#RolandMartinUnfiltered - U.S. COVID deaths hit 500k; New evidence in assassination of Malcolm X; Biden/Harris help Black biz

Episode Date: February 23, 2021

2.22.21 #RolandMartinUnfiltered: U.S. COVID deaths hit 500; New evidence in the assassination of Malcolm X; Biden/Harris plan to help Black biz; Merrick Garland AG confirmation hearing; Writer and producer Ira Rosen talks "Ticking Clock: Behind the Scenes at 60 Minutes"; Newly released video shows the deadly confrontation between sheriff's deputies and a homeless man in San Clemente; We'll celebrate the life and legacy of NYT Bestselling author and lawyer Lawrence Otis Graham.Support #RolandMartinUnfiltered via the Cash App ☛ https://cash.app/$rmunfiltered or via PayPal ☛https://www.paypal.me/rmartinunfiltered#RolandMartinUnfiltered is a news reporting platform covered under Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Taser Incorporated. I get right back there and it's bad. Listen to Absolute Season 1, Taser Incorporated, on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Clayton English. I'm Greg Glott. And this is Season 2 of the War on Drugs podcast. Last year, a lot of the problems of the drug war. This year, a lot of the biggest names in music and sports. This kind of starts that a little bit, man.

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We asked parents who adopted teens to share their journey. We just kind of knew from the beginning that we were family. They showcased a sense of love that I never had before. I mean, he's not only my parent, like, he's like my best friend. At the end of the day, it's all been worth it. I wouldn't change a thing about our lives. Learn about adopting a teen from foster care. Visit adoptuskids.org to learn more. Brought to you by AdoptUSKids, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and the Ad Council. Today is Monday, February 22nd, 2021. President Joe Biden is speaking right now commemorating the 500,000 people who have died due to COVID-19. Let's go live to the White House.

We're going live to the White House. Our fathers, our sons, our daughters, husbands, wives. We have to fight this together as one people, as the United States of America. That's the only way we're going to beat this virus, I promise you. The only way to spare more pain and more loss, the only way these milestones no longer mark our national morning, these milestones, I should say, no longer mark our national morning. Let this not be a story of how far we fell, but of how far we climbed back up. We can do this. For in this year of profound loss, we've seen profound courage from all of you

on the front lines. I know the stress, the trauma, the grief you carry, but you give us hope. You keep us going. You remind us that we do take care of our own, that we leave nobody behind, and that while we've been humbled, we have never given up. We are America.

We can and will do this. In just a few minutes, Jill and I, Kamala and Doug, will hold a moment of silence here in the White House, the people's house, your house. We ask you to join us, to remember so we can heal, to find purpose in the work ahead, to show that there is light in the darkness. This nation will smile again.

This nation will know sunny days again. This nation will know sunny days again. This nation will know joy again. And as we do, we'll remember each person we've lost, the lives they lived, the loved ones they left behind. We will get through this, I promise you. But my heart aches for those of you who are going through it right now. May God bless you all, particularly those

who've lost someone. God bless you. He's right on time and he's rolling Best believe he's knowing Putting it down from sports to news to politics With entertainment just for kicks He's rolling It's Uncle Roro, y'all It's Rolling Martin Rolling with rolling now. He's funky, he's fresh, he's real the best. You know he's rolling, Martin.

Now. Martin. That was President Joe Biden, of course, speaking at the White House, where he is about to lead a moment of silence in a candlelit ceremony for those who have lost their lives due to COVID-19. Five hundred thousand Americans have now died as a result of COVID-19. And he has, frankly, done more since he's been president addressing this very issue than Donald Trump ever did. Like I said, in a moment, we're going to go back to the White House to actually have a live look at that moment of silence, as well as the candle lit all on the back end of the White House. Go ahead and take that shot, folks. What you're seeing right now

is this shot outside of the White House there, the rear of the White House, where all of these candles are lit to commemorate the folks who have lost their lives. Our panel is Kieran Young, Democratic strategist, Dr. Julianne Malveaux, economist, president, Emerita Bennett College, Teresa Lundy, principal founder of TML Communications. We can go back to the shot of the White House, and then we'll just talk over it, folks. I want to first start with you, Teresa, as somebody who understands communications and the importance of it. The reality is this, and that is President Biden understands how significant this issue is. It was a major issue during the election.

So for him to spend the amount of time, remember, of course, when he got inaugurated, they had the events taking place where they had a ceremony at the reflection pool for those who lost their lives due to COVID-19. And so then you have this as well. This is what we call a president understanding how to touch a touch point for Americans? Yeah, the Biden-Harris administration has definitely understood what the needs of the people are. And right now it's about understanding that lives have been lost and rebuilding America. And I think what that means, you know, especially to the Biden and Harris administration, is that the time has come to rebuild, to strengthen, to show what real leadership looks like. But in order to do that, you actually have to identify where the problems are and also provide resources and understanding for the families and the lives that are lost. So it was really, you know, not only monumentous,

but it was remarkable that the works that they did, the compassion and the sympathy that was shown, because for, you know, four years, we didn't have that. We didn't have... Teresa, hold tight one second. We're going to... This is the moment of silence at the White House. I love you. © BF-WATCH TV 2021 ¶¶ © BF-WATCH TV 2021 Kjell Kjell I'm sorry. And that was President Joe Biden, Dr. Jill Biden, joined by Vice President Kamala Harris, and of course, second gentleman, Douglas M. Hoff. Teresa, go ahead and continue with your comments.

Yeah, I mean, outside of us knowing, you know, that we have a Biden administration that is listening to the hearts and souls of the people and takes that compassion with them in every decision, it's just rewarding to just to know that we have leadership finally back in the White House after four years of destruction and turmoil for most Americans. Julianne. It was a very somber moment, a very important one. As Teresa said, we haven't seen this before. We've seen the deaths toll rising, rising, rising. You see no response from the previous

president. But what President Biden and Vice President Harris have done is made it clear that when you have half a million people dead, half a million people dead, it requires some acknowledgement and some commemoration. So as I said, it was a very somber moment and a very appropriate one. And it really does bode well in terms of looking at this administration and how they understand all of our pain. A half a million people, I don't know a person who hasn't been affected by someone who's passed because of this COVID or who has been affected by it. I know young people who are still trying to get through it. And I know other people who lost, I mean, my godfather died a month ago because of this. So we have so many people who are affected and it's useful to have an

administration that says, I feel your pain. Kieran, that is obviously something that is important because people do want to believe. They want to see, out of the President of the United States, being the healer-in-chief. That is something that Donald Trump never did. And keep in mind, Donald Trump said that COVID was going to disappear by June of last year. Wish he had.

Actually, we can't hear you. Make sure your mic is not muted. Kieran? All right, so folks, let me know when we have Kieran's mic taken care of. There we go. Now we can hear you. Go ahead. Sorry about that, Roland. No, I think the president is right in trying to heal the country. I think he's focused on, you know, showing the compassion that the previous president could not.

And I think there are so many people who have been struggling throughout this, so many people in different communities around the country who have lost jobs and lost family members, that it's right for him to start this presidency by focusing on COVID, trying to address the problems with COVID-19, but also remembering the people that have been lost and remembering the suffering that has gone on throughout the last year. And I think healing the country is the best way for him to start this presidency. And of course, it continues to keep the light shining on the issue. You have Joe Biden constantly talking about the role that he is playing as commander in chief, as president of the United States, listening to the science, listening to the science, because that is certainly not what we heard from the previous occupant. There was this constant battle, if you will, with scientists when it came to COVID.

In fact, this was a video that the White House actually dropped on yesterday. Watch this. This is the spike protein. This is the protein of coronavirus. When you see the coronavirus, it has these spikes that come out, which is the reason they call it corona, for spikes of a crown of a... Okay. Now, this is what your body is currently making antibodies against when you got vaccinated with the mRNA, because the vaccine that you got, that you're going to hear about in a couple of minutes for the people who actually made it,

is an mRNA, which is the coding component that tells the body to make a protein. You had this injected in your arm. It then started to make this protein, which is the spike protein. Now, this has to be in the right shape and conformation. You're going to hear about that from one of our scientists. If it's in the wrong conformation, your body's going to make a very poor immune response. In the right conformation, it makes a really, really good response. That, folks, is what happens again when you lead. That's very important to be able to put these messages out for people to listen to doctors and the experts, because one of the reasons we're sitting here in this problem, Teresa, of individuals who are just constantly ignoring masks and things along those lines is because they don't quite listen. We've listened for more than a year of folks not wanting to trust the scientists, of people just throwing any kind of crap out.

And then have people who are doctors who knew nothing about infectious diseases. Absolutely, and then it was so strange because we would see these people, more so starting from the elected officials, right? So these are the people who are supposed to be representing a district, a city, a county, and they would not follow the simple instructions that was given to them by their own health professionals,

the CDC. And so it just made it unfortunate when you start seeing those representatives, you know, saying, it's OK, don't wear a mask. It's OK, you know, still go to the restaurants and still, you know, keep the doors open when there is a pandemic that is killing people by the hour. And so it was not only strange, but it was just really just heartfelt in itself. But again, the misinformation that was given out,

I think also gives us an opportunity to know that education is now going to start streamlining through the Biden-Harris administration and start trickling down so other people know why this COVID-19 vaccine matters to communities of color and individuals around. So that's why the rollout actually matters. When you have the right information that's going out, people then can trust the sources, Julianne. That is the issue here. It's the credibility of the office that's important.

Dr. Fauci has been unleashed. As we saw him in the previous president's administration, he was constrained. He was contained. They did not let him say what he needed to say. Now he's saying it. He's putting it out there. It's not just Dr. Fauci. There are others. But the fact is that we know what's up. And many of us have known what's up for a long time. But we have had a previous administration who was dealing in crackerjacks. I mean, literally crackerjacks. Ingest yourself with bleach, all this nonsense. Now what we know is that the science is saying that this matters. And when you look at the numbers, Roland, what we're seeing is the numbers are reflecting that the science matters.

As more people have been vaccinated, the numbers have gone down. As more people have been vaccinated, hospitalizations have gone down. We're not there yet, as Dr. Fauci has said several times. But what we are is moving in the right direction. And so we have to, just in a month, Joe Biden, Kamala Harris have been in charge for a month. And in that month, we've seen a difference. That's important. Again, the politics of this is important, Kieran. And that is what Joe Biden wants to show, is that he is completely on top of this. Now, of course, the emphasis also goes to the COVID-19 relief package of the $1.9 billion, because that's what folks are demanding. They want to see leadership and action coming from the White House.

Yeah, I think leadership and action from the White House is what communities across the country are looking for. I was in Texas when coronavirus first broke out, and I remember Lena Hidalgo and Sylvester Turner taking the lead in Harris County on, you know, solving the problem of COVID, whether that be testing or, you know, small businesses as well as to work with low-wage workers in order to, you know, stem some of the problems that have been created by the mass unemployment that we're seeing because of COVID-19. And, you know, also making sure that we get checks in people's hands. I mean, I was in Georgia for the runoff election, and we really heard a message of, you know, we're going to get an extra $2,000 in your hands. And that hasn't happened yet. And people are clamoring for it. I really think the Biden administration needs to focus not only on mitigating the problems with small businesses,

but getting checks into the hands of people, everyday working people. And I think that'll help to solve some of the problems. Speaking of those issues when it comes to COVID-19, PPP loans. The Biden-Harris administration, they made several considerable changes to the latest round of Paycheck Protection Program funding. They pledged to assist the smallest businesses this time around and those that were left behind in previous relief efforts. Included in the updates are significant increases in money allocated to small businesses with fewer than 10 employees

and additional support for sole proprietors, independent contractors, and self-employed individuals. They have also eliminated an exclusionary restriction that prevents small business owners with prior non-fraud felony convictions from obtaining relief through the Paycheck Protection Program. Joining me now to talk about this is Robert James, Chairman of the National Bankers Association, and Ron Busby, President and CEO of the U.S. Black Chambers, Inc. Ron, I'm going to go to you first, and that is we talk about PPP here. We talk about these loans. This is important over the next two weeks, over the next two weeks to give the money that's going to companies 20 employees or less. What people

have to understand is that when you talk about small business in America, Ron, a small business is considered 500 employees or less. Well, guess what? That's a lot of large companies, frankly, for true small businesses. So this distinction, 20 or less, is really important. Well, it was for us. As we know, 95% of black-owned businesses are considered small businesses, and 95% of them were not able to participate in the largest stimulus package that this country has seen.

And so it was very important for us to advocate on behalf of the members that we represent. So the 10 employees, 20 employees is extremely important. The next two weeks is extremely important for everyone to make sure that they can go establish those relationships with the community lenders, fill out your application and to get it back. The other two things that Roland said were extremely important. If you currently are delinquent on your student loan, that's not a deterrent. And if you're a felon without a fraud conviction, that's not a deterrent. This is important for us. We advocated for this because we felt it was important for Black-owned businesses to be able to get their share. This administration has heard. These are things that could have been done during the first wave,

but we're so happy that we were seeing the improvements in this portion of the package. This is critically important, Robert, because when we talk about, again, help for those most in need, the people who are true small businesses really got lost in the PPP program. How is the National Bankers Association, the group representing black banks and minority banks, prepared to help folks over the next two weeks? Because this is specifically right now, this period beginning on Wednesday, before the next two weeks for businesses, 20 employers or fewer. Roland, thanks for having me this evening,

and thanks for covering this really important issue. We have been, at the National Bankers Association, our member banks across the country, have really been rolling up their sleeves throughout the PPP process and working with these truly small businesses in the black community. Our bank, Carver State Bank,

I'm a banker in addition to my role as chairman of the NBA. And at our bank, the median borrowing has been under $25,000. Most of the businesses are far less than the 500 employees. Really, you know, those one, two, three, four, maybe 10 employee type businesses.

And it's really critical that we have this extra time because even in the first two rounds and certainly in this third round, what we found is that we really have to roll up our sleeves and work with these individual companies and almost walk every one of them through the process. It doesn't matter if they're Ivy League educated professionals down to your local barber. Everyone that we're seeing really requires that additional help and assistance just navigating the process. And that's what our banks are specializing in doing with our community. And so we're grateful for this extra couple of weeks where we can really focus in on those smaller borrowers

and make sure they understand the program and get all of the resources that they're eligible for. The thing here, Ron, we talk about what's going on here is that it has taken this long for government officials to realize how do you truly target certain groups? Because we were sounding this alarm when the PPP program first started that then we saw these stories where Los Angeles Lakers are qualified for PPP loans and Ruth Chris Steakhouse and other major companies, because the way the rules were set,

you could just you could apply with these individual restaurants when you were part of these massive, larger groups. And then once those companies got out it, they were embarrassed. They had to give the money back. But again, and the people who were truly small, small businesses, they were they were yelling and screaming,, we're going to be DOA. Now, has this also dealt with the whole deal of a 1099, or is it still full-time employees? Because that also was part of the problem. Sure. And I want to address the number of employees that a business can have.

It's based upon your standard industry code, your sixth code or your next code. So there are industries that will allow you to have up to 500 employees based upon that code. So the other thing that I want to make sure that people understand that if you are a sole proprietor, the math may sound complicated in reference to how you can fill out and how much you can get. The maximum that a sole proprietor, an individual business owner can apply for is $20,800. In effect, what you would do is take two and a half months of your annual payroll or what you would pay yourself, amortize that over 12 months, divide it, and that's what you come up with, or roughly 0.0208.

You can either do the two equations or, on the average, no more than $20,800. But, again, I think this is going to be extremely important for the small as well as midsize black-owned firms. And the other thing is, in reference to before it was you had to show that you lost money during the fourth quarter. We're saying now in this new plan, any quarter during the year 2019, if you had fewer revenue in 2020 during that period of time, you're still eligible. So make sure that you find your local Black banker, establish that relationship, and let's go make some loans and get through these difficult times. Robert, for the folks out there, they may not have a black bank that's in their town. How can they still assist?

How can they still work with a black bank? Are there any restrictions? Do you have to reside in that city, in that state? Share those thoughts. Thanks, Roland. The answer is no. You don't have to reside in a particular geographic region in order to do business with a black bank.

Many of our institutions are accepting PPP applications from customers across the country. I know that our institution, even in the first two rounds, we found that black businesses found us from across the country. We made loans to black businesses as far away as California and up in New York. Our bank is located in Savannah, Georgia. We're one of the smallest banks in the country. But we we really jumped in with both feet to serve black businesses that weren't getting attention from those larger institutions. And we're doing that now. And you see that if you go to the National Bankers Association website, nationalbankers.org,

you can find a list of all of our member institutions and find one that's accepting applications online and ready and willing to serve. Ron, one of the issues, the last question for you, one of the issues that, again, people are dealing with is understanding the process. What are y'all doing at the U.S. Black Chambers, Inc. to help people who don't, who aren't clear with all these, fill this out, fill this out, what steps to take, what bank to connect with, what's the right bank? Because the people

who got it are folks who paid others who knew how to, frankly, I won't say, who knew how to work the system. Yeah. And I appreciate that. And what the U.S. Black Chamber does is we're providing that free information for the business owners across the country. Every Thursday, we have online classes. We're having seminars. We understand that the majority of businesses that failed, it was not because they didn't have good businesses. It's just because they

didn't have good information. And so we're here providing it for them. You can find out at usblackchambers.org. Again, usblackchambers.org to find out how you can find out the information to provide you with the PPP that you need. All right. Then Ron Busby with us black chambers, Inc. Robert James with the national banking association. Gentlemen,

we certainly appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thank you. Julianne. This is one of those things again, where bureaucrats make decisions, politicians make decisions without really going back to break down, wait a minute, how can we really help those in need?

And this was one of the problems. And billions, billions had already gone out of the door before they realized, oops, we got some issues here. And so this focus the next two weeks is critically important. Absolutely, Roland. the next two weeks is critically important. Absolutely, Roland. Part of the challenge is that we have to disaggregate data. We're seeing people say, well, businesses are in trouble. Black businesses are in a different kind of trouble than other businesses. We've lost 40 percent of our businesses since COVID started. The paperwork burden, I think, that Ron Busby referred to is a paperwork burden that a small business is not equal to meeting. You know, you've got all these pages, all this, this, that, and the other, and people aren't able to do it. So I think Maxine Waters

and many others have lifted up the notion that we have to be race sensitive about this stuff, not race neutral, but race sensitive, because we know that Black businesses have been harder hit. White folks lost about 20 percent of their businesses. Black folks, about 40 percent of our businesses. That's really catastrophic when we think about the impact that our businesses have on our community. And so what we, you know, the couple, next couple of weeks are important for the Congressional Black Caucus and others to stand up and say, how can we make sure that some of this money is targeted? And here's the dangerous thing is that white folks don't like targeting. They do not like saying, let's do this for black

people. It's like, let's do it for everybody. Kumbaya, kumbaya. But in fact, everybody did not get hit the same way. So I'm very happy that we have this segment rolling. Happy we have these brothers. And I think it's really important for us to understand how Black business has been hit

by COVID and how there is nothing in the system unless we push for it for these businesses to recover. And Teresa, squeaky wheel gets the most grease. That's the bottom line here. And so having advocates in D.C. certainly made all this possible. Absolutely. And I thank them every single day because these are the type of conversations that we are looking for our representatives and business associations to actually have on our behalf, because we're not at the White House. We don't, you know,

most people don't have the full access and resources and the responsibility that is necessary in order to get us all back to business. And that means the 40 percent of Black businesses and minority businesses that was lost during this pandemic. So thank you, Karen. What we're going to be seeing here again. But you also have the communication medium getting the word out to the people most in need. Look, bottom line is I'm sitting here looking at television here, national media. A lot of their focus really is on the latest thing Trump responded to also with Biden and COVID. But this is one of those things that could really help our businesses stay afloat. As Julianne said, we lost 41 percent.

And folks, keep in mind, prior to COVID, we had 2.6 million black owned businesses in America. 2.5 million had one employee. So, you know, when you lose 40 percent, you're talking about that means that of the 2.6 million black owned businesses that we had, you've lost, folks, a million businesses. So the one thing the one thing that I think about constantly is my parents. My parents are small black business owners. They've owned restaurants. They've owned retail stores. And now they're in a business where they contract with the government. And I'm very

thankful for that because it's one of the few things that hasn't disappeared because of COVID. So as we're going forward, we need to start to think about the people who own restaurants and bars in our neighborhoods that didn't get any support, didn't get any help, and were told to shut down for months on end. And some of them are now opening and some of them aren't. But the ones who are opening are still making significantly less money and are having trouble keeping the lights on. So I think we really need to focus on being deliberate about targeting black business owners, large, small and making sure, you know, some of our black businesses operate on a very thin margin and making sure that they have the resources necessary to keep the lights open. I think of Ben's Chili Bowl in D.C. as one of my favorite restaurants. You know, they have had some trouble over the past couple of months. So even our institutions, our staples in our neighborhood could possibly be could possibly be gone if we don't get help for them. And again, Julian, for the people who don't know, or the folks in the back of the room who want to be stuck on stupid,

Congress can't say, we're going to create a program specifically for these black businesses. One of the things that they do is use a language such as, 20 employees or fewer. And so what the CBC and others understand is how can you craft language that can really target our community, but not use very specific race language? But Roland, you know, I think that we have to use specific race language. Oh, no, I know. I agree. I agree. But Supreme Court has all. Look, we talk about the Crocian case.

The Supreme Court is also weighed in on that. So, I mean, I agree we should. But the question is, can we? Is it legal? Well, I think that this is this is a time in the era of George Floyd for us to begin to push these envelopes about this. We don't experience America the same way. I agree. But the courts have ruled, though. How do you get around the courts? Oh, I know, Enron, you're the football guy. No, you can't! You can't get around the courts!

So you have to create creative ways to do what we wanna do. You're right. You have to carefully craft the language to say less than 20 employees in a certain zip code, perhaps, with certain kinds of... I mean, Maxine Waters is good at this.

Yes! We can craft the language, but we also have to understand, at some point, we're going to have to go back on Croson and say, look, we don't experience America the same way. And so we have to have remedies that are different. When we look at this COVID, we're three times as likely to die.

Three times as likely to die. Our life expectancy has gone down, Roland, as you know, by three years for white folks, half a year. Why aren't we at the top of the list for the people who get the vaccine? You know, I mean, I ain't worried about it. I'm over 65. But I'm just saying that we're seeing young black people dying at a rate that young white people aren't. America has to come to grips with the racism that has left us. I think the word that many scholars are using is weathering. That has left us weathered to be more vulnerable. And it's not just more vulnerable from a health perspective, but certainly from

an economic perspective. And so, you know, you're absolutely right. The court has said you can't do it. But I'm saying this is a good time to challenge that court again. It's not the right court for us to challenge, but it's a good time for us to lift our voices and say give black people a break. You ain't getting a damn thing through this court, Teresa, not with a

63 majority. This ain't 5-4. This is 6-3. Exactly. And again, why elections matter. You know, when Trump was in office, he was packing the court. And, you know, Roland, I think you said it very clearly early on in your segments when you said, listen, you know, it's not like, you know, we've lost some legislative priorities. But let's remember what the Republicans did gain. They gained the court. And when you can't change the system of the courts into your favor, these are the issues

when it comes up where you have to hide and split African-American language and minorities in order for us to at least get a slice of the pie. These are the type of issues that happen and where we have to take election and voting very seriously, but also critically. Absolutely. Folks, let's now go to a huge story that dropped yesterday. First of all, yesterday was the 56th anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X. And what was amazing yesterday was when lawyers came together and revealed what they called new evidence of a conspiracy perpetrated by the NYPD and the FBI to assassinate civil rights activists in Harlem. The family of Ray Wood, a black man who worked as an undercover police officer in the 1960s, and their attorney now claim Wood wrote a letter on his deathbed confessing the NYPD and the FBI conspired to kill Malcolm X. Wood's cousin, Reginald Wood Jr., read the letter during Saturday's press briefing in Manhattan. This is the original letter that was sent to my father on February 9th of 2011.

I'm going to read a copy. I've reserved it for the district attorney and whoever needs this for the court case to be able to exonerate the people that Ray was concerned that had been convicted because of his actions. It's dated January 25th, 2011. I Raymond A. Wood, being of sound mind and body, wished to confess the following. I was a black New York City undercover police officer from April 1964 through May of 1971. I participated in actions that in hindsight were deplorable and detrimental to the advancement of my own black people. My actions on behalf of the New York City Police Department, Bossy, were done under duress and fear

that if I did not follow the orders of my handlers, I could face detrimental consequences. Presently, I am aging with failing health. Recently, I have learned of the death of Mr. Thomas Johnson and are deeply concerned that with my death, his family will not be able to exonerate him after being wrongfully convicted in the killing of Malcolm X. The facts are as follows. April 17, 1964, I was hired by the New York City Police Department. Without training, I was immediately assigned to the Bossy Investigation Unit. After witnessing repeated brutality at the hands of my coworkers, I tried to resign. Instead, I was threatened with arrest by pending marijuana and alcohol trafficking charges on me if I did not follow through with the

assignments. Under the direction of my handlers, I was told to encourage leaders and members of the civil rights groups to commit felonious acts. The Statue of Liberty bombing idea was created by my supervisor slash handler. Using surveillance, the agency learned that Bo and Saeed were key players in Malcolm X's crowd control security detail. It was my assignment to draw the two men into a felonious federal crime so that they could be arrested by the FBI and kept away from managing Malcolm X's Audubon Ballroom door security on February 21, 1965. On February 16th, 1965, the Statue of Liberty plot was carried out and the two men were arrested just days before the assassination of Malcolm. At that time, I was not aware that Malcolm X was the target. On February 21st, 1965, I was ordered to be at the Audubon Ballroom where I was identified by witnesses

while leaving the scene. Thomas Johnson was later arrested and wrongfully convicted to protect my cover and the secrets of the FBI and the NYPD. I have placed my full confession into the care of my cousin, Reginald Wood Jr. I have requested this information be held until after I have passed away. It is my hope that this information is received with the understanding that I have carried these secrets with a heavy heart and remorsefully regret my participation in this matter. Raymond A. Wood.

Joining us now is Baba Zach Kondo, author of Conspiracies Unraveling the Assassination of Malcolm X. Baba, glad to have you on Roland Martin Unfiltered. I'm glad to be here. First and foremost, got to get your reaction to that news conference on Saturday where he read that letter from an NYPD undercover police officer. Yeah, well, first off, it's not any new information. What I think is good about it, though, is it's basically demonstrating once again the role that organizations outside of the Nation of Islam, you know, my book

basically argues that three forces killed Malcolm X. The Nation of Islam were the trigger people, the NYPD, which is what Woods represents, and then the FBI, who helped to pretty much organize everything. What this revelation basically shows is that the, excuse me, what this thing shows is, once again, the role, the significant role that the FBI and the NYPD played. And let me identify something that didn't come out in this thing. Woods was a member of a secret unit of the NYPD known as BALSI, the Bureau of Special Services and Investigation. The best way to understand him is that they basically represented a counterintelligence apparatus, like a miniature FBI is is what Balsi basically represented. And their job was to

infiltrate organizations. You know, you're familiar with the counterintelligence program. You know, most of your listeners are. Balsi was simply a city version of the counterintelligence program. So they were secretive. And this guy Woods, you know, one point that we want to make is that an African person cannot infiltrate the Ku Klux Klan. So when Woods was recruited, the only way that they could use him, that a bossy could use him, was against our own people. And the problem that I had listening to that news conference yesterday was that, you know, first off, Woods' nephew was making excuses for him. He chose to be a traitor for Malcolm.

He chose to be a traitor for our people. And him talking about, you know, they were going to white mail him and they arrested him and all that. But for Malcolm, he chose to be a traitor for our people. And him talking about, you know, they were going to white mail him and they arrested him and all that, all of that is part of the game. You either choose to be a man and to basically support your people or you choose to betray your people. That guy chose to betray our people. And, you know, this, of course, in many ways, people now seeing the story of William O'Neill, who did the exact same thing to Fred Hampton, where the FBI, in conjunction with the Cook County State's Attorney's Office, killed Fred Hampton. And when people talk about the dissension, when you talk about even what took place within the Nation of Islam, the anger towards Malcolm X, we also cannot deny the reality of the FBI having people on the inside stirring that dissension up.

We saw the exact same thing in other groups. I mean, the reality is Dr. King was killed. One of the folks who was on that balcony leaning over his body was somebody who was an undercover CIA operative. So, again, the America American forces saw black liberation, black freedom as the number one threat to this country. And they chose to say we're going to dismantle it by cutting their head off. Exactly. And one thing that we also must always remember, you know, the church committee was a congressional committee that took place in mid-1970s, 1975. And they investigated the activities of the FBI and the activities of the FBI, and the activities of the CIA. And one of the things that came out of that, you know,

and this is not, you know, Roland Martin talking or Babazak Kondo talking. This is what the committee found. It found that when it came to African people, the most violent techniques were accepted. And that meant anywhere from assassination to wrongly imprisoning people to, you know, beating people, shooting people. In broad daylight, just to put this in some context, in broad daylight one day in the late 1960s at the Los Angeles branch of the Black Panther Party, the FBI had a raid. And they sent carloads of their people. They fired over a thousand bullets

into the Central Avenue headquarters of the Black Panther Party of Los Angeles. Over a thousand bullets. And luckily, because we had a brother there by the name of Geronimo Pratt, he had like five minutes to get everything together. They got a phone call or something, and he was able to fortify it. But I'm saying a thousand000 bullets into one room,

hoping to kill as many Panthers as they could. Lucky for us, there were a couple injuries, but nobody was killed. The thing that, first of all, where do you think, with this letter being read, where does this go from here? And for people who have not, you know, they may have read stories and stuff along those lines. Should there be a push for folks to push President Joe Biden to declassify any and all documents related to COINTELPRO, Malcolm X, Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., any other folks doing that particular era? Has everything that they have, has it all been released,

or is it still a lot of redacted information? Right. No, it's still, put it this way, when I was doing my research on Malcolm X, my book was published in 1993, and it's being revised right now. But at the time that I did my research, I had a conversation one time with this young brother who worked in the reading room of the FBI, because you had to go there to do the research. And he told me something very interesting. The King file at that particular time, the headquarters file, was 500,000 pages. He told me that they had destroyed at least that number that people like me and you will never see.

And because this is an eternal type of thing, there's no accountability. Now, here's the thing, though. I hear what you're saying in reference to releasing the documents, but oftentimes the most important documents, the ones, the smoke and gun documents that the average person needs to see, those documents in most cases will never see the light of day. Of course. Because the FBI and other intelligence apparatus, they have that freedom, and they justify it under the national security. And that's a big umbrella. Plus, we also know that when J. Edgar Hoover died, he gave instructions for a secretary to basically corral and gather all of his all those secret files. We don't know what happened to them. We don't know if they're stored somewhere. We don't know if he instructed her to destroy them. But we know that when when when Justice Department leaders went to his home and office, they found nothing.

Right. One thing that we do know, though, he had tens of thousands of documents in this warehouse. And per his will, his secretary, a woman by the name of Helen Grundy, if memory serves me, she made a phone call. Some trucks pulled up maybe 30, 40 minutes later at this warehouse. They took out some documents, and then accidentally they burnt down the facility with the rest of them in there. So there were certain documents he apparently wanted preserved,

and the rest of them went up in flames. Real shocker, huh? No, no shock at all. What happens next? Do you think this changes anything? Do you think anything comes about from this revelation or the reading of this letter? Right. You know what? I think what it does, because remember, supposedly Cyrus Vance,

the DA of Manhattan, is supposed to be considering looking into investigating the possibility of reopening the trial of the case that sent two innocent men, Butler and Johnson, to prison. Now, I'll be honest, I've been in contact with them. They had asked for a copy of my book. I haven't heard anything from them. But I guess you could say that I wouldn't hold my breath. I think the best thing that is likely to happen, the best thing that is likely to happen right now is that public opinion will be piqued. People will become interested. And depending on what type of a thrust, particularly we African people give, will dictate how far. But I think we would

be naive to think that there's going to be any movement from a legal standpoint unless we organize and pressure and threaten and demand. So if anything is going to happen through the system and you're talking to a pessimist because this system you know has never you know has never had our best interest at heart and keep this in mind think about what is the repercussion here if they find okay say they open up a trial and the trial proves that there was some government complicity in Malcolm's assassination. Do we, I mean, do we really think that the FBI or the courts are going to take that real serious?

And see, that's my problem, you know, as a, you know, having studied this, you know, this government as long as I have, you know. But it doesn't mean that it can't happen. So I guess you could say I'm probably, I'm a modified optimist that maybe something can happen. It is. But I still say we should push it. You know, let's not, you know, like I like what the daughters are doing right now, you know, and use whatever vehicles, whatever weapons, whatever resources that they can use, that we can use to, you know, bring attention and then open this up.

And then we roll the dice. Baba's at condo. We certainly appreciate it, sir. Thank you so very much for joining us. Thank you. It was an honor. I want to go to my panel here. Julianne, I'll start with you. Again, the fact that 56 years later, we are still talking about this, we're still hearing things. People really have to understand the depths of how this country, its top police departments, the FBI, how they despised black leadership and did everything they could to destroy leaders like Malcolm X, Dr. King, Fred Hampton, and others.

Roland, what I got from Brother Baba is the notion of what has been buried. We can go back. We can look at Wilmington, North Carolina in 1896. We still don't have the whole story there. Tulsa, we have more information than we thought we had, but we still don't have the whole story there. And so the assassination of Malcolm X, the killing of Medgar Evers,

we still don't have the whole story. If Brother Biden wants to do the right thing, we'll unseal some of these records and let us see it. There's nothing we can do about it, but we need to know. We need to know why our leaders were assassinated. We know why, but we need to know who, what, when, where, and why. And we need to know this is why reparations are so important. We need to understand the damage that has been done to our community. When I think about the daughters, about Quabila, Atala, and all of them who I know, and I think about the pain that they've had to deal with all their lives, but also now to hear more, I think about the, what is it,

the resolution that they must have of the closure to have this stuff put out there. So I just feel like this is one step in the right direction, but it's just one step. And I don't know what this little underground FBI fellow was doing. And he has very little credibility, but he has enough credibility for us to think about what he's saying and what it means. We need to know how these people have damaged our community. Teresa. Teresa. Teresa you keep

Teresa stop hitting the mute button please yes you're on mute oh my goodness keep talking Oh, my goodness. Keep talking. All right, control room, what's going on? Karen, I'm going to go to you.

Well, I'll say something. We used to bomb an entire block. So it doesn't surprise me that our government was involved in killing Malcolm X or Martin Luther King. It's pretty much par for the course. Local governments have been involved in killing black leaders. The national government has been involved in killing black leaders. It just seems to be what they do. Whenever one of us gets too powerful, they try to shoot us. All right, Teresa, we have you now. Yes, I'm here. Now we have you now yes I'm here now we have you just keep hitting that dog on mute button but go ahead

to be determined so I think there's some unfounded revelations you know that it comes to time when the you know people okay all right all right I think Oh, my God. I've got to control my facial expressions. Okay. All right, Keri. All right. I think that...

Teresa, go ahead. Teresa, go ahead. All right. Yeah, so I think there's an opportunity here where there will be a lot of people who were, you know, working in the past, government entities, who now, you know, feel the effects of the George Floyds are starting to see the trickle down. I think we'll probably start to see a lot of those who are retired, those who are coming out of hiding, and they just need to get it out their chest, off their chest in order for change to happen. I'm not shocked, but I am more so looking forward to more dialogues and more discussions and more revelations of this, because I do think, you know, the time is now more than ever to really just to put it out there, to make it known that,

you know, these accusations and the assassinations that happened to our black leaders who helped shape the American culture for black people do need their day of justice. And honestly, I just want to be alive when that day happens. Absolutely. All right, folks, got to go to a break. When we come back, we'll have more on Roland Martin Unfiltered. One of the things we'll also talk to is the author of a book, his time on 60 Minutes. He shared some really interesting thoughts about folks in television news.

And so a lot of stuff we want to talk about. That's next on Roland Martin Unfiltered. Black Americans, because of slavery, because of the complete destroying of the past, there really is no direct connection to various African countries. Right. But the reality is for Latinos, and even if you use that phrase, first of all, I'm from Texas, so in Texas, Hispanics is used.

Other parts of the country, they say, no, call me Latino. Mm-hmm. Other parts, call me Chicano. And so you also sort of sort of have that going on there's a connection with country as well right and so if you're from mexico if you're from colombia if you're from uh any other particular country it's yeah i'm here but i'm also from there as opposed to no no this is my. This is my country. This is I'm involved. I'm involved. Everything here. I think that's also something that's also at play. It is at play. And it's unfortunate because it happens even even when we're not talking about politics. I think that Latinos, the word that we're very it's very divided because we have we all have this allegiance to this other place that we came from. But I believe that that's not helping us. That's not unifying the country.

We need to come together and understand that this is where you're raising your kids. This is where you're paying taxes. This is where you're living. This is your country. This is where it matters. Hi, I'm Eldie Barge. Hey, yo, peace world. What's going on?

It's the love king of R&B, Raheem Devon. And you're watching Roll Roland Martin Unfiltered. Charters in Plano, Texas, have been dropped against an 18-year-old black man who spent a night in jail after he was strangely arrested for walking in the street. Officers responded to a call that a black male wearing a short-sleeved shirt

was stumbling along the road in icy conditions. They were dispatched to do a welfare check, but ended up following Rodney Reese, a high school student, on his way home from work. Officers followed Reese for 2 minutes and 17 seconds before they arrested him on a pedestrian in the roadway charge. Here is the body cam footage. Dude, stop. We're trying to help you. Here is the body cam footage. Are you trying to get home? You sure you need to ride somewhere? Hey, look, we just want to make sure you're all right. We just want to make sure you're all right. Sir, you need to talk to us, okay? Sir.

Can you calm down? All right. Sir. Sir, look, we just want to talk to you. All right. Sir. Don't touch me. Sir, we just want to talk to you. All right? I'm on the way home. I'm staying.

Okay. Where the fuck am I going? Okay, but you're walking in the middle of the road. All right. I understand that. I'll be back. I'm not in the area. What's up, Mom? We're just trying to figure out where you're going.

Home. I just said that. Oh, you OK, then? Watch out, man. Where's Mom at? Do you want us to just give you a ride? No, I'm good. I do this every night, literally, on the street. OK. You ain't cold or nothing? No. With that chief? No, I'm good. I do this every night, literally, on the street. Okay.

You ain't cold or nothing? No. With that chief shirt on? I'm good. What's your name, man? Huh? I don't know. You don't know?

Can you just stop and talk to us for a minute? Uh-oh. Do you mind? Do you mind just talking to us for a minute? Hey, hey, hold on. Just talk to us for a minute. What's going on? Just talk to us for a minute.

I ain't going to put my hand on the female. Please don't touch me. Okay. I'm just trying to get your attention. Okay. We're just trying to make sure you're okay. Don't touch me. We're just trying to make sure you're okay. We're trying to make sure you're okay. No, no, no way. We're trying. No, no, no way. We're doing an investigation. I don't care. I'm going home.

You were officially detained. No. Yes. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Stop. Just relax. Just relax. All right. We're just trying to talk to you. I got to add a problem. Please get off me. Y'all not going. Y'all not. No. I'm sorry. I didn't even tell you. Yeah you didn't stop. Put your hands behind your back now. You are not free to go. Wow Can you just tell us the address? What's the way? It's a lot dude. Put a cusp on it. I'm trying to... Please just let me go. Wow, you're really making this worse right now.

We're trying to do that dude. Honestly. Okay, he's about to kick it. Alright. Where did you get that? It's not back here. Nope. It's not back here. This is what I do.

Dude, just stop. Stop resisting. Just let me go. Let me go! Stop. Let me go! Stop resisting. Well, first of all, just let me go. Stop resisting. Just let me go. Just relax. Go. Not much. And then you're not seeing yourself.

I'll tell you what, I'm not seeing you. Give us. What the fuck? You're hitting me for it all. What's wrong with you? You have me fucked up. Get on the ground, dude. Just get on the ground.

Stop resisting. You want me to get on this snow after y'all was lying about me? Really? You're causing this problem right now. You want me to get on his snout after y'all was lying about me? Really? You're causing this problem right now. We've never had to go this way, man. I got it. I got it.

You got it? I got it. Sorry, dude. Just relax this arm. Relax your arms, okay? Just relax your arms. What's your name? Letko, I'm gonna take care of your phone, babe. Where's Alan?

He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. He's out there.

He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. He's out there. What's your name? Let go. I'm going to take care of your phone, babe. What's your name? Can you at least tell me your first name? No, I'm good. Tell me your first name. I'm good.

We honestly were just trying to check on you. That's cool. I said I'm good. First of all, you were in the roadway, which is a safety hazard, and you're not supposed to be in the roadway. I am not. All right? You're not at liberty to in the roadway. I am not supposed to. All right? You're not at liberty to move around. No.

Okay. Just relax. I thought you was turning me around. Why are you trying to put me on the ground for? Just relax. You're not at liberty to move around. Where do you live? I can do what the fuck I want. Where do you live?

Actually, right now you can't. Yes, I can. Where do you live? Where do you live? All right. If he's not going to cooperate, he's popping into the back of the car. There's the fucking heavy. You got a worker?

Yeah. Don't play games. Stop right here. Stop right here. Just across from me. Spread your feet out. Sorry. You got anything that's going to help you stab me now like that? You have any weapons on you like that?

No. Now, folks, this took place, again, last week in Plano, Texas, which is located just north of Dallas. Now, the Plano Police Department posted this video on their page, their Facebook page. Immediately were condemned by a significant number of people. Rodney Reese, high school student who worked at Walmart, okay, walking home. Now, officers, they followed him because they claim, it's this report of a man stumbling in the street. Plano's police chief said the arrest was not consistent with the reason officers were called. The department will determine whether an internal investigation is warranted. This is the kind of nonsense that we see, Kieran.

That is crazy. If you examine the video, the brother is trying not. He's trying not. First of all, that's wrong. It was body camera footage, not dash cam footage. Here's the crazy part, y'all. The body camera footage is shocking. He's trying not to engage them.

He's trying not to deal with them because he just wants to go home. Second of all, he doesn't have to give them his information. This is why Colin Kaepernick has his Know Your Rights camps. He doesn't have to. Absolutely crazy. So the big

problem that I see with what happened is that the police in Plano are harassing young black people in what is one of the fastest growing suburbs in the state of Texas. You have people moving from all over the country into Texas. And, you know, to harass black people is just appalling. I've lost friends to this type of gun violence or this type of violence from police. I had a friend who was shot five times in the city of Pittsburgh. He managed

to survive. But this is just par for the course, not just in Texas, but around the country. I know you see a lot of really racist incidents in Texas regarding hair, especially. I remember the young man from outside of Houston who was suspended from school for his dreadlocks. You know, this type of harassment of young black people is just completely uncalled for by local governments in Texas. The thing here, Teresa, when watching this body camera footage

is that he just wants to be left alone. Here's the deal. I know it's cold. I get it. I see that it's snowing. But if somebody doesn't want to be bothered by the cops, keep walking. Do you need a ride home? Nope. I'm good. I do this every night. He, he clearly wasn't bothered by the cold weather. He was fine. Jeans and a shirt. Hey,

leave me alone. Okay. Hey, he has, they offered public assistance. He said no. No. They chose to keep pursuing him and continue to pursue him. And again, then when he declined to tell them his address and his name, oh, so you're not going to tell us. He doesn't have to. He was doing, he was trying to avoid what eventually happened him being detained come taken to jail and spent a night in jail absolutely and this high school um you know

black man you know just came from a hard days of work and you know obviously there's snow on the ground so he didn't go uh through transportation, didn't need a ride. He's probably like, look, I'm two to three blocks from my home. I just want to get there. And I think, you know, countless times most of us just want to get to our destination without being disturbed. Right. We're already fighting, you know, especially if he's working at Walmart. He's definitely not making fifteen dollars an hour. So I'm sure he's already probably frustrated about that.

But the other portion is he's literally just trying to avoid confrontation and honestly, probably just not trying to get shot. I think enough enough many times and enough times we have seen black men talking to the police and then it goes left. So I think he decided to do the opposite. I'm glad he's still alive. I'm glad he can, you know, use this as an, we can all actually use this as an example of non-confrontational from us. And yet we're still being confronted with aggression and with, you know, the need for them to just to feel like, hey, you know, let us help you.

Like, it's OK to help when we ask you for assistance. But again, we don't have to respond. You have to know your rights. He knew his rights. I think I'm grateful for the body cam footage. But it's interesting to me that the Plato Police Department thought they were in the right to actually, with this type of interaction with him, for them to actually post and see, this is what happens when you don't cooperate with the police. No, what it actually shows, and I think the video was very clear, is this is what happens when you try to avoid confrontation with the police, and yet you still get put in the paddy wagon? It's just, Julianne, it's just...

He's... He is trying... He literally... He's not trying to engage them. He's not trying to anger them. I'm good. No problem. Ma'am, I don't want to touch a woman. I don't want to strike a police officer. Please don't touch me. All of that.

Yet with all of that, he still gets arrested. He still gets put in the car. Now, he, and this is the thing that white folks don't understand. He now is now saddled with the trauma for the rest of his life of that experience when all he was trying to do was a black man walking home trying to get home from walmart um um you know through the snow you know teresa has it completely right in this man is just minding his business literally all he's doing is minding his business he didn't ask for help he didn't need any help this is the crux of white supremacy is that you can put yourself in my space and decide what i

need and then when i refuse it decide that you are going to exert your white supremacist power this brother if you look at the you know we looked at the body cam, car cam, whatever. He's literally minding his business. There's nothing illegal about walking in the snow in a T-shirt. That's your business. Why in the you know what are these people insistent on engaging him and harassing him? That's a question. And the answer is, any time a Black person is walking down the street, there are some white folks who feel that they have the right to engage them and harass them. This, you know, I mean,

you've heard me talk before, Roland, about my nephews. I have one who is 37 and one who is 35. And I adore them. And they're young Black men. They're tall. They're buff. And every morning, I get up and pray that they don't have any drama. And they do have drama because they get stopped here, stopped there for the same kind of stuff. And it breaks my heart to see the ways that their energy gets broken down by this kind of crap. And we really, as Teresa, what was wrong with these people? They're going to post this and say, oh, you have to obey the police? No. You police have to act like you have some good you-know-what sense.

Again, charges dropped, and frankly, I hope he sues. And the police chief should fire those officers. I mean, it's just ridiculous. It's just absolutely ridiculous. Folks, let's go to California, where a newly released video shows a deadly confrontation between sheriff's deputies and a homeless man in San Clemente, California, in September. In the video, two Orange County sheriff's deputies and a homeless man in San Clemente, California in September. In the video, two Orange County Sheriff's deputies who were in patrol assigned to the homeless outreach team and they heard deciding whether to confront

42-year-old Curt Reinhold. One deputy is heard saying, quote, watch this, he's going to jaywalk. One of the deputies then asked Reinhold, are you going to stop or are we going to have you, have to make you stop? Reinhold responds, jaywalking here? That's ridiculous. Video captured by bystanders shows the confrontation escalate quickly.

Reinhold then says, what is your problem? Why are you touching me? Watch this. There we go. You didn't need to do that. It's controlled, man. I don't know. It is. Click down, you just stop in the middle.

Don't make case of that. Gabriel. Not just that. We're gonna identify him, huh? He's gonna be quite close. He's not here. Ready? Hey. Hey. Hey. Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei! Hei!

Hei! Hei! Hei! As I said, video captured by bystanders shows the confrontation escalate quickly. Reinhold says, what is your problem? Why are you touching me? Moments later, both deputies tackle Reinhold. One of the deputies shouts that Reinhold had his gun. Surveillance video appears to show Reinhold's hand near one of the deputy's holsters. A deputy then fired two shots, killing Reinhold. At this time, the sheriff's department has only responded by releasing a pre-recorded video stating that it

is withholding judgment until all facts are known and the investigations are complete. Again, Julianne was crazy. Here he is. This started because he was jaywalking. He's dead. He's now dead. But it started supposedly for jaywalking. It started because these police officers have an ax to grind against people.

It started because they were exerting their power, their ability to mess with anybody. This man wasn't bothering anybody. Yes, he was jaywalking, but hell, we live in D.C., Roland. How many days a week do you jaywalk? You know, or me? That's not a crime that has a death penalty.

What we have here are out-of-control police officers, and I'm glad that you're raising this up because we keep hearing these stories that people say, oh, yeah, but the police are okay. It's a marvel. But many of them are essentially harassing people, and they're exerting their power. And this is the issue. It's power. They're exerting their power. You go back to the beginning, oh, he's jaywalking.

Looks like they're almost stalking him. This is absurd. It is. Again, if you're sitting here, if you're a police officer, Kieran, and if you see somebody doing something, if you see wrong doing happy, I get it. But jaywalking. The level of selective enforcement is just crazy to me. I mean, you see somebody who is peaceful and, you know, you just decide to roll up on them and harass them and then kill them. It goes back to the same thing that I said before about the incident in Plano. You just have a level of government harassment of Black people that a lot of times ends in death. And I really think we need to call upon the Biden administration to do something about this epidemic of Black people,

Black men especially, being killed. So it's disgusting that we continue to have to go through this. And I'm glad I didn't have to watch another Black man get killed. I know it happened, and I'm so sorry that it didn't, and feel for his family, but it's just to the point now where it seems like every other day we're watching another video of another black person being killed, and it's just terrible. Look at that face. It's so sad.

I mean, brother, he's gone, Teresa, because you got cops who are just, they just do what they do. And this is, I mean, this is the crazy stuff here. I mean, you look at the Plano, I mean, perfect example. That brother could be dead in Plano. That's how things escalate and black men end up getting killed? Yeah, so, I mean, these videos are

in strict contrast, but also the same, you know? So, I mean, in one hand, you have the homeless man who, you know, is literally walking across the street, and, you know, it's not a death sentence. It should be, actually, what it's not a death sentence. It should be actually what

it's constituted as is a ticket. But it's not warranted for a gun to be drawn and shots to be fired and your life is to be lost. So it's very interesting circumstances. And again, this is the time where, you know, it's just too many times we're all having these conversations about justice and what does criminal justice reform looks like. It looks very clearly if we start to, you know, start putting our powers legislatively and judiciously, judiciously, judiciously, judicially into action. So what does that mean? That means we need to, you know, escalate and increase and decrease the police budget, understanding that, you know, these people are using their powers to get away with really murder, and also put into place some of the reforms that has been

repeatedly stated over and over. And I think if we start doing that, we can then start to see results. But right now, it just seems like it's on a standstill. And thus, these policemen and deputy sheriffs are having a free-for-all on black lives. It is certainly sad, sad, sad. Speaking of sad, folks, many people were shocked today to find out the death of Lawrence Otis Graham. Of course, the New York Times selling book author passed away on Friday at the age of 59. Of course, he's a lawyer and activist. At this time, no one knows exactly how he passed away. He was known for exposing racial discrimination.

He's also an acclaimed author who published 14 best-selling books, one of which titled Member of the Club. He detailed his undercover experience as a country club worker at an all-white Greenwich country club in the early 1990s. Graham was also a lawyer who practiced corporate and real estate law at Cuddy & Fetter, a Manhattan law firm, and was a contributing editor at U.S. News & World Report. He also was a former adjunct professor at Fordham University, where he taught African American studies and American government. A public viewing for Graham is going to be held Friday at Lee's Funeral Home in White Plains, New York. Julian, it's Julian. It's interesting here when you talk about the passing of Alonzo Graham. Man, so many people ripped him when he did his book. He did his book about the first black

senator. Him and his wife, of course, called a socialite. His book dealing with the black elite as well. People were like, oh my goodness, Lawrence Oles Graham was all about the elite. But here's the deal. He was writing about actual black people. So, I mean,

you can be mad and upset. I remember having him on my radio show when he was promoting the book, WVON. But the reality is, that was also black people. This notion that you didn't have black people who lived that life, it was just wrong. No, absolutely. I interviewed

him years, years ago, and we actually hung out a couple of times. We came to Washington, and we actually hung out a couple of times. We came to Washington and I took him to a couple of parties. He was a good guy. He was really smart. You know, he was classist, but, you know, many of us in these positions are. We don't want to admit it, but we actually are. And he got the ways, I mean, what I liked about him the most is that he took the Black experience from where he was, and he wasn't born bougie, but he got bougie. And he took that and talked about it. And a member of the club, he really talked about it. One of my one of my favorite and most funny conversations with him was about his nose job. He talked about how he had been encouraged to get a nose job because his nose was too Negro. And I thought he was cute nose job or not. But he we talked about it on the air about, you know, why did you do that? You know, he was really experimenting with his authentic self and sharing his authentic energy.

And I didn't know he had been ill. We had been in touch in a couple years. But I'm sorry to hear that he passed. And I think that people who have anything to say about him should just go back and look at some of his work. Elegantly written, very insightful, and just really right on time. Again, the book that really set it out was A Member of the Club, Reflections on Life in a Racially Polarized World. First of all, he wrote an article for New York Magazine where he detailed Teresa going undercover as a waiter at a country club making $7 an hour and writing about all the stuff that white folks talked about at that country club. Man, that certainly stirred

a lot of stuff up. The book I was talking about that, and I have this book, and it's an amazing book. It is called The True Story, go to my iPad, please. The True Story of America's First Black Dynasty. The Senator and the Socialite. That was really that was really an absolutely just just fabulous book that he was writing about. And then, of course, Our Kind of People was was another book. I'm going to show you the book cover in just a second, folks. So that's a socialite there. Let me show you Our Kind of People. That book detailed, give me one second, I'm going to pull the cover up, Inside America's Black Upper Class by Lawrence. And of course, that did very well. And that was

the thing, Teresa, I never understood people being pissed off because he wrote about bougie black people as if you ain't got bougie white people. See, I think if we really want to go there, I think we need to confront the reality that there are too many black people who have defined blackness based upon public housing complexes, growing up without a daddy, and being broke. If we really just want to go ahead and go there, okay? Because you know what?

It's a whole bunch of rich white people and it's some broke-ass white people. This whole notion that to be black is defined by one thing, that's what he wrote about. Now, you can be upset with that, but that's real. Yeah, and I think he gave, that was the perspective that I, you know, one I enjoyed. Because part of it is, you know, if you read his books, you start to understand and you start to look at your neighbor and your colleague and you're like, you could be a part of that social life, that black elite club. Right. Because it's little instances and it's nothing wrong with being in the black elite.

But just don't lose yourself when you're a part of that society. Don't forget where you come from. Don't forget to pull others up so they can also be in the club. So the percentage in that population also increases. But also we just need to be very cognitive. And that's where I think, you know, from my understanding, that's where I got from his books, is that we just as black people just need to be real cognitive of who we are, the arena that we're in, and how we conduct ourselves. Because society is gonna tell us that we should act a certain way as being black, but I think it also tells us in his books

that if we show ourselves and give ourselves, you know, in terms of like our education and our status, we will also, you know, show a different type of African American that exists to the white man,. And hopefully they allow us in their society. I was reading some, I was reading some of the comments, people, um, remarking, uh, about, um, his passing today. And, and there were people who were like, oh my God, it was this, that, and the other. And it always struck me as crazy. Uh, oh, my goodness, he's just wrong. He's just, how dare he?

I don't like how he talks and all that sort of stuff. His wife, Pamela Graham, she also former president and CEO at CNBC. And he certainly survived by his wife, his children and other family members as well. But again, I just think that if I if I could if I could if I could really just think of something, I think some black people, black people need to grow the hell up and get the hell out of their own circle and realize that there are black people of all sorts of classes. There are black people who are light-skinned, dark-skinned, black people who grew up with... It's just like this whole idea as if it's a badge of honor to grow up with a single mama. Well, guess what? That's bullshit. I grew up with a mama and a daddy who's still married, who will be married for 54 years in June.

Okay? And so I just think that we have to be willing sometimes to check folks on how we define blackness. I agree. Well, you know, we have our own... Hold on one second. Kieran, go ahead. So, I'm a black man

who grew up in a two-parent household. My parents will be married 32 years, 33 years in April. So, I get exactly where you're coming from, Roland. And I really do think we need to normalize black people passing things down to their children, estate planning, black people having wealth, the less likely others will be to succeed and to strive hard because they will see that, you know, they're not accepted in most black spaces because

they have now. So I think we need to be inclusive in the black community and make sure that we include our bougie friends and make sure that we try to represent everybody in the black community because we all share one experience because no matter what, the color of our skin never changes. I don't care how much money you make. Yeah, but it's just, look, we live in different worlds. I see somebody go, look at Clarence Thomas, all kinds of black folks. What is rolling on? Easy.

I'm on blackness. Guess what? There are black people like Clarence Thomas. Wow. There are black conservatives. Yes. There are black people who marry whitece Thomas. Wow. There are black conservatives. Yes. There are black people who marry white people. Yep.

Men and women. There are black people who grow up in middle class neighborhoods, poor neighborhoods, rich neighborhoods, suburbs, cities, rule America. There are black people who go to HBCUs and black people who go to PWIs. Black people go to community colleges. Black people who don't evenBCUs and black people who go to PWIs. Black people go to community colleges. Black people who don't even go to college. Guess what? There are black people who do all sorts of things. The problem is when we somehow define it as solely this.

Oh, my God, you're out of the norm. No, actually, you aren't. You're not. I just think that even now, what we're doing is we sort of have this litmus test for black people. And then what happens is if somebody black actually moves out, ooh, who you think you are? Easy. A mover. I'm a homeowner. OK, I just think that I mean, I just think that again, it really bothered. It really bothers me when we we place these limitations on blackness. And then we go, we descended from kings and queens.

Oh, so then if you black, you own a mansion. Now there's a problem. Julianne, go ahead. I think that one of the, I think this is a really important conversation around the issues of dimensions of blackness. I think it's important for us to understand our heterogeneity as opposed to our homogeneity. In other words, we are different. We have different lives. As you said, we've been raised different ways. Everybody did not have a single mama and an absent daddy. Everybody did not grow up on food stamps. And some of the people who did do that

actually transcended that. So I think it's really important to deal with that. But I think the other importance here is to not roll into talk about what divides us, but what unites us. And in some cases, there's not a whole hell of a lot that does unite us. And we need to deal with that as well. We talk about a Black community, but what is a Black community? What does it mean? How do we come together? We are, you know, we're connected by pain. We're connected by discrimination. We're connected by what they did to us. And we have to really transcend that to talk about what makes us stronger. I think about people like Mary McLeod Bethune, who started the National Council of Negro Women in 1935 in the middle of a depression, in the middle of a depression. And NCNW was not

all bougie, not all working class. It was a combination of Black women. And so I think we need to think about the ways that we chose to come together. But, you know, I'm disturbed, extremely disturbed by some of what is going on right now, especially around people trying to say, OK, I'm not this, I'm not that. I mean, Brother Ben, who, and you, Roland, talking about, well, you know, we didn't have single whatever, whatever. I didn't either. My parents divorced when I was six.

And I had a very middle-class upbringing. Thank you, Mama, because she did it. Right, I'm just saying, we all have, we have multiple experiences. That's all I'm saying. I just think that, I just think that for, there are a number of us, it becomes this notion of how do you define blackness? And look, we all sit here, like I crack on Jason Johnson and say I'm going to snatch his black card because he don't know how to play spades. Now, I think right there, I think right there... Because I always fail. Huh? I always fail at spades. I don't know how I mess

up all the time. Hold up. Do you not know how to play? You don't play or you play bad? I play bad. Right. Okay, fine. Just keep your ass away from the spades table. At least you can actually sit down. First of all, how you an economist and you badass spades?

It's all about numbers. Well, Roland, let's not talk about it. Uh-uh. Yeah, you don't want to go there. Lord, let me just go ahead and move on because I don't understand. The spades table would be at college. If they saw me sitting down, they'd walk away. Oh, my God. You shouldn't have told everybody

that. Ooh, Lord. Okay. Let me go again, y'all. No cause of death given, but Lawrence Otis Graham passed away Friday at the age of 59. All right, I got to go to a quick break. We come back. We're going to talk to a long-time producer at 60 Minutes who shared some inside scoops on what it was like to work at the legendary shop.

And also share some thoughts about, of course, longtime correspondent, the late, great Ed Bratley. That's next on Roller Mountain Unfiltered. You do know that there is not a piece of your life that government in some way does not involve. I mean, I crack up with these conservatives who talk about it. Down to your name. Everything.

Down to your name. Everything. I mean, if you actually sat down and said, okay, what part of my life, let me try to find something in my life that government does not have a part of, I can't think of a single thing you can say fine they don't impact my marriage which they do because you gotta get that marriage license yeah yeah from the birth to the tomb and if you're gonna be here in the united states of america whether you like it or not you gotta know about it you gotta know it's history

because when somebody knows about you more than you know yourself, that's slavery. That's volunteer slavery. So it's almost like double the education we got to pick up of what this place is all about, how it works, how it runs. I'm a firm believer, being in 112 countries, that you got to think global and act local. But you better ACT, act local.

All right, folks. Welcome back to Roller Mark, The Unfiltered. Every, of course, Monday we talk, we always like to have book authors on the show, and I came across an interesting book. It's called Ticking Clock, Behind the Scenes at 60 Minutes by Ira Rosen. Of course, Emmy Award-winning producer.

Go ahead and show the graphic, please. Thank you very much. And some quite hilarious and interesting stories about what it was like to work at 60 Minutes. He joins us right now. Ira, glad to have you on. You were there from the beginning, and that certainly had to be quite a a different view working there for so long and seeing how it all unfolded. Thanks for having me. I was 26 years old when Mike Wallace hired me. He had no reason to hire me aside from the fact that I played tennis. And he taught me, you know, my original title for this book was called Growing Up in 60 Minutes because I did grow up there. And they, you know, Mike would take me out to dinners and he would teach me the art of the interview, which which

I was listening to a little bit before. You're quite good at it, which is you listen to a person's answers and you respond. You just don't try to get through a list of questions. You try to build up an air of of confidentiality around a person. You try to give them a reason to want to go on camera or talk to you so that they have their sharing with you. And you also ask the hardest questions first. So that way, the person begins to relax a little bit and then you come back at them later on. And one of the people, you began by talking a little bit about Ed Bradley. Ed Bradley was a master. I mean, everybody at the show wanted to work with Ed Bradley. He had a certain style to him. I mean, I was going to do one story with him. I ended up

doing it with Mike Wallace. We were going to do Jesse Jackson's first run for president in 1983. And then we then Mike took the piece over. But there was a certain class to the guy, which, you know, everybody there admired. Everybody wanted to be Ed Bradley. Everybody wanted to work for Ed Bradley. He had got seats at the Garden. He loved to spend it. He would throw his wardrobe out every two or three years.

He'd just clean his closet out. Okay, I'm going to buy something new. He would go down to New Orleans Jazz Fest, and he would love to play. There's a song called The 60 Minutes Man. I don't know if you know it. It's a Billy Warden. Oh, yeah, I know it well.

Oh, great. So, yeah, so he would get on on stage and he'd bang the tambourine out and he'd play that song. You know, I miss him every day, as I think a lot of people who were there miss him. When we think about its success,

it is still one of the top-rated television shows. Every network has tried to replicate 60 Minutes. NBC has Dateline. ABC has its long-running show, 2020. There have been other shows as well. But why specifically has 60 Minutes been able to be this dominant this long with, and obviously you get a cast that was there for a very long time. But what really is its secret to its dominance and its ability to have staying power? Here's the secret.

It's tell me a story. Don Hewitt had thought of this a long time ago. There are two things. At the beginning of 60 Minutes, you were engaged in the adventures of Mike and Morley and Ed and Dan, rather, and you wanted to go with them where they went. So, you know, Harry Reasoner took you

to the most expensive meal in the world. Morley took you on the train, you know, the Siberian Express. Ed did these extraordinary stories about spies in London. You wanted to be with them. You wanted to hear what they had to tell you. And you were engaged there. The stories always had a beginning, middle and end. You don't diminish the audience. You don't repeat the same information over and over again. And it was this kind of art form that has remained consistent for 53 years. One of the things that when I think about, obviously, you have Ed Gort, excuse me, you have Ed Bradley, Byron Pitts was there, you had Bill Whitaker there. Byron is like my brother. I mean, I was lucky enough to do an incredible story with Byron in Chicago about these five youths who were falsely accused of murder. And Byron completely nailed the prosecutor who had framed them and we we did this story anyway I'm sorry to divert but it's all good I mean but the point I was making there is that is that

obviously it is extremely hard to get will get one of those correspondence rolls but but I am interested in terms of the issue of diversity in 60 Minutes and what it was like being on the inside and the competition and the battles in trying to land one of those very few positions that very few open up. Right. And it's incredibly hard. You know, we talked about Byron for a little bit. Byron wanted to be a 60 Minutes producer, you know, since he was in college. When he got there,

he was there for a brief time as a contributor. He would take home Mike and Ed tapes and study them. He would, when he and I got together, he would take out a notepad and take notes. He studied the form. He wanted to learn. I mean, he turned into a fantastic anchor at Nightline. But the other person who I, after Byron, I ended up working with Bill Whitaker, who's taught me so much about being a reporter and a journalist. Let me tell you a story about Bill that a lot of people don't know.

I don't know. Do you know Bill Whitaker at all? I mean, he's a great start. I've talked to Bill several times. I see him all the time at NABJ. Yeah, Bill's dad worked at the Cotton Club, which was at the time an all white establishment. His father was a waiter there when he couldn't even be a patron. His mother worked in the kitchen, used to play cards with Ella Fitzgerald. And it was this kind of hard, the work ethic that his father had that kind of, you know,

went to the kid. And, you know, Bill was crashing stories in Los Angeles, crashing stories in Tokyo. I mean, he really put in the time. And he and I did the story that I'm probably most proud of in my career on the opiate epidemic, which we did with the Washington Post. Piece one later would win a Peabody, a DuPont, an Emmy and, you know, every other award. It became the most single award-winning piece in the history of 60 Minutes. And we had a whistleblower named Joe Renazzisi. And I was a little worried about how it's going to go. This is a guy who was inside the DEA. Bill Whitaker

sat with the guy for four hours, did a four-hour interview with this guy. And he got every ounce of information out of him. When we did the story, when it aired, there was a congressman, the story, you know, for people don't remember it. The story was about how the Congress covered up and allowed the took basically neutered the DEA of all their enforcement powers, which allowed Purdue Pharma and McKesson Corporation to flood America with opiates. And there was one congressman in particular, Congressman Marino, who kind of pushed it forward.

Well, lo and behold, at the end of our story, Marino, we announced that Marino was going to be Donald Trump's new drug czar. Well, let me tell you something. Within two days of that story running, Trump began to praise Marino and saying, oh, he's a nice man. Once when he started to praise him, the guy was toast. He was out of office by Wednesday. And, you know, that's the power of 60 Minutes. You know, I've told my friends it's like being it's a little bit like being Superman because you have these magical powers where you could get people who are wrongfully convicted out of out of prison. You could you could right the wrongs of societies. You could expose corporate America. And and it's really, you know, you asked earlier why it's lasted so long, because I think the audience appreciates what 60 Minutes has brought forth.

Last question before I go to my panel, so my panel will get ready. Each of you will get to ask a question shortly. I certainly got to get your take on when Oprah Winfrey left. Just as somebody who spent a lot of time there, I found it hilarious as hell for Oprah to say when she was told several times how to say her name, she was like, okay, I'm good.

I'm done. Whoever that person was probably should have been tarred and feathered by saying, it's Oprah. I think she's good at her name. I think we're good. She's the goat.

What are you telling the goat how to pronounce her name? I completely agree with you. I mean, I was flabbergasted. And I'm not going to name the names. I'm not going to say who that person was. But I had to talk with that person. And I had a talk with him. And let's just leave it at that.

I just, I was stunned. First of all, you've got to understand something. Oprah is basically volunteering to work there. Right, right. It's literally, Oprah Winfrey doing 60 Minutes. It's like her going down to the food bank. Yeah. I mean, you know, she's she's she's I don't I don't even know if she took a salary or if she did. She donated it to charity. I mean, so, you know, and you're telling her how to you know, I mean, this is you know, we're hearing it from Oprah's side of it,

which is you're telling her how to pronounce her name or how to read her copy slower or something. I mean, stop it. Just stop it. Just stop it. Yeah, that was that was that was a little crazy to me. Let's go to. Yeah, maybe you maybe have to tell me off air what that conversation was like. All right. Let's go to my panel with questions. I'll go start with Teresa. Yeah, so I'm so inspired. I am an avid watcher of 60 Minutes. So I was wondering, are you guys interested in doing some new content that surrounds maybe some, like, I don't know, like some younger generation, some, like, young feel.

I feel like it still gives me, you know, seasonal individuals, which is great. But do you guys plan on bringing it a little bit up for the new generation? So hold on., hold on. Let me do this here. I'm going to add in the denim to Teresa's question. Of course, CBS launched West 57th, which was supposed to be sort of the younger version of

that. Meredith Vieira was one of the folks who was on that IRA. That did not sit too well based upon what I've heard with Donna Hewitt. Then, of course, the new show, 60 Minutes, had launched a show with Quibi. Wesley Lowry is one of the folks who was a correspondent on there. Quibi, of course, shut down. They're looking at launching a similar show on the Paramount Network.

So, Zara, go ahead and just share, you know, historically what it was like having 60 Minutes and then West 57 and how Don Hu was not the greatest fan of that show. You know, God, it's so nice you remember all this history. Back then, there was a rivalry and Don would always be teasing the West 57. And in the elevator. They were on the eighth floor, we were on the ninth floor. And there was a real rivalry. But having said that, you know, Steve Croft came from West 57th Street. Meredith Vieira came from West 57th Street.

John Ferrugia was there for a period of time. So I mean, it was it brought a lot of younger stories at the time. Of course, they didn't have the protected time slot that 60 Minutes had, which was Sunday at seven. And, you know, people inside often joke, you know, you could put a test pattern on and still get a 12 share. I mean, so, you know, that's a huge, huge advantage to have. But so to your point, Teresa, they are actually doing that show. But again, it was on Quibi. Now look forward possibly on this Paramount streaming service, which they're launching, which combines CBS All Access and some of their other properties. All right, Julianne, what's your question? One of the most impactful 60 Minutes pieces I saw was when someone went underground in a meat packing plant and basically looked at wages and all of that kind of thing.

I think that's the kind of thing that 60 Minutes does best. What's next in terms of that investigative journalism? So I wrote about this in my book, Ticking Clock, where I was a senior producer at Primetime Live for 15 years. And I was in charge of all the investigative stories we did there. And what I what I brought to the table was I brought to the table hidden cameras. And I don't know if anyone remembers those stories. Of course we do. Primetime Live hidden camera investigation, where we actually did send people into a meatpacking plant to see the conditions that exist there. We also sent them to sugar cane fields.

We sent them to board and care homes, daycare centers, VA hospitals. And it was really seminal work. But then I senior produced a story called Food Lion. Now, Food Lion was a grocery store chain where we sent two people in undercover and it resulted in, is we lost the first round, won the second round, the award was reduced to a dollar. But as a result of that story, all these hidden camera investigations for a period of time kind of went away. Yep. Yep. I certainly remember that lawsuit as well. Kieran Young, your question. My question would be, tell me about the experience that you've had with the size of the nfl audience leading in on sundays i i imagine that the power that the nfl has leading into the 60 minute show gives you a broad audience and a and a good way to if you can hook people

in the first 15 minutes with a good story it it can be amazing for the rest of the show. So I'd like to talk about that. Yeah, no, you're exactly right. I mean, what you're always looking for in TV is you're always looking for a good lead-in. And, you know, what happened in those periods of time is you always programmed along a big NFL weekend. You'd look for the late game, the four o'clock game. And, you know, a four o'clock game, especially with a good rivalry, you know, back then it was, you know, believe it or not, it was the New England Patriots against the Jets, say, would be a good lead in.

And so you would program it and then you would promote it throughout the game. So you're then getting the overflow of the NFL audience. And then after 60 minutes, what it does is it helps launch the night for CBS. So, you know, the 60 is on 7 to 8 or 7 30 to 8 30, and then it sets up the rest of the night for CBS. So it's very important. Last question I have for you, Ira, and that is, again, first of all, fascinating book. As somebody who chose to go into media when I was 14, I've got probably a couple of hundred media books. So I'm always interested in all the different mediums, whether it's television, radio, online,

digital, you name it, but especially also the black press. And that is this here. I think that when we talk about where do we go from here, we're now operating in a world where you've got everybody named Obama. I saw today Obama is sitting down and launching this podcast with Bruce Springsteen and all sorts of different things along those lines. Do you think that 25 years from now, there still will be a 60 Minutes because of how unique they are in this moment, in this era of a whole bunch of people just talking, but very little reporting? I think there will be as long as the accountants

don't take the show over. And they continue to give the money needed to travel where you need to travel and to tell the stories that you need to tell. If they start trying to cut back on the buck and hiring people who are maybe not as skilled at reporting or storytelling, then you're going to see a diminishment of it. But I'm hopeful that the people there are smart enough to know that this is not something they want to mess with. Absolutely. This is actually the last question. This is the typical question I ask every single book author uh what was your wow moment in writing this where you might remember something or it was your research even caused you to say wow uh when i was in pakistan and i was um i i kind of dumbly went to the red mosque which is in the

center of islamabad with the CBS fixer. And I did an interview with this guy who was the al-Qaeda representative in town there. And his English is probably better than mine. I was frankly, I didn't have my radar on that night. And so after the interview, he took me into the back where the madrasa was and he's showing me around. And then suddenly my the CBS fixer and him started getting into a fight, an argument. And he the CBS fixer grabbed me and pulled me out of the place and brought me into the car. And he was a very calm guy. Normally, he started to heave.

And I said, what just happened? And he said, well, they were talking about making you another Daniel Pearl and kidnapping you. And I told them that my brother is the police chief in Kohat, which is a nearby town, and that if they kidnap you, he will track everyone down and slaughter them by morning. And he said that just gave us enough time to get the hell out of there. Yeah, that's a wild moment. That is a wild moment. That certainly fits the bill there, y'all. The book is called Ticking Clock, Behind the Scenes at 60 Minutes from Ira Rosen, Emmy Award winning producer there at 60 Minutes. Ira, we sure appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Thanks for having me. All right, then. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Kieran, Julian, and as well as Teresa

for being on our panel today. Thank you so very much. Folks, if y'all want to support what we do here at Roland Martin Unfiltered, please support us by joining our Bring the Funk fan club. You can join us via Cash App, which is Cash App, dollar sign RM Unfiltered, PayPal.me forward slash RMartinUnfiltered, Venmo.com forward slash RMUnfiltered. Zale is Roland at RolandSMartin.com.

Tomorrow, I will be in Atlanta. We're working on a particular project where we're going to be doing these intergenerational conversations. Cliff Albright sitting down with Ambassador Andrew Young. You'll be able to see that later on. We'll tell you more about that. So tomorrow, I'll be on the road in Atlanta.

Wednesday, I'll be sitting down with attorney Fred Gray. Of course, 90 years old, one of our legal stalwarts in civil rights veterans. And then Thursday, we'll be broadcasting from Jacksonville, Florida, where we will be facilitating conversations with Tiffany Lofton, Dr. Janetta B. Cole, as well as Charlie Kavosnik and Philip Agnew. So, all right, folks, that is it for us. Again, please support what we do. Those of you who support us on YouTube, we appreciate it.

But remember, we get 55% of our revenue on YouTube. They get 45%. And so you'll join our fan club. If you want to be a monthly, want to support us monthly, please do so by supporting us directly, directly via Cash App, PayPal, Zelle, or Venmo. That's it for me, folks. I shall see y'all. Oh, hold up. I did forget.

That is big shout out. This weekend was the 94th birthday of the great Sidney Poitier. His birthday was this weekend. Yesterday, of course, was the birthday of Congressman John Lewis, who we lost last year. Yesterday also was the birthday of Nina Simone, who passed away a number of years ago as well. So I wanted to go ahead and shout them out. And also shout out for today. That is today's birthday of Dr. J, the great Julius Irving. He turned 71 years old today. And so I wanted to shout out Dr. J.

And so I will leave you guys, of course, with this photo here. This was a photo that I took with Sidney Poitier when we were at Oprah's home. When Selma came out, she had a gospel brunch. And so he is one of our greatest. Talking about the GOAT, Sidney Poitier. Happy birthday, Sidney. Talk to y'all later. I know a lot of cops.

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on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. music and sports. This kind of starts that in a little bit, man. We met them at their homes. We met them at their recording studios. Stories matter and it brings a face to them. It makes it real. It really does. It makes it real. Listen to new episodes of the War on Drugs podcast season two on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's the deal. We gotta set ourselves up. See, retirement is the long game we gotta make moves and make them early set up goals don't worry about a setback just save up and stack up to reach them let's put ourselves in the right position pre-game to greater things start building your retirement plan at thisispreetirement.org brought to you by AARP and the Ad Council. This is an iHeart Podcast.