WEBVTT - Toxic Masculinity Is DESTROYING America | A Conversation with Ken Harbaugh 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:03.360 We are live, and I'm thrilled to be joined by 0:00:03.400 --> 0:00:09.280 my friend Ken Harbaugh. Ken is a former naval aviator. 0:00:09.480 --> 0:00:14.319 He is the president of Valor Media. He is the 0:00:14.360 --> 0:00:22.000 producer of the number one rated Apple documentary Against All Enemies. 0:00:22.680 --> 0:00:27.320 You can find that, download it, watch it on Apple TV. 0:00:28.320 --> 0:00:36.600 Ken is a veteran's activist and advocate, a democracy advocate, 0:00:37.400 --> 0:00:44.760 and a democracy activist. Ken is part of the great 0:00:45.720 --> 0:00:53.080 fabric of America's civil society, where he has stood up 0:00:54.200 --> 0:00:58.520 for the country, taken the oath, flown off the deck 0:00:58.600 --> 0:01:05.800 of aircraft carriers, flown into harm's way, and has come 0:01:05.840 --> 0:01:11.400 home and has entered into another type of harm, which 0:01:11.440 --> 0:01:16.440 is as a leading voice in a great battle that's 0:01:16.520 --> 0:01:21.759 taking place as we speak, all across the country between 0:01:21.920 --> 0:01:26.240 two forces that have long been in opposition in the 0:01:26.360 --> 0:01:32.520 United States, forces that oppose liberty and those that wish 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:37.280 to expand it. And all through our history there have 0:01:37.480 --> 0:01:44.360 been attempts and attacks against the against the Constitution of 0:01:44.400 --> 0:01:50.600 the United States. There have been no gentle periods in 0:01:50.680 --> 0:01:54.840 the American story, and so today we live in a 0:01:54.920 --> 0:01:58.600 consequential time, and so it's a great privilege to be 0:01:58.720 --> 0:02:03.200 joined by We're going to talk about some of the 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:09.120 activities that are taking place, the large veterans protests taking 0:02:09.160 --> 0:02:13.040 place on the sixth of June in Washington, d C. 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:19.440 We'll talk about that. We're going to talk about all 0:02:19.680 --> 0:02:23.040 of the things that are happening, but we're going to 0:02:23.200 --> 0:02:27.200 start by talking about the Valor network. And we're going 0:02:27.280 --> 0:02:33.200 to start by talking about a subject that's of real importance, 0:02:35.120 --> 0:02:39.840 something that has gone off the rails, and we'll talk 0:02:39.880 --> 0:02:44.200 about that. I think it's in the last seven or 0:02:44.280 --> 0:02:47.320 so years, but it could be a little bit before that. 0:02:48.400 --> 0:02:54.760 But as we begin the conversation with Ken, we're coming 0:02:54.840 --> 0:02:59.120 up on a Memorial Day, and when we think about 0:02:59.440 --> 0:03:04.920 Memorial Day, we have to think about the generation of 0:03:05.040 --> 0:03:09.400 Americans that were sent to war in the twenty first century. 0:03:10.360 --> 0:03:15.119 But before we do that, I want to talk about 0:03:15.520 --> 0:03:21.400 the generation that we remember as the Greatest Generation. And 0:03:21.960 --> 0:03:24.960 I've never liked the name because I'll tell you what, 0:03:25.480 --> 0:03:30.000 and I think it's clear in this moment that we're 0:03:30.040 --> 0:03:33.120 going to have to have another great generation of Americans. 0:03:34.000 --> 0:03:36.960 And I think truly the greatest generation will be the 0:03:37.000 --> 0:03:39.960 one that makes it to the mountaintop that Martin Luther 0:03:40.160 --> 0:03:44.640 King saw right that completes the building of the city 0:03:44.720 --> 0:03:48.560 on a hill. The World War two generation stood up, 0:03:49.760 --> 0:03:57.240 They were measured, they were counted, They did incredible they 0:03:57.240 --> 0:04:01.800 did incredible things. You grew up when we grew up 0:04:02.760 --> 0:04:05.040 as a as a young man I was born in 0:04:05.080 --> 0:04:11.800 the nineteen seventies, there was an arc type of masculinity. 0:04:13.080 --> 0:04:17.760 And in that arc type of masculinity has been utterly 0:04:18.000 --> 0:04:24.720 shattered in the last seven years by people who would 0:04:24.800 --> 0:04:29.560 have been roukeenly regarded by those guys as there's a word. 0:04:29.839 --> 0:04:34.040 It starts with key, right. It's the key word right, 0:04:34.080 --> 0:04:37.280 which I can't say, which is too bad, because it's 0:04:37.320 --> 0:04:41.760 an important concept right in society, and it was something 0:04:42.440 --> 0:04:44.919 as a young man you were raised not to be. 0:04:45.160 --> 0:04:48.200 And so when you look at an Andrew Tate, he's 0:04:48.240 --> 0:04:51.880 a let's call him a pussy cat, right when you 0:04:52.120 --> 0:04:55.120 when you when you look at it, Joe Rogan, right, 0:04:55.200 --> 0:04:59.120 another pussy cat. Right. So, if you're sitting there and 0:04:59.480 --> 0:05:03.920 and you're a person who has an audience of many 0:05:04.000 --> 0:05:08.360 tens of millions, and you're sitting there and you're like, oh, 0:05:08.560 --> 0:05:11.640 you know, Hitler and Kanye West may have a point 0:05:11.680 --> 0:05:16.279 here about the Jews controlling everything or you tolerate the 0:05:16.400 --> 0:05:21.680 Nazi apologist, or you wink and nod at the racist 0:05:21.920 --> 0:05:26.560 or the misogynist or whatever. Indecency doesn't make you tough. 0:05:27.240 --> 0:05:30.400 It generally it makes either a racist and an imbecile. 0:05:30.440 --> 0:05:36.640 And those two things typically matched together like round square, 0:05:37.000 --> 0:05:45.640 round peg. And so those guys, by and large would 0:05:45.680 --> 0:05:53.760 have been repulsed by the Andrew Caates, by the Joe Rogans, 0:05:53.960 --> 0:06:00.599 by all of these dishonest snake oil salespeople telling this 0:06:01.720 --> 0:06:06.280 fake gospel of machismo, because the real thing is collapsed. 0:06:06.880 --> 0:06:13.440 And so real men, right, are not cruel Right, real 0:06:13.560 --> 0:06:21.560 men are fierce against cruelty. That toughness is not meanness, 0:06:23.520 --> 0:06:31.000 and that there's nothing wrong if you're a man in 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:34.320 standing up for the little guy, and so so what 0:06:34.480 --> 0:06:40.479 these people are are classical bullies who've said to be 0:06:40.600 --> 0:06:46.400 a man is to be a bully, and that's not true. 0:06:46.640 --> 0:06:55.080 But traditional masculinity has been casket castigated, run down, kicked 0:06:55.120 --> 0:07:00.280 into the gutter, been politicized, called toxic in the truth 0:07:00.320 --> 0:07:04.240 of the matter is is we need to raise our 0:07:04.400 --> 0:07:08.400 young men to be fierce and their patriotism and their 0:07:08.480 --> 0:07:13.880 respect for other people, for dissent for America's values, and 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:18.760 we've done a terrible job as a generation of doing that, 0:07:19.120 --> 0:07:21.600 and so we've created a vacuum where some of the 0:07:21.720 --> 0:07:26.960 worst people you can conceivably imagine now hold themselves up 0:07:27.040 --> 0:07:31.400 as totems of manliness, when in fact they're epic cowards, 0:07:31.560 --> 0:07:35.680 all of them. They're moral cowards, their physical cowards, and 0:07:35.760 --> 0:07:39.800 their political cowards. And you have a remedy for that, 0:07:40.360 --> 0:07:43.760 and that's Valor Media. And i'd love for you to 0:07:43.960 --> 0:07:47.480 talk about Valor Media. I think this is a great idea, 0:07:48.240 --> 0:07:52.280 a great network, and I think it's going to be 0:07:52.440 --> 0:07:56.800 something that really reaches tens of millions of young men 0:07:56.920 --> 0:08:00.760 in this country with a competing vision about what it 0:08:00.920 --> 0:08:03.400 means to be a man, and what it means to 0:08:03.480 --> 0:08:05.240 be a man at the end of the day is 0:08:05.320 --> 0:08:11.160 to stand up with some integrity. And integrity and manliness 0:08:11.240 --> 0:08:15.560 are deeply connected, and people who have no integrity, who 0:08:15.640 --> 0:08:20.120 are bullies and liars, have no claim to masculinity. And 0:08:20.200 --> 0:08:22.120 so I just want to get you to talk about 0:08:22.760 --> 0:08:25.760 Valor Media and your vision for it. And thank you 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:28.080 so much for being with us today. 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:31.200 Well thanks for having me, Steve. It's great to talk 0:08:31.240 --> 0:08:35.720 to you. Your intro was overly generous. I'm a little embarrassed, 0:08:35.800 --> 0:08:37.920 but I think you hit the nail on the head 0:08:38.080 --> 0:08:43.520 when you described these influencers of the so called manisphere 0:08:43.840 --> 0:08:47.480 as cowards, because at the end of the day, every 0:08:47.600 --> 0:08:51.480 bully is a coward, right they are, They're projecting, they're 0:08:51.520 --> 0:08:56.079 compensating for something. And it really gets to me, especially 0:08:56.200 --> 0:08:59.360 as we're leading up to Memorial Day, when these guys 0:08:59.640 --> 0:09:04.000 in heroism, when they do the tough guy act, right, 0:09:04.080 --> 0:09:07.120 when they talk about the need to be strong on 0:09:07.200 --> 0:09:09.920 the world stage, and somehow every single one of them, 0:09:10.000 --> 0:09:12.760 the ones we're talking about, the Andrew Tates, the Joe Rogan's, 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:16.439 somehow managed to miss out on the longest wars in 0:09:16.520 --> 0:09:21.079 America's history, right Iraq and Afghanistan. That shows you that 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:24.880 they're they're all talk. On the other hand, at Valor Media, 0:09:25.080 --> 0:09:27.720 we've got a lineup of hosts that I think can 0:09:27.880 --> 0:09:34.760 reach into this toxic manisphere, this hostile information ecosystem. We've 0:09:34.840 --> 0:09:37.679 got three seals who are hosts on the network. We've 0:09:37.720 --> 0:09:41.079 got rangers, We've got an ex Delta Forces guy. We've 0:09:41.080 --> 0:09:43.079 got two Navy pilots. One of them was a top 0:09:43.160 --> 0:09:45.760 gun guy. One of them was pilot of the year 0:09:46.040 --> 0:09:50.560 in PACAPP Pacific Air Force. These are actual. 0:09:50.320 --> 0:09:51.439 Dudes, right they. 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:54.720 I would love to put any one of them squared 0:09:54.800 --> 0:09:57.839 off with Joe Rogan or Andrew Tap and let people 0:09:57.920 --> 0:10:01.960 decide what real masculine it is looking at those examples, 0:10:02.000 --> 0:10:04.920 and it's what you laid out. Strength is actually found 0:10:05.000 --> 0:10:09.199 in compassion. Masculinity is found in taking care of the 0:10:09.360 --> 0:10:12.400 least among us. Being a man is not what you 0:10:12.559 --> 0:10:15.520 do for yourself, which is what is being sold, which 0:10:15.600 --> 0:10:18.640 is what Rogan and Tate and the others preach. Being 0:10:18.679 --> 0:10:21.079 a man is what you do for others. And I 0:10:21.120 --> 0:10:23.720 think there is a political component to this as well, 0:10:23.880 --> 0:10:28.280 because in failing to address this, we are seating territory 0:10:28.760 --> 0:10:32.640 that we should rightly occupy. We gave up an entire 0:10:33.360 --> 0:10:37.640 demo of votes to Donald Trump because we didn't play 0:10:37.679 --> 0:10:40.400 in that information space. We didn't talk to them, We 0:10:40.480 --> 0:10:44.680 didn't give them a vision of what a well run 0:10:45.080 --> 0:10:48.280 country can look like and what's in it for them. 0:10:48.640 --> 0:10:53.400 Valor media is about uplifting the real men in our 0:10:53.440 --> 0:10:58.480 communities who we think can break into those information silos 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:01.080 and save some one of these young men who are 0:11:01.120 --> 0:11:04.200 being sucked into the to the Rogan and Andrew tape 0:11:04.720 --> 0:11:06.280 Pit of toxic masculinity. 0:11:07.840 --> 0:11:12.920 You know, I was listening to a podcast and it 0:11:13.320 --> 0:11:19.360 was Scott Galloway, Professor Galloway and Anthony Scaramucci, and they 0:11:19.400 --> 0:11:23.760 were talking about masculinity. And I think Scott Galloway is 0:11:23.760 --> 0:11:26.079 a brilliant guy, makes a lot of a lot of 0:11:26.160 --> 0:11:28.640 great points. And one of the things he's talking about 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:31.920 is that you really have a generation of young men 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:34.320 that are terrified to talk to a young woman. They 0:11:34.440 --> 0:11:36.800 just can't do it right face to face. Have never 0:11:36.960 --> 0:11:42.120 asked anyone out. You know, Anthony Scaramucci starts talking about, 0:11:42.600 --> 0:11:44.800 you know this right of passage that you know, I 0:11:44.960 --> 0:11:48.240 remember well, which is this moment of terror, right when 0:11:48.280 --> 0:11:50.000 you were trying to call a girl up on the 0:11:50.120 --> 0:11:53.080 phone and her dad might answer right, and you're trying 0:11:53.120 --> 0:11:55.840 to sneak around the house tethered to the cord. You're 0:11:55.920 --> 0:11:58.719 fighting with your sister when it was me right, it 0:11:58.840 --> 0:12:01.960 was right at the adventity age of call waiting right, 0:12:02.040 --> 0:12:04.360 and you're you're going through these rituals, and we have 0:12:04.600 --> 0:12:09.839 young men in this country who were through COVID not 0:12:10.120 --> 0:12:13.160 in school, miss out on this period of life. And 0:12:13.240 --> 0:12:16.000 then in the politics of the moment our young men 0:12:16.520 --> 0:12:20.200 are told that you're dangerous, you're unworthy, you're somehow bad, 0:12:21.520 --> 0:12:25.319 that in any type of interaction with with a woman, 0:12:25.480 --> 0:12:28.000 you'll you're the you're on the wrong side of that. 0:12:29.520 --> 0:12:34.079 Women don't lie. Uh, young men are bad. And so 0:12:34.920 --> 0:12:39.760 in that space, right, in this gospel of toxic masculinity, 0:12:39.880 --> 0:12:42.640 people talk about, you know, the excesses of the of 0:12:42.800 --> 0:12:48.080 the woke era, right people, young men, Right, there's really 0:12:48.160 --> 0:12:52.400 no more boy scouts. Uh, there is a you know, 0:12:52.640 --> 0:12:56.320 absence of school. So we see the sports right fall 0:12:56.600 --> 0:12:59.960 fall apart. And in that vacuum, it's the old saying 0:13:00.120 --> 0:13:04.520 goes right nature or pores a vacuum. Right, there's fraud 0:13:04.559 --> 0:13:09.120 steers who rise up and say hey to the dispossessed, right, 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:14.000 to the lonely, Hey follow me. And so this kid, right, 0:13:14.080 --> 0:13:17.160 and that's what we're talking about here, kid, right, is 0:13:17.280 --> 0:13:21.360 not sitting in a group right of one hundred other 0:13:21.640 --> 0:13:26.840 kids watching Andrew Kate. Right. This is not a group activity, right, 0:13:26.880 --> 0:13:30.640 This is a lonely activity. You're sitting in your room. Right. 0:13:30.760 --> 0:13:33.480 There is no girlfriend to talk to, right, there is 0:13:33.600 --> 0:13:38.360 no friends. Right, So you have isolated, lonely boys sitting 0:13:38.400 --> 0:13:41.360 in their rooms right, sitting in their basements, who are 0:13:41.440 --> 0:13:45.400 being stoked, being provoked, being fed a bunch of lies 0:13:46.640 --> 0:13:54.360 by these people. And it's metastasizing now in that you 0:13:54.520 --> 0:13:56.839 have a lot of these fighting clubs, a lot of 0:13:56.920 --> 0:14:01.760 these mixed martial lates arts facilities have urged with white 0:14:01.920 --> 0:14:08.000 nationalists politics and have become forums and venues for the 0:14:08.200 --> 0:14:12.959 spread all of it connected through this manosphere, which is 0:14:13.320 --> 0:14:22.800 a fundamentally dangerous mix of extremists peddling a message that says, hey, 0:14:22.920 --> 0:14:27.840 young man, Winston Churchill's the bad guy in Adolf Hitler. Well, 0:14:27.960 --> 0:14:33.440 he's misunderstood. And so the remedy to this, right is 0:14:34.200 --> 0:14:38.040 what you're talking about, which is that in the end, 0:14:39.040 --> 0:14:44.480 that the meaning of life, of manhood is the acceptance 0:14:44.600 --> 0:14:47.720 of this idea that there are some causes, some things 0:14:48.160 --> 0:14:52.760 that are bigger than yourself. And to me, for most 0:14:52.880 --> 0:14:58.360 amongst all of those things that transcend everything is the 0:14:58.600 --> 0:15:04.600 United States. And so the United States is a project. 0:15:05.320 --> 0:15:07.600 It's two hundred and fifty years old. We're in our 0:15:07.640 --> 0:15:11.800 two hundred and fiftieth anniversary year. Some great anniversaries. This 0:15:12.000 --> 0:15:15.200 year we had the anniversary of the United States Army, 0:15:15.800 --> 0:15:19.720 of the United States Navy, the United States Marine Corps. 0:15:20.760 --> 0:15:25.680 All this all this year, and the Republic turns two 0:15:25.800 --> 0:15:28.760 hundred and fifty next year, the birth of its independence. 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:36.360 Thomas Payne talked about liberty, so use some things you 0:15:36.480 --> 0:15:39.480 can't put a price on them. He's also the first 0:15:39.560 --> 0:15:43.040 person to come up with the name the United States 0:15:43.120 --> 0:15:45.640 of America, to write it down on a piece of paper, 0:15:46.360 --> 0:15:51.280 should be the name of the country. Against all enemies 0:15:52.280 --> 0:15:57.400 is a important phrase in the Constitution, in the oath 0:15:58.040 --> 0:16:01.480 that anybody takes to the cost institution a lot of 0:16:01.560 --> 0:16:04.760 ways to serve the country, not just in the in 0:16:04.920 --> 0:16:07.880 the military. A lot of people have taken that oath 0:16:08.600 --> 0:16:13.239 ready to defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic. 0:16:13.840 --> 0:16:19.440 Talk about your documentary on Apple that's number one, Why 0:16:19.520 --> 0:16:22.600 you think it got to number one, And about and 0:16:22.720 --> 0:16:25.840 about specifically your use of that phrase. 0:16:26.440 --> 0:16:30.160 Thanks Steve Well. I think it speaks to a lot 0:16:30.240 --> 0:16:34.440 of what you just laid out, which is a disinformation 0:16:34.640 --> 0:16:40.600 ecosystem that is so effective at reaching disaffected men, young 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:44.680 men in particular. And our focus was on military veterans. 0:16:45.560 --> 0:16:48.240 I alluded to the longest wars in America's history, right, 0:16:48.880 --> 0:16:52.960 those had repercussions off the battlefield, and we welcomed home, 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:59.440 actually two generations of soldiers back to the country, many 0:16:59.520 --> 0:17:02.880 of home, and we're looking to recapture that sense of 0:17:02.960 --> 0:17:06.840 camaraderie and purpose that they felt downrange. The vast majority, 0:17:06.880 --> 0:17:11.400 it has to be said, do reintegrate successfully into civilian life. 0:17:11.920 --> 0:17:13.000 But it doesn't take many. 0:17:13.119 --> 0:17:15.840 It doesn't take a small subset of that, a small 0:17:15.920 --> 0:17:21.240 percentage who find that sense of purpose and mission through 0:17:21.320 --> 0:17:24.200 the Oathkeepers or the Proud Boys, or the three percenters. 0:17:24.240 --> 0:17:27.440 It doesn't take many of those to wreak absolute havoc. 0:17:27.680 --> 0:17:31.600 And the impetus for the film was me sitting in 0:17:31.720 --> 0:17:36.920 my driveway on January sixth, twenty twenty one, just in 0:17:37.320 --> 0:17:42.080 disbelief at what was happening in looking when I finally 0:17:42.160 --> 0:17:44.480 got my phone out. I first was listening to it 0:17:44.600 --> 0:17:46.560 on the radio, but I was watching the coverage and 0:17:46.640 --> 0:17:53.520 seeing the organized stacks, the tactical stacks or lines of 0:17:53.680 --> 0:17:56.840 people working their way through the crowds, and realizing that's 0:17:56.920 --> 0:18:01.720 Vets right. And it turned out that a disproportionate number 0:18:02.080 --> 0:18:06.480 of the people there on January sixth, and certainly of 0:18:06.560 --> 0:18:09.520 the leaders behind it, the Stuart Rhodeses of this movement 0:18:10.040 --> 0:18:13.440 had military backgrounds, and we wanted to understand how the 0:18:13.560 --> 0:18:16.240 heck we got to this point, and so much of 0:18:16.320 --> 0:18:21.520 it is because of this disinformation ecosystem that pumps lies 0:18:21.720 --> 0:18:25.640 into people twenty four to seven. And if what you're 0:18:25.680 --> 0:18:29.480 hearing again and again and again, especially from the mouth 0:18:29.560 --> 0:18:32.320 of the commander in chief, is that an election was stolen, 0:18:32.520 --> 0:18:35.520 for example, and we have one hundred examples of lies 0:18:35.720 --> 0:18:38.280 just as nefarious since then, but let's just focus on 0:18:38.359 --> 0:18:41.040 that one. You hear the election was stolen. At first, 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:42.840 you don't believe it. You hear it again and again 0:18:42.920 --> 0:18:45.760 and again. You see Fox News playing on the wardroom, 0:18:46.080 --> 0:18:48.760 in the wardroom TV on your base right, you hear 0:18:48.800 --> 0:18:50.800 the commander in chief or the former commander in chief 0:18:50.840 --> 0:18:54.840 saying it, and it twists your mind and you begin 0:18:55.000 --> 0:18:58.760 to tell yourself, especially if you're surrounded by people who 0:18:58.800 --> 0:19:01.520 are reinforcing this, that you know what, my oath compels 0:19:01.560 --> 0:19:04.680 me to do something about it. And that, to me 0:19:05.040 --> 0:19:08.440 is one of the greatest tragedies of how we lost 0:19:08.760 --> 0:19:13.560 so many veterans to this disinformation campaign. So many of 0:19:13.680 --> 0:19:15.880 them thought they were doing the right thing. And one 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:17.480 of the things we try to get at in the 0:19:17.600 --> 0:19:23.240 film is the real onus of moral accountability. Sure, those 0:19:23.280 --> 0:19:26.880 who broke windows, those who broke into the Capitol deserve 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:30.080 to be held accountable. I think the pardons are an outrage, 0:19:30.840 --> 0:19:33.720 but the real onus should lie with those who provoked, 0:19:33.840 --> 0:19:37.119 who knew better the Josh Hawley's that Ted Cruzes and 0:19:37.640 --> 0:19:40.080 we just wanted to plan a flag to set a 0:19:40.160 --> 0:19:44.080 marker for history that this is something we're not going 0:19:44.160 --> 0:19:46.399 to ignore, We're not going to turn away from. And 0:19:46.560 --> 0:19:51.480 I think that message is what resonated. It's what catapulted 0:19:51.520 --> 0:19:54.320 it to the top of the charts on Apple TV. 0:19:54.480 --> 0:19:59.560 It's now on Amazon, pretty much anywhere you get your streaming, 0:20:00.520 --> 0:20:03.120 you're streaming films. But I think that's what the film 0:20:03.200 --> 0:20:06.119 was speaking to that struck a chord with so many Americans. 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:15.720 We have a generation of Americans that were sent to 0:20:15.880 --> 0:20:22.359 fight in wars. That one was started under a false 0:20:22.480 --> 0:20:28.600 pretense by the administration that I worked in. I played 0:20:28.600 --> 0:20:32.159 a senior role in the Bush administration. I was a 0:20:32.280 --> 0:20:36.760 deputy assistant to the President. Against All Enemies is the 0:20:36.880 --> 0:20:40.400 name of the film, everybody. I just saw that question 0:20:40.520 --> 0:20:44.080 Against All Enemies number one on Apple I was a 0:20:44.160 --> 0:20:47.359 deputy assistant to the President. I was counselor to the 0:20:47.480 --> 0:20:50.920 Vice president. Again, the name of the film is Against 0:20:51.400 --> 0:21:01.720 All Enemies, Against All Enemies on Apple Television. And as 0:21:01.760 --> 0:21:07.440 a political staffer, I spent time in Iraq. Was was 0:21:07.560 --> 0:21:10.720 sent there on an assignment, you know, for a for 0:21:10.880 --> 0:21:13.760 a month or so, and got a case of the 0:21:13.960 --> 0:21:19.119 flavor of what it is like to see the American 0:21:19.240 --> 0:21:26.160 military deployed fully alongside the British military and our coalition partners. 0:21:26.200 --> 0:21:30.320 You've either witnessed that, seen it, or have or have not. 0:21:31.560 --> 0:21:34.280 I'm convinced you could be in the military for twenty 0:21:34.359 --> 0:21:36.639 years and have not seen it and not understand what 0:21:36.800 --> 0:21:41.679 that is. An It's an incredible thing too. It's an 0:21:41.760 --> 0:21:48.560 incredible thing to see the power of the country. But 0:21:49.359 --> 0:21:52.760 what do you think about the political leadership that lost 0:21:52.920 --> 0:21:57.800 to wars that your friends were sent to That this 0:21:58.040 --> 0:22:07.720 is what politics is, and there is a reality that 0:22:08.200 --> 0:22:15.160 Trump rose in a Republican primary so many years ago 0:22:16.480 --> 0:22:21.280 as the truth teller right about these wars in that 0:22:21.680 --> 0:22:27.360 hey this was crazy, we lost these wars, and hey, 0:22:27.440 --> 0:22:35.080 it's your fault politically, And so I understand at a 0:22:35.200 --> 0:22:39.360 psychological level that if you send the army to war, 0:22:40.800 --> 0:22:43.240 in the Navy and the Marine Corps, in the Air Force, 0:22:43.400 --> 0:22:49.080 and in all of the contractors for twenty years, and 0:22:49.240 --> 0:22:55.119 you lose those wars, and you lose those wars with 0:22:55.280 --> 0:22:59.720 the images for example, at the end that come out 0:22:59.760 --> 0:23:04.639 of Afghanistan after twenty years. Right, that there's a moral 0:23:05.000 --> 0:23:12.160 injury done. Right, that's profound, And I'd love to hear 0:23:12.280 --> 0:23:18.040 you just talk about that moral injury, that grievance, that 0:23:18.480 --> 0:23:26.199 resentment that takes an American soldier, airman, marine, from defender 0:23:26.359 --> 0:23:32.800 of the Constitution to the tip of the spear waging 0:23:32.880 --> 0:23:40.760 a war against it, prodded on by the exact type 0:23:40.800 --> 0:23:44.879 of person that at one point in their life they 0:23:44.920 --> 0:23:51.440 would have understood is exactly what the country's against. 0:23:52.400 --> 0:23:56.720 Yeah, I'm so glad you brought up the term moral injury. 0:23:57.600 --> 0:24:00.640 Most people aren't familiar with it. It is distinct from 0:24:01.000 --> 0:24:05.600 PTSD or post traumatic stress, with which most people do understand. 0:24:05.680 --> 0:24:10.920 But moral injury is an injury to the soul, and 0:24:11.119 --> 0:24:14.280 it's being increasingly researched and discovered that it can be 0:24:14.400 --> 0:24:19.040 every bit as devastating as PTSD, and it just leaves 0:24:19.480 --> 0:24:23.760 a hole in you when, for example, you are sent 0:24:23.880 --> 0:24:27.240 down range, you're told that you're defending the country, say 0:24:27.520 --> 0:24:32.400 in Afghanistan, for example, you lose buddies based on this promise, 0:24:33.160 --> 0:24:35.720 and then you come home and you don't get the 0:24:35.800 --> 0:24:39.800 support that your country promised you. This isn't a hypothetical. 0:24:39.880 --> 0:24:43.800 It's happening right now. Look at the Packed Act, which 0:24:43.920 --> 0:24:46.120 was passed to take care of all of those soldiers 0:24:46.200 --> 0:24:49.119 down range who are exposed to burn pits. It actually 0:24:49.200 --> 0:24:51.680 goes all the way back to the Vietnam War and 0:24:51.800 --> 0:24:55.080 those exposed to Agent Orange who were never taken care of. 0:24:55.280 --> 0:24:57.800 My dad was exposed to Agent Orange. We lost them 0:24:58.280 --> 0:25:01.040 a month ago. I'm actually wearing his jacket today. I 0:25:01.119 --> 0:25:04.359 took my patches off and put them on his jacket. 0:25:04.760 --> 0:25:07.880 But the first word in the Packed Act is promise. 0:25:08.160 --> 0:25:11.280 It's a promise to America's veterans, and it has been 0:25:11.760 --> 0:25:18.040 ripped away because the Republicans, at Donald Trump's encouragement, have 0:25:18.560 --> 0:25:22.000 taken away the seventeen billion dollars that was committed to 0:25:22.119 --> 0:25:25.560 take care of those veterans who shouldered the burden that 0:25:25.680 --> 0:25:29.240 Americans asked them to shoulder. On top of that, you 0:25:29.440 --> 0:25:33.720 have this talk of sending back afghan refugees, many of 0:25:33.800 --> 0:25:38.119 whom stood alongside US in Afghanistan risked their own lives, 0:25:38.320 --> 0:25:43.080 lost family members, interpreted translated for US, fought alongside US. 0:25:43.119 --> 0:25:47.520 In many cases, those on TPS status in the US 0:25:47.680 --> 0:25:50.600 are in danger of losing it and being sent back 0:25:50.640 --> 0:25:54.399 to Afghanistan because Marco Rubio State Department has assessed that 0:25:54.480 --> 0:25:57.080 it's now stable. Do you know what happens to an 0:25:57.119 --> 0:25:59.760 Afghan interpreter for the Americans when he goes back to 0:26:00.440 --> 0:26:05.560 Taliban controlled Afghanistan? Take a wild guess that leaves an 0:26:05.680 --> 0:26:09.760 injury on the soul of the American troop who's life 0:26:09.840 --> 0:26:13.600 dependent on that Afghan interpreter. That is what moral injury is. 0:26:14.160 --> 0:26:17.480 And this administration seems to have no regard for what 0:26:17.640 --> 0:26:19.320 it is doing to the American veteran. 0:26:21.160 --> 0:26:25.080 I want everybody to understand what Ken is talking about. 0:26:25.200 --> 0:26:27.920 This is literally the plot of season six of The 0:26:28.040 --> 0:26:32.680 Handmaid's Tail. Right, it is, it is, it is, It 0:26:32.880 --> 0:26:39.080 is remarkable, and that decision, it's a bureaucratic evil that's 0:26:39.359 --> 0:26:45.879 that's being done. But I want to laser focus on 0:26:46.160 --> 0:26:51.800 something that that Ken is talking about, which is that 0:26:53.720 --> 0:26:58.160 this is not Marco Rubio who is doing this, Right, 0:26:58.440 --> 0:27:02.160 this is this is not Chris know who is who 0:27:02.320 --> 0:27:05.359 is doing this right, It's the American people who are 0:27:05.440 --> 0:27:10.879 doing this. When Marco Rubio issues an order, when Christy 0:27:11.040 --> 0:27:15.560 No issues an order, right, that the burden of that 0:27:16.760 --> 0:27:20.639 is carried by us, because we are a government of 0:27:20.800 --> 0:27:23.879 the people, by the people, for the people. And this 0:27:24.920 --> 0:27:29.560 is what instills in this moment, right, the fierce moral 0:27:29.880 --> 0:27:34.760 urgency right to stop it, right and to say no. 0:27:35.520 --> 0:27:38.920 And so what I want everybody on here to appreciate 0:27:40.000 --> 0:27:44.440 is that Elon Musk is back in Texas, self pitying, crying, 0:27:45.240 --> 0:27:48.400 right saying no Moss. And the truth of the matter 0:27:48.600 --> 0:27:51.960 is is that one hundred whatever days into this you know, 0:27:52.160 --> 0:27:55.360 to today is you know four months in a day, 0:27:56.080 --> 0:28:00.240 is that you have a lifetime of accountability ahead for 0:28:00.320 --> 0:28:03.680 a lot of people who have engaged in an assault, 0:28:03.880 --> 0:28:08.480 in an arson and attack against the United States, against 0:28:08.920 --> 0:28:15.040 the law across the board, in this administration. And it's 0:28:15.080 --> 0:28:20.240 going to take a very very very long time for 0:28:20.400 --> 0:28:23.480 that for that to play out. You know, it's easier 0:28:23.520 --> 0:28:26.480 to light something on fire than to rebuild it, and 0:28:27.400 --> 0:28:31.399 that's just the reality of things. But what we're talking 0:28:31.480 --> 0:28:38.120 about here, the moral injury sustained over twenty years time. 0:28:39.080 --> 0:28:45.120 As we come into now a period where we're going 0:28:45.200 --> 0:28:50.760 to see something on June the fourteenth, which is which 0:28:50.880 --> 0:28:57.080 is I think a desecration on the anniversary of the 0:28:57.160 --> 0:28:59.960 birth of the US Army. We'll see a brigade strand 0:29:00.640 --> 0:29:08.400 about six thousand American soldiers marching in a review. Kim 0:29:08.480 --> 0:29:13.600 John unstyle passed our maximum leader, our furer, the American 0:29:13.760 --> 0:29:19.800 fueror there Donald Trump tanks, fighter jets, helicopters deeply on 0:29:19.960 --> 0:29:25.440 American type parade. The United States Army is the greatest 0:29:25.520 --> 0:29:29.520 force for liberation in world history. You go to the 0:29:29.560 --> 0:29:34.800 American cemeteries in Europe, what you appreciate there is what 0:29:35.000 --> 0:29:38.800 Colin Powell talked about, which is that the only territory 0:29:38.920 --> 0:29:41.800 the United States ever asked for was enough to bury 0:29:41.880 --> 0:29:46.080 our war dead on And you can see that in France, 0:29:46.240 --> 0:29:51.120 you can see that in Belgium, these beautiful cemeteries. But 0:29:51.520 --> 0:29:56.800 how do you think about this June fourteenth parade? How 0:29:56.880 --> 0:30:00.880 should a veteran look at this? I think you have 0:30:01.160 --> 0:30:04.720