Speaker 1: From the Abraham Lincoln Radio Studio and the George Washington
Speaker 1: Broadcast Center. Strong, arm Strong and Jetty Show. Olympic ratings
Speaker 1: are down quite a bit, although TV ratings are hard
Speaker 1: to figure out now because um, if you if you
Speaker 1: watch you know, when you watch a sport on your phone,
Speaker 1: it doesn't count, and um, I don't know, it's hard
Speaker 1: to figure out how many people actually watch stuff. I've
Speaker 1: watched less Olympics this time around than any Olympics since
Speaker 1: I was seven years old. I don't know if other
Speaker 1: people are the same, but the ratings are down quite
Speaker 1: a bit. Anyway, welcome to the program. I'm glad you hear.
Speaker 1: You picked a good moment to tune in because everybody
Speaker 1: likes Tim the lawyer. We call him Tim Sanderford. He's
Speaker 1: the vice president of Litigation for the Goldwater Institute. He's
Speaker 1: written a number of fantastic books. Will mention at the
Speaker 1: end of this interview Suit that you can go by
Speaker 1: them immediately. Tim, How you doing, dude? How are you
Speaker 1: doing all right? I know you're an anti sports guy.
Speaker 1: Are you anti Olympics? Yeah? I'm very much anti Olympics.
Speaker 1: I cannot stand the idea that our athletes would compete
Speaker 1: on an equal footing with enslaved children from China, and
Speaker 1: that we would then lend the the oppressive Chinese government.
Speaker 1: And this goes to other tyrannical governments. Also the credibility
Speaker 1: of uh that that goes along with taking them as
Speaker 1: an equal. It's disgraceful, disgraceful to me to see these athletes,
Speaker 1: our athletes got there and worked their their whole lives
Speaker 1: to pursue a dream on the same balance beam with
Speaker 1: children who are forced into virtual slavery by a totalitarian
Speaker 1: government overseas and and compelled to compete on pain of punishment,
Speaker 1: as if that's somehow the same thing. No, I think
Speaker 1: the Olympics should be abolished immediately. Wow, there you go, strong,
Speaker 1: strong opinion from Tim Sanderford. I'll tell you, I'm shocked
Speaker 1: that this whole because the Olympics are supposed to be
Speaker 1: in China right after you know, next year Winter two,
Speaker 1: So not that farman. I can't believe that that had
Speaker 1: have been canceled, that all of the good countries of
Speaker 1: the world haven't pulled out yet they were still acting
Speaker 1: like that's gonna happen. Uh, Like I'm okay with the
Speaker 1: Olympics happening in Japan right now, And uh, I get
Speaker 1: what you just said, but um, there's no way we
Speaker 1: can send an Olympic team to China and let them
Speaker 1: have that platform to show off the city of Beijing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I would think. You know, the original Olympics, the whole
Speaker 1: idea when it was recreated in the nineteenth century was
Speaker 1: that we were going to have you know, it would
Speaker 1: be for peace, for world peace, and everybody would drop
Speaker 1: politics and just compete together and forget their political differences.
Speaker 1: But the one because it's all about politics now, it's
Speaker 1: just prestige competitions between governments that want to pound themselves
Speaker 1: on the chest and say how great and bold they
Speaker 1: are when back home they're throwing their people into concentration
Speaker 1: camps and forcing them to make wallets for for uh
Speaker 1: sale overseas. No, it's just just just as graceful. It
Speaker 1: should be completely ended. Both it makes you feeling better.
Speaker 1: Our US men's basketball team beat Iran by fifty points yesterday,
Speaker 1: so you know that does make me feel better. I
Speaker 1: kind of feel like this is well trodden ground, but
Speaker 1: it keeps popping up, and I know it's going to
Speaker 1: end up in schools around the country the sixteen nineteen project.
Speaker 1: You have written eloquently on this, you've spoken uh forcefully
Speaker 1: on this. Could you give us kind of a short
Speaker 1: version for people who don't know what the sixteen nineteen
Speaker 1: project is, because again, they might be teaching to your schools,
Speaker 1: in your schools if your kids are allowed to go
Speaker 1: back to school this year, which is a different topic,
Speaker 1: but they might be teaching to your your kids this year.
Speaker 1: What is it and what's the many flaws? Well, it's
Speaker 1: in the same way that that critical race theory is
Speaker 1: both the st project is very vague in certain crucial ways.
Speaker 1: So it's supposed to be about trying to emphasize black
Speaker 1: history more, to talk about the consequences of slavery, more
Speaker 1: to talk about the ways in which the discrimination after
Speaker 1: the Civil War perpetuated racial and inequalities, and and the
Speaker 1: heroic stories of the people who triumphed over those those obstacles.
Speaker 1: And in that sense, that's great. But then when you
Speaker 1: start reading the text, you find that it goes further
Speaker 1: and it makes certain claims about the nature of the
Speaker 1: United States and says that America was founded on slavery,
Speaker 1: that what makes America essential is the existence of slavery,
Speaker 1: and that the American Revolution was fought in order to
Speaker 1: perpetuate slavery, and that the Constitution was written in order
Speaker 1: to protect slavery. And those are all factually false and
Speaker 1: really dangerous propositions to be teaching children, to tell them
Speaker 1: that they were and remain fundamentally excluded from the American Dream.
Speaker 1: It's contrary, for one thing, it's contrary to the views
Speaker 1: of those who fought for civil rights just in the
Speaker 1: nineteen sixties, who insisted no black Americans are entitled to
Speaker 1: participate in the American Dream. They have as much legitimate
Speaker 1: claim to the Declaration, and the and the Constitution as
Speaker 1: anybody else does. But the sixty nineteen project idea oology
Speaker 1: turns that backwards and says, no, this isn't always has
Speaker 1: been a white supremacist nation. And of course those white
Speaker 1: supremacists out there they applaud that, they say, yeah, right,
Speaker 1: you know so, I think I think in that sense
Speaker 1: plays into the hands of the white racists who would
Speaker 1: say that this country was and remains for whites only,
Speaker 1: whether it's the sixteen nineteen project or a variety of
Speaker 1: other things, that we're we're constantly talking about now and
Speaker 1: and teaching in schools or you know, become the hot
Speaker 1: topic of the day. Has has any nation ever in
Speaker 1: its history turns so self hating as the United States has,
Speaker 1: or at least segments of the United States, I don't
Speaker 1: know of it. It's really weird. Well, there was the
Speaker 1: nihilist movement in Russia in about nineteen hundred, uh, you know,
Speaker 1: which set the stage for terrible things that followed. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think there there have been times when nations have
Speaker 1: been this kind of self critical. But you're right that
Speaker 1: this goes beyond self critical. This goes into genuine self hatred,
Speaker 1: which tells people that there is no greater purpose to
Speaker 1: the American dream. And you know, in fact, and this
Speaker 1: is this is what inspired my article. Was was Nicoleheannah Jones,
Speaker 1: who is the charlatan behind nineteen project. And charlatan is
Speaker 1: a perfectly uh the right word to use, because they've
Speaker 1: retracted or she's walked back a whole bunch of different
Speaker 1: stuff from that bride winning article without admitting it, without
Speaker 1: acknowledging it, They've erased it without saying that they've changed it,
Speaker 1: which is charlatan is um And when challenged on her
Speaker 1: historical claims, she resorts to accusing her critics of racism
Speaker 1: instead of responding to them on the on the merits.
Speaker 1: So that's the that's the the surefire sign of a Charlottean,
Speaker 1: so her she said in at one point defending herself,
Speaker 1: she said, well, this was all about about a narrative,
Speaker 1: about telling a narrative about American history. This isn't supposed
Speaker 1: to be factual. We're this is about creating a story
Speaker 1: about America. Well we all knew that that that that's
Speaker 1: the whole point. And what it was is it's an
Speaker 1: alternative theory of what the American dream is, the alternative
Speaker 1: to that which is articulated in the Declaration of Independence.
Speaker 1: That's what it is is. It was an attempt to
Speaker 1: say the Declaration of Independence is a lie and was
Speaker 1: written by liars, and that in fact, not all men
Speaker 1: are created equal, and that in fact, the Constitution's authors
Speaker 1: did not really mean this. Now, as I said, they're
Speaker 1: very vague about this. So the authors of the project
Speaker 1: are very vague about this. So then they'll turn around
Speaker 1: and say, no, no, we're saying that they that these
Speaker 1: were noble ideals, but they didn't really live up to them.
Speaker 1: But that's a very different thing than saying what they
Speaker 1: actually say, which is that these ideals were were false
Speaker 1: from the beginning, which is a quotation from the from
Speaker 1: the project. So it's vague on purpose in order to
Speaker 1: allow them to to make assertions about America being evil
Speaker 1: and then when they're called on it, to dance back
Speaker 1: across the line and say, no, no, we're just saying
Speaker 1: that America was great in theory, but people fail to
Speaker 1: live up to the noble ideals. But that's not what
Speaker 1: they're really doing. For for so many, um, particularly academics
Speaker 1: in this in this country, and then a lot of
Speaker 1: the students that they're teaching the nation, were like a
Speaker 1: human being that has gone from ignoring all our flaws
Speaker 1: and being uh, you know, pompous and a little deluded
Speaker 1: as to uh to to uh you know where we
Speaker 1: fit in in terms of good and bad to like
Speaker 1: all we do now is we're like a person that
Speaker 1: only emphasizes their failures and walks around saying, nobody could
Speaker 1: ever love me, nobody should ever love me. I'm a
Speaker 1: bad person. It's just so weird, that's right, And there's
Speaker 1: a rhetorical strategy behind this on the part of those
Speaker 1: who are propagating it, and that is, if you want
Speaker 1: to destroy great ideals, the first thing to do is
Speaker 1: to destroy idealism outright, or to elevate things that are
Speaker 1: not really ideal to the status of ideals in order
Speaker 1: to obscure the desire, the aspiration for truth and goodness.
Speaker 1: You tell people that there is no such thing as
Speaker 1: truth and goodness, or that things that are not true
Speaker 1: and are not good are really true and good, in
Speaker 1: order to confuse them. And that's the strategy. That's similar
Speaker 1: strategy is that played with with critical race theory. Critical
Speaker 1: race theory says that there is systemic racism and that
Speaker 1: we should pay attention to systemic racism. What but but
Speaker 1: the ambiguity here is what do we mean by system?
Speaker 1: What system exactly are we're talking about some If you're
Speaker 1: talking about something like let's say the drug war, well,
Speaker 1: you know there are ways in which the drug war
Speaker 1: has racist elements to it from its history and and
Speaker 1: the way it's enforest and so powder cocaine that, and
Speaker 1: we can have that discussion absolutely. But if what you
Speaker 1: mean by system is say capitalism, then we have a
Speaker 1: very different story that capitalism is not inherently racist. Capitalism
Speaker 1: is the greatest boon ever enjoyed by racial minorities in
Speaker 1: the history of the species. So it's it's carefully designed
Speaker 1: to be ambiguous so that when people say systemic, what
Speaker 1: they mean is the same thing that the hippies meant
Speaker 1: when they said the establishment right right exactly at the piece.
Speaker 1: I like it when you mentioned the Hippies Olympics hating
Speaker 1: Tim sander for on the line. Um, So if sixteen
Speaker 1: nineteen project comes up in your school, like you find
Speaker 1: out your kids are being taught that, I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1: Google sixteen nineteen project and Tim Sanderford's name, and you'll
Speaker 1: come up with some of the stuff that he has written,
Speaker 1: and you'll have the ammunition you need to fight back
Speaker 1: against your school board. Now, Tim, if you can hang
Speaker 1: around for a little bit, I got a couple of
Speaker 1: questions because you are one of the You're one of
Speaker 1: America's leading finkers on freedom. According to George will of
Speaker 1: the Washington Post, you're an American treasure. So a lot
Speaker 1: of people out there haven't gotten the vaccine. I didn't
Speaker 1: see that coming. I thought we were going to, you know,
Speaker 1: race to figure out a vaccine, come up with a vaccine,
Speaker 1: figure out how to get it out, and people got
Speaker 1: and get vaccinated. I didn't I didn't really see this
Speaker 1: coming that there would be a pretty big chunk of
Speaker 1: the country that decided they didn't want to get the vaccine. Now,
Speaker 1: you're your lefty media really likes to make it all
Speaker 1: about dumb white Trump voters, and and uh and uh,
Speaker 1: there are an awful lot of other people that aren't
Speaker 1: getting the vaccine. Also, for instance, of New York City's
Speaker 1: Department of Education employees aren't vaccinated. I doubt many of
Speaker 1: those were Trump voters. And there are a lot of
Speaker 1: examples of that in big cities across the country. And uh,
Speaker 1: for instance, um, African American men are as a percentage,
Speaker 1: they as a group of people aren't getting the vaccination
Speaker 1: in the highest numbers. So um. So there's a lot
Speaker 1: of talk now of forcing people to do it. You're
Speaker 1: a libertarian with the great thinkers in America. Where do
Speaker 1: you come down on the government forcing people to get vaccinated? Well,
Speaker 1: the libertarian principle is that it should be up to
Speaker 1: the property owner whether to require somebody to have the
Speaker 1: vaccine before going on his property. If I'm a homeowner
Speaker 1: and somebody didn't come and have dinner at my house,
Speaker 1: I have the right to say you can't come over
Speaker 1: to my house if you don't have a vaccine. Same
Speaker 1: thing if I'm a business owner or whatever. So the
Speaker 1: libertarian answer is that it's a question of prior at
Speaker 1: property rights, and that leaves people free to decide for
Speaker 1: themselves whether to get the vaccine and come over to
Speaker 1: my house or not get the vaccine and not come
Speaker 1: over to my house. So the problem that we have
Speaker 1: is that we've reduced the rights of property and business
Speaker 1: owners so drastically in today's world that people feel like
Speaker 1: they have to look to the government to tell give
Speaker 1: them guidance on on questions that ought to be individual choices. So, um, well, okay,
Speaker 1: well back to their does the federal government if if
Speaker 1: they're going to start if the government's going to start
Speaker 1: mandating this, is this a federal government thing? Is state
Speaker 1: government thing? Who has got the power to even do this?
Speaker 1: It should well, As with everything having to do with
Speaker 1: health and safety, it's primarily a state matter. And and
Speaker 1: that's another thing where we've diverged so much from what
Speaker 1: the Constitution actually requires by giving so much power to
Speaker 1: the federal government, when in fact this should be a
Speaker 1: question that decided at the state level. So for like
Speaker 1: my school, everybody knows who's got kids in school. There
Speaker 1: are a number of shots that you have to get
Speaker 1: to attend a public school. Is that a is that
Speaker 1: a county Bay county thing that is informed by the
Speaker 1: federal government, or is that a federal mandate under existing law,
Speaker 1: it's probably a thing where the the school district gets
Speaker 1: funding from the Feds, and in exchange for that funding,
Speaker 1: you have to agree to a whole bunch of things.
Speaker 1: That's the way most federal control has expanded in the
Speaker 1: in the twentie and early twenty one century is by
Speaker 1: the Feds coming along and saying, well, well, we'll give
Speaker 1: you this this grant, but you have to agree to
Speaker 1: follow our rules if you if you receive the grant,
Speaker 1: and of course you can't really refuse the grant because
Speaker 1: that's your tax money. They've taken that money from you already,
Speaker 1: and they say, we'll give you your tax money back
Speaker 1: if you agree to these rules, and so you know,
Speaker 1: you don't really have a choice about the matter. But
Speaker 1: that's the way most federal mandates are imposed now is
Speaker 1: I know how you feel about a lot of the
Speaker 1: business shutdowns and school shutdowns and everything like that. But
Speaker 1: as an individual, and you've got you know, as much
Speaker 1: bona fights as anybody I know in America in terms
Speaker 1: of libertarian freedom. You know, on my own person, the
Speaker 1: government can't make me do things, blah blah blah. Have
Speaker 1: you felt like the line was crossed for you personally
Speaker 1: and wearing masks or vaccines or anything at any point
Speaker 1: during this pandemic? Not really, No, But remember that I
Speaker 1: I I reside in Arizona, which had a very different
Speaker 1: restaurant to to the pandemic than California did. In California,
Speaker 1: have Governor Newso basically declaring one man rule, even though
Speaker 1: the state legislature is in session now and could make
Speaker 1: the rules, he decides, No, No, I'm going to make
Speaker 1: the rules for everybody unilaterally and impose those on everybody.
Speaker 1: That was very different than the way our state did it,
Speaker 1: which was our governor asked people to stay home for
Speaker 1: a while and then asked them to remain safe, and
Speaker 1: then local governments, counties I had the primary responsibility for
Speaker 1: setting safety rules for how businesses should operate. So I
Speaker 1: just have two minutes left, and this just came up
Speaker 1: in my own real life, and I want to ask
Speaker 1: you about this because you know a lot about the
Speaker 1: Second Amendment. So I wanted to buy some ammunition the
Speaker 1: other day. I already own a gun, but I wanted
Speaker 1: to buy bullets, and I went to the local Big five,
Speaker 1: and at least in the county in the state that
Speaker 1: I live in, the amount of paperwork that they handed
Speaker 1: me and the number of things that I had to
Speaker 1: do to just buy some bullets was freaking unbelievable. How
Speaker 1: expensive it is the paperwork for the basic background check
Speaker 1: for buying bullets. Um, I have to find my birth
Speaker 1: certificate that I've got somewhere in a box or whatever.
Speaker 1: How does this stop violate my Second Amendment right to
Speaker 1: keep in bear arms? Oh? Of course it violates your
Speaker 1: Second Amendment rights. It's death by a thousand cuts, or
Speaker 1: or as they say, being nibbled to death by ducks. Right.
Speaker 1: The state biocrats know perfectly well how to make life
Speaker 1: difficult for you. And then they can say, well, we're
Speaker 1: not denying you, We're just saying you have to fill
Speaker 1: out yet another form and you have to wait another
Speaker 1: six months or we at the Goldwater Institute actually have
Speaker 1: are suing the state of Illinois for failing to issue
Speaker 1: people the permits to which they are legally entitled to
Speaker 1: have to hold firearms. Even the state law says that
Speaker 1: there's a deadline for the estate to decide whether to
Speaker 1: give you or denying the permit. Instead, they just completely
Speaker 1: ignore this deadline and take years sometimes to decide whether
Speaker 1: or not to give you your firearms permit. Meanwhile, you
Speaker 1: have dangerous riots in Chicago and people want firearms to
Speaker 1: protect themselves, and the state says, oh, no, you you
Speaker 1: you have to fill out yet another form and wait
Speaker 1: another six months. Uh, you know, rely on the police.
Speaker 1: We are unfortunately out of time. Tim, and I really
Speaker 1: appreciate everything you had to say today. I'm gonna pump
Speaker 1: your bucks. You want to come back and get