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Speaker 4: I am your host, John Stewart. Haven't you you know
Speaker 4: what you know what? Come? Come, come here, come here,
Speaker 4: con he.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Resistance. I promise here.
Speaker 5: Actually being facetious, but okay, I promise you, for the
Speaker 5: remainder of the next four years, I will only speak
Speaker 5: to you in this tone of voice, this close to
Speaker 5: the camera. I will be relentless or well they will.
Speaker 5: I'm here, mondays, really not even that many. There's a
Speaker 5: dark weeks holidays, and the point is this, you can
Speaker 5: count on me for truly about fifteen hours of resistance total.
Speaker 1: All right, go back down to the thing.
Speaker 4: Welcome to the show, ladies and gentlemen.
Speaker 6: Later I'll be talking with after.
Speaker 4: We do the show this evening.
Speaker 3: Oh what did that time?
Speaker 1: I'm going to be talking with Thomas J. Brewnn.
Speaker 2: And he's the founder of Warhorse, a nonprofit military reporting organization.
Speaker 2: They do fabulous work, you know, gentlemen. The audience asked
Speaker 2: me a little bit earlier, said.
Speaker 1: Hey, last week, what happened.
Speaker 2: Now he may have met it rhetorically, but if you
Speaker 2: remember the last time that we spoke, it was midnight
Speaker 2: on election night, and it seemed even at that moment,
Speaker 2: very clear Donald Trump had won the election in a
Speaker 2: bit of a thumping. Now, part of the disorientation of
Speaker 2: the Democrats losing the electoral vote and the popular vote
Speaker 2: and losing ground in the cities and the areas around
Speaker 2: the cities and the areas around those are I guess you'd.
Speaker 1: Call it America, was.
Speaker 2: That we had all been told by many of our
Speaker 2: best prognosticators it was going to be closed. We ran
Speaker 2: the results in the computer one hundred thousand times. She
Speaker 2: won fifty thousand and one, He won ninety nine, ninety
Speaker 2: nine and nine. But in this coin flip country, I
Speaker 2: was confident because the Democrats had a secret weapon in
Speaker 2: a close election, perhaps the most important weapon.
Speaker 7: Since joining the race, the vice president has raised an
Speaker 7: eye boggling one billion dollars.
Speaker 1: Call me eyes boggled.
Speaker 2: See, the Democrats in a fifty fifty election had a
Speaker 2: billion dollars a war chest to be spent on data
Speaker 2: analytics and consultants and very clearly texting.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of text thing.
Speaker 2: A lot of that money went to how the fuck
Speaker 2: did they just text me I'm in the tub.
Speaker 1: I don't even have my phone. It just came through
Speaker 1: the water.
Speaker 2: And while, of course maybe just giving away a million
Speaker 2: of it every day would have been the smarter, more
Speaker 2: efficient plan. Now the billion dollars went towards the one
Speaker 2: thing Republicans didn't have, couldn't have that would put the
Speaker 2: Democrats over the top.
Speaker 8: And the Harris campaign has a massive ground game, fifty
Speaker 8: thousand volunteers.
Speaker 3: If volunteers, knocking on five million doors in Pennsylvania alone.
Speaker 2: This is the first time, some Democrats have told me
Speaker 2: they've ever heard of people knocking on the same doors
Speaker 2: a second time or a third time. You know, if
Speaker 2: there's one thing people love more than someone appearing randomly
Speaker 2: at their door once, it's that same person coming back
Speaker 2: two or three times.
Speaker 1: To talk politics.
Speaker 2: Even though everyone from vacuum salesman to Jehovah's witnesses, no,
Speaker 2: that's a losing strategy. In fact, they've known that for decades.
Speaker 2: Let's just spend a quarter of a billion dollars on it.
Speaker 1: You know, what Democrats should do.
Speaker 2: Whatever money is left over, send those same people back to.
Speaker 1: Those voters' doors.
Speaker 2: And just knock again during dinner, and when the homeowner
Speaker 2: comes to the door, go what.
Speaker 1: The fuss got? I thought we connected?
Speaker 2: But the reason why, and I give them some shit
Speaker 2: for their strategies was a method to the Democrats madness.
Speaker 2: Democracy and freedom are on the belot, Our democracy is
Speaker 2: on the line. We have to protect democracy.
Speaker 5: We have to work even harder to make sure that
Speaker 5: we defend our democracy.
Speaker 2: We don't get to choose when we're asked to defend democracy.
Speaker 1: We just have to do it. And this is not
Speaker 1: a drill noble words.
Speaker 2: And I'm glad to say Democrats did protect democracy.
Speaker 1: Just for the other.
Speaker 2: Side, because when all is said and done, we had
Speaker 2: a free and fair election in which the Democrats had
Speaker 2: been prepared for almost every scenario but one. The Harris
Speaker 2: campaign has built probably the most sophisticated, robust, impressive voter
Speaker 2: protection program in the history of presidential politics. We have
Speaker 2: millions in the bank ready, with lawyers all over the
Speaker 2: country that are ready. Democrats have been put planning on
Speaker 2: every one of these options for four years.
Speaker 1: Are Democrats ready?
Speaker 9: They are we have the county courts ready to go,
Speaker 9: Secretaries of state ready to go.
Speaker 1: So it's all lined up. What are we forgetting people?
Speaker 4: What we got? The lawyers? We got the protecting the
Speaker 4: Why do we go to? Oh got Jimmy? Did you
Speaker 4: bring the voters?
Speaker 8: Oh?
Speaker 6: I no you ever bringing the voters? I brought the
Speaker 6: hate has no homier posters. Nobody brought the voters. One
Speaker 6: of the voters.
Speaker 2: It turns out the election was stolen by more people
Speaker 2: voting for Donald Trump.
Speaker 1: It's quite a caper Ocean's seventy four million.
Speaker 10: But there.
Speaker 2: So now as many on the left fear the future
Speaker 2: as they should, many others threw the past.
Speaker 1: Joe Biden should have dropped out earlier.
Speaker 11: There should have been in an open primary.
Speaker 3: People never got to know Kamala Harris. They spent too
Speaker 3: little time talking about the economy.
Speaker 10: Wildly overestimated the power of the abortion issue, chose the wrong.
Speaker 2: VP, managed to alienate historic numbers of Latinos, abandoned the
Speaker 2: working class.
Speaker 3: Democrats need a new way to talk about urban America.
Speaker 4: Do that, Joe Rogan podcast. Trump spoke, Trump.
Speaker 1: Spoke to the people.
Speaker 2: Democrats never once mentioned Arnold Palmers, never once, yet focus
Speaker 2: group after focus group said, got anything.
Speaker 1: On Arnold Palmer's car?
Speaker 2: If not, can you at least stand there and sway
Speaker 2: to ave Maria for.
Speaker 1: Like an hour? Can you at least do that?
Speaker 2: But it's a delight to hear about why it happened
Speaker 2: from so many people who were.
Speaker 1: So wrong about what was going to happen. And everyone
Speaker 1: has their own.
Speaker 2: Pet theory, but there's one theory that a lot of
Speaker 2: people seem to be coalescing around. They were too woke,
Speaker 2: insisting that people use the term LATINX too far.
Speaker 3: To the left on transgender rights.
Speaker 2: You have to say, they know, you have to do this,
Speaker 2: stop with a virtue signaling.
Speaker 6: Step away from woke, focus less on who is woke
Speaker 6: and more on who is.
Speaker 11: Broke social justice issues, and take a back seat when
Speaker 11: your son is in the basement vaping and playing video
Speaker 11: games and can't find a job.
Speaker 1: I feel like that last guy was really venting more
Speaker 1: about his son everybody else. That's sort of a broader point, but.
Speaker 4: His was just so specific.
Speaker 2: You really got to focus on, let's say, a kid
Speaker 2: in your basement vaping and just jerking.
Speaker 12: Off all over the couch night after night.
Speaker 2: The point taker everyone's talking about this wokenness theory, from
Speaker 2: cable news to the op ed section, and sometimes the
Speaker 2: op ed section being read on cable news.
Speaker 7: We want to get to the Maureen Dowd piece from
Speaker 7: Loreen Dowd's piece for the New York Times entitled Democrats
Speaker 7: and the Case of Mistaken Identity Politics.
Speaker 2: Ooh, that was Morning Joe host Mika Brazinski discussing a
Speaker 2: New York Times column by Maureen Dowd on how to
Speaker 2: escape the liberal bubble. I guess I'll just have to
Speaker 2: get the Times and read it myself. Unless there's another
Speaker 2: way to make this less entertaining.
Speaker 7: We're going to read the entire piece, but it's worth
Speaker 7: it about wokeness.
Speaker 2: I couldn't even stay woke through that whole thing. Won't
Speaker 2: you read us the word? I only have one problem
Speaker 2: with the woke theory. I just didn't recall seeing any
Speaker 2: Democrats running on woke shit. These were the commercials I
Speaker 2: saw for the Democrats.
Speaker 3: Sharon Brown is working to fix our border.
Speaker 2: Crisis, and Monday Jones is working to secure our border.
Speaker 1: Pat Ryan is restoring order at our southern border.
Speaker 11: I'm Laura Gillon, and I'm here at the border of
Speaker 11: Nassau County. We're two thousand miles from Mexico, but we're
Speaker 11: feeling the migrant crisis almost every day.
Speaker 4: In Nassau County.
Speaker 2: By the way, Suffolk County make my fond day. You
Speaker 2: want a piece of our strip balls, you're gonna have
Speaker 2: to go through Laura Gillon.
Speaker 1: Those are the Democrats. The Democrats. I gave the police
Speaker 1: more money than they even wanted.
Speaker 4: I gave them planes and tanks.
Speaker 6: I built a mold around the country and filled it
Speaker 6: with alligators in Chlamydia. They didn't talk about pronouns. They
Speaker 6: didn't say Latin X. It was the opposite.
Speaker 7: We can't let China steal Wisconsin jobs, benefits for.
Speaker 2: Legal immigrants, no way blocking support for white farmers.
Speaker 8: I mean, look at me standing with law enforcement against
Speaker 8: defunding the police.
Speaker 3: I've owned a gun my whole life.
Speaker 1: Let me be clear. I don't want boys playing girls' sports.
Speaker 3: You all know me. I've never pushed for sex changes.
Speaker 1: Well that's just a weird one at the end there.
Speaker 4: God, guys, you know me.
Speaker 1: It's like George Bailey and it's a wonderful life.
Speaker 2: I'm not the guy I wish your sex shit I'm
Speaker 2: in your shops every day, Mary, Mary.
Speaker 4: It's me, George Bailey.
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to get you to get her sex change.
Speaker 1: I just wishing out would be.
Speaker 2: And don't forget about Kamala Harris. It's not like she
Speaker 2: was exactly waving around her NPR tote bag.
Speaker 1: I have a clock.
Speaker 2: They didn't do the woke thing they try, and they
Speaker 2: acted like Republicans for the last four months. They wore
Speaker 2: cameo hats and went to Cheney family reunions. Do you
Speaker 2: know how dangerous it is to wear a hunting hat
Speaker 2: around Cheney's Give any idea?
Speaker 1: I thought I had one more rip in me. I didn't.
Speaker 2: Democrats were mostly running against an identity that was defined
Speaker 2: for them. Based on a couple of months of post
Speaker 2: George Floyd defund the Police me too Instagram posts from
Speaker 2: four years ago, what happened was the country felt like
Speaker 2: government wasn't working for them, and the Democrats in particular
Speaker 2: were taking their hard earned money and giving it to
Speaker 2: people who didn't deserve it as much as them. So
Speaker 2: the Democrats got shell ACKed. I'm sure any robust examination
Speaker 2: of better policies is very welcome, but I just want
Speaker 2: to Please assure people this isn't forever. This is the
Speaker 2: map in nineteen eighty four, when Ronald Reagan.
Speaker 4: Won, that's the map.
Speaker 2: The only state that Democrats won was Minnesota. Yeah, everyone
Speaker 2: thought that's the end of the Democrats, but eight years
Speaker 2: later there was a Democrat back in office. We don't
Speaker 2: know what's going to happen in four years at all.
Speaker 2: The only thing that is certain is this.
Speaker 1: You all know me.
Speaker 3: I've never pushed for sex changes.
Speaker 1: When we come back, Thomas Brennan, don't go away.
Speaker 4: A lot about in the dark, show my guess tonight.
Speaker 1: We're delighted to have him on.
Speaker 2: A decorated veteran who's served in Iraq and Afghanistan. He
Speaker 2: is now a journalist and founder of the award winning
Speaker 2: nonprofit newsroom, The Warhorse. Please welcome to the program, retired
Speaker 2: US Marine Corps Sergeant Thomas Brennan, Sir, nice to see you.
Speaker 3: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 4: First.
Speaker 2: I want to congratulate you what Thomas has created with Warhorse.
Speaker 2: Just very briefly tell them it's such an impressive organization
Speaker 2: and idea. It's a very small organization, but it's about
Speaker 2: military journalism in a different way. Tell us what that is.
Speaker 8: So The Warhorse is a team of seven full timers
Speaker 8: right now that we're a nonprofit newsroom focused on the
Speaker 8: human impact of military service. What we do is we
Speaker 8: publish long form investigative reporting. We toast writing seminars that
Speaker 8: train the next generation of writers that are veterans and
Speaker 8: military family members.
Speaker 1: Right and they've done.
Speaker 2: Kelly Kennedy, who is part of your team, The reporting
Speaker 2: that she did on toxic exposure was I think instrumental.
Speaker 8: Kelly's impact on the veteran community and far as raising
Speaker 8: awareness about toxic exposure as I think, you know, really
Speaker 8: helped you and other advocates have a tremendous impact on
Speaker 8: the veteran community and make sure that future service members
Speaker 8: that are poisoned by the Department of Defense get the
Speaker 8: health care that they deserve.
Speaker 2: Yes, and they will be That's kind of how That's
Speaker 2: how they operate.
Speaker 3: It's kind of their thing.
Speaker 2: What did you think when you started it? What were
Speaker 2: you not seeing in military reporting that made you think
Speaker 2: there is a better way to connect these stories to
Speaker 2: veterans themselves and to active military service members.
Speaker 8: So when I first got off active duty, I worked
Speaker 8: as a local reporter outside of campla June in North Carolina.
Speaker 8: I was the last full time military reporter in twenty
Speaker 8: fourteen when I left to go to journalism school. So
Speaker 8: there hasn't been a military reporter in eastern North Carolina
Speaker 8: at the second largest Marine Corps base in the world
Speaker 8: since well for ten years now. So what I noticed
Speaker 8: at the boots on the ground level was I was
Speaker 8: covering stories of national importance, and because of the decline
Speaker 8: in the military or in the journalism ecosystem, those stories
Speaker 8: weren't being picked up.
Speaker 3: People weren't hearing about them.
Speaker 8: And it wasn't until I published one story about the
Speaker 8: NBA the National Defense Authorization Act in twenty thirteen, where
Speaker 8: they were cutting suicide prevention care for active duty service members.
Speaker 3: I wrote a story about that.
Speaker 8: The Secretary Defense within three days reverse the furloughs, restored
Speaker 8: mental health care to full capacity, and it was a
Speaker 8: moment in my career where I felt like I really
Speaker 8: saved a life.
Speaker 3: And at that moment, I asked.
Speaker 8: Myself, like, how can there be a national newsroom that
Speaker 8: focuses on these topics and help increase awareness among the
Speaker 8: American public to the issues the veterans of military families face.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have to say, it's a remarkable what you
Speaker 2: guys do. Now, the tough part is, here's the part
Speaker 2: that makes me crazy. So it's a nonprofit, yes, which
Speaker 2: most of news is now not by choice.
Speaker 1: But how difficult is it?
Speaker 2: This is such an important service to the military community,
Speaker 2: to the nation as a whole, and yet you've got
Speaker 2: to go out there and raise the money to keep
Speaker 2: just seven people out there being able to do that.
Speaker 2: How difficult is it to even get funding for these things.
Speaker 8: Warhorse was brought to life by five hundred and fifty
Speaker 8: donors on Kickstarter back in twenty sixteen.
Speaker 3: That was back when it was just myself with an idea.
Speaker 1: It was just a web thing.
Speaker 8: It was just a web thing. I went to journalism
Speaker 8: school at Columbia, graduated, and I left with no plans
Speaker 8: of having a job. You know. I just wanted to
Speaker 8: start the Warhorse. I figured I was young enough and
Speaker 8: I had it was an opportunity for me to have
Speaker 8: what I thought was a massive impact on the military
Speaker 8: and veteran community, and I just decided to run with it.
Speaker 8: And then those people wound up investing in me and
Speaker 8: investing in the idea, and at that point.
Speaker 3: I just couldn't give up. I had to keep going.
Speaker 6: You weren't just sitting in your basement vaping. You know,
Speaker 6: that's a thing that's going around now a lot of
Speaker 6: kids these.
Speaker 1: Days, they say, in the basement vaping.
Speaker 2: I don't answer that.
Speaker 4: Don't answer that.
Speaker 2: Along with the work that you did. So, I think
Speaker 2: what's remarkable about your story. And I've known you for
Speaker 2: a long time and I'm just such an admirer of
Speaker 2: your dedication, but I didn't know your whole story, to
Speaker 2: be frank until recently. This is now the twentieth anniversary
Speaker 2: of the Battle of Fallujah, which I think Americans, for
Speaker 2: the most part, I've heard of because it was considered
Speaker 2: one of the just most bloodiest, dangerous battles that was it.
Speaker 2: November November is the anniversary of that battle.
Speaker 8: Correct, November seventh of this month was the twentieth anniversary
Speaker 8: of Operation Phantom Fury.
Speaker 2: So you've done something I think that must be incredibly
Speaker 2: difficult for you. As a journalist, you generally are outside
Speaker 2: of the sphere of the story, but this is something
Speaker 2: you were there. Yes, what made you decide to want
Speaker 2: to tell the story of Fallujah and the group that
Speaker 2: you were with at that time, and to tell it now.
Speaker 8: For twenty years, I have watched as the conversation about
Speaker 8: war and the experiences of the men and women who
Speaker 8: actually execute those wars on the ground be controlled by
Speaker 8: public affairs officers and senior military officials, whether they're generals
Speaker 8: or officials at the Pentagon, and I had I have
Speaker 8: applatoon that I served with in Iraq, and I have
Speaker 8: very unique access to be able to talk to them
Speaker 8: about our experiences. So around the nineteenth anniversary, I went
Speaker 8: back to them and I said, I really want to
Speaker 8: tell our story. I want to show the American public
Speaker 8: what happened during Phantom Fury from our perspective and without hesitation.
Speaker 8: All of the Marines and Corman that you see in
Speaker 8: the film that we created jumped at the opportunity and
Speaker 8: never hesitated for a moment to hop on camera and
Speaker 8: share their story with the American public.
Speaker 2: And I thought, what was so interesting is you don't
Speaker 2: ever shy away from the fact that many of you
Speaker 2: struggled from that but weren't able really to even share
Speaker 2: it with each other. And if you don't mind, would
Speaker 2: you mind telling the story of you know, your platoon. Unfortunately,
Speaker 2: didn't come back intact.
Speaker 8: For twenty years, we've all, I think it's fair to
Speaker 8: say we've avoided the conversation with each other. One of
Speaker 8: the things that I think is abundantly clear in the
Speaker 8: film is that we all struggle with survivor's guilt. Like
Speaker 8: our Corman blames himself that he couldn't save Bradley Fairclough,
Speaker 8: I blame myself. I was down the street and it's
Speaker 8: completely irrational for me to believe that I should have
Speaker 8: shot a rocket into that house. But I feel that way.
Speaker 8: My lieutenant, he was in charge of our entire platoon,
Speaker 8: he feels like he feels like he has a burden
Speaker 8: of responsibility for why Bradley didn't make it home. So
Speaker 8: it it was a healing series of conversations that we
Speaker 8: were able to have back in August, and I'm just
Speaker 8: incredibly proud of.
Speaker 3: I mean, our.
Speaker 8: Coremen and the Marines that I served with were willing
Speaker 8: to just put their heart on display for the American
Speaker 8: public and the hopes that they would listen to our sacrifices,
Speaker 8: Like we are just a dozen marines from a battle
Speaker 8: that included well over a thousand of US, and that
Speaker 8: doesn't include the Iraqis and the Brits and the you know,
Speaker 8: the other people that participated with us, and whether you
Speaker 8: were a mortuary affairs, marine and infantrymen, a pilot, or
Speaker 8: you know, ADMIN processing the casualty reports back at the base,
Speaker 8: every single person who was in Iraq at that point
Speaker 8: felt the impact of Fallujah and it's continued to shape
Speaker 8: how we fought our wars and how we deploy our troops.
Speaker 3: Up to today.
Speaker 2: And the fact that you're able to tell the story.
Speaker 2: You know, we spoke about this a few times about
Speaker 2: the moral injury, about war being a failure on all
Speaker 2: levels of human civilization, and the fact that you guys
Speaker 2: signed up for something knowing the price you could pay,
Speaker 2: and maybe even some of the things that had to
Speaker 2: be done, but that leaving things on your soul.
Speaker 8: It's easy to look at an army infantryman or a
Speaker 8: Marine infantryman and say like, oh, yes, they signed up
Speaker 8: to go see combat or to go off to war.
Speaker 8: But the one thing, there's one thing that I think
Speaker 8: the average American just doesn't understand is that everybody who
Speaker 8: enlists or is commissioned in the military, regardless of whether
Speaker 8: you're admin or you work in a hospital, or you
Speaker 8: fix trucks and turn wrenches, or your special forces or
Speaker 8: a grunt like everybody is willing to make that same sacrifice.
Speaker 8: So it's I think that we just really need to
Speaker 8: start paying attention more to what we're asking service members
Speaker 8: and their families to endure on behalf of us as
Speaker 8: a country. It's a vital part of the conversation that's
Speaker 8: just missing, and it's even less present in the in
Speaker 8: the journalism ecosystem. Less than five percent of all journalism
Speaker 8: focuses on the military and national security, whereas, as you've
Speaker 8: talked about before, it's our number one budget item in
Speaker 8: this country.
Speaker 3: So the disparity of.
Speaker 8: You know, the conversation that we're having in the conversation
Speaker 8: that needs to be had, it pales.
Speaker 3: There's no contest.
Speaker 2: And I'm always struck also by the kind of almost
Speaker 2: schizophrenic cultural way that we relate to the military. You know,
Speaker 2: I watched football all day yesterday, and it was a celebration,
Speaker 2: justifiably so of people's sacrifice, but it was so steeped
Speaker 2: in kind of a numbing patriotism that didn't really explore
Speaker 2: as you're saying. And then I watched what you had filmed,
Speaker 2: and the disparity between what the soldiers are experiencing and
Speaker 2: what their families are experiencing, and the kind of rah rah,
Speaker 2: it's Veterans Day, come to Denny's for ten percent off.
Speaker 1: It's really jarring.
Speaker 8: It hurts as a veteran. I mean it really does.
Speaker 8: I think I can speak for a lot of us
Speaker 8: when I say the performative thank you for your services,
Speaker 8: where somebody just continues walking and continues their day. Me personally,
Speaker 8: I'd rather not get that. What I really want from
Speaker 8: the American public on Veterans Day and every other day
Speaker 8: is for them to actually care, care about the policies
Speaker 8: that are put into place that are going to affect
Speaker 8: veterans and military families and activity service members, care about
Speaker 8: the use of force, and when we send people off
Speaker 8: to combat, don't wait till the ten or twentieth anniversary
Speaker 8: of a battle to reconnect with the service members who
Speaker 8: fought it. Like, be proactive in this conversation, because like,
Speaker 8: if it ever comes to the point where we get
Speaker 8: to a draft or where we need to send people
Speaker 8: off to war, like it's going to be your son,
Speaker 8: it's going to be your daughter, it's going to be
Speaker 8: our nation's children who are answering that call, and like,
Speaker 8: when that happens, it's too late to.
Speaker 2: Actually care, right, and we need to understand what the
Speaker 2: true cost of that is. Yes, not just as a
Speaker 2: budget line on them. I want to play something from
Speaker 2: the documentary. You know, there's something in it you talked
Speaker 2: about you were there with the Navy coreman, and you
Speaker 2: talked a little bit about the responsibility not just that
Speaker 2: your whole you know, platoon felt, but that the Navy
Speaker 2: corman in particular, that they sort of suffer in a
Speaker 2: strange silence. And it's a little bit from I believe
Speaker 2: it's fair close mother, yes, speaking about the death of
Speaker 2: her son and the Army corpsman as well.
Speaker 1: So can we run that real quick?
Speaker 9: I guess knowing Bradley wouldn't alone when he died was
Speaker 9: the most comforting, and then seeing how much each one
Speaker 9: of you cared about him was sort of amazing to me.
Speaker 9: I don't think I really saw too much of your
Speaker 9: pain at that memorial service. I was kind of in
Speaker 9: a state of shock, but I really felt like they
Speaker 9: were being strong, so I'd be strong.
Speaker 10: My relationship with Kathleen means a lot. She treats me
Speaker 10: as if I was one of her own. I can
Speaker 10: feel that she loves me just as much as a
Speaker 10: mother could love one of their kids, and that means
Speaker 10: a lot. She's constantly telling me it's not my fault.
Speaker 10: I need to stop blaming myself.
Speaker 1: What did that moment mean to him?
Speaker 8: So that's Ronaldo Ponte. He is our Corman. Corman are
Speaker 8: why Marines run into fire. They are why we stare
Speaker 8: down machine guns. They are why we are willing to
Speaker 8: kick indoors. It's because we know that they might not
Speaker 8: save us, but they're going to do everything that they can.
Speaker 8: As a marine, I cannot understate how much Corman mean
Speaker 8: to us. The pain that I have seen Ronaldo carry
Speaker 8: for losing faircloth and has been tremendous over the last
Speaker 8: twenty years and watching him just we were sitting inside
Speaker 8: of the Fallujah exhibit at the National Museum and Marine
Speaker 8: Corps and what a lot of people don't realize is
Speaker 8: that Doc was kicked out for smoking weed after we
Speaker 8: got back from Iraq, and the Marine Corps publicly shamed
Speaker 8: him and told them that he lost his honor and
Speaker 8: that he shouldn't be proud of his service and I
Speaker 8: feel like this film led our platoon. It helped Doc
Speaker 8: feel pride in his service again. It helped Doc feel
Speaker 8: like he tried his best. It helped it helped all
Speaker 8: of us see Doc take a met like a legitimate
Speaker 8: step forward in his healing. And like I said to
Speaker 8: the Marine Corps when I thanked him for letting us
Speaker 8: film there was like Doc and our entire platoon left
Speaker 8: that exhibit with our packs much lighter, listening to Kathleen
Speaker 8: read her son's final letter in there, listening to Doc
Speaker 8: claim what the Marine Corps did to him and how
Speaker 8: it's left a mark on his life. It may sound selfish,
Speaker 8: but it made marines in the platoon feel like we
Speaker 8: had his back the same way that he had our
Speaker 8: back under fire.
Speaker 3: And I just I hope, more.
Speaker 8: Than anything, as I continue moving forward and as this
Speaker 8: film continues to build up steam and is that Doc
Speaker 8: continues his journey to healing, because if there's anybody in
Speaker 8: our platoon that deserves it, it's him.
Speaker 2: Well, Thomas, Uh, I can't tell you how incredible the
Speaker 2: work is. It's not selfish at all. It is everything
Speaker 2: that I think the Marine Corps stands for, which is
Speaker 2: we don't leave anybody behind no matter what happens.
Speaker 1: You do amazing work. Love you, thanks for being here.
Speaker 3: Thank you.
Speaker 2: Thomas Brandon, Shadows of Paluza, war Horse, dott Or.
Speaker 1: We're gonna take a book break.
Speaker 4: And that is down Sharper tonight.
Speaker 1: Before we go, we're gonna check in with your host
Speaker 1: for the rest of the week.
Speaker 4: Mister Jordan Clupper.
Speaker 6: Jordan Clapp, Jordan, what we got coming up for the
Speaker 6: rest of the week.
Speaker 13: Oh well, John, I'm choosing not to dwell on our
Speaker 13: grim future. There's lots to be happy about. In fact,
Speaker 13: I spent the weekend enjoying all this beautiful summer weather.
Speaker 1: Yeah that it was unseasonably warm its.
Speaker 13: Fall, yes, well that would explain the cozy smell of campfire.
Speaker 2: That was actually wildfires, Jordan, New Jersey, Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: From the drought. Everything was pretty much a fly.
Speaker 13: I'm trying to be optimistic, John. Just this morning I
Speaker 13: saw a horse and carriage ride by. Actually there was
Speaker 13: no carriage, and technically there were four horses. You saw
Speaker 13: four horsemen, I mean they were they were hooded and floating,
Speaker 13: So it's it's hard to tell.
Speaker 1: Keep keep smiling up for everybody here.
Speaker 4: It is your moment is.
Speaker 11: Now that good he discussed, and his view could be
Speaker 11: unraveled right by a second Trump administration.
Speaker 3: Okay, we can't hear Kayla.
Speaker 6: Explore more shows from the Daily Show podcast universe by
Speaker 6: searching The Daily Show wherever you.
Speaker 4: Get your podcasts.
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