a lot of shit. We put y'all in there. We came out in droves. Black women saved America again. We need a fucking win. I saw Cory Booker on there talking about the child tax credit. I looked it up.

That's not something specifically for black people, although it does help black children. It helps all children. Fantastic. I'm going to be completely forthright right now. All this stuff for black farmers is amazing as well. I'm going to talk directly to them, though. I'm talking about on the issues that get Black America moving. I am not downplaying anything that can be done for black farmers.

Black farmers have lost millions acres of land over the course of this last century. Not downplaying anything. I'm saying black people need a big, shiny win. Big shiny win. police reform is on life support voting rights on life support and when you need to cut some shit out of your goddamn spending bill

you didn't cut down to 10 or 15 billion you went down to two and the schools are paying for it okay it's people from the schools that went out and got y'all elected we need to win y'all fucking up I'm not gonna be long-winded about it. People don't want me to be long winning. I'm not going to be long winning about it. We need to win. This is like this is fucked up. We're about to, I'll tell you, we'll be honest with you.

I'm about to start getting on your ass. I'm going to be real with you. I'm about to start getting on your motherfucking ass. All right. I hope you guys didn't think I saw this. 18 former NBA players charged with defrauding the NBA's health and welfare benefit plan. And I will just be forthright. One of these players is Glenn Big Baby Davis, who is my cousin. I don't know anything. I haven't spoken to Glenn about this. I don't know the ends and outs of this. This is not something I will not cover. This is not something we will not talk about.

More information will be forthcoming. He is my family. And so I want to make sure people know that I'm aware of the story. I reached out to Glenn earlier. I've never known that guy to have one crooked bone in his body. So I'm sure there is something to be said here. And when it's said, I'll talk to you guys about it. But I'm not ignoring it.

He's my cousin. So I just wanted to go ahead and put that out there. There's other players involved, Darius Miles, Sebastian Telfare, a couple other people. And there are all kinds of allegations. Some well-known names there, Shannon Brown, Ruben Patterson. If you follow football, these are some Jamarion, Will Bynum. These are guys that you might have heard of. Football or basketball?

Excuse me. If you follow basketball, I'm sorry. If you follow the NBA. the guys you might have heard of. So yeah, I'm not ignoring it, but I'm telling you, obviously with a situation like this, I'm going to want as much information as possible before I talk about it. Here's the wild thing about this story.

Wild. 18, I think it was around 18 NBA players have been indicted or named in this, or charged with this, indicted. Yet none of the doctors have, have been charged or named in this. Isn't that wild? You know what that means? They're the ones who told.

Glenn is innocent. Oh, okay. That's what it means right there. Glenn is innocent. He didn't do it. Listen, for all you guys wondering, there were fraudulent invoices that were created for health care services

that allegedly these NBA players said they received, they filed it with the insurance company, they didn't receive these services and the guy who was the ringleader got a kickback off of the money that they got paid that was given to them for these services that they

whatever received but the offices that created the invoices were not named and charged that is wild to me because clearly none of this could have happened if they weren't creating these fake invoices I'll be real with you even if they did do it I don't care

you don't care about any of it if they did it is victimless to me fucking try to defraud them so white collar crimes don't mean anything to you I mean not when they happen to institutions like the NBA well not institutions the NBA NBA

NBA players well no but this comes did they this came from the NBA they defrauded yes they defrauded them health and wellness benefit package correct they made their pockets bigger but at the end of the day it's a crime

so what so again white collar crimes don't mean anything to you it depends on what kind of white collar crimes like Enron means something to me Enron runs all the fucking stock shit crazy shit people that had all the Enron shit invested in Enron they lose all their fucking money that matters

I have a problem with people lying about the health care they receive to get money I have a problem with that I'm gonna go ahead and be on frotting the health care system. It's messed up. It's messed up enough as it is. I don't care who you are. I don't care what organization is involved. I guess it is.

It's messed up. So let me ask you, do you have a problem with the PPP scams? Yes. No. I don't. Yes. I have 100% do. There's a whole thing about people in Bachelors that were getting PPP loans. Who? Who? You want me

starting to name? No. Hell yeah. I know, I know. I know, I know Dale was. I know he was. Dell, I think I won't. Adele looks like a PPP-ass d'Anger. Like who didn't have a business, right? If you had a business, I don't care about that, right? You had business, whatever.

I look at Dale, I see PPP. Is it true that Chip and Dale broke up again? I totally texted you this. They broke up? They broke up. They're done for good. Okay. I want to see Chip do better than this.

Chip don't go back to Dell again. I really, I don't think she will. Who's going to date now? Who's out there? Who's number one out there? for Chip. What kind of guy you think Chip is going to date? Shouldn't we do a reality show now based around Chip finding love? Well, they did that. It was called The Bachelorette. No, not that one, because that one didn't even play out. She got too excited over what you think she's going to do on

round two. But see, this is my thing, though. First of all, would they ever bring her back to the Bachelorette again? That would be big ratings if they did. No. Okay. So here's my thing about Chip in this situation. Number one, let's be honest, Chip kind of fine. Okay. Gorgeous. Okay. So She jumped off. She wouldn't be the first white woman who dove off the deep end for the tall, light skin, black dude. It happens. It happens.

It's happened before. Okay. So my thing is, we want to see her find love. We could fucking care less what happens to Dale. PPP Dale, party city's hiring. He'll go out there. He'll be in the photo shoots. It's fine.

But I want Chip to be happy. I do too. But she's not going to be happy. She's dealing with a lot. Like her mom's health is failing. She's dealing with a lot. So, you know, we want her to take her time, take care of herself. And when she's ready, you know, we can talk about it.

But for now, she got to stay away from Dell. All right. Mailback time. Sorry, Chip. Mailback time. Time to read your letters. And then we'll reply to them. Oh, it's mailback time.

write us with your queries and we'll chime in from Sunshine A12 If you had to drink one thing Other than water For the rest of your life What would it be?

Orange juice I love orange juice I used to What kind of orange juice? I really like any kind I used to like I was somewhat prefer Like somewhat preferential

to the Walmart brand back in the day but now I'm too special for that so we get like simply orange oh love a simply orange pulp no pulp hate no pulp okay what about you this is tough probably red bull sugar free sugar free sugar free god rach you'd be turned up around this bitch red bull sugar sugar free or coolate it's gonna be one of the other cool eight let's have a coolie party The four of us. Okay.

And what does that mean? We're just, who makes the best Kool-Aid? You don't know. You never had a Kool-A party before? No. This is what Kool-A party is. It's two ways you can do it.

You make two pictures of Kool-Aid. Okay. One picture of Kool-Aid, spiked. One picture of Kool-Aid, not spiked. Ooh. Or you make two, you make,

or if you have people coming over to your house and this is dubious for people in college. but you pour actual cups of Kool-A but you don't tell people which cups of Kool-A have alcohol in them. You don't think people can taste? Sometimes they can, but the cups,

you can taste it when you're drinking it, but you don't know when you're grabbing it. Gotcha. So, okay, we'll do a Kuley party if we really do a Bachelor-watching party. Bachelor, okay, Bachelor-watch party, Kool-A party. Okay, cool.

Let's go next question. Come on. Well, that brings me to my next question. This is from S. Riddell. 54. Now that Rachel's season is on Hulu, would you guys ever recap it on the pod? Yep.

Nope. I sure would. Nope. We're not doing it. I would love to. I'm not about to come on here and be a joke every single book. Complete with interviews with the guys and the whole not. I'm willing to do.

I'm willing to do, Bill, I'm willing to do a separate pot. Bill, Juliet. I'm willing to do a separate. I'm turning in my two weeks. I'm willing to do a. a separate pot. Like a rewatch. A batch of rewatch.

Nobody's going to listen to it. They'll come for us, baby. I'm turning in my two weeks. I'm giving my two weeks notice. The day that gets green lit. They would love for you to do that. I would love to. Complete with interviews.

One more. One more. This is from just amber. Dot nc. What are or would be your couple Halloween costume with your significant other. So Van and Kalika, Rachel and Bryant. I don't believe in it.

We've never, oh no, I was a Playboy Bunny one year. And he was half. And he was Hugh after. Degrading. Jesus Christ. This is a few years ago. Degrading. You're like, oh, my God.

What the fuck is going on over there? I look back and not my, not my best moment, but, you know, it happened. It's on social media. I'm not going to hide from it. We don't do that anymore. We don't do that. We don't dress up. I don't even know what we would do.

That's not happening. That's not happening. For many reasons, that's not happening. All right. That's enough. That's enough mailback for right now. It's a lot of reasons. You done?

Yeah. That's enough mail back. Ally of the week. So we don't have an ally of the week, but we do have a praise report. I like this. I love it too. Orlando Brown,

who used to be on what was he on? That's so. Raven. That's so Raven. Yeah. He struggled with drug addiction for a long time, but it looks like Orlando Brown is doing a lot better. He's clean and he's now a Christian rapper. I think he was on Family Matters too.

Wasn't he, wasn't he little Reggie's friend? Was that a name? He might have been. He might have been. He's done a lot of stuff in the little, as a child actor. He was out there bad for a long time. Had some really, really, really bad moments. But he's out there now.

I'm not sure which is being worse, a drug addict or a Christian rapper, but I'm happy for him. Like, I'm happy for him. Are you with that? Listen, I love this because we're very quick to talk about when he was not doing well and what happened to Orlando Brown and all of that was trending. And sometimes we relish in the negativity. So it's nice to say, you know what? He's actually doing well.

Doing well. He, it looks, I think he's married. He's got a kid. He's married. He's looking, he's doing good. He's doing good. He's a Christian rapper. He looks so much healthier.

So good for him. Good for him. Seriously, prayers is, I've met him before. Prayers and blessings. No, no, no. I've met him. What I mean to say is that I don't know, I learned around, but I've said I met him when he was, we covered him at TMZ when he was doing bad.

Exactly. People love to do that. Yeah. And so, I'm. I'm glad to see somebody like that, like get it all turned around. So shout out to Orlando Brown. O.B.

Orlando Brown. All right. That is enough higher learning. That is enough. We have Indigenous People's Day coming up on Monday, right? Yes, you do. And we have a very special episode of Higher Learning. Okay, we have Lynette Gray Bull coming on to talking about missing and murdered indigenous women.

And it is an amazing conversation that in all sorts of, seriousness, I hope every single one of you who tunes into this podcast, listen to this brilliant, amazing lady talk about her life's work. It's really great stuff. I was moved and I was floored. So please check in with us on Monday. All right. Take the thing caps off.

But do not stop learning. Please read the articles and not just the headlines. I am Van Lathan Jr. I am Rachel and Lindsay. Bye, guys.