The Eric Metaxas Show - Dimas Salaberrios

Episode Date: May 13, 2021

Dimas Salaberrios works in the inner-city of several major cities and presents some behind-the-scenes stories from his new movie, "Chicago: America's Hidden War."

show with your host, Eric Mettaxas. Folks, welcome to hour two of the Eric Metaxus show. I'm Eric Metaxus, or at least I'm playing the role of Eric Metaxus. But I have an actual guest playing himself. Dimas Saliberios or something like that. Salabarios. You did it. You fabulous job.

Okay. Ablas Spanish? A poikito. A boiario, Spirito Santo. And I also. Okay. You, my friend, you were talking about the real problem in Chicago with the shootings. You said is forgiveness.

And now you're a Christian minister. Yes. What do you mean? I mean, if somebody says, well, how do you explain when you say that's the real problem? Why do you say that's the real problem? Because there are, in the film, you know, we film a gang meeting. And they break it down. They're like, there's so much damage between two.

neighborhoods that, you know, the guys can't even go to the store anymore. And that damage is, you know, if one person is killed, this other gang tries to kill 10 of their friends. And one person is killed on this side, they try to kill another 10. So we have one shooter that we interviewed. And his name is Dolo. And he says it. He says, everything that we're doing is out of pain. It's out of hurt. You know, you killed my friends. So I have to. keep trying to get you. So this is going to be an ongoing cycle. And I think churches have one of the greatest shots of bringing this situation to a close by speaking to people about forgiveness. And you have to at some point let it go. You have to, you know, relinquish the debt of these other shooters.

No matter how many times you shoot, you can't bring back those that have done. God. When I fought against the Fed of Freddie Gray riots and helped shut that down, I screamed to the gang barons. I said, there's nothing you can do that's going to bring Freddie Gray back. I said, getting arrested or fighting the cops or shooting at the cops today is not going to bring him back. It's just going to put you in jail for life. And it was like a wake-up call. So one of the things we did, and you'll see at the end of this film, is homicides dropped by the efforts of the church and organizations. going out to do this kind of work is we told many groups just let's have a truce for a few

weeks during this summer in some groups enjoyed that piece so long that it never kicked back off again until now after the coronavirus it seems like the shooting shot back up yeah people like um al sharpton they you know they've been called race baiters and stuff and I think no matter what you think of him, I think his ideas are wrong. In other words, he talks about, we're going to have a day of rage. There's something about that that we as Christians know, that doesn't work. It gets people more angry. So it's one thing to have actually a peaceful protest, is saying, in the name of Jesus, we're walking to express or whatever. But when it gets into rage, it taps into that thing where you say, I want revenge, I want justice, I'm going to burn stuff down, I'm going to do stuff, because it feels

good, but it leads to bad things. And so what you're saying is that people that you have your friend shot, and unless you really know what Jesus says, it's the most human thing to say, I can't let that rest. I'm going to kill the person that shot my friend, knowing the cops will probably never touch you because they're staying out of it. I mean, so it's a radical thing to bring Christian forgiveness because most people say, it doesn't feel right. But it's counterintuitive. But you're saying, I mean, I was saying that Bob Mazzikovsky was on here. He was telling me the backstory because he talks to cops and everything about the seven-year-old girl that was killed in line in the McDonald's. And he explained to me that it was a gang shooting, that the guy, the father of the girl had killed somebody's friend.

And then they videotape themselves urinating on the grave. Like this is out of hell. Out of hell. And so then some people come by and they spray 42 shots, 42 shots. 42 shots and they killed a little girl. Yeah, they're shooting in a random way now. Before, like, New York City and other places, it was more targeted. Now they're killing in a random style in Chicago where whoever they hit, who's associated or not.

So this has gone to a genocidal type of level. And this is why I think police, I think clergy, I think, It has to be a multi-layer approach to going out there. I just flew back in, like I was telling you, I was in Watts out in Los Angeles. You want to talk about the projects. They got the bounty hunter bloods there. I mean, that's a tough, tough area. But the police out there are going to different families and saying,

we'll invest in your child going to a better school. And we'll invest in your child going to college. This doesn't get any airways, but I've never seen anything like that. And even on our film, I'm saying, can you bring in the cops from L.A.? Can you bring in the cops from New York to help with a new strategy? Because what's going on in Chicago is simply not working. Although, I mean, I think you have to say that the leadership in places like Chicago and New York, they have not backed the cops.

I know because I feel like they put gasoline on the fire. They're taking a political position that is making. making it harder for basic law enforcement to do its job. And it's almost like the cops are being told, stand back, don't get involved. Yeah, it's very sad, you know, what we're seeing. There needs to be a balance to all this. Hey, I mean, there's unjust cops, but you got to think of out of thousands of people being pulled over, it's usually one or two percent, they say, that something goes wrong.

And, you know, and it's just everybody's tossed out. I mean, this is what I'm saying is like, if somebody says there's a crooked cop, like whoever the guy was that kneeled on George Floyd there, you'd just be like, what's the problem? We have laws against that, and that guy will go to jail. It's not like people are saying it's okay. I mean, if somebody steps out of line and does something like that, we have laws. And everybody I know, me included, says, throw the book at those people. Make an example so that every cop knows if you're tempted to behave. like that, you better think twice and three times and five times.

But I don't know anybody who wouldn't agree with that. So when you start demonizing all cops because you got these, you know, there's nasty individuals in every business, in the radio business, Albin Seder, number one, nasty guy. And I'm telling you, it's just, but it's kind of common sense, I think. So it's not a race thing, but people make it a race thing and everybody gets angry and it's us against them. And I don't know anybody who doesn't care if people are getting shot. What you'll see in Chicago, America's Hidden War, which is in a theater near you,

is you're going to see, you know, real interaction between the cops and the community. And sometimes it went really bad and sometimes it were really good. Like there was a shooting where everyone thought the cops shot an innocent guy, but the situation did turn that the guy was pulling, he was trying to pull out his guns at the time. You know, and they got that on the body cam. So very quickly, that went away. But there's a lot of, you know, hurt and pain where I grew up, you know,

where Diallo was shot 40 times, man, with just having a wallet. 40 bullets. Mama do Diallo. That was a long time ago, but I remember that. Yeah. So those kind of things back before there were cell phones, they were just brushed under the table. But now the accountability is there. there needs to be a great healing between the cops and the black community.

And I think our film, Chicago America's Hidden War, gives the big overview of what the kids are going through. Children said, Eric, they have to sleep under their beds because they're scared of being shot. When you hear this stuff, it's just, it's unbelievable. It's unbelievable. Well, look, you and I know Jesus is the answer, but that sounds just like a bromide. We have to live that out. And I know you've done that. So what is the film?

In other words, what is it, does it follow an arc or is it just more like a standard documentary? We don't do the old style of cinema verite where you just follow two or three people. We do a big sweeping over. We have the police chief. We have children. We have all these different dynamics. So you get the full picture of what the community is experiencing, including what the church does. to fight against the homicides.

Okay, we're going to be right back. We're talking about the new film, Chicago, America's Hidden War. Hey there, folks. How many years have I been telling you about relief factor? What, like four? The truth is, I know there are millions of people.

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Squadpod.com slash Eric. Check it out. Folks, welcome back. I'm talking to my friend Demas Salabarios. What was the book, the title of your book, was a kingpin? Street God. Yes. About you came out of a life of being a drug dealer.

Yeah. More than a drug dealer, like a top drug dealer. Yeah. And now I understand you're dealing less drugs. Actually, no drugs. No, your life was so turned around. But that book, tell me, it's Street God. Street God, yes.

And that was in New York? That was in New York. And I transported the dirt down to North Carolina. Yeah. So you were in that world. So you understand this in a way that, you know, people like me, most people would not understand. You were in the world of guns and drugs, and so you bring a level of compassion, I know, to what's going on.

Now, the movie, Chicago, America's Hidden War, you were just describing what is in it. So get into that a little bit. Yeah, you know, most people call the film war journalism. Like, we had to throw on bulletproof vests. We were every day out there with shooters. We built relationships. I made a strong relationship with another ex-Kingpin, who they called the Bentley Twins.

They were just recently featured on some stuff. And those guys gave me the access into the gang meetings, into sitting down with legitimate shooters. You know, guys that are banging it every single day. I got to really go into that mindset, you know, as to what motivates them. Why are they shooting? You know, one guy named SP talked about he got into a fight and he got his brother killed.

You know, he's standing there with some of his boys and they're pulling up their shirts. I got shot four times. I got shot. I mean, you thought you were in another country. You know, then we started to talk about the PTSD that these children are experiencing. You know, little kids, 10, 11 years old saying the only place they feel safe is that school, and at church. They said outside of that, we don't feel safe.

And I just feel like there's so much that we can do and there's so much that we need to do. And I think it's grown people need to, and I actually want to call the church out specifically, that they would make Chicago a mission field. I love Guatemala, great. But go out to Chicago. I had white people with us at, a girl named Bonnie Kate,

who was cripple, who was shot at the shooting. at the Aurora movie theater. And she was on crutches going and talking to gangbangers and ministering to them. Had Ron Hall, who you may know from same kind of different as me. He was out on the blocks with me walking with his wife, who was a model. And we're going through so everybody can do something. And if you're scared about that, we have something where you can teach masterclasses to kids. We can zoom it in throughout technology where you can speak to these young people and work with them.

because many of them are just born in a war zone. They're born in a battle that started years and years before them that's continuing on today. And, you know, Chicago's been one of the most, known as one of the most corrupt cities in America, if not the most corrupt city. And that's going back decades and decades and decades. And people think, hey, I got an idea. We'll solve it. We'll elect a black mayor.

It'll solve all the problems. That's not really happening. I mean, I'm trying to demonize the men. mayor, but her leadership has not been good. I don't know what is happening. But I think people get very political and they're not. I mean, this is why I get excited about this film and about you, because you get into it. You're trying to solve problems. It's not about a political party or whatever. I think how are the cops reacting to this? I'm thinking that if the mayor doesn't have your back, you're like even afraid to get involved in any.

thing. Yeah, well, the candidate I went for, her name was Amara. And if she would have won, it would have been a different story. We feature her in the movie. I mean, she's more boots on the ground. Maybe she'll win next time. When's the election? I'm praying. What's her name? I don't know. Amara. Amara? It's a very long African name. Forgive me, I can't quote it right now. Amara. Yeah, Amara. But that's, you look up Amara, a Chicago mayor candidate, you'll get it. But she she's absolutely brilliant. She's done

an Iron Man run twice. I mean, she's tough, she's smart, she's brilliant. And what she realizes is there's a real broken relationship with the cops in the community. And also I'll go a step further than that.

Our generation, our jobs were a calling. Like you look at this job as a calling because I know you personally. You look writing books as a calling. I look at what I do as a calling. Some of the younger people look at as how much am I getting paid? And why should I risk my life for $40,000? If you're a cop or a nurse or a doctor or a teacher and you don't see it as a calling, that's the problem. This is something I have talked about. That is what's changed in America. Yeah. And that's bad. I mean, there were people that if you're a teacher, you are called. It's not about the money. You get paid, but you're called to be a

teacher. Yes. You're called to be a nurse, a doctor, whatever. It's not about the money. It's about a calling. And you're quite right that I mean the idea that I'm going to risk my life, you have to believe that that's what you're supposed to do. We remember you meet a guy who's like, I'm a cop. That meant something. Yeah. I'm a garbage. Whatever you were, it meant something. Well, it means I am that. That is why I live out my life in that. It's not just the thing I do to get a check. This generation, I've met several officers that said, look, I'm not risking my life. I said, if you saw a shoot, I asked one officer, if you saw a shooting and the guy was speeding down after, you know, busing shots, where you chase him, he said, no, I wouldn't. And so one of the things I lean on is that there needs to be a house cleaning in the police force in Chicago.

If you're not willing to do the job, hire people out of the military. How is somebody else that has this passion, you know, that that's not afraid when bullets are going off? That is very interesting. I mean, I never thought of that, but that there are people that you get cynical. And when that happens, it's not going to work. You cannot be cynical about it. You have to believe that this is the right thing to do. Wow, that's a big one.

So some celebrities have gotten behind this film. Who are some people that we would know? Denzel Washington bought out theaters. Salamane the God from the hip-hop. Charlemagne the God. The God. The God. He bought out theaters.

Dall Strawberry. Angie Stone. Clifton Davis, one of the hosts, the TBN. Clifton Davis. I just remember him from his big days on That's My Mama. Yeah. That was a people don't remember. I remember it.

That's my mama. Yeah. He's fantastic. And many others have been just stepping up, blowing us away. Dexter Darden, his girlfriend, Jojo. Who's Jojo? Jojo is a singer who's dating Dexter Darden and the two of them. I don't know. When you mention Jojo, I think it's Jojo Starbucks, the Olympic Theater.

She's a friend, Jojo Starbuck, but it's not Jojo Starbucks. The other Jojo. Yeah. And Mark Burnett, Roma, we've got to mention them. beautiful people back in the film and supporting us. So a lot of people have... Willie Robertson. He trimmed his beard.

Willie Robertson. Yes, I haven't seen the new picture. Well, you know what I find? This is how pathetic America is. The dude trims his beard. They make it like a big news story. Like he didn't shave the beard. Didn't even shave it.

He just trimmed it. So it looks like a large beard, but not an insane beard. Not as easy top beard. That's like news. Willie's in the movie. He actually came down. I love him. And hit the streets.

And he told people, he says, I'm not a racist. You know, he said, too many people believe I'm a racist. If I was racist, why would I be here risking my life? Of course. It was beautiful, Eric. Well, he is, no, listen, those guys, they're the real deal. The Robertsons, Phil Robertson, the whole gang, they live their faith, you know.

And that's what it is, you know, to go into these danger zones as you do. It's to live your faith and to show somebody something different, to say there's something real here. Why am I doing this? But I'm not aware of where the churches are in Chicago. I mean, I don't know. Are the white evangelical churches in Chicago, hey, you know, you want to do something woke? How about going and, you know, putting your life out there

and showing people that Jesus wants to heal this situation? I mean, there's a lot of Christians in the Chicago area. Yeah, they are uniting together, which has been beautiful called United States. land, Chicago, they're coming together, they're praying, they're going out into the streets. And so we hope, you know, they're going to be doing some big work this summer. And we hope that it has the same effect that the shootings keep going down and dropping down. Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I mean, you know, you said forgiveness. How does that work? I mean, in order if somebody killed my brother or my friend, I would need to be very serious about Jesus to understand forgiveness. It's not a little idea. Yeah. It'll have to be more framed as a truce of don't go trying to kill them, and they will not come and try to kill you.

I think that would be a great step, and we've seen some success with that as a first step, but is much further to go. All right. Well, we're going to go to break. Folks, I'm talking to Deimos, Salabarios, my friend. Where can they find the trailer? What's the website?

They can go to Chicago, America's Hidden War. they can type that into YouTube or Chicago's Hidden War.com. Okay. They can find the choice. All right. We'll be right back. Prescription dispensing labs is a national licensed pharmacy

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Folks, we're talking about a new film. It's called Chicago, America's Hidden War. It's a documentary directed by my friend Dimas Salabarius. Dimas, you were talking about the kids. I mean, it is hard for us to imagine kids having it grow up. up in circumstances like this in America. You also talked about, you know, the mission field in a place like Chicago. People are like flying, you know, to other continents and stuff. These people need Jesus to heal the most fundamental. I mean, it's right now. It's our backyard.

Yeah, we need a lot of local missions, particularly to help the young kids. I mean, many of them are growing up in war zones. They can't sleep at. night, many of them have PTSD, that they're afraid. They feel on a daily base that they're going to get killed. One of them in the film named Lorenzo, he says, I'm just scared to go outside. And all the other kids are like, yeah, me too. I'm scared. I'm scared. They're like, only time I'm out here is because a church is holding this event and I feel a little safe. But other than this, I don't want to come outside. I don't want to die. I don't want to be shot. And the stories they tell, one kid said he watched his cousin be gunned down in front of him, then the guy walks off, comes, kicks him to

make sure he's dead, and guns him down in front of the kids again. So pastor named Corey Brooks said he was outside and he heard gunshots and about 100 kids on a playground all hit the floor at the exact same time. He's not from Chicago. He said he blew his mind that all them knew exactly what to do. And so my argument is, you know, Chicago's struggling financially, so they say, it's like, can we put beat cops back out there? Can they be cops stationed on these blocks where we know the shootings are happening? If that was New York City, you know they put up a tower, lights there, they shut the block down, but for some reason in Chicago is just a quick cleanup crew. And I don't know all the financial issues going on, but I pray that, you know,

government, the president, whoever, somebody would fund the police in a big way so that I remember New York City when it was wild. We're adding 50,000 more police, 5,000 more. So you are not, it doesn't sound like you are for defunding the cops. Now, that is a complicated issue. The thing in a big way, no, but should cops show up for everything? It's sad now. I know what you're saying. That's sad. A cat's in a tree.

You're calling the cop. You have an argument with your family. Calling the cop to fight the war on drugs, to fight the war on crime, to fight the war on tickets, to fight. How many wars can one organization fight where I think there should be some other options when you dial 911 to say, look, I don't need a cop. Maybe I need a counselor or somebody that can come. So I think figuring that out could be helpful, but I'm not an expert.

I'm a clergy, man. But that's some of the thoughts that I think about a lot. It's like, you know, some young cop coming in and maybe out of his element dealing with some mental health issues. Well, I was going to say it's tragic. But, I mean, look, we know demonizing cops is wrong. I mean, these are people putting themselves in dangerous situations. Even if things go wrong, have some mercy and some grace. I mean, you know, I always say if we're talking about a murderer, like, I don't know anybody who doesn't want the murderer to pay for that.

We're not talking about excusing evil behavior. But when things get so divided, it's hard for us even to have any grace on either side. It just becomes us versus them, us versus them. I have compassion on the cops. I have compassion on the community. I have compassion on the way the system is set up right now. It's hard, you know, and I'm sure you read this more than me, but it's hard to see.

I was with an officer who was smashed in his head, and he said, I've never even pulled out pepper spray on anybody. I've never harmed anyone. And that's sad. Then you've got kids, you know, have stories of, you know, trigger happy police officers that gun down their brother, you know, as he was just fleeing and things. So it's just so, oh, it's like, get me to utopia, you know, heaven is going to be the answer. Well, you start longing for heaven because it gets, it's when it

gets this ugly. It's really unfortunate. Listen, the church is deputized by God to bring heaven to earth now. The Holy Spirit lives inside us and we can bring God into the situations. There is no other solution. I mean, it doesn't mean there's no political solutions. There's always things that can be done and that should be done. And there's politicians that are doing the wrong thing. But one thing we know is God does have the ultimate answers. That's right. And this film, as crazy as it sounds, you will have an incredible movie experience. You'll be filled with hope. You're going to see an army go out into the street called the church, the largest nonprofit organization in the world is going to be marching. You're going to see guns taken off the street.

You're going to see gangbangers turned around. This film is something that will inspire you, encourage you, and fill your heart with hope and joy. And that was one of the most important things that we wanted to show. And the website, tell me again, because this is too much. It's Chicago's Hiddenwar.com. Or you can go to Fandango and buy tickets. And you can go to CineLife.com as well. Chicago, America's Hidden War documentary film. We need to face this in America. This is everybody's problem.

This is not Chicago's problem. This is our problem. It's our problem. This is happening. So, Deimos, just congratulations on directing a film and on everything you do. God bless you, my friend. Thank you. It's just you and me.

Bob left. Bob. Bob. Zocowski left. Get back here. We're going to have to fill the time. They tell you, stretch, stretch. We've got, no, actually, we've got a lot of stuff to share.

This is, we're going to do a viewer rights segment where somebody writes. Now, folks, I want to say this again, anyone who writes to us at Ericmataxis.com, now you should go there to sign up for the newsletter. If you don't, you're dead to me. Ericmataxis.com, go to sign up for the newsletter. But anybody writes to us at Ericmataxis.com, I'm still able to read all of them. and I do. Yeah. I would like to think that eventually there'll be so many that I can't,

but I'm still trying, excuse me, to stay ahead of it, and I'm reading these. So I want to talk about this. A viewer writes, I don't know where this viewer is from, but he's comparing Trump to Hitler. What? Very savvy. No one's ever said that before. So we're going to get back to this.

But before I do a viewer rights, Albin. Yeah, yeah. I came down from Terry Town through Grand Central today. We're in New York City. Yeah. You come from Westchester down here. You take the train. You get out at Grand Central.

Yeah. Station. The terminal right there. The big one. The beautiful one. There's a big long line. And I saw a big sign up in several places that said, get the vaccine and get two round trip tickets anywhere on the metro north.

Okay. And then I saw another sign that said, sell your soul for a round trip to Ossining. I said, okay, I'm getting in line here. Be a guinea pig. Yeah, exactly. by somebody I know very, very closely, and I'm not going to mention how it is. Before you say this, I just want to say our policy on this program is, if you want to get the vaccine, that's right. Get it.

If you want to drive 150 miles an hour and risk your life, feel free. As long as you don't hurt anybody else. But when somebody tells you you have to do the dangerous thing, I would say don't do it. Right. So I'm telling everyone I know, unless you are in a bad place where you feel, I've, got to do this, I would say do not do it because there's all kinds of questions and you're hearing anecdotal information about people dying and stuff. So for crying out loud, folks, don't let people tell you like, hey, you know, just go, just go and take it, take it. I would say no, do not. Right. And

before I heard your advice, I got it 42 times. I got shot and now I'm going around healing people. So that's amazing, Albin. It's wonderful. But anyway, a guy I know very closely, not a joke. This is not a joke. My wife told me about this actually. We both know this guy. He got the Johnson and Johnson one and like the next day he could not hear. He was totally deaf like in one of his ears. And of course he goes to the E&T, get it checked out. And he said if you had not come within like the last 48 hours or something like that, you would have been permanently deaf. And it was from apparently the J&J vaccine. So yes, there's some guinea pig trials going on here right now. So you got to be careful. That's all we're saying. So that's not a joke. Right, and he's a younger guy.

He's like 35 years old. He's 35. He's not 60. He went deaf in his right ear. Totally deaf. Now, people are saying that the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, some people, your saliva tastes like floor wax. Very nice.

But you can polish your shoes and it's great. Side effect. No, that was a dumb joke. But what you're saying is not a joke. No, it's not. Okay. My father and mother took the vaccine. My father and mother both were sick for weeks.

My father was very sick for weeks. and there's no other explanation. And in fact, I talked to some doctors, oh, yeah, the vaccines. But, you know, there's nothing permanent that we know of. But I just want to say, ladies and gentlemen, don't get into this politicization. This is just used common sense. Okay. There's enough information out there that says, do not go with the flow.

When everybody says, you got to do something, make a note, do not do it. Because I would say that, you know, again, if people want to get it, good for you. It's a free country, but don't put pressure on people. Look, I walk around in New York City, people are wearing masks outdoors. I know. Lunacy. It's like I can't even believe that people are so sucked into this that they're wearing masks outdoors. And here's what it is. It's kind of like saying like, hey, I'm a good guy. Don't bother me. Don't look at me funny. I'm going to go with the crowd. You're breathing your own carbon dioxide. It is totally unhealthy. All doctors say, fresh air. Fresh air.

Breathe. Breathe. So this is insanity. Anyway, all right, we got a viewer rights. Yes, viewer writes. Okay, here's this, this is somebody named, I'll make up a name. And we get quite a few of these letters, by the way. And this is, I'll make up a name, Patrick McHenry.

Okay. All right, here we go. Does that a good make up made up name, isn't it? Yeah, it sounds like, it's Irish. Patrick McHenry. All right, sure, sure, sure, sure. All right, here we go. He writes, she writes, please go to the web and read the definition of a cult

leader. Trump is not a Christian in the way Bonhofer was. Holy cow. If you're not a Christian the way Bonhofer was, you're probably the Antichrist. You might be Adolf Hitler 2.0. Let me just ask a question. Trump is not a Christian in the way Bonhofer was. Probably though Biden is, right? Biden is a Bonhofer type Christian. So far. So far. We'll see how it goes. Yeah. Okay. So this person writes, please go to the web, read the definition of a cult leader. Trump is not a Christian in the way Bonhofer was. He sensed where his support would be if he adopted some of our principles like the sacredness of life. I think the word sanctity, but we're going to go with it. He was for abortion before he was against it. I am a lifelong Republican. I did not vote for Hillary or Joe either. We really did not

have a choice, which is sad in a country of 330 million. Trump is as evil in some ways as Hitler was. Exclamation point, exclamation point, exclamation point. Open your eyes. Exclamation point. point. Now, it's interesting because you can't tell from the text whether this man was foaming at the mouth, but I get the impression he might have been. Here's the issue, folks, okay? Let's just point out the logical absurdities in this note written to me, okay? He says, he was for abortion before he was against it. So was Eric Metaxus. So you're saying I'm a phony? I write in my book, fish out of water. Okay. You're hit. That when I was a young man that I, that I, was involved in

aborting a child. Yeah, I know. And that is called a sin. It is horrible. But people do those things before they realize that it's wrong. And so you repent and you ask God for forgiveness. But you never say, oh, it didn't matter. It mattered. Okay. So Trump obviously was not the man he is today. No. But something happened and he changed.

So the idea that this person is sort of saying, well, you can't change. Listen, you know who says that you can't change? The devil, okay? Whatever you did, I'm going to haunt you with it. I'm going to haunt you with it. I'm going to beat you over the head with your past sins. My sins are nailed to the cross, folks. And so to say that, you know what, we're going to continue.

We're going to do another segment. I'm going to continue my rant. Oh, boy. When we come back and see Eric Mattaxas show, don't forget to go to Ericmataxon. Sign up for the newsletter, folks. Please do that. up all your friends. You're doing them a favor. Eric Mataxis.com. Don't forget. Folks, welcome back. Final segment. Okay, Albin, I'm reading a viewer rights. Okay.

And what did I say? Patrick McKenry? Let's just change it to Alice McGillacuddy, just so you know that it's neither of them. It's somebody who's Irish. Let's just put it that way. It's some Irish, some angry Irish person. Really blotchy with rage. Yeah. And here's the person writes, I can't believe an educated person as you claim to be, can be taken in by Donald Trump. I did not vote for Hillary or Joe either. We really did not have a choice, which is sad in a country.

Trump is as evil in some ways as Hitler was. Only in some ways. Yeah, only in some ways. Not in all ways, right? Like you didn't murder millions and millions of people. But in other ways, just as evil. Mark it down. Okay.

So anyway, Alice McGillacuddy, I got to tell you, you're not thinking logically. You're not thinking logically. When somebody says Trump is as evil as Hitler was, in some ways, that's a non-statement. I don't even know what that is. Every one of us knows that apart from the grace of God, we're evil. So it's kind of a meaningless statement.

But when some people say that Trump is a cult leader, he has fascist tendencies, can I tell you something? I have fascist tendencies. The question is not whether you have fascist tendencies. The question is whether you are a fascist or behave as a fascist. And by God's grace, I do not. So when somebody says Trump has fascist tendencies, you realize their things. thinking so sloppily. The question is, folks, can you point to things that he does? Can you speak

like the language of men in English and explain to me what in the world you're saying? I would say, for sure, this person cannot because it's an emotional statement. Whenever people say things like that, it's just preposterous. I mean, think how preposterous it is to say that Trump is not a Christian in the way Bonhofer was. Right. Well, is he a Christian in the way that Alban is or that I am or Look, what does this even mean? I'm not a Christian in the way that Bonhoeffer was. Bonhofer was the gold standard. Yeah.

Okay. And we all strive for that. But it's preposterous to say, you got a choice. Either a holy man of God like Bonhoffer or everybody else is of the devil. And I'm not voting for anybody. If you don't vote for people because you're looking for perfection, you're part of the problem. You allowed Joe Biden to get into office if you didn't vote. When you don't vote, whoever wins, you're on the whole, you're on.

the hook for that person. You know, I wasn't crazy about Trump when he was first running, and people would say, like, well, he had these affairs and whatever, but, da, but I let that pass because I said, I don't know Trump and I don't know his sins, but I'll tell you something, I'm a bigger sinner than Trump. Okay, so that's, that issue, that's a non-issue. That's a non-starter for me. You're the real fascist. I am.

You are Hitler 2.0. I'm taking away your microphone right now, sir. I know. It's incredible. Okay. But I just say, because I get all these letters that say the Trump, is. And what fascinates me and actually saddens me is how illogically people think. If you don't like somebody, explain to me what you mean. But when you say, think that he has authoritarian

fascist tendencies or he's a cult leader, it's so preposterous. It's so silly that you can't really dignify with much of response except some kind of mockery. And Jesus said, by the fruit, you will know them, by their fruit. He has produced such great fruit in his justice for years. We see what he has done for the country, for the economy, for the world in general, how he stopped wars. He did some wonderful things, folks. You've got to admit. Now, how is Joe Biden in his position as the unelected bureaucrat? How is he doing right now? What are his fruit? Well, it's hard not, I mean, you could talk for an hour about this, but I want to say to people, you've got to think logically, folks. And the letter that I just wrote you is the classic example, many people I know,

some of them brilliant people. They don't think logically. They let their emotions cloud things. And they say things like this. And it's simply preposterous. If somebody is pro-life in terms of their actions, I don't really care about their past or what they're really thinking. The reason somebody is called president, he presides.

He's over the executive branch. He does stuff. The stuff he does, that goes into the history books. So, you know, the idea that somebody is, not perfect, he's not a Christian as Bonhoeffer was, you know, it becomes meaningless. And I just want to say, uh, I'm not in favor of that. Okay, Albin, we got to tell people, don't forget, use the code Eric, wherever you go at the A&P, just use the code Eric. And don't forget, sign up for the newsletter, folks. Please, thank you.