WEBVTT - The Karol Markowicz Show: Partying with Inez Stepman 0:00:05.800 --> 0:00:09.680 Hi, and welcome back to the Carol Markowitz Show on iHeartRadio. 0:00:10.000 --> 0:00:14.440 This clip came across my feed the other day on Twitter, actually, 0:00:14.680 --> 0:00:16.680 and I have to say something about it. 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:20.000 Okay, So boyfriend I have been together eight years, and 0:00:20.040 --> 0:00:22.720 that's because we met really young. I was twenty when 0:00:22.720 --> 0:00:25.720 we met, having got married simply because like neither of 0:00:25.800 --> 0:00:28.000 us have wanted to yet. And I guess now, I 0:00:28.080 --> 0:00:29.760 know a lot of people wouldn't date someone for eight 0:00:29.840 --> 0:00:32.400 years without a ring, and that's totally fine, Like that's 0:00:32.640 --> 0:00:35.680 your prerogative, but it works for us. Next thing is 0:00:35.680 --> 0:00:37.319 that I pay my boyfriend rent. In the past, when 0:00:37.320 --> 0:00:39.400 we've rented properties together, we've split the rent. Now my 0:00:39.440 --> 0:00:41.479 boyfriend has purchased a house. I'm still an adult that 0:00:41.560 --> 0:00:43.720 needs a place to live and pays for the place 0:00:43.760 --> 0:00:46.519 she lives. I just happened to pay that money to 0:00:46.560 --> 0:00:48.879 my boyfriend. People are upset that I'm doing this work 0:00:48.920 --> 0:00:50.840 for freed and I'm not gaining equity in this house 0:00:51.159 --> 0:00:52.640 way that I look at it. And he was able 0:00:52.640 --> 0:00:54.240 to buy this house because that has been a. 0:00:54.160 --> 0:00:54.520 Goal of hit. 0:00:54.600 --> 0:00:56.480 I didn't have the ability to take on that risk. 0:00:56.800 --> 0:00:59.360 I don't see it as my place to like reap 0:00:59.400 --> 0:01:01.920 those gains to me, it would be weird to not help, 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:05.440 just like a friend helping out. People are gonna have 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:06.800 a problem with the fact that I just referred to 0:01:06.880 --> 0:01:09.000 myself as a friend, but I am my boyfriend's friend. Well, 0:01:09.000 --> 0:01:11.919 if my boyfriend dumped me tomorrow, like, yes, the gains 0:01:11.959 --> 0:01:12.399 in the house. 0:01:12.280 --> 0:01:13.680 Would be his, But I can live with that. 0:01:14.319 --> 0:01:16.480 The other like little nuance is that, like, my rent 0:01:16.560 --> 0:01:19.800 is pretty low. It's definitely low for the size of 0:01:19.800 --> 0:01:22.400 house we live in and the location that we are so, like, 0:01:22.440 --> 0:01:23.760 if it makes you feel better, you could kind of 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:26.080 look at it as like my rent is subsidized by 0:01:26.080 --> 0:01:28.039 the work that I do. I'm doing this work because 0:01:28.040 --> 0:01:29.959 it's fun and it improves the home that I live in. 0:01:30.240 --> 0:01:32.440 I will now stop talking about our relationship and get 0:01:32.440 --> 0:01:36.280 back to removing paint from old things. Please give us 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:38.440 a follow if you want to see how my vision 0:01:38.440 --> 0:01:40.200 for this house comes to life, whether it's for me 0:01:40.440 --> 0:01:42.280 or my boyfriend's future wife. 0:01:42.400 --> 0:01:46.679 Now, this girl is twenty eight years old and she's 0:01:46.800 --> 0:01:51.040 contributing toward the mortgage of her boyfriend, who she has 0:01:51.080 --> 0:01:53.720 been dating for eight years. She says that they were 0:01:53.720 --> 0:01:56.200 too young to get married but they live together and 0:01:56.240 --> 0:01:59.080 now they're in their late twenties. I know I push 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:01.800 marriage on here, and this is a great example of 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:05.160 why what is this woman doing. I'd be so upset 0:02:05.160 --> 0:02:07.840 if this was my daughter dating a guy for nearly 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:11.040 a decade, not on the path to marriage, and helping 0:02:11.200 --> 0:02:14.200 him pay for the home he owns. But she does not. 0:02:14.560 --> 0:02:16.280 You know, she says things like people are going to 0:02:16.360 --> 0:02:19.639 get upset, or this upsets people. I'm not upset for her. 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:22.200 I'd be upset if it was my kid. You know, 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:24.240 she could do whatever she wants. She's a stranger on 0:02:24.280 --> 0:02:27.160 the internet. I think this is particularly crazy to do, 0:02:27.800 --> 0:02:31.440 but I, you know, don't really care what strangers do. 0:02:31.560 --> 0:02:34.120 So for me, i'd be upset if it were my 0:02:34.320 --> 0:02:38.080 kid doing this, even without marriage. I'd point out that 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:41.119 this guy is not interested in taking care of her. 0:02:41.360 --> 0:02:43.720 I know women can do it for themselves. They don't 0:02:43.720 --> 0:02:47.120 need no man. She mentions she's an adult whatever, But 0:02:47.120 --> 0:02:50.480 that's ridiculous. We need each other. We take care of 0:02:50.560 --> 0:02:53.600 each other. It's not a one way thing. She's taking 0:02:53.600 --> 0:02:56.360 care of him, he's not taking care of her. To me, 0:02:56.720 --> 0:03:00.840 this video is a public service announcement for our to 0:03:00.960 --> 0:03:04.720 not fool themselves into believing that living like this is 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:08.600 somehow a win, somehow this is feminism. She apparently made 0:03:08.600 --> 0:03:11.840 this video responding to a comment that said she's getting 0:03:11.840 --> 0:03:13.960 the home ready for him and his future wife to 0:03:14.040 --> 0:03:16.440 live in. But that's how I see this ending too. 0:03:16.639 --> 0:03:20.399 You're dating for eight years. Where is this going? Why 0:03:20.440 --> 0:03:23.280 wouldn't you be married yet? This makes no sense to me. 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:25.800 I mean, just the fact that she's financially helping him, 0:03:26.280 --> 0:03:29.080 like build up his equity in a home that is 0:03:29.120 --> 0:03:32.800 not hers is wild to me. You're not into marriage, fine, 0:03:32.960 --> 0:03:35.560 but I'll be telling my kids to not do this 0:03:35.600 --> 0:03:39.000 pretend marriage thing where one person gets all the benefits either. 0:03:39.360 --> 0:03:45.800 Coming up next, an interview with Inez Stepman. Welcome back 0:03:45.800 --> 0:03:49.480 to the Carol Marcowitz Show on iHeartRadio. My guest today 0:03:49.640 --> 0:03:54.600 is Inez Stepman, senior policy analyst for Independent Women's Forum 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:57.280 and host of the show high Noon. Hy Inez. 0:03:58.080 --> 0:04:00.000 Hey, Carol, it's great to talk to you. 0:04:00.320 --> 0:04:03.200 It's so nice to have you on and to see you. 0:04:03.600 --> 0:04:05.080 We used to hang out a lot in New York, 0:04:05.120 --> 0:04:07.840 and you know what, one of us had to move away. 0:04:09.480 --> 0:04:11.360 Well I moved in, so I was I was the 0:04:11.400 --> 0:04:14.200 newcomer in New York and then everyone I knew left, 0:04:14.240 --> 0:04:18.120 including you. So right, because you did. 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:23.359 The rare pandemic move to New York. What made me 0:04:23.400 --> 0:04:23.719 do that? 0:04:24.440 --> 0:04:27.080 My party trike is telling people. You know, imagine one 0:04:27.080 --> 0:04:30.359 of those horror shows where everybody's locked up trying to 0:04:30.360 --> 0:04:32.800 get out of the city after an apocalypse, and there's 0:04:32.880 --> 0:04:35.760 one car going in. That was me and my husband. 0:04:35.839 --> 0:04:38.839 We came to New York December of twenty twenty. 0:04:38.960 --> 0:04:41.039 So what made you do a part of the it 0:04:41.080 --> 0:04:43.960 just seems really fun to be locked in a smaller apartment. 0:04:44.080 --> 0:04:46.880 Well, actually, because of the pandemic prices, were probably the 0:04:46.880 --> 0:04:49.440 first people in history who went from DC to New 0:04:49.560 --> 0:04:51.600 York and got a bigger apartment and then you know, 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:54.040 booted out of that apartment based on the price increase. 0:04:55.720 --> 0:04:59.440 In any case, No, we had been planning to move 0:04:59.480 --> 0:05:02.960 to New York actually roughly in May of twenty twenty, 0:05:04.160 --> 0:05:08.080 and then as those plans were taking place, the pandemic 0:05:08.120 --> 0:05:09.800 hit and so we delayed it for a while. But 0:05:10.279 --> 0:05:12.760 given the low prices and stuff, it seemed to make sense. 0:05:13.839 --> 0:05:17.640 My husband had just gone remote so my husband, Jared Stepman, 0:05:17.680 --> 0:05:19.400 he works for the Daily Signal, but he had gone 0:05:19.400 --> 0:05:23.479 remote before the pandemic, and so we were sort of 0:05:23.480 --> 0:05:26.039 free to move to New York and that was our plan. 0:05:26.160 --> 0:05:28.080 So it wasn't We just kind of delayed our plan 0:05:28.480 --> 0:05:30.640 by a little bit, but it was our plan to 0:05:31.040 --> 0:05:33.880 move here. I just I like this, in all honesty, 0:05:34.040 --> 0:05:36.440 my husband was, you know, doing me a favor by 0:05:36.480 --> 0:05:41.240 moving here that Yeah, yeah, I just loved New York. 0:05:41.279 --> 0:05:43.120 I've always loved New York. I've wanted to move here 0:05:43.160 --> 0:05:46.640 for a decade and a half, but it never like 0:05:46.680 --> 0:05:49.680 sort of practically made sense. And so so have you 0:05:49.760 --> 0:05:50.279 enjoyed it? 0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:51.359 Yeah? 0:05:51.400 --> 0:05:55.160 I have. I mean, obviously it's facing a lot of problems, 0:05:55.240 --> 0:06:00.240 as virtually every city is. I'm a city person. To 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:03.839 be able as particularly to walk, I need o architecture 0:06:03.920 --> 0:06:08.000 is really important to me. A certain attention to aesthetics 0:06:08.120 --> 0:06:10.520 is really important to me that you don't find, I think, 0:06:10.560 --> 0:06:12.720 in a lot of American cities outside of New York. 0:06:14.760 --> 0:06:17.200 So just for that daily beauty, which I realize a 0:06:17.200 --> 0:06:18.479 lot of people look at New York and they're like, oh, 0:06:18.520 --> 0:06:20.280 look at the garbage. What are you talking about in 0:06:20.320 --> 0:06:22.919 the daily beauty? But I really think there is an 0:06:23.080 --> 0:06:27.280 enormous daily beauty in New York. There's a rhythm to it. 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:32.040 There are beautiful buildings that you can look at walking around. 0:06:32.120 --> 0:06:34.800 It's enjoyable. It's energizing to walk around in New York. 0:06:34.880 --> 0:06:37.440 So despite all of the problems, and then of course 0:06:37.480 --> 0:06:41.719 there's just the enormous amount of things you have access 0:06:41.760 --> 0:06:46.280 to your culturally, artistically, just to me, day to day 0:06:46.279 --> 0:06:53.080 life here is exciting and is beautiful. And so I've 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:55.520 always I've always had a romantic feeling about New York, 0:06:55.520 --> 0:06:58.040 which my actual New Yorker friends always help me is 0:06:58.440 --> 0:07:01.120 is cheesy and lame. 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:04.440 No, not at all. I think New York is a 0:07:04.480 --> 0:07:07.120 beautiful city. I used to I mean, you know, I 0:07:07.240 --> 0:07:10.360 was the biggest New York evangelist, New York supremacist, and 0:07:10.400 --> 0:07:13.440 I used to like take pictures of the city and 0:07:13.960 --> 0:07:16.960 of the bridges as I went over them or things 0:07:17.000 --> 0:07:19.440 like that, and I would, you know, tweet, I'm sure 0:07:19.480 --> 0:07:22.240 your city's nice too, but like, this is my city 0:07:22.480 --> 0:07:26.400 and look at it. So I totally get that. I 0:07:27.720 --> 0:07:30.320 don't like not liking New York. Like I'm you know, 0:07:30.560 --> 0:07:35.840 I'm still deeply a New York lover overall. It's like 0:07:36.520 --> 0:07:38.680 the child that you have to like let go of 0:07:38.760 --> 0:07:40.680 and let them do their own thing because you've like 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:43.320 gotten tired of fighting for them. Maybe that's a bad 0:07:43.320 --> 0:07:45.960 analogy because I actually, what would not stop fighting for my children, 0:07:46.000 --> 0:07:48.960 but for my you know, for my children, I had 0:07:48.960 --> 0:07:52.200 to leave New York. So that was kind of the 0:07:53.000 --> 0:07:55.240 sad truth of it. But I love how you love 0:07:55.320 --> 0:07:57.840 New York and that reminds me very much of the 0:07:57.880 --> 0:08:00.440 way I felt about it, and I I love to 0:08:00.480 --> 0:08:02.760 see it through your eyes. I love to watch you, 0:08:02.760 --> 0:08:05.960 you know, become a New Yorker and really live there. 0:08:06.000 --> 0:08:08.160 And it's been it's been great. I loved, I've been 0:08:08.160 --> 0:08:08.960 loved to watch you. 0:08:09.920 --> 0:08:13.880 Yeah, I mean, I think there are certain policy consequences 0:08:13.880 --> 0:08:16.239 that you can't escape with children. Part of the reason 0:08:16.240 --> 0:08:18.000 I think it's easy for us to stay here is 0:08:18.000 --> 0:08:23.640 because we don't have kids. They're really I understand perfectly 0:08:23.640 --> 0:08:24.720 why why you left. 0:08:25.320 --> 0:08:28.080 I mean, in my schools and crime thousand words on it. 0:08:28.120 --> 0:08:33.280 So yeah, it's schools and crime. Although I will say this, 0:08:34.080 --> 0:08:36.160 crime in New York is much worse than crime in 0:08:36.160 --> 0:08:39.440 New York in twenty nineteen. It's palpable, it's visible, you 0:08:39.480 --> 0:08:42.800 see you know, you see it a lot more you 0:08:43.280 --> 0:08:45.800 even just walking around, there are definitely more like high 0:08:45.800 --> 0:08:48.760 people wandering around. There's definitely I can see my citizen 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:52.160 app taking up day by day. That being said, the 0:08:52.240 --> 0:08:56.439 focus from our own team, Carol the right on New 0:08:56.520 --> 0:08:59.040 York is sort of the disaster zone of the country, 0:08:59.520 --> 0:09:03.200 I think is really not accurate in terms of the 0:09:03.240 --> 0:09:07.160 big cities in America, all of which are basically except 0:09:07.200 --> 0:09:11.439 for Miami maybe Dallas are making the same policy mistakes, 0:09:11.800 --> 0:09:15.040 and they started not nearly as safe as New York. 0:09:16.040 --> 0:09:19.080 So people seem from outside the city sometimes to think like, oh, 0:09:19.120 --> 0:09:22.600 it's dangerous to walk down the street in Manhattan. It isn't. 0:09:22.840 --> 0:09:25.240 It's fine. I mean, it's more unpleasant than it used 0:09:25.280 --> 0:09:26.640 to be. You definitely have to be a little more 0:09:26.679 --> 0:09:30.440 alert than it used to be. But comparatively to DC, 0:09:30.559 --> 0:09:32.880 I mean, when I lived in DC in twenty eighteen, 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:36.320 before any of this happened, there were twelve murders within 0:09:36.400 --> 0:09:38.559 half a mile in one summer of where I lived, 0:09:38.559 --> 0:09:40.560 and I lived in a nice part of DC. Yeah, 0:09:40.559 --> 0:09:43.480 so like, comparatively to that, there hasn't even been one 0:09:43.559 --> 0:09:47.679 murder in my vicinity since I moved here. 0:09:47.800 --> 0:09:52.040 So that's a wind, you know. I know, I fully. 0:09:52.160 --> 0:09:56.679 The depressing part to me is that New York solved 0:09:56.920 --> 0:10:01.200 like the mystery of ken a big city be governable? 0:10:01.320 --> 0:10:04.319 Can it be livable? And then threw it all away 0:10:04.400 --> 0:10:07.360 and then just decided that that's you know, that didn't 0:10:07.400 --> 0:10:09.640 actually happen, or that didn't work the way we wanted 0:10:09.679 --> 0:10:13.600 it to or whatever. And that's like the depressing part 0:10:13.640 --> 0:10:17.800 to me. It's not the you know, cities will have challenges. 0:10:17.880 --> 0:10:20.080 I always say this, but I grew up in a 0:10:20.160 --> 0:10:22.599 much worse New York than exists now, and yet I 0:10:22.640 --> 0:10:25.320 couldn't live in this New York because this New York 0:10:26.000 --> 0:10:29.360 didn't take seriously the threats that nineteen eighties New York 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:32.320 took seriously. So crime was far worse in the eighties 0:10:32.360 --> 0:10:35.520 when I was growing up, But it wasn't a debate. 0:10:35.760 --> 0:10:38.000 It wasn't like, what are you talking about? What crime? 0:10:38.040 --> 0:10:40.720 What crime? It's a crime, you know, And that's what 0:10:40.760 --> 0:10:44.199 I felt was going on. Especially in the neighborhood that 0:10:44.240 --> 0:10:46.160 I lived in Park Slope. It was like, literally, if 0:10:46.200 --> 0:10:48.040 you said, you know, oh, the crime's going up and 0:10:48.080 --> 0:10:49.960 I'm a little nervous about that, or can my kids 0:10:49.960 --> 0:10:52.600 walk around alone the way that they could you know 0:10:52.679 --> 0:10:56.080 six months ago you were racist? And how dare you 0:10:56.120 --> 0:10:59.000 bring this up? And that's the part that I like 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:02.079 could not live with. And you know, also talking about 0:11:02.080 --> 0:11:04.400 like beauty of New York, like I one of the 0:11:04.400 --> 0:11:07.160 things I miss, and it's funny, but like the way 0:11:07.240 --> 0:11:10.640 people really try they like dress up, and I mean 0:11:10.760 --> 0:11:13.600 it's people in Florida look good, do not get me wrong, 0:11:13.679 --> 0:11:16.640 Like way better than like let's say, Parkslope, Brooklyn, like 0:11:16.679 --> 0:11:20.160 where I felt like nobody tried it at all. But 0:11:20.679 --> 0:11:22.440 you know, so there are things about New York that 0:11:22.520 --> 0:11:27.360 I think are beautiful and amazing and that I you know, 0:11:27.440 --> 0:11:29.640 miss about them. I just hate that they threw away 0:11:30.400 --> 0:11:35.640 decades of good government and good policies to you know, 0:11:35.679 --> 0:11:38.160 the ideology of the moment which turned out to be 0:11:38.640 --> 0:11:40.240 you know, fools gold. 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:43.440 Yeah, I mean it is a tragedy. And coming from 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:45.920 California originally and from the San Francisco area, I mean 0:11:45.960 --> 0:11:48.439 I had a front seat to the tragedy that is 0:11:48.480 --> 0:11:51.560 San Francisco. Am I view much worse than New York, 0:11:51.600 --> 0:11:54.120 even though they start out with a baseline of like 0:11:54.840 --> 0:11:58.400 San Francisco is has a very very small black population 0:11:58.559 --> 0:12:01.160 for example, which does core relate with the crime rate. 0:12:01.440 --> 0:12:05.840 San Francisco is incredibly wealthy. It's much smaller than New York. 0:12:05.920 --> 0:12:10.320 Like all the demographics of San Francisco would point to 0:12:10.360 --> 0:12:12.920 the fact that it should be as it was, which 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:16.720 was like an incredibly safe city when I was growing up. 0:12:16.760 --> 0:12:19.000 I mean I used to go when I was fourteen, 0:12:19.080 --> 0:12:20.880 fifteen years old. I used to walk around and then 0:12:20.880 --> 0:12:23.640 Tenorline District by myself as a teenager. There was no 0:12:23.760 --> 0:12:26.120 question that that was fine. I mean, yeah, there were 0:12:26.280 --> 0:12:28.839 there were some people doing drugs at San Francisco, very 0:12:29.000 --> 0:12:31.360 you know, there were some homeless people. It was San Francisco. 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:35.240 But the there was a really real tipping point, and 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:37.800 it was entirely as you say, it's like entirely the 0:12:37.960 --> 0:12:41.960 choice of people who live there to throw away all 0:12:42.000 --> 0:12:46.200 of the natural beauty of San Francisco, natural safety of 0:12:46.200 --> 0:12:49.720 San Francisco, everything that's wonderful about San Francisco to just 0:12:49.760 --> 0:12:52.360 like put it in the trash can and in San 0:12:52.360 --> 0:12:55.800 Francisco at actually the tipping point, I don't imagine how 0:12:55.800 --> 0:12:58.000 bad it's gotten, although I've seen plenty of the reporting 0:12:58.000 --> 0:12:59.920 and stuff, but the tipping point really was twenty five 0:13:00.040 --> 0:13:04.160 ten twenty sixteen where the actual experience of the city. 0:13:04.760 --> 0:13:08.200 And again, I'm a city person. I'm not somebody who 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:11.080 is shocked by seeing a homeless person on the corner 0:13:11.200 --> 0:13:16.720 or all fighting or whatever. But in twenty sixteen it 0:13:16.760 --> 0:13:21.120 became San Francisco. The actual enjoyment of being in the city, 0:13:21.160 --> 0:13:24.640 the walking around, the sitting in the cafe, all of 0:13:24.679 --> 0:13:30.400 that started to very aggressively be impacted by the fact 0:13:30.440 --> 0:13:34.040 that the city basically threw open the doors to every 0:13:34.120 --> 0:13:37.000 drug drug addict in America and said, hey, shoot up here, 0:13:38.440 --> 0:13:42.000 why would you do that? You know, you know, look, 0:13:42.080 --> 0:13:46.440 they have their their idiot rationales. But it very very 0:13:46.480 --> 0:13:48.200 clearly fell off a cliff at that point. So I 0:13:48.240 --> 0:13:51.000 share your sense of tragedy. I do think there's a 0:13:51.080 --> 0:13:54.240 couple institutions in New York that are keeping it from 0:13:54.240 --> 0:13:57.880 going completely nuts, at least for now, because obviously the 0:13:57.920 --> 0:14:00.040 City Council is insane and they all have to go 0:14:00.120 --> 0:14:05.720 down the same path as DC, as Seattle, San Francisco. 0:14:06.080 --> 0:14:09.600 Right, And it's funny because there are more Republicans now 0:14:09.640 --> 0:14:12.200 on the New York City Council than like in decades. 0:14:12.840 --> 0:14:16.559 It's just the leftist on the city Council. The Democrats 0:14:16.600 --> 0:14:18.960 have become far left, is really what happened. So you 0:14:19.000 --> 0:14:21.920 have actually more quantity of Republicans. I think this five now, 0:14:22.200 --> 0:14:25.800 which was unheard of in you know, the last number 0:14:25.840 --> 0:14:30.760 of years. But the Democrats have just become insane. 0:14:30.440 --> 0:14:37.720 Crazy, I mean yeah, and it's They do have two institutions, 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:40.640 like I said that I think help balance a little bit. 0:14:40.760 --> 0:14:42.760 One is that the NYPD is the best force in 0:14:42.800 --> 0:14:45.840 the world. I really believe that. I mean, it's remarkable 0:14:45.880 --> 0:14:47.840 what they're able to do when they're allowed to do it. 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:52.360 And they're very large force, like per capita comparatively to 0:14:52.400 --> 0:14:54.480 a lot of these other cities. So there are the 0:14:54.480 --> 0:14:57.520 cops to put on corners and they're very well organized. 0:14:59.040 --> 0:15:02.320 And then they we have clout apparently behind the scenes, right, 0:15:02.360 --> 0:15:04.440 I mean, the police union is still a big deal 0:15:05.000 --> 0:15:07.760 in New York politically in the way that it's completely 0:15:07.760 --> 0:15:12.560 non existent, and I can demonstrate very easily how that 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:16.320 works between DC and New York. I cannot imagine. And Carol, 0:15:16.320 --> 0:15:18.880 you've spent plenty of time in DC. Can you imagine 0:15:19.280 --> 0:15:21.840 the kind of parade that was put on for the 0:15:21.880 --> 0:15:25.040 fallen officers maybe two years ago, where you have just 0:15:25.120 --> 0:15:29.320 like hundreds, maybe thousands of cops marching down the street 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:33.440 in New York. For that would never happen in San Francisco. 0:15:33.520 --> 0:15:36.640 It would just never happen in DC because there's such 0:15:36.640 --> 0:15:40.480 a hostility to the cops. There still is like a 0:15:40.560 --> 0:15:43.240 pride in the police force here among average people, and 0:15:43.280 --> 0:15:45.680 I think that's really important, and it gives them the 0:15:45.720 --> 0:15:48.160 clout I assume a little bit behind the scenes, although 0:15:48.200 --> 0:15:50.960 I'm sure that their lives are much worse than they 0:15:51.040 --> 0:15:52.360 used to be. Don't get me wrong again, I'm not 0:15:52.440 --> 0:15:55.800 down comparatively to these other cities. 0:15:56.520 --> 0:15:59.000 That's really interesting. I've really never thought of that, but yeah, 0:15:59.040 --> 0:16:00.560 they're absolutely. 0:16:00.080 --> 0:16:01.640 You should think about the second one, which is that 0:16:01.680 --> 0:16:04.880 they have the New York Post. Yeah, wow, which there's 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:09.960 no major daily newspaper with a actual city readership. There 0:16:09.960 --> 0:16:11.720 are conservative journals and so on. 0:16:12.240 --> 0:16:16.720 Yeah, no, everybody needs the Post. Yeah, like everybody across 0:16:16.720 --> 0:16:19.400 the political spectrum in New York has always read the Post. 0:16:20.120 --> 0:16:22.440 They will just post reports on crime, and the Post 0:16:22.760 --> 0:16:27.040 hosts conservative opinion. And the fact that that's a daily 0:16:27.080 --> 0:16:30.680 newspaper in New York that's in everybody's padega like that, people, 0:16:30.880 --> 0:16:33.400 ordinary people a political people not like you and me 0:16:33.680 --> 0:16:38.200 read I think is an enormous asset for the city 0:16:38.240 --> 0:16:41.000 and keeping it going completely insane. Now, maybe all those 0:16:41.040 --> 0:16:43.880 things will be overcome and the left will steamroll or 0:16:43.880 --> 0:16:44.520 all of those things. 0:16:44.560 --> 0:16:46.960 But let's root for New York, like you know, I hope, 0:16:47.120 --> 0:16:50.080 I hope they don't. I hope that the voices of 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:53.880 sanity within and you get to live in a beautiful, 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:56.520 safe New York the way that I remember that it 0:16:56.560 --> 0:16:58.880 should be right now, But you know, isn't for a 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:03.680 lot of reasons. So what do you mostly work on 0:17:04.320 --> 0:17:06.600 at IWF? I mean, I obviously read a lot of 0:17:06.600 --> 0:17:09.719 your stuff, but what would my listeners want to know 0:17:09.760 --> 0:17:10.680 about what you do? 0:17:11.840 --> 0:17:15.000 So I have a kind of funny hodgepodge of issues. 0:17:15.119 --> 0:17:17.639 I did do more than a decade as an education 0:17:17.800 --> 0:17:21.400 policy analyst, so I still do some education stuff some 0:17:21.680 --> 0:17:27.119 I mean school choice K twelve policy stuff. I also 0:17:27.240 --> 0:17:29.639 have been working a lot on higher ed recently. So 0:17:29.760 --> 0:17:32.840 I have a proposal out to tax the university sector 0:17:32.880 --> 0:17:36.560 for a loan forgiveness, and I think this is going 0:17:36.640 --> 0:17:38.480 to be I think this has the potential to be 0:17:38.800 --> 0:17:42.800 a huge win for the right. There is an enormous 0:17:42.800 --> 0:17:46.040 pressure to forgive student loans, and I think we often 0:17:46.040 --> 0:17:51.520 talk about it as a matter of individual responsibility, which 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:53.800 it is. I'm not saying that the EIGHTEENEP signing on 0:17:53.840 --> 0:17:58.200 the dotted line, you know, didn't legally incur that debt, 0:17:58.720 --> 0:18:02.000 but the entire system since the nineteen sixties really has 0:18:02.080 --> 0:18:05.439 been structured to push as many people prepared or not 0:18:05.640 --> 0:18:11.280 into college as possible. And I think it's a little 0:18:11.280 --> 0:18:14.159 too much to assume that the average eighteen year old 0:18:14.240 --> 0:18:18.359 is more financially savvy than the US Congress that put 0:18:18.400 --> 0:18:22.040 these these loans government loans in front of basically every 0:18:22.640 --> 0:18:25.800 every high school graduate in America. The universities get their 0:18:25.840 --> 0:18:28.840 money upfront, so they're you know, they're rolling in. They've 0:18:28.880 --> 0:18:33.320 created enor miss wealth from this policy that is directly 0:18:33.359 --> 0:18:37.760 directly financed by the US taxpayer, and you know, everyone 0:18:37.760 --> 0:18:40.040 else is kind of screwed, right, The taxpayer is screwed 0:18:40.040 --> 0:18:41.840 because by the way we hold all these loans. So 0:18:42.040 --> 0:18:45.159 if a large proportion, as is predicted, default on the 0:18:45.200 --> 0:18:48.240 student loans, and it could be anywhere from fifty to 0:18:48.240 --> 0:18:52.400 sixty percent, that those are like reasonable estimates of how 0:18:52.640 --> 0:18:56.840 much like what default rate we're likely to see. We 0:18:56.880 --> 0:18:59.360 already own all those loans that Department of Education owns 0:18:59.440 --> 0:19:01.080 ninety three or some of those loans. You know, there's 0:19:01.080 --> 0:19:03.919 those companies like Moela or Mohela whatever it's called, or 0:19:04.000 --> 0:19:08.080 Naviant before it. They're just managers of their hired guns 0:19:08.119 --> 0:19:10.760 to manage the loans and collect payments. But the US 0:19:10.840 --> 0:19:13.400 government owns that debt, so we're already on the hook 0:19:13.480 --> 0:19:17.440 for it. I think we will have a default bailout, 0:19:17.520 --> 0:19:22.159 whether we like it or not, by default. So to 0:19:22.240 --> 0:19:24.639 my mind, the fair way to do this is to 0:19:24.720 --> 0:19:27.719 take some of that enormous wealth that's been amassed on 0:19:27.800 --> 0:19:30.480 the basis of the backs of the US taxpayer by 0:19:30.560 --> 0:19:33.800 institutions that are overtly hostile, and I don't think anyone 0:19:33.800 --> 0:19:37.160 can argue that point in twenty twenty four, overtly hostile 0:19:37.240 --> 0:19:41.440 to everything that's good about this country and about America. 0:19:42.480 --> 0:19:45.360 To take the money from those institutions and use it 0:19:45.440 --> 0:19:50.160 to essentially settle up with those who were preyed upon, 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:53.359 frankly by this system, by this promise that if you 0:19:53.840 --> 0:19:55.919 take on this debt and go to a four year school, 0:19:56.280 --> 0:19:59.520 oftentimes a four year school, you're totally academically unprepared for 0:19:59.640 --> 0:20:02.920 because the graduation rates only sixty percent. These schools were 0:20:03.000 --> 0:20:05.520 admitting people because everybody comes with the government check that 0:20:05.520 --> 0:20:07.880 they get up FROMT So a lot of those defaults 0:20:07.880 --> 0:20:09.760 are people who are admitted to schools that had no 0:20:09.880 --> 0:20:12.760 chance of ever graduating from for the money for two 0:20:12.880 --> 0:20:15.320 or three years and they are stuck with the debt 0:20:15.320 --> 0:20:18.880 and they have no degree and anyway, Like, I could 0:20:18.880 --> 0:20:21.480 talk forever about this, but I think that there is 0:20:21.600 --> 0:20:25.600 a lot of merit to taxing universities for this. For 0:20:25.640 --> 0:20:27.480 the right, I see it as a twofer. We hit 0:20:27.480 --> 0:20:31.120 our institutional enemies because that's what they are, and we 0:20:32.040 --> 0:20:34.919 justly make the people who have made money off of 0:20:34.920 --> 0:20:37.720 this system pay for the fallout of it instead of 0:20:37.760 --> 0:20:40.560 the US taxpayer and the majority of Americans without a 0:20:40.560 --> 0:20:44.040 four year degree, you know, redistributing their wealth towards paying 0:20:44.080 --> 0:20:45.960 off loans for people who did go to college, who 0:20:46.000 --> 0:20:49.359 did go to for example, law school, which seems blatantly regressive. 0:20:49.680 --> 0:20:52.800 Yeah, so who is opposed to this politically? Like, obviously 0:20:52.840 --> 0:20:56.600 the colleges are against it, but who I conceive the 0:20:56.720 --> 0:20:59.359 argument from both the Republican and the Democrat side of 0:20:59.440 --> 0:21:00.879 why this is a great idea. 0:21:02.800 --> 0:21:04.479