The Young Turks - Union Busters

Starting point is 00:00:00 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. We're going to be able to be. All right, welcome to the Young Turks. Jake Hugar, Ed Experian, with you guys. Chris Stanley and Mark Anderson as well. Already people are joining up.

Starting point is 00:01:09 What is this? Why? Because Chris and Mark, obviously American heroes. They hit the join button below on YouTube. You can do the same thing. All of a sudden, you're part of the Young Turks, and you're helping to bring both the truth and changes to the world. Yeah, I said it.

Starting point is 00:01:24 Okay, Casper, we've got a big show ahead. We do. Yeah. And Anna, you're not going to believe this, but I'm going to tell you ahead of time anyway. Today, I fight back against Republicans and pretty aggressively. Twist. Huge twist. Huge twist.

Starting point is 00:01:42 No one could see that coming. Yeah, well, as you'll see here, there is a little bit of a twist that I want to do throughout the show. So you have that to look forward to. But let's get going. Casper, what's in the news? All right, we start off with some positive news, actually. So it has to do with the Supreme Court. Judge Katanji Brown Jackson is on track to be confirmed as the latest justice in the United States Supreme Court. And this is thanks to a bipartisan effort. What? Now, I don't want to give the Republican Party too much credit because as some of you have already seen, the line of questioning that she's had to deal with, these deceptive, disgusting smears that she's had to deal with from certain members of the Republican Party. have been pretty terrible.

Starting point is 00:02:30 However, it turns out that three Republicans voted along with Democrats to advance Judge Jackson's nomination, here's what happened. So the Senate Judiciary Committee deadlocked along party lines in an 11 to 11 vote Monday on whether to send Jackson's nomination to the full Senate. The tie vote forced Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer to file a discharge motion to bring the nomination before the full Senate in order to get it out of committee. And guess what? Three Republican lawmakers, again, voted along with Democrats in order to advance her nomination. So GOP Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Mitt Romney of Utah, and Susan Collins of Maine voted with Democrats. All three Republicans will also support Jackson

Starting point is 00:03:17 when it comes time to vote on the final confirmation, which again is likely to happen by the end of this week, not because there's really any urgency other than the fact that you know, Easter break is coming up. Spring break is coming up for our very hardworking members of Congress. And so they would like to get this done before they go on break. Jank. Yeah, so it is a little encouraging to see like a ray of light in the Republican Party where three people still have not lost their minds. And so that's the good news. The bad news is the rest of the Republican Party still totally loony tunes. So the reason it got deadlocked in the committee in the first place is because Chuck Grassley join the lunatics

Starting point is 00:04:03 in the asylum. And in that reason I tell you that, you probably don't even know a thing about Chuck Grassley, but the people in D.C., they've been telling me for years, like over a decade. Oh, don't worry about the Republicans going crazy. There's still the old-timers who are moderate, wonderful, reasonable people like, and they would always say Chuck Grassley. Where's he at? Where's he at? And where's all the idiots who push for bipartisanship and said, no, no, no, including Joe Biden, by the way. Oh, no, my beloved Republican friends are going to come around. Beloved, okay, look, on the easiest vote of all time, you only got three Republicans.

Starting point is 00:04:44 She is eminently qualified. No one can reasonably disagree with that. That's why they had to make up the insane thing about the Josh Hawley smears that I don't want to get back into, although we're gonna get back into it in a second because we're forced to because more Republicans are speaking out against it, right? So they invented insane smears against her and 97% of the Republican Party is all in favor of it. So while I celebrate Romney Murkowski and Collins doing the right thing on an incredibly simple vote, don't get it twisted. That is not the majority. That is a tiny, tiny, tiny minority of the otherwise insane Republican Party.

Starting point is 00:05:25 And look, I also want to be careful in regard to giving these three Republican senators too much credit because this was really a layup. Regardless of how these Republican lawmakers voted, let's just keep it real. It was very clear that Katanji Brown Jackson would be confirmed by the Senate simply with the Democrats and only the Democrats voting in favor of her. Mansion came out in support of Judge Jackson, so did Kirsten Cinema. So there was really no question that she was going to be confirmed. But you know, what do you what do you want your legacy to be remembered as? Do you want to be one of the Republicans who decides to go on the record voting

Starting point is 00:06:06 against a Supreme Court nominee who is not only qualified, but is about to make history as the court's first African American woman? And so for Murkowski, Collins, and Romney, It was a layup. They have presented themselves especially throughout the Trump years and even now as the so called moderate Republicans. I think that the press gave them way too much credit for that because more often than not, while they might have some strong statements against Trump or against the Trump era Republicans, they typically voted along with Trump and the policies that he championed. So I want to make sure that we give the audience that context because it's incredibly important. That said, earlier this week, there were stories coming out regarding Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and how he was urging the Republican caucus to remain united in voting against Judge Jackson. And Romney, Murkowski, and Collins decided to go against the grain here. And so I guess credit where credit is due, but obviously context, full context does matter. Yeah, it does. And an important point about Mitch McConnell before we get to the prime lunatic.

Starting point is 00:07:21 So McConnell said that if the Republicans would control the Senate, they would not have allowed Jackson to even get a hearing. Lindsay Graham said, that's it, we wouldn't allow hearing under any circumstance because they don't care that Biden won the presidency. They just want to block him. They don't care about what's fair. Get it through your thick scuffs. By the way, if you're in the audience, you all know that already. I'm mainly talking to mainstream media who are like, oh, no, I can't tell who's fair or not fair. I can't tell.

Starting point is 00:07:49 So Lindsey Graham says, even if the president is a Democrat for four years, they would never allow the president to pick a Supreme Court justice. That's obviously not what's in the Constitution. That's obviously grossly unfair. But the press is like, I can't tell. I can tell. I can tell. The Republicans are cheaters.

Starting point is 00:08:07 They don't believe in the Constitution, et cetera. But more importantly, McConnell said, look, we would have forced a more moderate pick. In other words, they would have forced Biden to pick a conservative justice. Not fully a lunatic like Gorsuch or Alito, but conservative in that there was one available that conservative Democrats like Jim Clyburn pushed for. That judge was totally pro corporations in every ruling, right? So they would have put another conservative on the court if the Republican said. held the Senate. And you know Biden, he would have collapsed immediately and done that.

Starting point is 00:08:44 So now the Republicans are going to take the Senate very likely next time around because Biden's doing nothing to stop it. So that's it. There's no more. Trump gets three. Biden will probably get one here, Judge Jackson. And that's great news, by the way. I don't want to take away from that either, right? So, but giving you full context. But when the Republicans take over, that's it. It doesn't matter that it's two years. They're not going to allow any more Biden picks on the Supreme court, so wish for the health of all the Supreme Court justices, because the playing field is so uneven. They put in a justice, well, a week or two weeks before the election, whereas we will not be able to get a justice two years before an election. Right. I mean, McConnell

Starting point is 00:09:28 is transparent about what his objectives are. And what's frustrating is the treatment is not returned in kind. You do not get the same type of treatment toward the Republican Party from Democrats. What you hear over and over again from Democrats, people like Joe Mansion is the necessity for strong Republicans. That's how our government works. And this so-called desire to work alongside or work with Republicans with this imaginary nonsensical notion of bipartisan legislating and then rulemaking. But we all know what that really translates to. It translates to, hey, we're looking for an excuse as to why we keep empowering the Republican Party to carry out pro corporate policies. And the reason why they do

Starting point is 00:10:21 that is because they have the same donors. So while rhetorically, the two parties are very different, and obviously when it comes to social issues, they're very different. When it comes to these types of bread and butter issues when it comes to judicial nominees, they're usually in agreement for the most part in regard to pro corporate nominees, pro corporate judges. Look, Judge Jackson, of course, is qualified. I'm happy that she's certainly on the left compared to some of the justices that we have in the Supreme Court right now. But make no mistake, she definitely has some pro corporate rulings in her history as well, which is why Biden would nominate her, which is why you would have three Republicans who would also vote in favor of advancing

Starting point is 00:11:07 her nomination. That said, the initial possibility, the first potential nominee that we talked about on the show was far worse. She had a lot more blemishes on her record that were pro corporate than Judge Kataji Brown Jackson does. I do want to also just quickly give you a statement from Lisa Murkowski, because I thought what she had to say was interesting. I want to get your thoughts, Jenk. She said in a statement, after multiple in-depth conversations with Judge Jackson and deliberative review of her record and recent hearings, I will support her historic nomination to be an associate justice on the United States Supreme Court. My support rests on Judge Jackson's qualifications, which no one questions, her demonstrated

Starting point is 00:11:50 judicial independence, her demeanor and temperament, and the important perspective she would bring to the court as a replacement for Justice Breyer. She also continues to say, It also rests on my rejection of the coercive, coercive politicized, politic, I always have a hard time pronouncing this word, apologies, but politicizing essentially of the review process for Supreme Court nominees, which on both sides of the aisle is growing worse and more detached from reality by the year. While I have not and will not agree with all of Judge Jackson's decisions and opinions, Her approach to cases is carefully considered and is generally well reasoned.

Starting point is 00:12:35 So what I thought was the most interesting there, Jank, was her willingness to call out just how insanely polarized, you know, Capitol Hill is, how both parties seem to be working against each other, certainly the Republican Party. I mean, it's pretty crazy. But I just think it's easy to make that statement in this context. But I would have liked to see that kind of statement. in a different context where maybe she actually ends up emboldening some of the terrible policies that are championed by someone like Donald Trump. It's just interesting that she used it in this context. Well, so I can explain clearly where the camps are, right? So Murkowski, Romney, and Collins are in the old school corporate Republican camp, okay? And they believe in bipartisanship as long as it's helping corporate rule. And every once in a while, they'll agree to something Democrats want, Democrats will agree to what the Republicans want,

Starting point is 00:13:27 that are not strictly part of corporate rule to continue the facade of bipartisanship. Those were the old days, right? And so that's what Collins is doing here. She's saying, I don't agree with everything Judge Jackson says, but she's qualified, etc. It's a very old school of her to do that, and that's good in this context, right? Now there's a second camp in in American politics, and that's the right wing. And the right wing populists are now frothing at the mouth and nothing is good enough for them. Judge Jackson is perfectly qualified and even the other old school Republicans confess to that.

Starting point is 00:14:04 And they say, oh, I don't care. She's pro pedophilia. Looney tunes, totally nuts. Detached from reality, right? But what does Susan Collins do? Because it's the old corporate playbook, she both sides it. They're both getting detached from reality. Really?

Starting point is 00:14:20 Which Democrat is detached from reality? And how? No, you're just saying that because you're a Republican, and the press eats that up. Oh, yum, yum, yum, yum, yum. No, one side is filled with lunatics, the other side, which is still slightly dominant, but in this election, the right-wing populace might win and wipe away democracy entirely. But the dominant faction is not good either. That's corporate rule, corporate Republicans, and at least 80 to 90% of Democrats are corporate Democrats.

Starting point is 00:14:48 They love corporate rule. And then you have the tiny 10% wing in the political sphere for today. In reality, the public is so much more progressive than any of these guys. And I could show it in the polling. But for now, there's about 10% of the Democratic Party that's actually populist left. Right. So I would argue, and I could prove with facts that they're the only sane ones. But for the moment being, these allies of ours like Murkowski and Romney, that are from the corporate camp, are not, of course,

Starting point is 00:15:20 in the long term our allies at all. We have to defeat corporate rule. That's the oppression that has ruled for the last 40, 50 years, okay? But for the moment being, we need their help in defeating the fascist on the right, because otherwise there ain't gonna be a next election to argue over. So that's your full context. I'll take the vote and thank her for it, Judge Jackson. And by the way, I'll thank Biden too, because Judge Jackson overall is a very, very good judge.

Starting point is 00:15:45 And I'll give Biden credit all the way to the end. to the end, this is one of the positive things he did. Anna, you're muted. Apologies. So we've got to take a brief break, but when we come back, we have more news for you, including how Amazon is trying to censor its employees following the successful unionization effort in Staten Island. We've got that story and more when we come back. All right, all right, back on TYT, Jank, Anna, Ryan L, Kenny Turner, and Bull Freak Knot, all with you here. Those three just joined, just became American heroes.

Starting point is 00:16:44 We're going to bring truth to this country, and we're going to bring positive change to this country. And we're all going to do it together. Thank you for hitting the join button below the video on YouTube. Everybody else, you can go to t.com slash join and be part of the effort here as we retake the country. And yes, we're definitely going to do that. Wesley Oliver, by the way, thank you for the super chat. We appreciate your generosity. All right. Anna, what's next? All right, well, let's talk about the Supreme Court nominee and the fallout following a bipartisan effort to advance her nomination. So. Marjorie Taylor Green has decided to attack Senate Republicans who actually voted in favor of advancing

Starting point is 00:17:24 the nomination of Judge Katanji Brown Jackson. She was nominated by Joe Biden for the Supreme Court. And it turns out that Lisa Murkowski, Susan Collins, and Mitt Romney voted in favor of advancing her nomination. She's very likely to be confirmed as the newest Supreme Court justice by the end of the week. Now, Marjorie Taylor Green has decided to use a tried and true method of smearing these Republicans as pedophile supporters. So let's take a look at what her tweet said. And remember, this is a woman who is good friends with Matt Gates, who is under investigation by the DOJ for possibly having sex with a minor and paying for her travel across states. Now, Marjorie Green says Murkowski Collins and Romney are pro pedophile. They just

Starting point is 00:18:13 voted for KBJ. Again, we're talking about a woman who has nothing to say about what Matt Gates is being investigated for. But the pedophile smear is just the perfect tactic for right wingers, both politicians and voters, who want to go after someone they don't like. And this is exactly what she's doing here. And she's going after Republicans. So there's no limit There's no rules anymore. There's no nothing on the Republican side. It's total open warfare against everyone. So and, and, but look, normally the saying goes two can play at that game, but not in America.

Starting point is 00:18:59 Democrats can't play that game at all. Democrats are always saying, oh, it's so hurtful. We're so offended. Like Cory Booker, about Judge Jackson, he's, he's. In response to all of this, he was like, you know, this really hurts and it's very hurtful. No, Corey, you're not supposed to cry in politics. You're supposed to punch them back and have them cry and talk about how Cory Booker is hurting their feelings. Okay, no, but Democrats cannot play at that game, so I'll do it for them, okay?

Starting point is 00:19:38 Marjorie Taylor Green is constantly doing events with Matt Gates. Matt Gates is accused of having sex with underage children. So I guess that makes Marjorie Taylor Green pro pedophile. And she did that with an actual person charged with actually having sex with someone who's under age. And after he was accused of that. And she went on a tour with him. So she's on a pro pedophilia tour. Okay, that's Matt Gates.

Starting point is 00:20:08 But that's not all the Republican Party's littered with pedophiles. Remember their former House Speaker, Dennis Hastert, got busted and convicted of molesting young boys. That's who Republicans are. They have no morality. They have no decency at all. Those are facts. Jim Jordan, current Republican, accused of knowing about child molestation as he was a coach, a wrestling coach, that another coach was doing. And he didn't do anything about it. All the former students said, oh, yeah, coach Jordan, he knew. And I guess he didn't mind because he's pro pedophilia. And Marjorie Taylor Green has no problems with Jim Jordan because she's pro pedophilia. But one last one, they're big daddy.

Starting point is 00:20:52 Trump, I'm going to say it every time now. Trump said about Jeffrey Epstein, the worst child pedophile in American history, that he was, quote, a terrific guy. And he said about him once, he's a lot of fun to be with. It's even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do. And many of them are on the younger side. So when did Trump know that EPSC was a pedophile? When did he know it?

Starting point is 00:21:17 And why didn't he say anything to the authorities? Instead, he bragged about what his friend, the pedophile, used to do with young girls. He bragged about it. Marjorie Taylor Green, you support Donald Trump. There is no question factually that you are pro pedophile based on your record of support for people who clearly either engaged in pedophilia, or rhetorically, proudly boasted about their pedophile friends. Those are facts, Marjorie Taylor Green.

Starting point is 00:21:48 I'm sick of the Republicans doing smears without anybody fighting back with actual facts. Yeah, and not to add like another 10 minutes to this conversation, because it's so abundantly clear that she's full of crap. But remember, Trump also during a press conference following the arrest of Gilaein Maxwell, who groomed teens and found young women to be essentially raped by, Jeffrey Epstein, Trump wished her well at a press conference. I wish her well. Okay, that's, that's their guy. That's the person that Marjorie Taylor Green and the Republican Party overall supports. So look, I remember all of these Republican lawmakers who were later outed as

Starting point is 00:22:33 gay, which I have no problem with. But the ones who were later outed as gay tended to be the ones who spoke the loudest against the gay community. And it's just really interesting to see the projection taking place right now among the Republican party as they smear others as being pedophiles. The ones who use that phrase, that word the most, just pay close attention to the company that they choose to keep. Yeah. So I'm saying.

Starting point is 00:23:00 Yeah, and I'll add just one last thing. For all the Q&N people, is it possible that the Republicans tricked you into bashions, bashing the wrong party, knowing that their leader celebrated pedophilia, and even on TV when he was president, when the, Gillane Maxwell, along with Epstein, the worst child molesters in American history, he said he wished her well. And then they accuse the Democrats to throw you off dissent. When it's the fact that Republicans are pedophiles, not all of them, But they're top leadership, Speaker of the House, head of the Conservative Freedom Caucus, the president himself, one of the leaders in Matt Gates.

Starting point is 00:23:44 Well, if they wanted to keep doing pedophilia Q&N followers, what would they do? They would have you attack the wrong people while they're doing it out and open. So think about it, okay? I'm just asking you to think about it. And then you tell me why you support all those people who are clearly and obviously pro pedophilia. Wait a minute, if you're part of Q&N, are you pro pedophilia? Because if you support these monsters, it certainly seems that way. All right, well, let's move on to our next story.

Starting point is 00:24:19 Amazon is now looking for ways to censor its own employees following the unionization win of Amazon workers in Staten Island, New York. Now, how are they planning on doing this? According to internal documents reviewed by Ken Clippenstein over at the Intercept, they're planning on doing it through their internal messaging app, which is likely to be rolled out by the end of this month. Amazon, according to Clippenstein, will block and flag employee posts on a planned internal messaging app that contain keywords pertaining to labor unions. An automatic word monitor would also block a variety of terms that could represent potential critiques of Amazon's working conditions like slave labor, prison, and plantation, as well as

Starting point is 00:25:08 restrooms, presumably related to reports of Amazon employees, relieving themselves in bottles to meet punishing quotas. And so there are lots of words included in this internal document. And apparently this issue came up as the executives and managers were having some sort of meeting about how to roll out this app, what kind of features it's going to contain. Following a meeting about the internal messaging app, an auto bad word monitor was devised constituting a blacklist that would flag and automatically block, block employees from sending a message that contains any profane or inappropriate keywords. In addition to profanities, however, the terms include many relevant to organized labor, including union,

Starting point is 00:25:58 grievance, pay raise, and compensation. Other banned keywords include terms like ethics, unfair, slave, master, freedom, diversity, injustice, and fairness. Even some phrases like this is concerning will be banned. It's just, like, where are the Republicans claiming that the corporate world is too woke? Where are they? Where are they? I want to know where they are.

Starting point is 00:26:26 Where are the free speech warriors who spend literally all day on Twitter crying about how censorious the left is? Let's have a conversation about this type of censorship that is very likely to take place as they roll out this internal messaging app. By the way, will their workers even have time to engage in chats with their colleagues as they're dealing with these crushing quotas so much so that they have to urinate in plastic bottles, just curious. Anna, that is an excellent question. And I had not thought about it in that context, to be honest. That's literally a list of canceled words. I mean, you want to talk about

Starting point is 00:27:07 political correctness. You will not be allowed to say factually correct things. By the way, including I've got to go to the restroom, right? Because those words have been canceled by a corporation. The number of Republicans you will see complain about that is zero. We're predicting ahead of time. All those guys pretending to be populist. Oh, we're taking on corporations and Disney is woke. Those other guys are bad?

Starting point is 00:27:35 Okay, where are you at? This is to protect the average American worker. Where are you at, Republicans? None of them will ever criticize Amazon for this. You know why? Because they're corporate America's bitches. All those liars like Matt Gace, Marjorie Taylor Green, when push comes to shove, they're kissing the ass of corporate America, and they're not actually going to do anything

Starting point is 00:27:57 about the workers. Higher wages, they hate the idea. Protecting American workers, they despise the idea. Do you understand all those right-wing populace don't mean anything other than, you know, they're talking about race, I don't like to talk of race, because I'm a racist, I don't like it. All they are is hate and fear. of actually protecting their own voters, they would never do it. They would never, ever do it. Instead, every one of them will be licking the ass of Amazon, even though they're doing the most political correctness you've ever seen. No, I mean, 100%. Right-wing populism is, it starts

Starting point is 00:28:36 and stops at them throwing hissy fits over some, you know, random Black Lives Matter sign that a company might post somewhere within the building, outside the building, which by the way, everyone, including the left knows, is nothing more than pandering, doesn't really mean anything. If you actually care about people's lives, including the lives of your black employees, for instance, maybe improve the working conditions, maybe stop firing them when you find out that they're actually trying to organize a union. But of course, the right wing is not at all interested in improving working conditions,

Starting point is 00:29:14 conditions or more importantly, ensuring that there's some equilibrium of power within these corporations to ensure that workers are empowered to protect themselves, to protect their wages, to have better working conditions. The right wing politicians are not in favor of that. But I do want to draw a distinction because there are certainly right wing voters who want better working conditions. I mean, you look at various strikes that happened in this this country quite recently, like the strike that happened at John Deere, you think that all those workers are on the left? No, they're not all on the left. I'm sure there's plenty of conservative workers at John Deere who took part in that strike and they demanded better pay, better working

Starting point is 00:29:58 conditions. But there's a reason why Republican lawmakers, corporate funded Republican lawmakers, run away from these types of discussions because they're not about economic populism. They're not about empowering workers. They're about serving their corporate donors, something that we talk about on the show often. But I want to get to some other pretty hilarious statements coming from Amazon about this internal messaging app because, well, what's the point? What is the point of this app, especially since it's going to censor its own employees? The major goal of the program, Amazon's head of worldwide consumer business, David Clark said, was to reduce employee attrition by fostering happiness among workers and also productivity, of course.

Starting point is 00:30:45 Yeah, a great way to support or emphasize happiness among your workforce is to treat them well and to not censor them and to not fire them if they're conversing with their colleagues or coworkers about potentially organizing. There's more. They plan on making their employees happy through shoutouts, you know, because I mean, who wants bathroom breaks when you can get a shoutout? So shoutouts would be part of a gamified reward system in which employees are rewarded virtual stars and badges for activities that add direct business value document state. At the meeting, Clark remarked that some people are insane star collectors.

Starting point is 00:31:31 I don't know about you, Jank, but I think you're messing up, bro. Like, you're not gamifying how well we're performing on our jobs. And I would like some virtual gold stars to feel better about my. Workers don't want that. Workers want better working conditions. They want to be compensated fairly. That's what they want. They want to ensure that they're not going to get fired if they're having conversations

Starting point is 00:31:52 about organizing. Yeah, by the way, you could also do both. You could say nice things about your employees and give them good wages and give them good health care, right? My guess is if they're weighing things, they're going to prefer the wages and they're going to prefer the health care, right? But then give them a gold star, great. Gameify. I enjoy gamifying, right? But it's not in lieu of. It's not in substitute for actual good wages, health care, and being decent to your employees. When you gamify and you give credit or any, the credit doesn't have to be through gamification. When you give credit to people,

Starting point is 00:32:27 It should be heartfelt as opposed to a trick so that you trick them into being appeased and not actually paying them. Totally. But that's exactly what these guys, and they think they're so smart what these executives are doing. Final thing I wanted to remark on is, look, Amazon and other major corporations are panicking because there is this effort to organize among workplaces. And it's something that we haven't seen in this country for many, many decades. And so Starbucks is also panicking because various stores are also attempting to unionize. Some have already been successful.

Starting point is 00:33:26 So they brought back their former CEO, Howard Schultz, to serve as CEO for the third time. And the reason why they brought him back is because he has been one of the most effective union busters. In fact, recently he had this town hall style meeting and he addressed the efforts to unionize. I thought the way that he worded it was just fascinating. So let's take a quick look at that. Here's where it gets a little sensitive because I've been coached a little bit, but I do want to talk about something pretty serious. We can't ignore what is happening in the country as it relates to companies throughout the country being assaulted in many ways by the threat of unionization. Assaulted. They're being assaulted, Jank. They're being assaulted by that threat.

Starting point is 00:34:28 It's just hilarious. By the way, I should note that about an hour after that town hall, Starbucks fired a Phoenix based barista, Layla Dalton, beautiful name by the way, a move that was seen as retaliation for her involvement in union organizing at the store where she worked. Last month, the NLRB National Labor Relations Board issued a formal complaint against Starbucks for disciplining two employees, including Dalton, for working to unionize their Phoenix shop. Jank. Okay, Starbucks last year made $4.87 billion in profits. When the executives kept all of that and the shareholders kept all of that, the workers didn't say they were assaulted by Howard Schultz for keeping the money. But when the workers say, hey, can we also get a part

Starting point is 00:35:21 of your $5 billion in profits, I'm not a guy who says that it's black and white, that the workers are the only ones who should get the money and the executives are useless. But the executives do say that about the workers. They say, oh, the executives are such geniuses. They deserve hundreds of millions of dollars, but the workers, they deserve the bare, bare minimum, okay? I think that it makes sense to have a fair apportionment, and in order to get a fair apportionment at a giant company like Starbucks making $5 billion.

Starting point is 00:35:51 profits, you would need a union to organize the workers so they have leverage. That's not assaulting anyone. That's saying, hey, we all made a lot of money through our hard work here today. The workers did, the executives did. Why don't we share in those winnings that we created together? Howard Schultz, because you're assaulting my money. Come on, man. You have how many billions do you have, Howard Schultz? Don't give me this nonsense about assaulting Starbucks. All right, one last thing, guys. I need you to understand that you can tell who's the good guys and who the bad guys are,

Starting point is 00:36:29 and who's faking it and who's not. Rokana and Bernie Sanders pushed Amazon, for example, to do $15 minimum wage. And they battered them until they won. And Amazon conceded and got all those workers. You work at Amazon, you're getting $15 an hour now? $15 an hour now? Bernie Sanders and Roe-Connor put money in your hand, food on your family's table. They got your wages up and significantly so. You know what the Republicans did for you? Nothing. Zero ever, okay? And do not confuse Republican tools, fear and hatred for their goals.

Starting point is 00:37:06 Their goals have always been the same. Help the rich and only the rich. And they prove it every day by their action and inaction. Absolutely. Well, you do not want to miss the next story that we're going to do when we come back from the break. Because it turns out that the party that claims to be so concerned about things like child sex trafficking and pedophilia is working pretty hard in states like Tennessee to do away with age requirements for marriage. We've got the details on that story and more. Don't miss it. We'll be right back.

Starting point is 00:37:42 All right. All right, back on T. Jankana with you guys. Casper. Let's take a little trip over to Tennessee. Tennessee. Republican lawmakers in Tennessee are proposing legislation that's meant to be hateful toward gay people. They want to establish common law marriage as being between one man and one woman. But what's interesting about their proposal is that it does away with any age

Starting point is 00:38:31 requirements associated with marriage. Just a few years ago, we covered a story about all these red states that allowed adults to marry literal minors, people under the age of 18. And turns out that Tennessee was one of the states that finally did something about it. This was a few years ago. But now this proposal coming from Republican state lawmakers indicates that their common law marriage can only be defined as between one man and one woman. And if you're a 16 year old girl who's dealing with sexual misconduct or sexual abuse from an adult, they'd be able to, you know, marry you with no problem. Again, because of the way this legislation is written. So the bill's sponsor, Tom Leatherwood, said the law being considered would add a new marriage

Starting point is 00:39:21 option for Tennesseans. All this bill does is give an alternative form of marriage. This is how goofy these people are. Alternative form of marriage for those pastors and other individuals who have who have a conscientious objection to the current pathway to marriage in our law. Missing from the bill though are age requirements, opening the door for possible child marriages, something the bill's sponsor acknowledged during a child and family affairs subcommittee. There is not an explicit age limit, Leatherwood said. So look, lawmakers are sometimes stupid, okay, like they'll write legislation, you got to be super careful because the way you write it might have certain loopholes that allow for bad

Starting point is 00:40:08 behavior. So when I was initially reading about this story, researching the story, I thought to myself, I mean, they just outlawed like child marriage a few years ago. This must be like, you know, a mistake. Maybe they forgot to include some sort of provision that made it abundantly clear that they don't allow child marriage. No, no. Leatherwood's like, yeah, yeah, I mean, there's There's no, there's no age requirement, not a problem. He says this, so one person actually did speak out against it before we get to more from Leatherwood. So state representative Mike Stewart, who is a Democrat from Nashville says it's basically a get out of jail free card for people who are basically committing statutory rape. I mean, it's completely ridiculous.

Starting point is 00:40:57 So that's another reason why this terrible pill should be eliminated. So again, two massive reasons why, number one, the whole point is to be anti-gay. Number two, it allows for child marriage and the sponsor, the person who wrote the legislation knows it and has no problem with it. By the way, according to UNICEF, approximately 300,000 girls and boys in the United States were married before reaching 18 years old between 2000 and 2018. Under current Tennessee law, one can get married as young as seven, years old, but you'd have to do that with parental consent. In 2000, by the way, the state issued 1,256 marriage licenses to 16 and 17 year olds,

Starting point is 00:41:42 including 1,094 to 16 and 17 year old girls. In those cases, the oldest groom was 26 years old. So, you know, Leatherwood, real good guy, you know, real ethical, good Christian, you know, You know, he just wants to go back to the days where 16 year olds were married or forced into marriage to 26 year old adults. Or by the way, 12 year olds or 8 year olds, the law doesn't have any limit at all. So now, guys, this is really important. He was given an opportunity to correct that mistake if it was a mistake. And apparently he doesn't think it's a mistake because he didn't correct it.

Starting point is 00:42:26 And acknowledges it, not going to correct it. So he thinks four-year-olds can get married in Tennessee. That's the kind of monster he is. Four-year-olds. Babies, are you going to marry babies? I don't know. They're Republican monsters. Q&N, you've got the wrong party.

Starting point is 00:42:47 So I understand that in the old days, that people in different areas got married at younger ages. I understand that. I understand the historical context. That included the South, the South constantly was marrying, you know, younger girls. Very, very young girls, girls we consider to be very underage now. That was a tradition in the South filled with right wingers, okay? But we don't accept that anymore. Unless I don't know, maybe Q&N in the Republican Party are going to say, oh, we're just kidding.

Starting point is 00:43:15 We love it when older men marry or have sex with younger girls. Because that's not our policy. We hate that policy. That is the Republican policy in Tennessee. So are you against it or are you for it? I don't know, you tell me. Q and on, do you believe anything that you say? Forget the reality, forget the real world.

Starting point is 00:43:36 But the things that you guys claim, here it is. It's happening in Tennessee. Up and at him, get into action. Nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. So you never meant it. All the Republicans, Marjorie Taylor Green, talking about how Romney and Bernkowski and Collins are pro pedophilia because they voted for Judge Jackson.

Starting point is 00:43:53 Well, Marjorie Taylor Green, You're not speaking out about the legalized pedophilia that Tennessee Republicans want to do. So I guess that makes you pro pedophilia. So look, it's not my policy, it's your policy. So what are you going to do about it? Look, on the issue of gay marriage, that's obvious. Anyone who doesn't realize that Republicans are against gay Americans having the same rights of straight Americans is either obviously lying Dave Rubin or just doesn't know anything.

Starting point is 00:44:23 and just wandered out of the woods, like doesn't understand. It's the Republican Party that is passing laws against the LGBTQ community every single day, including, I don't think they should be allowed to get married. I don't think they should have the same rights as straight Americans. So by the way, all those Republicans who believe that, it's okay, you know, you want to live in a the theocracy and, you know, you want to go back to the medieval ages and all that. I get it, that's fine, it's your right. I believe in freedom of speech.

Starting point is 00:44:49 It's a free country. Let's vote. Let's see how it turns out. But you don't get to say you're American. American. America is for equality. They didn't say except gay people in the Constitution. You should read the Constitution. I know you never have and you never will because you bathe in your ignorance. But every time you strike out against the gay community, you're saying, I hate America. I don't believe in the idea of equality. And now though, you really don't even

Starting point is 00:45:14 have to get to it. I mean, look at that. 300,000 babies married off in the last 20 years or so in this country, underage kids married off in mass Q&N, in mass, 300,000 of them. And the Republicans say, yes. So who's a pro pedophilia party? Because right now, the facts clearly indicate it's the Republicans. Well, why don't we move on to our next story? Because it turns out that there's yet another religious person. In fact, someone associated with Ron DeSantis who got caught in a sex scandal of his own. Last week, a pastor in another state contacted me with information about one of our deacons, involving a sinful act that took place many years ago in his past before he was at Calvary.

Starting point is 00:46:23 Many years ago, a member of our deacon body committed sexual sin that could also be described as abusive. Now, I want to be careful here because we do not want this information to cause any harm to the victim or other innocent people. It did not involve criminal charges, and he has never been identified by law as a sexual offender. Nevertheless, it was a terrible sin and it devastated people's lives. That was Pastor Willie Rice out of Florida and he was addressing Ron DeSantis' faith advisor who has since stepped down after, well, you just heard it in the video, there was word of this deacon, the specific individual engaging in some sort of scandal that forced him to step down. Now, there wasn't much specificity in this announcement, but there was a report from

Starting point is 00:47:18 2005 in the Tampa Bay Times, which will give you some idea of what this is probably about. But first, some context. Jeff Ford of the Florida governor's faith and community-based initiative was recently dismissed from his role as a deacon of Clearwater's cavalry church after it was revealed he had a history of sexual misconduct when he was a teacher. Now, again, there wasn't much specificity in the announcement, the video that you just watched, but here's what we know based on a 2005 report out of the Tampa Bay Times. They reported that Jeff Ford resigned from J.W. Mitchell High School at the age of 27 because he was in a relationship with one of his students who allegedly at the time was 18 years old.

Starting point is 00:48:09 And since she was 18 years old, he wasn't charged with a crime. If she was underage, of course, he would be charged with the crime. But since he was a teacher who was engaging in a relationship, an intimate relationship with an 18 year old, he was essentially fired from that school. And it's unclear whether this is the particular issue that's come up again. And if this is the particular issue that's forced this deacon to step down, Jeff Ford, by the way, is the executive director of man up and go, a Christian nonprofit in the United States and overseas whose authentic masculinity program teaches men to be protectors of and providers of their families, according to the biography of Ford posted on the website of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis. According to the website, Ford is a member of the state's faith-based and community-based advisory council.

Starting point is 00:49:07 And, Jank, before I go to you, I would like to hear a little more from Pastor Rice. Let's watch. It was a terrible sin, and it devastated people's lives. After this brother's deep sin, his world crashed. After this event, he experienced as his own testimony has consistently stated, a genuine conversion to Christ. He repented of his sin. He trusted in Christ, and he was baptized as a true follower of Jesus. By God's grace, his marriage survived, and several years after that, he came to Calvary.

Starting point is 00:49:42 And he did not hide his story. It was a part of his testimony, and it was a story of God's amazing grace. Because of our brother's past, we did not allow him to serve in ministries to children or students, but he did become involved in other areas of our children. church life and over the course of many years, he demonstrated as much as we are able to judge such things, the genuine fruits of a repentant life. So you guys knew about this scandal when you hired him and had no problem with it until now when you decided to dismiss him. But don't worry, Jank. He got baptized. He's now living a real

Starting point is 00:50:23 repentant life. It's totally fine. Oh yeah, and by the way, I forgot. His marriage is allegedly doing okay. He was married at the time that this affair with an 18 year old happened. Yeah. Look, I would be surprised if that story of the 18 year old is the only thing that was in that guy's life. Since they're not, since they're not saying what it is, it does open them up to conjecture. Okay. So here's what I know. Guys who talk about authentic masculinity programs don't often have it, okay? Here's another thing I know. When you say man up and go, it's another red flag for, okay, I'm trying to overcompensate

Starting point is 00:51:05 here. But the most disturbing, that organization that this guy led, quote, was to inspire men to fight for the fatherless as Jesus commands. And then they mainly worked as a nonprofit in Uganda, Ethiopia, and the Dominican Republic. That's got red flags all over it. Number one thing that groomers do is they look for powerless people who have no defenders. And we've covered other stories before where kids that are fatherless are a giant neon sign to abusers. Come here, there's no one to protect them, and you could do whatever you want.

Starting point is 00:51:48 So until they tell us what he actually did, I have to assume that it's way worse than they're letting on. But even if it was just what they said, Ron DeSantis currently has on us faith-based and community-based advisory council, a man who his leader, the leader of that pastor, the one you just saw said, committed sexual sin that could also be described as abusive and that devastated families. So Ron DeSantis, what are you hiding? What kind of freaks are you hiring to be so-called faith leaders? Is it a deep state operation to try to actually get deeply sexually abusive priests into official government positions so they could do more abuse? I don't know because they won't say what the guy's crimes were. We know one instance where he did something, but they seem to know something way, way worse. talking about sexual sins that were abusive.

Starting point is 00:52:51 So what did he do? What does Rhonda Santos know and when did he know it? And why is this guy still on his board? Seems like a pro-petophilia position. That's what it looks like to me. Look, you know, the Republicans are constantly projecting. Oh, I bet there's pedophilia happening in a basement somewhere in a pizza shop. Really?

Starting point is 00:53:10 Why don't you look at your own faith-based group? I don't know, you tell me. You're the one constantly prattling about pedophilia, yet all of a sudden, while you're distracting people with Democrats and pizza parlors, look at your own faith-based group. What didn't this monster do? By the way, I believe in repentance. So maybe it was just the teacher, I'm sorry, the teacher-student relationship,

Starting point is 00:53:35 just that he slept with his, and I put just in air quotes, that he slept with his student. If that's the only thing that happened, you should clear the guy's name. And I mean, it doesn't clear his name, but right now, the way they're hiding, what he did sounds way, way, way worse. And of course, the person helping him to cover up is Ron DeSantis, because that's the kind of pervert and sick man that he is. Well, that does it for our explosive first hour, but stick around because hour two is just as if not more explosive.

Starting point is 00:54:07 We're gonna start off with an insane campaign ad that J.D. Vance just put out. You don't wanna miss it, come right back. Florida's ground zero for God's waiting room. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members, only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.

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