Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, tour announcement, it's just me. Chuck. Josh isn't
Speaker 1: here for this one. We had to get it out
Speaker 1: the door. So apologies for fifty of stuff you should know.
Speaker 1: But we have added two dates to uh the two
Speaker 1: thousand eighteen tour, and there may be another couple to come.
Speaker 1: You never know. But everybody we asked Salt Lake City
Speaker 1: ins and Utahn's should we come there, and boy, we
Speaker 1: heard from you, so we're coming. It is that easy.
Speaker 1: Tuesday October, we are coming to Salt Lake City for
Speaker 1: an evening with stuff you should know at the Grand
Speaker 1: Theater and we are super excited. I'll tell you what.
Speaker 1: You guys really came through on the emails and social
Speaker 1: meds and let us know that we would see some
Speaker 1: love if we came to Salt Lake City, a city
Speaker 1: we've talked about often in the past. So we are
Speaker 1: a coming Tuesday, October twenty three, and we decided, hey,
Speaker 1: we're gonna be out there, we might as well add
Speaker 1: another city that we've never been to. So it is
Speaker 1: your lucky day, Phoenix eras Zona and dare I say,
Speaker 1: Tucson and in the Greater Phoenix area drive over to
Speaker 1: Phoenix and come see us on Wednesday October at the
Speaker 1: Van Buren. And this is also an evening with Stuff
Speaker 1: you Should Know. I don't even know what that means,
Speaker 1: but it sounds a little more regal than normal. So
Speaker 1: come see us October Salt Lake City and Phoenix. Uh,
Speaker 1: you know what, I don't even know if tickets are
Speaker 1: on sale. I believe by the time this announcement goes up,
Speaker 1: tickets will be on sale, and you can go to
Speaker 1: the Van Buren website or to the Grand Theater website
Speaker 1: to get your ticket links. I will try and have
Speaker 1: them up very soon on s y s K live
Speaker 1: dot com, but I don't know if I'll get to
Speaker 1: that today, but look forward soon and we can't wait
Speaker 1: to see you, guys. Welcome to Stuff you Should Know
Speaker 1: from House Stuff Works dot com. Hey, and welcome to
Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, and there's Charles W. Chuck Bryant,
Speaker 1: and we've got guest producer Tristan with us today. Ye
Speaker 1: who's filling in for Jerry who may or may not exist.
Speaker 1: Tristan exists. Look at him. He shaved his mustache. I know,
Speaker 1: and Chuck, he shaved his mustache. Within a day of
Speaker 1: me telling him how cool it was next time I
Speaker 1: saw him, no mustache. Interesting, Yeah, that's what I thought too.
Speaker 1: What's that all about, Tristan? That's cool, that's probably the
Speaker 1: appropriate response to that one. Yeah, but he's I noticed.
Speaker 1: You can't even look at in the eye right now.
Speaker 1: So no, luckily we're sitting beside one another, not facing
Speaker 1: one another. Else to be really weird for the next
Speaker 1: two hours. Pulls a knife. You'll know that because I
Speaker 1: just run from the room. Okay, that'll be the signal.
Speaker 1: All right, sounds good. So let's say that Tristan pulled
Speaker 1: the knife on me and I had nothing to do
Speaker 1: with the fact that I complimented slash ruined his mustache. Um,
Speaker 1: let's say that it was because he was a drug
Speaker 1: addled lunatic. Okay, like he was literally attracted to the
Speaker 1: moon and he was on drugs and he pulled a knife. Um,
Speaker 1: had I got my phone out in time and called
Speaker 1: nine one one and the cops had shown up, you know,
Speaker 1: immediately and arrested him. Tristan could have been up for
Speaker 1: what's known as chuck a drug court. Yeah and wait, wait,
Speaker 1: that was now my best in trove. No, that was
Speaker 1: good of the ten years, but it was in the
Speaker 1: top sadly, Okay, so that means in the like about
Speaker 1: I can't even do math right now? So what's wrong
Speaker 1: with your brain? I went to a show last night,
Speaker 1: so I'm I'm I didn't even drink much. I'm just tired.
Speaker 1: Who'd you go see? Calexico? Oh? Really? Boys? Yeah? What else?
Speaker 1: Are they? An? Iron and Wine? Well they did a
Speaker 1: they did a record with with them, That's what it was.
Speaker 1: But they're not in them, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: So they did it. They did a joint jam together,
Speaker 1: they did, and I'm a little I'm just tired as
Speaker 1: a result. Okay, well let me set it up again, Chuck,
Speaker 1: I don't know. Okay. Well, here's the thing is, did
Speaker 1: you uh did you really know about drug courts? I
Speaker 1: mean it was something that I was aware of. I
Speaker 1: don't sit and think about different types of courts much, um,
Speaker 1: and I've never been through drug court, but I I
Speaker 1: guess I knew it was there. I didn't know this
Speaker 1: much about it, and I certainly, I gotta say I've
Speaker 1: never run across a more glowing review of drug courts
Speaker 1: among anything in the media, and the media really loves
Speaker 1: drug courts, but apparently how stuff works heart drug courts
Speaker 1: like crazy. Yeah, I did not specifically know what it was.
Speaker 1: I did a brief little skim when I picked up
Speaker 1: the article, but I thought when I saw drug courts,
Speaker 1: I was very naive and I was like, oh that,
Speaker 1: you know, the are just like courts set up just
Speaker 1: to run people into jail as fast as possible. Oh
Speaker 1: I see, I see, you know, like just let's turn
Speaker 1: and burn like a hundred cases a day and just
Speaker 1: throw people in the slammer. But it turns out it
Speaker 1: is the exact opposite of that. Yeah, it is, and
Speaker 1: turning burn this is like top gun. All of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I am dangerous. So no, it's it's meant to be
Speaker 1: the exact opposite and ideally, and it sounds like there
Speaker 1: are some actually really really good, ideal drug courts out there.
Speaker 1: It is it's meant to do the opposite. It's meant
Speaker 1: to say, hey, man, you're a criminal. Let's not kid
Speaker 1: ourselves here, but you're a criminal really because you're addicted
Speaker 1: to drugs. You're addict first in a criminal second, right,
Speaker 1: and then maybe a family member, fourth or fifth. But
Speaker 1: you kind of put that on the back burner during
Speaker 1: your drug career. Right, So, so you you're on drugs
Speaker 1: and you're you're committing crimes and even more to the point,
Speaker 1: and this is how it kind of got its towards you,
Speaker 1: in which we'll get to in a second. I've seen
Speaker 1: you before. I recognize your face. That's how bad this
Speaker 1: situation is. You're clogging up the court system. I I've
Speaker 1: got like a serial killer behind you who's like getting
Speaker 1: very impatient. Frankly, we need to move this along, save
Speaker 1: some money. Let's figure out if there's another way, um
Speaker 1: that we can we can do this that actually helps you,
Speaker 1: but that also helps society and saves costs, and that
Speaker 1: came in the form of drug courts. Yeah, so should
Speaker 1: we should we get in our our low rider, our
Speaker 1: low rider way back machine and and drive back to
Speaker 1: the the late eighties and Dade County, Florida. So first
Speaker 1: I bought us matching pastel suits. I appreciate that to
Speaker 1: where put it on, it's on, it's puffy, it looks
Speaker 1: like what's that grepe paper? Crepe paper? Yeah, or fish skin?
Speaker 1: All right, So we're in Miami Dade County. Um, we're
Speaker 1: in our are metallic purple Lowrider. We're driving around and
Speaker 1: there's a lot of people on crack. It's hid the
Speaker 1: crack epidemic, right, and people are being run through, Like
Speaker 1: you said, these courts so often, and these jails are
Speaker 1: so clogged because these drug addicts are being run through there.
Speaker 1: Sometimes they are dealing drugs, maybe sometimes they're committing crimes,
Speaker 1: but sometimes they're just people who had drugs on them
Speaker 1: and are very sadly addicted to crack cocaine. To the
Speaker 1: point like where what you said, which is these these
Speaker 1: judges are saying, man, you've been in here five times
Speaker 1: in the last six months, and this is no good.
Speaker 1: There's got to be a better way, right, So some
Speaker 1: judges actually got together and they said, let's let's make
Speaker 1: a better way. And they I don't know exactly how
Speaker 1: they did this. They couldn't find the um full story
Speaker 1: on it, like whose singular idea it was, or how
Speaker 1: they actually went about establishing it. I guess they they
Speaker 1: the municipal court system gives these judges a tremendous amount
Speaker 1: of leeway and setting up courts on their own apparently.
Speaker 1: But in Miami Dade County, the judges got together and said,
Speaker 1: we're gonna set up what what will be the nation's
Speaker 1: first drug court. Actually I found out who the very
Speaker 1: first person it was, judge drug. Oh that's what it
Speaker 1: was named for. What a coincidence? Don't that weird? Judge
Speaker 1: crack cocaine. But there was there's an interesting story in
Speaker 1: our our own article that we should probably highlight about
Speaker 1: this attorney, David Scott Marcus, that I thought was pretty interesting,
Speaker 1: and he was in He was an attorney on drugs.
Speaker 1: He was arrested drug possession, leaving the scene him an accident.
Speaker 1: His defense attorney. So, so, wait, you just painted a
Speaker 1: picture that I think screams Porsche. Yeah, yeah, I probably had,
Speaker 1: which I thought was kind of like the coolest car.
Speaker 1: Time is it the one? It looked kind of like
Speaker 1: a Lotus submarine bond low to submarine. It had like
Speaker 1: the pointiest end, pointiest front. M it's the one from
Speaker 1: Risky Business. Not familiar. I think that's all right, and
Speaker 1: if I'm wrong, so be it. Porsche. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to google that stuff right now. But he was a
Speaker 1: defense attorney and a successful one too, and he was
Speaker 1: assigned to drug court. His attorney said, can we can
Speaker 1: we put this guy in drug court and his his
Speaker 1: quote in this article says, it wasn't an arrest, it
Speaker 1: was a rescue and he was in his mid thirties.
Speaker 1: Um went up in front of Judge Stanley Goldstein drug
Speaker 1: and apparently like this is this is kind of a
Speaker 1: great success story of a drug court situation because this
Speaker 1: guy turned his life around, committed to this program, went
Speaker 1: to the twelve step meetings, and is now a successful
Speaker 1: attorney again trying to steer his clients to drug courts
Speaker 1: because it works so well for him. Right, And that's
Speaker 1: actually one of the ways you can be steered toward
Speaker 1: a drug court is your attorney, your defense attorney can
Speaker 1: go to the judge it when when you're busted and
Speaker 1: say this person is a really great candidate for for
Speaker 1: drug court. Judge can say I agree, let's do this
Speaker 1: and kick you over the drug court. Yeah. So this
Speaker 1: one in Miami was the first one. It was sort
Speaker 1: of the pilot program, I guess, and uh, by most
Speaker 1: measures and well we'll talk, We'll save the poop pooing
Speaker 1: until the very end. How about that? That sounds okay? Um,
Speaker 1: But it was looked at as a success and then
Speaker 1: all around the country, they started emulating this program to
Speaker 1: the tune of today. There says in our article there's
Speaker 1: more than three thousand of these set up in the
Speaker 1: United States. Yeah, it seems to be hovering just over
Speaker 1: three thousand. I think I saw three thousand, fifty seven,
Speaker 1: three thousand seventy six, so it seems to have topped
Speaker 1: out at about three thousands. Although there is a two
Speaker 1: thousand seventeen memo or I guess advisory from the Commission
Speaker 1: on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis, and it
Speaker 1: recommended this is ye two seventeen, late late two seventeen,
Speaker 1: that every district in the US established a drug court.
Speaker 1: So it's possible there will be more in the future.
Speaker 1: I don't know how many districts are. Maybe there's three
Speaker 1: thousand eighty two. Maybe we're almost there. But they're like,
Speaker 1: come on, you guys, just just let's make it a
Speaker 1: h Yeah. So, like you were saying, it can come
Speaker 1: from the defense attorney, but it can also be a prosecutor.
Speaker 1: It can be the cop who arrested you. Um. The
Speaker 1: way I look at this is it seems like everyone
Speaker 1: sort of it's like a team effort. It's it's set
Speaker 1: up in a way so it's not adversarial. It's not
Speaker 1: like the prosecutor and the defense attorney are fighting each
Speaker 1: other in this case, and the judge, like everyone's sort
Speaker 1: of kind of gets on the same side to say, hey,
Speaker 1: le's see if we can straighten this person out. Right.
Speaker 1: Not only is it not ever cereal and a drug court,
Speaker 1: the prosecutor and the defense attorney are required to hold
Speaker 1: hands throughout the entire hearing. I know, and Bobby mcferron,
Speaker 1: right besides, as the bailiff, instead of swearing on the Bible,
Speaker 1: you just think, don't worry, be happy. That's the same time,
Speaker 1: and then everybody goes they clap and go drug court.
Speaker 1: At the end of every session, we should probably yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: let's take a break. That's why Skoddy should know. Should
Speaker 1: I go large? I was sk okay. So Bobby mcfarren
Speaker 1: has just left the room. Oh and court is starting, Yes,
Speaker 1: court is started. You know who would have been a
Speaker 1: great drug court judge is Harry Stone r I p yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's it just recently passed. He was not an
Speaker 1: old man, no, and by all accounts a really good guy.
Speaker 1: When all the oh yeah people started pouring out their stories.
Speaker 1: He was It seems like he was a really good dude.
Speaker 1: He did this some really heartfelt, like very moving one
Speaker 1: man show um right after Hurricane Katrina that you can
Speaker 1: as probably on YouTube, if not on like Netflix or
Speaker 1: something like that. Um. That was about, you know, all
Speaker 1: the horrible things that happened from the flooding and just
Speaker 1: the humanitarian crisis that arose. It was pretty great. Wow.
Speaker 1: And if you don't know who he is, people, then
Speaker 1: we are referencing the great, great show Night Work from
Speaker 1: the eighties. I would say, one great wow, build him up,
Speaker 1: and he knocked them down. No. I thought he was
Speaker 1: accused a great individual, but the show itself was one great,
Speaker 1: not great great, so Harry the great great Harry ins
Speaker 1: and was limited by his the bad writing to one
Speaker 1: great there you go. But but he his character specifically
Speaker 1: from this this explanation of drug courts and what what
Speaker 1: is expected of drug court judges, it is exactly what
Speaker 1: he did. Like he was compassionate towards the person. He
Speaker 1: wanted to know what their backstory was. He would recognize
Speaker 1: them by sight, sometimes by name. Every once a while
Speaker 1: he would lighten the move with the magic trick. Um.
Speaker 1: Maybe take away the magic trick part. But all of
Speaker 1: those things are boxes that a drug court judge is
Speaker 1: supposed to check. It is nothing like what normal court is. Like, yeah, correct,
Speaker 1: which is why it's let's sitcom right, it's it's more
Speaker 1: like night court than regular court drug court is. That's right.
Speaker 1: So all right, how it's how it works is very
Speaker 1: dependent on what court it is, because as everyone knows
Speaker 1: it's it's works on the state level, and then like
Speaker 1: the city or county or municipality level as far as
Speaker 1: how they want to structure their own scene. Sometimes it's
Speaker 1: people that only people that have didn't have like a
Speaker 1: violent crime um committed in the course of their drug use.
Speaker 1: I saw that that was a federal funding requirement that
Speaker 1: really you couldn't also be up on violent crime charges.
Speaker 1: So like so like if you shot somebody in the
Speaker 1: kneecap while you're robbing them for drug money, you're probably
Speaker 1: not going to get kicked at drug court. Well, and
Speaker 1: sometimes if you have dealt drugs, you're not allowed in
Speaker 1: the drug court. That's another one. To a lot of
Speaker 1: them tend to pick first time offenders um, people who
Speaker 1: are new to the court system. If you are caught
Speaker 1: on like possession charges or something like that, and there's
Speaker 1: a drug court in the county that you're in or
Speaker 1: the municipality that you're in, there's probably a hundred and
Speaker 1: ten percent chance they will recommend drug court for you. Right.
Speaker 1: And then sometimes they will have the defendant sign a
Speaker 1: contract saying, you know, I'm on board with this. I'm
Speaker 1: actually signing my name on this document. Um. Sometimes they'll
Speaker 1: even uh, they'll even have to plead guilty. Right. So
Speaker 1: there's two ways that it can go. One is that
Speaker 1: they say we have you. You are you've been indicted
Speaker 1: and charged with possession of crack cocaine right right, And um,
Speaker 1: if if you go to regular court, you will probably
Speaker 1: get sentenced. Here's what your jail time might be. Um,
Speaker 1: but we are offering for you to go to drug
Speaker 1: court instead. And what we're gonna do is we're gonna
Speaker 1: defer these charges against you pending your graduation from this
Speaker 1: drug court program. We'll get more into the program in
Speaker 1: a second. But it's hanging out there as as a potential, Like,
Speaker 1: but if you don't, then this is what's waiting for you. Right.
Speaker 1: It's not like everybody's just gonna forget about it. After
Speaker 1: you go to drug court, right, Like, this is this
Speaker 1: is one of the things, right, So coercion is the
Speaker 1: key to drug court, right. Um. The other way that
Speaker 1: they can do it is they can say you have
Speaker 1: to plead guilty to this charge, and if you go
Speaker 1: to drug court and graduate successfully, you will the judge
Speaker 1: will either dismiss your sentence or they might even expunge
Speaker 1: the them the conviction from your from your permanent record. Yes,
Speaker 1: I was trying to remember my violent femmes. Uh. And
Speaker 1: here's the other thing that's that's different than regular court
Speaker 1: is this is all done very fast. Um. It's not
Speaker 1: like you're hung up for weeks and months trying to
Speaker 1: figure this out. Because their whole deal is as you
Speaker 1: you walk in there addicted to drugs, and they want
Speaker 1: to get you treatment as soon as possible, right, so
Speaker 1: in patient or outpatient. So so like within days of
Speaker 1: an arrest, you could be in treatment. Yes, which is
Speaker 1: again if you go to normal jail, that is not
Speaker 1: what happens. Most jails don't offer treatment. Um, treatment programs.
Speaker 1: Some do, but a lot of them don't. So if
Speaker 1: you go to jail, your treatment is either going cold
Speaker 1: Turkey or just doing a bunch of drugs in jail. Right.
Speaker 1: This is this is meant to say, Okay, we're going
Speaker 1: to actually keep you out of jail. You're not going
Speaker 1: to jail right now, but you're going into this treatment program.
Speaker 1: And like you said, it could be impatient or outpatient.
Speaker 1: It can be public funded treatment, or it could be
Speaker 1: a private like treatment hospital like a rehab center. Right.
Speaker 1: And all of this stuff is is hammered out on
Speaker 1: a case by case basis. So you are recommended by
Speaker 1: either the your your attorney or a judge that sees
Speaker 1: you in the criminal court might say you do better
Speaker 1: in drug court. The arresting officer apparently can can recommend
Speaker 1: drug court, and then they look at you as an
Speaker 1: individual and they look at your individual case and then
Speaker 1: they decide what is the best way to handle your case.
Speaker 1: And there is definitely like a structure in a program
Speaker 1: that every drug court is going to have have, but
Speaker 1: there's a lot of room from what I understand, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of room and a lot of leeway for
Speaker 1: them to almost personally tailor your drug cord experience to
Speaker 1: make it as successful as possible. And this is the
Speaker 1: ideal version. Again, I know that we're holding off on
Speaker 1: poo pooing as you can see chuck on biting clear
Speaker 1: through my lower lip right now. But um, this is
Speaker 1: the ideal version and it it it does exist in
Speaker 1: some places. Yes, it's tailor made. It's like a pillow
Speaker 1: menu at a nice hotel. Actually it's nothing like that.
Speaker 1: But what you are going to get, just like at
Speaker 1: a nice hotel, is drug tested a lot. Um you
Speaker 1: will be I mean maybe every other day for the
Speaker 1: first while, you might be drug tested. Yeah. I think
Speaker 1: that one attorney who was busted and became like a
Speaker 1: drug court advocate. Um, he was drug tested like five
Speaker 1: days a week. Yeah. And again this is tailored to you,
Speaker 1: so it's Uh. One of the things our article points
Speaker 1: out is that what happens is is your judge gets
Speaker 1: to know you. Um, and that's kind of the whole
Speaker 1: point is they need to know who you are so
Speaker 1: a they can suss out whether or not you're trying
Speaker 1: to game the system. And they get from what it
Speaker 1: sounds like, they get really good at that kind of reading.
Speaker 1: These people who are like, no, man, I can tell
Speaker 1: this guy is he's just trying to go through drug
Speaker 1: courts so we can go out and do drugs again,
Speaker 1: um or this person seems like they really want to
Speaker 1: turn their life around, right, Uh, So they will get
Speaker 1: to know these folks and assess like I think they
Speaker 1: need maybe to be tested once a week, and the
Speaker 1: more you test clean, the less you get tested, and
Speaker 1: the more um sort of leeway you have and freedom
Speaker 1: you have as long as you're you know, working those
Speaker 1: steps and completing your program. Right. Okay, So then, like
Speaker 1: I said, though, the coercion thing is the key to
Speaker 1: drug cord, right. The whole point of drug cord is
Speaker 1: that you can you can go through a program out
Speaker 1: of court, right, and it wouldn't be like like judicially
Speaker 1: mandated or anything like that. But the what the drug
Speaker 1: court advocates are saying is that doesn't work nearly as
Speaker 1: well as the idea that if you don't complete this program,
Speaker 1: you're going to jail. And some drug courts take it
Speaker 1: even further and say, okay, man, here's your choice. You
Speaker 1: can stick with the regular charges, go to normal criminal
Speaker 1: court for this you will probably almost certainly do some
Speaker 1: jail time, or you can come try drug court. If
Speaker 1: you succeeded drug court, you won't go to jail. We
Speaker 1: may even dismiss the case and make it like this,
Speaker 1: this conviction never even happened. If you fail, not only
Speaker 1: are you going to jail, you're going to do more
Speaker 1: jail time then if you hadn't come into drug court
Speaker 1: at all and just stayed in the regular criminal system.
Speaker 1: So the coercion there is very strong. And the reason
Speaker 1: that it's there, according to drug court advocates, is because
Speaker 1: that is what helps ensure the success of these treatment
Speaker 1: programs and gets people to actually complete them and become
Speaker 1: unaddicted to drugs at the end of it, or at
Speaker 1: least started on a path that they can keep up
Speaker 1: with for the rest of their lives. Yeah, and this
Speaker 1: I'm like when I said it's a quick program, the
Speaker 1: program isn't quick. They get you going quickly, but this
Speaker 1: doesn't happen over the course of a few months, like
Speaker 1: it seems like. The minimum is is about a year,
Speaker 1: and it can be as long as two years sometimes
Speaker 1: to graduate and prove that you are are drug free
Speaker 1: and committed to being drug free. Right, so you'll have
Speaker 1: like the court all up in your stuff like during
Speaker 1: that two years. Right. Some of them are even shorter,
Speaker 1: but they're almost men is like an emergency case, like, um,
Speaker 1: you know, somebody's having a mental health crisis. I don't
Speaker 1: know if it's federal. I know some states have it.
Speaker 1: At least if it's not a federal law that you
Speaker 1: can you can be locked up for for I think
Speaker 1: seventy two hours against your will if a court says
Speaker 1: this person needs to be emergence, they need emergency mental
Speaker 1: health treatment. There are some kind of sub categories of
Speaker 1: drug courts that have been set up to adjust the
Speaker 1: opioid crisis. That will will be like a ninety day
Speaker 1: like emergency crash program that's basically meant to keep you
Speaker 1: out of jail but also keep you alive and like
Speaker 1: really get your your treatment going. But um, that's like
Speaker 1: an additional part to the drug court program because from
Speaker 1: what I saw, it seems like twelve to twenty four
Speaker 1: months is pretty normal. Yeah, And and who are these people?
Speaker 1: Who are these prosecutors and defense attorneys and judges, And
Speaker 1: in most cases it seems like they are people that
Speaker 1: have specifically requested drug court. Um, it doesn't seem like
Speaker 1: a lot of people are begrudgingly assigned drug court. They
Speaker 1: feel compelled to do so. Maybe a mid career switch
Speaker 1: or maybe you know that's what they wanted to do
Speaker 1: to begin with. Um, you know, they feel like to
Speaker 1: have a calling to try to help people and not
Speaker 1: necessarily just be like I'm gonna be the prosecutor that
Speaker 1: like throws a book at everybody, the judge that just
Speaker 1: wants to put everybody behind bars. Uh. They definitely have
Speaker 1: a more compassionate side than you're probably used to in
Speaker 1: a courtroom. Um. Although I will say most courts, I
Speaker 1: mean I've only been like traffic court and stuff, but
Speaker 1: they have all sorts of you know, traffic court is
Speaker 1: they have a range of people in there, and most
Speaker 1: of the judges I've I've seen in my life have
Speaker 1: been kind of the it's sort of harsh with a
Speaker 1: heart of gold. Yeah. I've never seen one in person
Speaker 1: that was just like it seemed like a real jerk
Speaker 1: that was just intent on running people through the system.
Speaker 1: You know, you make a good point. I think every
Speaker 1: every scientific study that involves human subjects should be required
Speaker 1: to get their their population sample from traffic court. There's
Speaker 1: no better like perfect cross section of America then like
Speaker 1: a Tuesday morning in traffic Oh man, you ain't kidding.
Speaker 1: So that's the rule. Now first science everybody, Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: really true, and you're always like, I feel like every
Speaker 1: time I've been to traffic court, which has only been
Speaker 1: two or three times it's been, I'm always feel like
Speaker 1: I'm the last person that all day long, and uh,
Speaker 1: always envious of the people that are are are up
Speaker 1: there first. But at the end of the day it
Speaker 1: ends up being fairly interesting for a dude like me
Speaker 1: who just enjoys um watching this sort of experience play out.
Speaker 1: Have have you ever been to traffic court and you
Speaker 1: were like looking at the cops who showed up, and
Speaker 1: you're like, is that the one I think I gave me? Think?
Speaker 1: Because you know if they don't if they don't show up,
Speaker 1: they throw out your case supposedly, right, which I'm not
Speaker 1: even sure if that's an urban legend or not, But
Speaker 1: I don't know if it is. No, I think it
Speaker 1: might depend, but I think that can be the case
Speaker 1: for sure. Well, I've never I've never been able to
Speaker 1: perfectly say yes, the cop that gave me the ticket
Speaker 1: is not here, because you know that's because you were
Speaker 1: whacked out. They man, I really can't remember. I wasn't
Speaker 1: even a traffic court. I was like in jail, just
Speaker 1: hallucinating at the time. Um. Yeah, I have heard that,
Speaker 1: because that was the advice I always got. Um was,
Speaker 1: all right, you want to plead not guilty just in
Speaker 1: case they don't show and then by the time you
Speaker 1: you actually get up in front of the judge, if
Speaker 1: they've shown up, you can always change your plea bro.
Speaker 1: And they actually have another Um, they have a diversionary
Speaker 1: court or a diversion court like a side court that
Speaker 1: they've set up for a traffic court where you can
Speaker 1: go in plead guilty and then pay like a reduced
Speaker 1: fine and you don't have to sit there for the
Speaker 1: whole day. And it's really a They just take any
Speaker 1: pretense of trying to keep people safe as the reason
Speaker 1: they give out traffic tickets. Just they completely do away
Speaker 1: with it. It's just like there's like a guy wearing
Speaker 1: one of those green brim like bankers caps, you know,
Speaker 1: if you make it fast, Yeah, pretty much exactly. And
Speaker 1: and but there's like no public safety aspect to it.
Speaker 1: It's just a money making thing. But that actually qualifies
Speaker 1: is like this kind of thing with a drug court.
Speaker 1: It's like here's a regular court, here's something else off
Speaker 1: to the side that we're using to to divert people
Speaker 1: out of the clogged court system. For sure. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: think it's I think everyone should go to court, just
Speaker 1: at least once. I want to be on jury duty.
Speaker 1: You know, I got called not too long ago, and
Speaker 1: I didn't they you know, they didn't even call me
Speaker 1: up to be questioned or whatever. I just ended up
Speaker 1: being hanging out all day and then they dismissed a
Speaker 1: whole lot of like the thirty people I was with.
Speaker 1: But I'm I'm into it. I would definitely do it.
Speaker 1: I certainly wouldn't want to be tied up for weeks
Speaker 1: or what do they call it when you have to question? Yes,
Speaker 1: a question? No way, But but they give you, like case,
Speaker 1: you get dinner for free. Yeah, but come on, I
Speaker 1: know would be tickets old after like two or three weeks.
Speaker 1: I think you're right free dinner. Um, all right, So
Speaker 1: where were we? We're talking about good judges and bad judges.
Speaker 1: So yeah, everyone's sort of on the same team in
Speaker 1: drug court, which is, let me get to know this person,
Speaker 1: let me find the root of their problem, let me
Speaker 1: see if we can help them walk this straight and
Speaker 1: narrow together, which is sounds very hippie dippy. I'm kind
Speaker 1: of surprised this took root in the United States. Yes, so, yeah,
Speaker 1: it is simpler or something, right, super Scandinavian. Yeah so
Speaker 1: um so again this is ideally not every judge is
Speaker 1: going to fit this bill, but drug court judges would
Speaker 1: tend to lean towards this, this personality trait um or
Speaker 1: or act like this more than say your typical criminal
Speaker 1: court judge. Right, so they one of the things that's
Speaker 1: expected of them as part of being a drug court judges.
Speaker 1: They are meant to be kind of a social worker
Speaker 1: almost for this person, which is a really weird position
Speaker 1: for a judge being why not just leave it to
Speaker 1: the social worker? Well, again, you come back to the coercion,
Speaker 1: right if you. And this is supposed to be built
Speaker 1: into a good, even average drug court program. It treats
Speaker 1: addiction as a public health problem, as a chronic disease,
Speaker 1: And if you're not familiar with that model of addiction,
Speaker 1: go listen to our addiction episode because it's really interesting.
Speaker 1: But it treats it is like, this is a chronic disease,
Speaker 1: so it's expected that this person is going to probably relapse,
Speaker 1: probably with certainty, depending on the level of their addiction,
Speaker 1: and that is not grounds to wash out of the
Speaker 1: program the first time, or maybe even the second time,
Speaker 1: or maybe even the third time. It's up to the
Speaker 1: judge's discretion. But eventually you get to a point where
Speaker 1: the person either washes out of the program or it's
Speaker 1: clear they're not really taking it very seriously, so the
Speaker 1: judge will um issue what's called a flash in carceerrat,
Speaker 1: which means you you showed up to take your drug test,
Speaker 1: it's been four weeks since your lasting court. You're in
Speaker 1: the program, and you just failed, and the judge is
Speaker 1: tired of you failing your drug tests. And the next
Speaker 1: thing you know, you're wearing an orange jumpsuit and spending
Speaker 1: the next ten days in jail to kind of like
Speaker 1: snap you out of it and get you serious about
Speaker 1: this thing again. And then over time, eventually you'll just
Speaker 1: you'll wash out, You'll get kicked out of the program
Speaker 1: and end up in criminal court, and you will pick
Speaker 1: up where you left off, which is the beginning of
Speaker 1: your trial for whatever the original charges were, right, but
Speaker 1: the idea that you can be incarcerated and still remain
Speaker 1: in this program, and given these second and third chances,
Speaker 1: depending on what the judge and the prosecutor and the
Speaker 1: court staff think your level of dedication is. That's you.
Speaker 1: You're not going to find that anywhere else in the
Speaker 1: in the criminal justice system in the United States. No.
Speaker 1: And not only are they do they try and treat
Speaker 1: people for drug abuse, but if you were a victim
Speaker 1: of domestic violence, they will you will go to an
Speaker 1: age see to help you with that. If you they
Speaker 1: work a lot with veterans, um if you suffer from PTSD,
Speaker 1: or if you're just a drug addicted veteran, then they're
Speaker 1: gonna make really sure that they're taking care of you
Speaker 1: and providing you with all the medical and mental health
Speaker 1: benefits that you have. And I love how our article
Speaker 1: says it that you have earned, not even that you
Speaker 1: like deserve, like you have earned this right. And so
Speaker 1: this is another just crazy different thing about the drug courts.
Speaker 1: Is imagine that Chuck imagined is basically being like homeless
Speaker 1: and addicted to heroin and you're a veteran right to
Speaker 1: to have people who have access to computers and emails
Speaker 1: and know the phone numbers of the services you're supposed
Speaker 1: to be calling, and know what forms you need to
Speaker 1: fill out and then even how to fill out those forms,
Speaker 1: to have access to people who can help you do that,
Speaker 1: so that all of a sudden you actually do get
Speaker 1: the benefits that get you off of the street and
Speaker 1: into a treatment program and get the government to help
Speaker 1: pay for it. Like that's that's invaluable. And that's another
Speaker 1: aspect of drug Court is that you they provide those services,
Speaker 1: you have access to those people who are helping you
Speaker 1: get those services, or if your child has been taken away,
Speaker 1: they help you navigate them the child welfare system so
Speaker 1: that you can go take the classes you need to
Speaker 1: take to get your child back. Um, there's just a
Speaker 1: lot of different services that they offer that they help
Speaker 1: people with two that I think it's just an amazing idea. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's it makes sense too because one of the
Speaker 1: big drawback are not drawbacks, but one of the big
Speaker 1: things holding these people back many times is when you're
Speaker 1: a heroin addict, you are robbed of any ambition to
Speaker 1: do this yourself. Even if you wake up sober and
Speaker 1: you're like, man, I don't want to live this kind
Speaker 1: of life, but you are addicted to this drug. So
Speaker 1: you don't wake up and think, let me go to
Speaker 1: the the local library because they have the internet there
Speaker 1: and I can sign up and find out where this
Speaker 1: stuff is. And I have no family that's going to
Speaker 1: help me do this or I've rejected them, like that
Speaker 1: first step can literally just be the person it's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the number I will. You can be driven
Speaker 1: there and dropped off there and that can kick start
Speaker 1: the the process of getting healthy again. Right. So that's
Speaker 1: a huge part of drug court tune. That's a huge
Speaker 1: part of the success of it. So there's this whole
Speaker 1: court system set up there that if you if you
Speaker 1: want to take advantage of it, you can get off
Speaker 1: of drugs and you can stay out of jail. And
Speaker 1: the way that it's from what some of the studies
Speaker 1: I've seen, the best role that a judge can play
Speaker 1: is supportive but also stern, not a pushover, but also
Speaker 1: just not a blowhard. No, there's no room for blowhards
Speaker 1: in here, but there's also no room for somebody who's
Speaker 1: just completely being taken advantage of by person after person. Right,
Speaker 1: So you want a nice mix and the judge, but
Speaker 1: you also want to Jose is going to listen to
Speaker 1: the other professionals too, uh, and act almost as an
Speaker 1: advocate of the person who's who's in it, um. But
Speaker 1: they're also meant to kind of create this atmosphere where
Speaker 1: you are, you're you're doing this like this, you're this
Speaker 1: is good man, You're I'm this is a respectable thing
Speaker 1: that you're doing, and therefore I'm going to treat you
Speaker 1: with the respect that you're earning right now, by right,
Speaker 1: and rather than confrontation and shame, which apparently has a
Speaker 1: terrible effect on addicts, regardless of whether you're in court
Speaker 1: or in a rehab treatment or whatever. Um. And then
Speaker 1: the the end of it is considered like a graduation,
Speaker 1: like it's meant to be a big deal, so much
Speaker 1: so that they'll actually bring other people who are in
Speaker 1: the program to court on the day that you are
Speaker 1: graduating from the program because they they it's a it's
Speaker 1: a it's kind of a big deal, and they treat
Speaker 1: it like a big deal. Exactly, yeah, exactly, And they're
Speaker 1: treated with respect and all these people who they've probably
Speaker 1: become at least, you know, civil with, if not jovial
Speaker 1: and friendly with, over the last like ninety days or
Speaker 1: twelve months or twenty four months, um. To see them
Speaker 1: patting that person on the back. I'm sure that that
Speaker 1: means a lot, you know. Yeah, So the idea that
Speaker 1: it's this is it is it just feels really weird
Speaker 1: to be talking and not say and of course we
Speaker 1: mean Sweden. You know, it is very, very weird. But
Speaker 1: it's out there and it's it's growing like wildfire. All right, Well,
Speaker 1: let's take a break and we will come back and
Speaker 1: finish up with um some statistics and some more glowing reviews,
Speaker 1: and then of course the dreaded poopo ing of the
Speaker 1: bad side of drug courts right after this that k
Speaker 1: should know my dumbnail large ski. All right, So the
Speaker 1: cool thing about these kind of programs, when the government
Speaker 1: is involved in pouring a lot of money into these programs,
Speaker 1: is that there's gonna be a lot of research. And
Speaker 1: there's definitely been a lot of research on drug courts,
Speaker 1: and all data points generally point to the fact that
Speaker 1: it works on a pretty big level. Um, it works. Uh,
Speaker 1: it saves people money and saves taxpayers money. It lowers crime,
Speaker 1: it reduces crime, it lowers the rate of recidivism. Um.
Speaker 1: One bone head word, I think we can agree. So
Speaker 1: let's start with a stat from inside jail in prison
Speaker 1: of offenders in jail in prison abused drug and alcohol
Speaker 1: like while they're in prison, in jail, okay of them
Speaker 1: are clinically addicted. So it is clear that there's a
Speaker 1: really big problem to just sending addicts to jail. Yeah,
Speaker 1: because again, remember not a lot of jails, especially like
Speaker 1: city and county jails, have treatment programs. You're probably in
Speaker 1: a federal penitentiary or a good state pen if you're
Speaker 1: getting a treatment program, and if you're a low level
Speaker 1: drug offender, you're probably not going to state or federal penitentiary.
Speaker 1: You're going to city or county jail. Well, yeah, and
Speaker 1: sixty of of inmates who seek drug treatment, like if
Speaker 1: they have the program and you just want to seek
Speaker 1: that program while you're in prison, drop out early. Uh.
Speaker 1: With the thinking for drug courts being that there's no
Speaker 1: like they're already in jail. There isn't that carrot dangling
Speaker 1: or rather maybe a hammer dangling above their head that said,
Speaker 1: you know, you can avoid jail by doing this. They're
Speaker 1: already in jail, so there's not a lot of incentive.
Speaker 1: So the thing about drug courts is that they they
Speaker 1: apparently change that thing this this article says they reverse
Speaker 1: all these numbers. It's a little glib if you ask me,
Speaker 1: but they definitely are in it. They do. So. There
Speaker 1: was a UM National Association of Drug Court Professional study,
Speaker 1: and there's been other studies that should have shown similar
Speaker 1: UM statistics, but something like UM. The recitativism rate is
Speaker 1: like um SI after the first year, after the second year,
Speaker 1: which is far less than what you would find in
Speaker 1: the in the general population for people on probation UM.
Speaker 1: And these are people who have completed the program, which
Speaker 1: is we'll see as a big caveat UM. People who
Speaker 1: are parents in the drug courts tend to their kids,
Speaker 1: tend to spend less time in foster care, and their
Speaker 1: family is more likely to be reunited after they complete
Speaker 1: the program. UM. What else reduced crime rate compared to alternatives.
Speaker 1: And then another study from the National Institute of Justice
Speaker 1: for Escambia County, Florida, which I believe is Pensacola area UM.
Speaker 1: They said the felony rearrest rate there was lowered. So
Speaker 1: there's a lot of a lot of statistics that really
Speaker 1: seemed to show that this works, including reducing prison population
Speaker 1: which saves the state's money. Making it making improving employment opportunities,
Speaker 1: which would give more tax revenue. Uh, And so it
Speaker 1: seems like it's all like a no brainer. Why would
Speaker 1: anyone have a problem with us? Well, here, here's why
Speaker 1: I didn't get this Drug Policy Alliance when fully did you? Yes?
Speaker 1: All right, what's the deal there? So one of the
Speaker 1: things that drug courts do is they take the war
Speaker 1: on drug ugs from the supply side, which means like
Speaker 1: invading Mexico, to the demand side, which means busting users. Right,
Speaker 1: and drug cord is just basically a new iteration of
Speaker 1: the idea of busting a user, but rather than just
Speaker 1: busting them again and again and again in the hopes
Speaker 1: that they'll eventually give up on drugs, they this is
Speaker 1: to cure them of their addiction to drug It's the
Speaker 1: court intervening, but it's still the same thing. And the
Speaker 1: Drug Policy Alliance is like, this is, we don't need
Speaker 1: to be doubling down on busting low level users and addicts.
Speaker 1: We need to treat it strictly as a public health thing.
Speaker 1: And if you are busted with a small amount of drugs,
Speaker 1: you shouldn't ever go to jail like it should be
Speaker 1: decriminalized and what they're saying is that this this whole
Speaker 1: thing is like a whole new direction, a whole new
Speaker 1: push that's just keeping us from decriminalizing low amounts of drugs,
Speaker 1: which the Drug Policy Alliance says is best practices. All right,
Speaker 1: that makes sense. Uh, And then you send a really
Speaker 1: interesting article, Um, what was that was that the Atlantic? No,
Speaker 1: it was a Pacific standard. It was the Pacific. It's
Speaker 1: the Atlantic of the of the West Coast. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: one was really interesting because they paint are not paint.
Speaker 1: But they kind of tell another side of the story
Speaker 1: through a few examples of real people, which is, all right,
Speaker 1: let's say my son or daughter is addicted to heroin
Speaker 1: and they go through like what you talked about, like
Speaker 1: the flash incarceration, Like, hey, you came in here and
Speaker 1: tested positive. Um, so I'm just gonna go ahead and
Speaker 1: throw you right back in the slammer for ten days.
Speaker 1: What's happening is is a lot of these people, and
Speaker 1: it depends on the drug, but especially in the case
Speaker 1: of heroin and opioids, is they're putting people in back
Speaker 1: in jail very quickly who are in the middle of
Speaker 1: going cold Turkey, right, So that's not a good situation
Speaker 1: and kind of round me across the board. Medical professions
Speaker 1: have agreed that that methodone and what was the other drug? Oh,
Speaker 1: I can't, I couldn't, uh like benzer. Let's just say
Speaker 1: method because most people know that one. That methodone is
Speaker 1: like an essential medicine if you are trying to kick
Speaker 1: an opioid or heroin habit and under the terms of
Speaker 1: of a drug court, you can't use methodone even right,
Speaker 1: So they they found that fifty percent of drug courts
Speaker 1: in the US have an outright ban on what's called
Speaker 1: maintenance and the idea behind matenes and like you said,
Speaker 1: it's like the medical community says this is the best practice.
Speaker 1: If you're addicted to heroin or opioids, you go get
Speaker 1: what's called a maintenance dose, where you get a little
Speaker 1: dose of something like methodone, and you get it every
Speaker 1: day at the same time, every day, the same amount,
Speaker 1: and you get your body so used to this that
Speaker 1: you're no longer getting high. But it keeps you from
Speaker 1: going out and getting high because you are no longer
Speaker 1: have that craving, you're not drug seeking anymore. And apparently
Speaker 1: they compare it to like being on prozac that you
Speaker 1: can go out, have a job, have a high stress job,
Speaker 1: live a normal life and beyond methodone, this maintenance dose
Speaker 1: of Method methodone and and not get ever get back
Speaker 1: on heroin. Well fifty of drug courts say no, this
Speaker 1: is an abstinence based court court. To be part of it,
Speaker 1: you can't trust, you can't um test positive for drugs,
Speaker 1: and therefore you can't be on methodone. And so what
Speaker 1: they're doing is if you if you wash out of
Speaker 1: this court system, whether they kick you in the jail
Speaker 1: or say you're out of drug court and you've been
Speaker 1: you haven't been on methodone, but you have been off
Speaker 1: of heroin. When you get back on it, what used
Speaker 1: to be just a normal dose to you could kill you.
Speaker 1: That's just what happens with your body when you're in withdrawals.
Speaker 1: So it's like these drug courts that are abstinence based
Speaker 1: drug courts are setting you up to overdose on heroin
Speaker 1: if you don't follow this program strictly right, And they're
Speaker 1: what they're saying is like judges are judges who don't
Speaker 1: listen to the medical community's best practices are that's a
Speaker 1: very dangerous situation. Yeah, because you're I mean, they know
Speaker 1: that you're super at risk for uh, for relapse, and
Speaker 1: then once you're in there for ten days and you're
Speaker 1: cold Turkey and you're clean, then then you are also,
Speaker 1: like you said, significant risk for overdosing and possibly dying.
Speaker 1: So again, it seems to be specifically with like heroin
Speaker 1: and opioids, which is, you know, maybe the biggest problem
Speaker 1: in our country right now drug wise anyway, So I'm
Speaker 1: not discounting that, but especially in these cases, it seems
Speaker 1: like drug courts need to at least be uh. They're
Speaker 1: not saying drug courts are bad, but they need to
Speaker 1: h they need to maybe work with the medical community
Speaker 1: a little more when it comes to heroin and opioids
Speaker 1: as the best practice forgetting these people clean, because that's
Speaker 1: the goal, right And a lot of them do. A
Speaker 1: lot of them do allow for medication and maintenance. That's
Speaker 1: good to know. I thought it was rare what that
Speaker 1: that they allow for maintenance. Oh yeah, no, like like
Speaker 1: a lot of them do, say none whatsoever. Um, but yeah,
Speaker 1: a lot of them do. Some of them though the
Speaker 1: other fifty some are on certain basis bases like if
Speaker 1: you're a pregnant woman, they'll let you do a methodone
Speaker 1: treatment or something like that. Um, there's it's not like
Speaker 1: half let you and half don't. It's half don't and
Speaker 1: then some of the other half let just anybody like
Speaker 1: maybe twenty just openly allows it. But that that is
Speaker 1: the way to cure somebody of heroin and denying them
Speaker 1: that is it's just not it's ill informed. Well yeah,
Speaker 1: and very sadly. I mean it is anecdotal. I don't
Speaker 1: know what kind of um big studies they have on this,
Speaker 1: but you know, they sold very specific stories about people
Speaker 1: that went through drug court were released and overdosed and
Speaker 1: died because their body couldn't take what, like you said,
Speaker 1: was a week and a half ago a normal dose. Right,
Speaker 1: it's very sad. And then again there's the other there's
Speaker 1: the other aspect where it's like they they are you know,
Speaker 1: since they can select who comes into drug court, they're
Speaker 1: selecting people who are going to likely graduate and let
Speaker 1: their make their drug court look even better. And so
Speaker 1: they're going to pick first time or scared kids who
Speaker 1: who are like, my whole life is going to be
Speaker 1: ruined if I end up in jail, um, who will
Speaker 1: probably see the program through. And so that means that
Speaker 1: the data is kind of cherry picked, you know, like
Speaker 1: like these recentativism rates, those are for people who complete
Speaker 1: the program. For people who wash out of the program,
Speaker 1: they're actually worse off than the people who were similar
Speaker 1: criminals under the same circumstances that just kept going through
Speaker 1: criminal court because they ended up with more prison time,
Speaker 1: more jail time than they would have had if they
Speaker 1: just stuck the criminal court. So there's definitely some criticisms
Speaker 1: of it. It can be done better, but it does
Speaker 1: seem like there are some courts out there that actually
Speaker 1: do follow like these ideal best practices models. It's just
Speaker 1: there's just so much leeway that it's different from court
Speaker 1: to court, and it just depends on the judge. Really,
Speaker 1: you need Harry Anderson in there, sure you do. All
Speaker 1: those judges need to learn at least three card tricks
Speaker 1: and look good in black. You you got anything else?
Speaker 1: I got nothing else? I don't either. So let's see.
Speaker 1: If you want to know more about drug courts, you
Speaker 1: can search those words on the search bar hou stuffts
Speaker 1: dot com. And since I said that it's time for
Speaker 1: listener mail, I'm gonna call this what will be one
Speaker 1: of two North Korea responses in this in a subsequent recording.
Speaker 1: We got a lot of good feedback about that episode.
Speaker 1: I was pretty stoked. I was two. I was nervous. Um. Hey, guys,
Speaker 1: was able. Uh, this is from Ken in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
Speaker 1: He said, I've enjoying your show for a while. Now
Speaker 1: I wanted to toss a stone to your North Korean pond.
Speaker 1: I was able to visit the d m Z. While
Speaker 1: I was there for a while, he told a story
Speaker 1: why he was there. But he was able to go
Speaker 1: to the d m Z, and he said it was fascinating.
Speaker 1: I thought it was funny that each side built super
Speaker 1: tall flagpoles to be just a little taller than the other,
Speaker 1: and also made modifications to their buildings on either side
Speaker 1: of the blue huts to also be taller and more
Speaker 1: imposing than the other. South Korea actually trains their d
Speaker 1: MZ guards stand watch and the most imposing stance possible.
Speaker 1: One more thing I'll share is the talk I had
Speaker 1: with my Korean co teachers. I asked him what they
Speaker 1: felt about reunification, and the universal answer was that there
Speaker 1: should be one united Korea and they hope to see
Speaker 1: it happened soon. The lone dissenter was a woman. He said,
Speaker 1: she recognized how difficult that process would be, and she
Speaker 1: didn't think it would be good for the country. And
Speaker 1: the other teachers heard this co workers opinion, they all
Speaker 1: looked at her like she had just poured mayonnaise on
Speaker 1: the kimchi. That sounds delicious to me. I don't know
Speaker 1: what the is there? If there were, the Japanese mayonnaise
Speaker 1: made me yeah, exactly. Oh man, what was that stuff
Speaker 1: that was so good? Qps and more of that please? Uh.
Speaker 1: They couldn't believe she wasn't for reunification. Your culture is
Speaker 1: less individual individualistic than ours, so they often altered the
Speaker 1: party line on such things, but she did not anyway.
Speaker 1: Thank you for turning my long drives and monotonous tasks
Speaker 1: into opportunities to think and learn. My wife and I
Speaker 1: in most evenings talking about our days and how they went,
Speaker 1: and I often discussed the topics on your show because
Speaker 1: that's what I've been contemplate. Ken from Lancaster p A.
Speaker 1: Thanks a lot. Ken. Say hi to the Amish out
Speaker 1: there for us because they don't listen to our podcasts. Yeah,
Speaker 1: give him an give him an iPhone. The world there
Speaker 1: was one thing that Um I wanted to mention. There
Speaker 1: are actually two things in that episode that I forgot
Speaker 1: to mention. One was the nineteen seventies six Acts attack
Speaker 1: of North Korean guards against South Korean guards? Did you
Speaker 1: hear about that? Like killed by a hatchet for goodness sake? Right? Um?
Speaker 1: And then the current president was on the team who
Speaker 1: came out after that and finished cutting down the tree
Speaker 1: that the South Korean guards were originally doing. And then
Speaker 1: the other thing is that North Korea holds the Mass
Speaker 1: Games and they hold it in like this, it's like
Speaker 1: their own personal Olympics, and they hold it in a
Speaker 1: hundred and fifty thousand person stadium. And there's a I
Speaker 1: think it's a national geographic documentary about this girl who's
Speaker 1: a gymnast or a dancer or something like that. I
Speaker 1: can't remember, but it's her training for the mass Games.
Speaker 1: It's a great documentary. Check it out. Okay, thanks a lot, Ken,
Speaker 1: thank you Chuck for letting me talk, and thank you
Speaker 1: for listening. And if you want to get in touch
Speaker 1: with us, you can tweek to us. So I'm at
Speaker 1: josh um Clark. We're both at s Y s K
Speaker 1: podcast and Chuck is at movie Crush. Chuck's also on
Speaker 1: Facebook dot com, slash stuff you Should Know. Chuck's on
Speaker 1: Facebook dot com, slash Charles W. Chuck Bryant, and slash
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know. You can send us an email
Speaker 1: to Stuff Podcast at how stuff Works dot com and
Speaker 1: it's always joined usutter home on the web, Stuff you
Speaker 1: Should Know dot com. For more on this and thousands
Speaker 1: of other topics, is it how stuff Works dot com.