The Young Turks - Holy Hell

Episode Date: November 23, 2022

In an interview with CNN, a veteran recounts what it was like taking down the Colorado Springs gunman. The Club Q shooter’s records show a troubled past including a name change. Transportation Secretary, Pete Buttigieg warns the United States of the effects that the looming railroad strike will have on our economy. Governor Kay Ivey has ordered a halt to all executions after two botched attempts. As soon as the Sandy Hook families sued Alex Jones. Host: Ana Kasparian, Cenk Uygur Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. Why just survive back to school when you can thrive by creating a space that does it all for you, no matter the size. Whether you're taking over your parents' basement or moving to campus, IKEA has hundreds of design ideas and affordable options to complement any budget. After all, you're in your small space era. to own it. Shop now at IKEA.ca. All right, welcome to the Young Turks, Jake, Eugenic transparent with you guys, good day today.

A lot of fun stories, Republicans have decided they have no chance of winning a normal election. which is fascinating, even in now red states like Ohio. So we're going to show you how they're trying to cheat. We're going to show you how Alex Jones is trying to hide his money. And then Donald Trump, we had a story. It looked like finally Trump is in a lot of trouble, but then there's another twist in the story that makes you think maybe not. So lots of things to get to on today's show, some amazing stories. So without further ado, her name is Anna Kasparian.

She is news legend. Let us go forward. I don't know about that. But I do know that we're going to begin today's show with a hero. There's five people that didn't go home. And this guy, I told him while I was eating. I said, I'm going to kill you, man, because you try to kill my friends. My family was in there.

This whole thing was a lot. My daughter and wife should have never experienced combat in Colorado Springs. And everybody in that building experienced combat that night, not to their own accord, but because they were forced to. It's a lot for any human, man. This kid that was helping me was kicking another human in the head. And I told him to do it. We are learning more about Richard Fierro, who is the Army vet, who actually ran toward

the Club Q nightclub shooter in Colorado Springs, which led to the shooter being subdued and also prevented more individuals from being shot and killed by the gunmen. Now, Fierro was assisted by one other person who he referred to in that clip you just watched, that individual, a young man, proceeded to kick the shooter in an effort to help subdue him before he could cause more damage and murder more people. Colorado Springs police chief Adrian Vasquez and Mayor John Sothers for of course Colorado Springs named two patrons they said had subdued the gunman Fierro and a second man Thomas James. Now at some point Thomas James according to Fierro became tired from hitting the gunman to subdue him

and there was a drag performer who was kind of running by and Fierro had asked the drag performer to assist and so she did so and after that ran away because of course she was terrified as she should be. Military records confirmed that Fierro served as an army field artillery officer from 1999 to 2013 deploying three times to Iraq and once to Afghanistan. He rose to the rank of major before leaving the service according to Sergeant Pablo Sayes, an army spokesman. Fierro received numerous awards for his service, notably a combat action badge and two bronze stars. Since then, he has started a brewing company, a beer brewing company with his wife, and also works at Northrop Grumman. Now, Piero went to

Club Q to celebrate a friend's birthday with his family. His daughter also has a best friend who was a drag performer that night. Unfortunately, we also learned from Fierro that while he succeeded in stopping the shooter from murdering more people, he didn't succeed in preventing the shooter from killing his own daughter's boyfriend. So it's difficult to watch and hear just how torn up he is, especially considering the wonderful act that he did and the courage and bravery he showed in subduing this, the shooter. But I want to, I want you to hear more from, from him and what he experienced that night.

Let's watch. I ran across the room, grabbed the handle, pulled him down, and then started to, well, actually, I think I went for his gun with him. His rifle flew in front of him. And the young man that tried to jump in there with me, he, we both either pulled him down or whatever, but he ended up at his head, and right next to the AR. and then with the AR he we I told him push the AR get the air away from him the kid pushed the AR I don't know what his name was and then I proceeded to take his other weapon the pistol and then just start hitting him at where I could but the armor's in the way and I just started I found a crease in between his armor and his head and I just started weighing away with his gun and then I told the kid in front of me kick him keep kicking him So that was Thomas James that he's referring to there, who was assisting in subduing the shooter.

Jank. Okay, so there's amazing details on one more amazing video coming up. So first, an update on the story. It turns out Richard got it wrong. It was not a drag performer that had done the kicking. It was a trans woman who happened to be at the club as well. Excuse me. And so now, to his heroism, it's unbelievable.

And I love this guy, true American hero. As everybody's understandably running away, he runs straight to the government. Okay, first he actually gets down and he brings his friends that were with him, and he gets them to go down. Unfortunately, they were shot, okay? So they did not pass away, but as Anna told you, his daughter's boyfriend passed away. They were all there. And I had speculated yesterday the person who attacked him was probably in the LGBTQ community.

Turns out, Richard isn't, although the other two that were assisted him were, as far as we know. And so, but they were there because his daughter's best friend was performing. And so, and almost every comment coming out of the club in the area is this is our community. Exactly. This is, the LGBTQ community here is part of our community. So you're attacking all of us, right? And so I love that attitude. And so one of the people in the bar was Brianna Renee.

And she said about Richard, I saw him there. I danced with them. He saved my life. Thank you for your bravery. Yeah. Imagine that. You're dancing next to somebody next to your government comes in. And that guy tackles him and saves your life, right?

Authorities say he might have saved dozens of lives because the guy was heavily armed. And he tackled him in the middle of his shooting spree. That is unbelievable. And he's so humble. And he's like, look, I feel bad that we're kicking this guy. Right, I'm telling people to kick the guy in the head. And so the trans woman comes by, she does it, et cetera. But he's like, and he's like, I'm in a pool of blood.

And I hated every part of this, but I had to get them under control so I can go check on my friends because they'd been shot. And then he gets the friends together and he has them hold hands until they come get rescued. Yeah, he talks about that in this next video. And this is, in my opinion, one of the harder videos to watch because he gets so emotional. And he begins by talking about how he couldn't save his daughter's boyfriend, who, by the way, was 22-year-old Raymond Green Vance. So let's take a quick look at that.

I got to protect my kid. I lost my kid's boyfriend. I tried. I tried to have everybody in there. I still feel bad that there's five people that's five people that didn't go home. As soon as I got done with that guy and the cop came in, I went to quite. crossed the room and started first aid with my friend who was shot in the chest and the legs and the arms. And I told her, Joanne, stay with me, look me in the eye, stay with me.

And I moved her head so she wouldn't see her arm because he was shocked. And Chip was right there. Her husband was reaching for her. So I put her hand in his hand so that they could be together. I didn't know if they were going to make it. Yeah, I mean, I can't even imagine going through that. I can't imagine having the courage that this man had to run toward a shooter as everyone else is running away. He absolutely saved lives. He did something incredibly brave. And what really stood out to me, Zhang, to your point, is not only the fact that he's so incredibly humble after he saved lives,

but also how he's torn up about the fact that he was urging others to kick the shooter to help him subdue the shooter. So on one hand he says, I got to protect my family, I got to protect people, which I completely agree with him on that, but he still feels guilt in causing physical pain to the shooter, which I'll tell you something right now. I personally would not have those torn up feeling. No, I'm not even close. I wouldn't either.

And I love that that guy who came to shoot up an LGBT bar got kicked in the face by a trans woman in heels. And so I hope he feels that one to the end of his days. So by the way, he said at one point kick him, move the AR, move the AR because he's trying to make sure that the guy doesn't grab, get back in control of the AR because he's got the AR still. It's just pinned against the ground. And so he's desperately trying to make sure the guy doesn't kill anyone else. By the way, I'm going to give a random shout out here before I get to tell you about awful people. The reaction here has been unbelievable by the right wing. The beer company that he cones with his wife is Etriveda beer, Etraveda beer.

Go order some online. Okay, I don't know how you do it, but do it. So I love this guy. So, okay, here comes the right way. Kurt Schlichter on Twitter. I don't think we have to tolerate pedophies because some a-hole shot up a gay bar. Frankly, a lot of people trying to convince us we need to tolerate pedophiles seem to be happy to use any excuse to silence our opposition.

I'm sure he had that take when it came to getting Roy Moore elected in the Senate in Alabama. No, they, look, the right wing loves pedophiles. They love it. And I'll explain that in a second. So then Tim Poole responds, because there's no end to the depravity of right wing media. He says, we shouldn't tolerate pedophiles grooming kids. Club Q had a grooming event. How is it a grooming event?

It's a drag show at a, mind your own goddamn business. There's no kids there. Consending adults can do whatever the hell they please. They don't need your goddamn permission. Oh, do we need permission from grifters now to enjoy our adult lives? Is that what we need? I need permission from Beanie Boy Tim Poole to go to a drag show. And by the way, shut up and sit down, Tim.

How about that? How about that? Always involved in everyone's personal life and personal business. Didn't say a peep when it came to Roy Moore fondling 13 year old girls and molest. not a peep because it's all about political power. It's all about getting your guys elected into Congress and don't get me any of that garbage about how no, I'm not on the right, I'm not on the right. I just spew right wing propaganda all day and all night.

I'm not on the right. I'm not debating that. I'm not debating that. He's a monstrous right winger. He's a terrible, terrible person. He said, oh yeah, look, I'm jaywalking on progressive. But I think we should like all gay people are pedophiles and groomers and we should all attack them and just do all these, horrible things to and to so we can go to our lunatic audience and yes, Tim Poole, Matt

Wash, Tucker Carlson, you all have lunatics in your audience and you weaponize them and you know it. I mean, look at him. I'll finish the tweet to be fair. How do we prevent the violence and stop the grooming? He says. Oh, in other words, well, I didn't quite like the way he murdered all those people, but hey, I really like the fact that he attacked these people that I'm calling groomers based on nothing. I mean, he said in Club Q had a grooming event. He said, It's not a goddamn grooming event, you monster. Okay, so what is a drag queen? A drag queen is someone who dresses in a way you don't like.

It's a costume. Are you insane? Are you insane? Why do you care how they dress? Why do you care? It has nothing to do with kids. You should go. Maybe we don't like the way you goddamn dress with your stupid dumb beanie.

Okay? So what is it? Well, should we call you groomer, pedophile? And then say, oh, I know, somebody should do something to stop Tim Poole. He's wearing a beanie. He's a monster, he probably molest little kids because of a stupid beanie. Okay, we don't do that because unlike you, we're not trying to get people killed. Unlike you, we're not monsters who are constantly attacking people who are gay and in the LGBTQ community.

I'm sick of these right wingers. Look at it, they're almost celebrating it. I mean, he nearly brought goddamn pom-poms to the shooting. Listen, if you have problems with men dressing as women or men dressing in drag, You know, first thing I would do as a right winger is I'd clean my own room, okay? Why don't you go have a conversation with Stephen Crowder who never misses an opportunity to dress as a woman, which I have no problem with, but clearly he has an affinity for it. And you guys seem to think anyone who dresses in drag is somehow a groomer.

So why don't you go have a conversation with your groomer buddy, Stephen Crowder? But the right wing are disproportionately groomers and pedophiles. So this makes you super clear. I mean, let's talk about what do we know about the giant cases of pedophilia in this country? Number one is Catholic priests, one of the most conservative professions in America, right-wingers, Republicans. Catholic priests, and they're always constantly talking about, oh, yeah, a Catholic priest said that Nancy Pelosi or Joe Biden couldn't have community. Catholic priests are the best, they say. And meanwhile, they're the worst pedophiles in the entire country.

And the Boy Scouts, by the way. Boy Scouts, they love the Boy Scouts. Right-wing compared to the Girl Scouts. of vipers and pedophiles and groomers, okay? And the right way's like, yes, I love how they molest the little kids like that. Go get them, Boy Scouts. Go get them, priests. Tell me I'm wrong. You guys love the Boy Scouts and Catholic Pitchin.

You never criticize them. Well, okay, Jeffrey Epson. Oh, Donald Trump says, she's a great friend of mine. He said, I know he likes them young. He said, I know he likes them young. He said it. And he wished Gislaid Maxwell well twice after she was arrested. The biggest groomer in American history, as president from the podium, he's like, I wish her well.

Yeah. And Tim Poole, did you say, hey, Donald Trump is a monster who supports pedophiles and groomers? Well, Donald Trump's his daddy, right? He's your daddy, right? Tim pool, you love your daddy. Daddy can do no wrong. Daddy can go ahead and wish Gilead Maxwell and whoever he wants well, knowing full well that this woman was standing trial for literally grooming.

young girls and women to be molested and sexually assaulted and in some cases raped by Jeffrey Epstein. But your daddy is the one who wished Ghislaine Maxwell. Well, so that's okay. That's okay. Biggest pedophiles in American politics, Dennis Hastert, former Republican Speaker of the House, Mark Foley, another Republican who tried to molest the kids who were interns and pages in Congress. And every step of the way, all the Republicans circle the wagons, Roy Moore. molesters are awesome, they say. Please vote for our molesters and our pedophiles, Republicans say. Republicans, you're guilty, okay? So, oh, you don't like it. Does that hurt your feelings? Meanwhile, you call gay people groomers nonstop, and you don't care about their feelings. Now they're doing

another talking point. All teachers are groomers and pedophiles. Why? Because the teacher's union gives money to Democrats. So they're trying to destroy the teachers union. So Joe Rogan does it, Tim Poole does it, every Republican politician does it, and then I'm supposed to care about your God-dammed feelings as you encourage people to murder gay people day in and day out. He said it, he talked about how Club Q were groomers after they were massacred. The right wing are monsters, and I'll tell you right now, the number one reason they constantly talk about pedophilia is because it's going through their heads, nonstop, they're thinking about kids. I guarantee it. The reason Tim Poole wears a beanie is because he's trying to contain the pedophilia that's in his head.

That's why he's always talking about it. He's seeing it everywhere. Why? Because he's projecting. Oh, Tim, did your feelings get hurt? You call everybody groomers and pedophiles, and you have no concern knowing full wall there are lunatics who can't wait to murder them in your audience. Yeah, no, oh, but oh, you can't say that about me. Oh, I can.

I don't know. I don't know that if you are. I do know you show all the signs of it. Who can play at that game? Yeah, I mean, look, and keep going. If you want to, keep going. Because you'll go after medical professionals, doctors, nurses. You'll go after teachers.

You'll go after workers, all sorts of groups of people who have no power. And then elections roll around and you're like, wow, how did the Republicans underperform so significantly? Could it be that they spend all their time attacking, hardworking people in this country? They spend all their time defaming in the worst possible ways, innocent people in this country, because that's their bread and butter jank. So, I mean, the projection point, I think is a good point because we've seen it play out so many times with so many right-wing public figures. But the other possibility is this is Tim Poole's bread and butter. This is how he makes his money.

This is what a small faction of rabid right wing zealots eat up. This is what they want for dinner. And this is what they consume on media. And that's what Tim Poole and other goons like him provide. Isn't it amazing that they attack teachers, doctors, scientists, and the average workers saying their wages are too high. But they never attack bankers or corporate CEOs. not surprising at all. They work for the bankers and corporations. Wow, you guys are such populous

because you dress like bums. Wow, you're so populist, okay? You're not populist. You're all you are is glorified fluffers of the powerful. Ironically, Tim Poole is on his knees every single day servicing corporate executives. Oh yeah, everybody hate the little guy, hate the average man. I'm such a populist because I hate gay people and black people and brown people, right? Oh, yeah, but corporate CEOs, I love you guys. Have I done it off? No, you've never done enough. Get on your knees again, Tim.

And Joe Rogan and Crowder and all of you. Get on your goddamn knees for corporate executives that you serve with this goddamn hatred. But don't look at the real problem in the country. All those guys stealing your money through bribing all of our politicians, Republicans and Democrats. Don't look at that. Just focus on the culture. wars and drive the hatred because Tim's getting paid and so are the other monsters in the right wing. They're terrible human beings. All right, when we come back from the break,

we've got more on the Colorado shooting, including some details about the shooter's troubled past. We'll be right back. All right, back on T.O.T. Changana with you guys. Morning news. Well, we are learning more about, excuse me, got a little tickle in my throat. We're learning more about the gunmen who opened fire at a gay nightclub in Colorado Springs over the weekend, killing five and wounding, injuring dozens of others. Now, it's a tale as old as time at this point. We're learning that he was viciously bullied when he was younger.

At age 15, he became the target of particularly vicious, a particularly vicious bout of online bullying in which insulting accusations were posted to a website along with his name, photos, and online aliases. The online bullying incident included photos of the then 15-year-old youth posted to a Wikipedia-like website, along with the fictitious biography riddled with insults and ridicule. He's now 22 years old, and since then, he legally changed his name, which we'll get to in just a moment. But something else that stood out to me in regard to this report is a YouTube account that was created under his first legal name. According to the Washington Post, at some point, this YouTube account was created under his name before he changed it,

featuring a crude profanity-laden animation under the title, Asian homosexual gets molested. The YouTube account was opened in 2010, with a note to viewers of the channel that read, was up, guys, please help and subscribe. The crude animation with the Asian homosexual label was added in 2012. The video received more than 300 views, which isn't much, and I'm happy about that.

Now, it's unclear whether he created that YouTube channel or the YouTube channel was created under his name by the people who had been bullying him. But at some point, his two grandparents helped him change his name. They signed the petition allowing him to do so. Notably, his mother's name was not on that petition. She did not sign on to that. On April 28th of 2016, a petition was filed in Bexer County, Texas court, requesting a legal name change for the young man, the formal order, I'm sorry,

the formal order issued a week later, appeared under the simple heading, Nicholas F. Brink, that was his first name, to Anderson L. Aldrich, which is his current name. And as we had shared with you when we initially reported the story, he had a run in with cops back in 2021. He had allegedly threatened his mom with a bomb and other weapons. His mom called the authorities. And CNN has obtained some footage that he had actually streamed of himself as he was engaged in a standoff with the cops who had arrived to the scene. Let's take a quick look at that. There's a standoff that we were talking about that happened back in 2021. The suspect. Now, once you look at it and get the response to it here it is.

your boy. I've got the f*** sheds outside. Look at that. They got a beat on me. You see that right there? F*** sched's got their rifles out. If they breach, I'm gonna blow it to holy hell. So I've got to ask you, consider, you know, Poppy just did the whole layout on the red flag laws and what have you, and you saw what happened there in the house. So what is happening here, Athena? Well, this is a standoff, as you mentioned. In 2021, he had been accused of threatening his mother with a bomb and multiple weapons and ammunition, according to the El Paso County sheriff's office, several houses in that neighborhood had to be evacuated. And so you see a very agitated young man. He's wearing a helmet, some sort of body armor, ranting about law enforcement,

challenging them to breach the house. Now, I'm sure you notice that the question about the red flag laws and the prosecution wasn't answered in that clip. It's still unclear why the district attorney didn't pursue charges. While his mother did call the authorities on her own son due to the threats that she that he was thrown in her direction. She later stopped cooperating with the authorities and it's possible that since this was a domestic dispute with the victim refusing to cooperate, the district attorney probably just dropped it. But there are red flag laws in Colorado. They had already taken effect in 2021 and maybe because of the lack of prosecution, it didn't spark or, you know, wave the red flag in this case, either way, he shouldn't have had access to

the weapons that he current, like that he had and used to gun down five people at a nightclub. Yeah. So look, guys, it's hard to know based on these small details how much anti-gay bullying in his past led to him acting on this way. So first let's dispense with, was he mentally healthy? Of course not, right? Like, everybody knows that. But that's not the only part of the equation. Whenever the right wing wants you to stop talking about anything hateful that they're doing, supporting assault weapons all across the streets that are getting everybody in America killed, including our kids, or they want to attack the gay community and call them groomers and pedophiles,

et cetera, and then get them killed, they'll always go back. It's just so it's a mental health, mental health. By the way, they will then turn around and vote against measures that would increase funding for mental health. Let me just note the last time the House of Representatives voted on legislation that would provide funding for desperately needed mental health care in this country. Only one Republican who voted for it or voted on it voted in favor of it. Every other Republican voted against it. Remember that because mainstream media will never tell you that. They will do propaganda and Ted Cruz will come out.

All the other Republicans will come out. They'll say, oh, we, this is a mental health issue. And not one anchor on cable news will say, hey, wait, didn't you vote against mental health funding? What is wrong with you? Why are you lying to our audience right now? Oh, that's a beloved Republican. You have to be really, really, you know, loving towards them. Oh, I can't tell who's right.

I can't tell who's right. The guy's lying to you, to your face. Tell to your audience, nope, we're going to do propaganda on behalf of the Republican Party. They care about these issues just as much. That's why they care about mental health. I mean, they voted against it. They don't want to fund it at all. They don't care about a goddamn thing.

Anyway, back to this guy. So, but we have seen the anti-gay bullying that has led to many disastrous results. I've told you, hundreds of kids have killed themselves. Over the years, thousands of kids have killed themselves because of anti-gay bullying. So this guy didn't kill himself, and again, there's at least some anti-gay bullying on the record, right? We don't know the extent of it, but there's some of it. Well, you wound up killing others, right? And what is the very core that is of the problem?

problem in this case. It's that you have to be honest. And if it hurts your feelings, I'm sorry, it isn't you, okay, but it is organized religion. And organized religion tells you that being gay is a sin and homosexual acts are a sin. Oh, they say, oh, no, no, we love the sinner, but we hate the sin. No, no, the whole thing's made up. It isn't a sin. It isn't immoral at all. It's totally neutral. It's in nature. It is natural. If you believe in God, God, God created them that way. There's gay penguins, you idiots. Sorry, but it's impossible not to lash out of people who drive this hatred over and over again.

There's gay animals in every species. You think God kept making a mistake? Oh, there goes the penguins, oh, the horses, oh people, oh, beavers, he keeps making all these mistakes. No, it's in nature. Stop calling people who are perfectly normal, sinful, immoral. Every time you look, you've got to fight back. I just don't get why. Why does other people's happiness, which has absolutely no impact on your life,

either positive or negative? Why are people so obsessed with crushing that happiness? I know why. So I know how it originally started. It started in the beginning because the Israelites and the Canaanites were going to go to war and they needed as many kids as possible to fight and die in that war among the Trump. among the tribes. So if people were gay, they wouldn't create as many children.

So they would force them into straight relationships to create more and more kids and more kids to do the farming, et cetera. That's how it started. It has nothing to do with God. People made it up. And then why does it still persisted to this day? Because in every country, there are right wingers. And in every country, it's the right wing.

Every country in the world, it is the right wing that drives hatred towards gay people. What do they do? The right wing says, oh yeah, they're the others. They're outside our wagons. They're the ones causing all the problems. Why? Because they're probably robbing you. They're probably causing massive problems themselves and they want to distract you by driving hatred towards other people and based not on who's actually doing something immoral, but on a random trait. Because if you were actually looking at people who are doing something wrong, you'd be looking at them. And they don't want you're looking at them. So the The powerful always find another for you to attack, whether it's black people, brown people,

gay people. That's why it still exists, because in every country, there are hateful, corrupt right-wingers who want to drive you towards hatred of gay people to protect their own immorality. I just think that we're living in a country that happens to be a toxic stew of all these different issues that when combined together, we get endless mass shootings and violence, okay? So on one hand, we have the issue of bullying, which is a through line that we've noticed with most of these mass shootings. So how do we combat that? How do we deal with that? At the same time, it's also very much true that there is a growing problem of young men feeling increasingly antagonized, isolated, lonely.

That is a huge problem. I don't think the left has handled that issue. or in terms of like their messaging, the immediate knee-jerk reaction to that very real issue in the country is, oh, they just feel entitled to have sex with women. No, we're not, we're not even talking about the intimacy thing. We're just talking about the lack of friendship, feeling disconnected from society, feeling aimless, feeling like they have no goals or any objectives. Like, that is a problem, okay? So there's that.

Obviously, as we've talked about a million times before, the easy access to, you know, guns, the easy access to guns without having to undergo a federal background check is a problem. The fact that, you know, in the vast majority of municipalities and states in this country, if someone is irresponsible with their legal weapon, just leaving it out in their home without securing it, if their kid accesses it and causes harm, in most cases the parents don't face any punishment for that. So there's a policy issue there as well. And then the lack of mental health care, the fact that we have so many Americans with serious mental health issues that go undiagnosed and untreated, put that toxic stew together and you have endless violence,

and it'll continue. It'll especially continue when you have a right wing in this country that intentionally tries to distract Americans from the robbery they're experiencing through corporate greed by focusing on culture war issues and demonizing innocent people as dangerous sexual predators. So think about what kind of toll that takes on someone that is suffering a mental health issue. So a huge majority of the violence in this country is done by young males. Okay, leave out race, just young males. That's just a fact. You can look it up. It's an overwhelming fact. So the left's answer to that, progressive's answers to that is, hey, let's get people a higher wages, better health care, a better standard of living. So by the way,

They might be able to take somebody out on a date, get buy a house, make a housing affordable, and build communities that love and respect each other. The right wing's answer is, ooh, unstable young males, well, we could weaponize their grief and their loneliness, and we could turn them into killing machines to kill our opponents. That's what's happening in this country. I told you a little while earlier, fight back. How do you fight back? Look, not every person who says that a gay sex act is a sin is a terrible person.

Remember, most of them were programmed to believe that. Every week they would go in and some hateful preacher would tell them, it's a sin, it's a sin, it's a sin. Same exact Leviticus, don't eat shellfish. No, that's not a sin. It's stuffed your faceful as shrimp and crabs, et cetera. No problem. But it says it's the same exact sin.

It doesn't matter, we're lying, lying. So did your preacher and your priests, et cetera, and your imams lie to you? Absolutely. Almost every one of them lied to you. And by the way, like almost nothing they say about the Bible is true. I hate to tell you that. You could read the Bible. You'll see they're lying. And by the way, God is also in favor of abortion. They lie about everything. It's to manipulate you and to control you. So how do you fight back? Don't get angry necessarily of that person, but tell them anytime anybody ever says it in family or friends. It is not a sin. It is not. You could point to Leviticus. You could point to this trim. You can point to anything you like. But what you're doing is actually immoral.

You're trying to demonize your fellow human beings. And I'm really disappointed in you. It's actually shocking that you would say something so immoral. Shame them because they deserve to be shamed. I've had enough shootings. I've had enough killings of gay people, people in LGBT community, almost all of our communities. You must at a bare minimum fight back rhetorically, politically, verbally, ideologically. Not ever with violence, not ever physical, like these monsters in the right wing.

But we've got to win on this battlefield of ideas because they are immoral and we are the forces of righteousness. All right, we got to take a break. When we come back, we've got a big update on the potential rail strike. When we return, don't miss that. We've got that and more coming right up. All right, back on CYT, Jay Hanna, with you guys. More news. Well, we've got an update on the looming rail strike, and it does not look good.

One of the largest railroad unions has narrowly rejected a contractual deal between rail employees and the White House. Now, the White House got involved in an emergency to try to negotiate a deal between the rail employers and the rail unions. And while they did come up with a deal, many of these unions have actually voted against it. The latest is the union known as smart. So the union smart transportation division voted the deal down by 50.9%.

The Brotherhood of Locomotive Engineers and Trainmen, which represents engineers, announced 53.5% of members voted to ratify the deal. Now, the two are considered among the most politically powerful of the 12 rail unions in contract discussions. She also note that, look, I don't know how it ended up this way, but having 12 unions, I think, fragments this organized effort to have better working conditions. I think it'd be better suited to have one way more powerful union, but whatever, that's a side note. It's not that important. Let me move on. Already seven of the 12 unions have voted to approve their contracts, but in recent weeks, three of the smaller unions have also rejected their contracts and are back in negotiations.

Now, this is important to keep in mind. If a deal is not reached soon, a strike could happen as soon as December 5th, and Congress might get involved to prevent the workers from engaging in what's referred to as a sanctioned strike, there's still a possibility for them to engage in an unsanctioned strike, which is referred to as a wildcat strike, of course. But a national rail strike, which could happen as early as December 5th, would threaten the nation's coal shipments and its supply of drinking water. While shutting down passenger rail and shipment of goods as the holiday season revs up, the U.S. economy could lose $2 billion a day if railroad workers strike according to the association of American rail workers. But as I've mentioned before,

and this is an important fact, Congress can in fact step in and force the unions to accept the deal that's been negotiated. Under the Railway Labor Act of 1926, Congress can intervene in the case of a railway strike to impose a contract on the railroads to block or stop a rail strike. Some Republican lawmakers have said they are ready to impose a contract negotiated earlier this year by the White House. Congress can also extend strike deadlines or force both parties into arbitration. And look, the main sticking point here is pay time off or time off without retaliation to deal with things like, you know, family emergencies, medical emergencies. it is insane that this very reasonable demand is not met by the rail companies. And I'll explain why that is in just a moment.

But the main sticking point for rank and file members have been points based, has been the points based attendance policies that penalize workers for taking time off when they're sick or for personal time and contribute to grueling unpredictable schedules that weigh on workers' mental and physical health, they say. In June, a 51-year-old union engineer put off a doctor's visit and died of a heart attack on a train weeks later, his family said. So this is very serious. And what is the likelihood of a wildcat strike occurring should Congress decide to intervene? Well, I spoke to Jonah Furman, who is a labor reporter over at Labor Notes, great reporter. and he made a really good point about how the rail industry is, you know, monopolized.

It's effectively a duopoly. So when you consider the fact that on both coasts, there are only two major rail companies operating. In total, there are effectively four major rail companies in this country. And so over the last several years, they've actually cut their workforce by 30%. This has been going on for six years, well before the pandemic. And why have they been doing it? Well, we know, because they want to cut the costs associated with labor to ensure that they maximize profits and fulfill their fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders.

It's the classic corporate greed. It's how the system is built. And if the workers decide they want to do a wildcat strike, they do risk getting fired. And if you think that the rail companies would be terrified of that, you'd be wrong. because if they lose the workers and there are delays in the supply chain, what other options do you have? I mean, it's a monopolized industry. And they've been wanting to cut their workforce anyway.

It is just insane. Yeah, all right. So I'd read about a dozen articles before I got to one that clarified a really important issue. So most articles say, look, the president, the government overall can force the workers back into work. Okay? So that is relatively true. Finally, in the 12th article, they say, oh, by the way, they could also force the companies to take any terms that the government decides. Why is that not mentioned throughout?

Well, we know. Okay. We know. Exactly. No, no, it's amazing. Corporate media is just the way, I mean, the way the right wing complains about shadow banning on social media. No, mainstream media, shadow bans workers and average Americans all the time. They never even mentioned, the great majority of the articles don't even mention,

you could also force the companies to do it. You can force the companies to take any deal. But Republicans are proposing, no, it's crushed the workers. And the Democrats largely agree. The Democrats, look, on social issues, Republicans are the worst. They drive hatred in this country, nonstop. But on economic issues, in some ways the Democrats are working. Why? Because they're the good cop, bad cop. And the good cop in that scenario, which is the

Democrats, is more dishonest. Yeah, because they pretend to be the representatives for the common man, the common worker. But because of corporate contributions and wealthy donors in our political system, because of the fact that we have so much money in politics and we've legalized bribery, that has effectively turned a two-party system into a one-party system on major bread and butter issues like the economy. The only person I've seen, and maybe there are other progressives in the House, but the only person I've seen fighting for the workers in this scenario is Bernie Sanders. Yeah, 100%.

Okay. And so the rest of the Democratic Party's like, no, obviously you support the companies. The poor guys only made $20 billion in profits over the last couple of years, 18 billion of which they put back in stock buybacks. They're trying to take home the loot, okay, so they don't have to share it with any of the workers. Guys, think about it. They're making, like, it's not like they have any trouble with sustainability at all. They're making literal record profits.

And they're like, no, we won't give you a single sick day. Back to the assembly lines, the mines, and in this case, the rail system. Get back. So I saw a video, Anna, for more perfect year, and I want to give them credit. They did a great video on this. And they just showed different rail workers. Yeah. And this one of them was, every story was heartbreaking.

He's like, I barely got to see my kids growing up. Insane. Yeah, no. Because they don't let us take any time off, okay? Can I just jump in real quick? But guys, look, the reason why I gave you some of the insight into how the companies are functioning and the monopolized nature of the industry is because think about it. The reason why these companies are relentless in refusing the sick leave, some time off so they can deal with family emergencies is because they've already thinned out their workforce so significantly over the last six years.

They don't have the workers necessary to fill in should someone call in sick. But that's their own doing. That's their own doing. They did that to maximize their profits. They're not on a razor's edge. It's not like they're going to go under. It's not remotely close. By the way, the other thing that came through, which is really interesting,

it's actually the first time I've seen it in the more perfect union video is the work who's going, I can't believe how media has covered this. Yep. Usually you talk about the politics, you talk about the parties or whatever it is, you talk about the company. I've never seen them talk about media before. But now it's dawning on them. Oh, our biggest problem is the,

the liars in mainstream media, because they say, oh, they're getting a 24% raise. That's not the sticking point, though. The sticking point is the time off. Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on. But what they don't tell you is the context of the races they didn't get all those other years. Exactly. And it built up and built up and built up. So they had to finally do that.

And then part, but they save on their cause by saying yes, but then I'm not going to hire a whole bunch of other people. And I'm going to make you work whether you're sick or you're not sick, whether you need to spend holidays with your family or not. And so they just don't, the media doesn't give you the context. And so the workers are like, it's so weird, why are they lying about all of this? Because they're corporate media. They're here to screw you. They're not here to represent your side of what's currently occurring in this situation.

And yeah, I just wanted to also note that while a 24% raise sounds pretty good. Pretty good, right? No one's going to say no to a 24% raise. By the way, over four years. Over, yes, over four years. But the other caveat is it still won't be anywhere close to what they need to be paid to mitigate the damage done to their personal finances due to inflation. Not even close. You've got inflation. You've got all the years they didn't get raises. You've got it spanned over four years. You've got the fact that they can't take any sick days off, right? Mainstream media gas lights so much, I had to see a Bernie Sanders tweet to confirm, oh yeah, it really, I can't believe that there's zero sick days. I can't believe it, right?

And Bernie was like, no, it's actually true. There is zero sick days, and that's why they're negotiating this contract. But if you read a normal mainstream media article, they say, oh, they're getting this huge race, and they're still complaining. It can cost the rest of the companies a lot of money. Two billion a day from our beloved corporations, they don't say it that way. They make it seem like it's going to hurt you, it's going to hurt you. And it's the worker's fault.

Not one article insinuates that it might be the corporate executive's fault. Not one. Yep. They're gaslighting you as a matter of fact. All right, the next story is pretty awful. Well, the topic itself overall is awful. But the update to what a Republican politician is doing is a good thing. So let's talk about it.

Alabama's governor, K.I.V. has ordered a pause on statewide executions after a number of gruesome. and botched lethal injections led to outrage and backlash. Now, we hear, at least I think we both agree that injections period make no sense. I'm very much against the death penalty and also very much against cruel and unusual punishment. And there's quite a bit of evidence indicating that these botched lethal injections and lethal injections that don't end up getting botched are pretty cruel and inhumane. I'll explain why in just a moment. Now, the governor asked the Alabama Attorney General, Steve Marshall, to withdraw the state's

two pending motions in the state of Alabama, okay? And they were supposed to set execution dates for Alan Eugene Miller and James Edward Barber. That has now been paused effectively because they want to review the lethal injections process. Alan Miller, by the way, was set to be executed on September 22nd, but survived after prison workers couldn't find a vein to start the intravenous line needed to, needed for the three drug lethal injection cocktail before the death warrant expired at midnight. Kenneth Eugene Smith, who was set to die on November 17th, experienced a similar situation and also survived after officials couldn't start an IV. Now, the way lethal injection executions are done is there are three

injections. One basically puts the person to sleep. The second one is supposed to numb their entire body so they don't feel pain. And then the third injection is the actual lethal injection that stops their heart. But the person who came up with this three drug cocktail has admitted on record that he had a hunch that this method would work without a hitch and didn't really know for sure whether or not the person being executed could feel pain. So that's issue number one. Issue number two, of course, is when you read the details of these botched executions,

it is very clearly cruel and unusual punishment. And so the governor's office said this in Alabama, of course, working in conjunction with Alabama Department of Corrections Commissioner John Hamm, Governor Ivy is asking, that the Department of Corrections undertake a top to bottom review of the state's execution process and how to ensure the state can successfully deliver justice going forward. Ivy also asked Alabama's AG's office to not seek additional execution dates for any other Alabama death row inmate until the review is complete. No timeline was provided. Now in the next video, you're going to hear about another botched execution, this time in Oklahoma.

And I think it's important to watch this to kind of understand just how cruel this process really is. Let's watch. John Marion Grant waited to be killed. Executioners strapped him to the gurney. Then they injected him with a sedative. John was being executed by lethal injection. It's supposed to be the humane, less cruel way to die. But John began to vomit and shake.

It went on for around 15 minutes before he was declared dead. It had been violent and likely painful. Before the state killed Grant, Oklahoma hadn't executed anyone in six years after a string of botched killings. And in many autopsies across the U.S., examiners found the prisoners' lungs were filled with fluid. The death here is more akin to death by drowning,

where a person's lungs fill with fluid and they choke, and they may have awareness of this, and that's how they die. They die of suffocation. Now keep in mind that through organizations like the Innocence Project, we've also learned that many death row inmates were exonerated using DNA evidence, clearing them of any wrongdoing. So we have definitely executed people who are innocent. The other thing to keep in mind is the racial bias that plays a role in these sentences. So if you look at crimes, similar crimes committed by black suspects, or black individuals who've been convicted of the crime and white people who have been convicted of like the same crime, clearly you could see it in the data, black people get the death

sentence far more often. So there's the racial bias component of it. There's the inaccurate convictions, wrongful convictions, and then there's the cruel and unusual punishment. Executions make no sense in this country. They just don't. Yeah. So look, I'm not philosophically opposed to the death penalty. I'm sure a lot of you are and that makes me. probably makes you a better person than I am. Having said that, I'm now completely and utterly against the death penalty. Why? Two main reasons.

One is, when I was a kid, I thought that the government was competent. Boy, I've been disabused of that in many ways. And as you see, Alabama struggled in September and November of the year 2022. They're like, ah, we can't find a vein. What was I thinking? I mean, I was a kid, right? But it was stretched into my adulthood. And so you look at him, you go, these yokels are going to figure out how to humanely kill someone?

No way, no way. Of course they're going to botch it. That's why you see story after story of them botching it royally. Almost now it seems like they botch it in more cases than they executed properly. Yeah, no, 100%. And in fact, in some states where they still have other. execution methods, whether it be, believe it or not, the execution chair still exists. So in some states, they have that. And then they also have death by firing squad.

Yeah, I think it's Utah. And guess what? In some of these cases, the inmate will choose death by firing squad or in some cases even gas chamber over going with a lethal injection. Gas chamber. Really, guys, we line up a guy against, and then there's the guys, we line them up against the wall and we shoot them in the head, right? And then the electric chair, we literally fry them to death. No, this is crazy. We can't do that. Okay, there is rightly or wrongly, fortunately or unfortunately, there is no humane way to kill a person. Okay, so then the second part that I was wrong about is it turns out a lot of them are innocent. On average, 4% of the people on death row are innocent. Well, does that add up to a lot of people? Yes, this is

1973, 190 people on death row were exonerated. Turns out they were innocent and we were going to murder them. It's crazy and awful. No, on that alone, even if ideologically you like the death penalty, you can't like the death penalty killing innocent people. That's nuts. Now, we just heard about the botched lethal injections and the cruel and unusual punishment associated with it. But while I agree with Governor K. Ivey's decision to pause on executions until further review, I do not agree with her placing the blame on the inmates here. Yeah, of course. So let's get to that statement. For the sake of the victims and their families, we've got to get this right. I don't buy for a second, the narrative being pushed by activists

that these issues are the fault of the folks at corrections or anyone in law enforcement for that matter, I believe that legal tactics and criminals hijacking the system are at play here. What are you talking about? So the inmates who are about to suffer cruel and unusual punishment with botched lethal injections, they did it. They wanted that. They wanted water, fluid in their lungs, they wanted to feel like they were drowning to death. That's what they wanted, K. Ivy. Like this is, she's a governor of a state in this country. She's a governor.

Yeah. Okay, the big dog, the top dog in the state of Alabama. She said that. So criminals hijacking the system that you're running, how do they hijack? They're strapped in and you're the one trying to find a vein to kill them. And somehow that one's on them. That just doesn't make any sense at all. But like, that's just the thing that Republicans do now.

They put out statements that don't make any sense because they realize their followers don't care. They're like just kill, kill, kill, right? And it doesn't, you think Republican voters in Alabama care that it's botched and it's going to be incredibly painful and they might accidentally be killing the wrong black guy? If they care, they haven't shown that they've cared. They've got a curious way of exhibiting that. Right now, they're saying full steam ahead. In the second hour, we will begin by discussing all the ways Alex Jones seems to be hiding his money to avoid having to pay damages to Sandy Hook families he defamed.

That story and more. Coming right up. We'll see you in a few. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work. Listen ad free. Access members only bonus content and more by subscribing to Apple Podcast. podcast at apple.co slash t yt. I'm your host jank huger and I'll see you soon.