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Free Speech, Media Bias & Government Overreach: Johnny Sutton on Civil Liberties, Immigration & Healthy Discourse

Episode 50 · 26 November 2025 · 1 hr 4 min

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Free Speech, Media Bias and Government Overreach: Johnny Sutton on Civil Liberties

Former U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton returns for Part 2 with Randy Lorensen, Dr. John Oberg and Anthony Marino. Johnny Sutton takes on free speech, media bias, government overreach and immigration, after Randy and Anthony's Abundance Briefing on XPRIZE, robots and energy.

What does free speech really mean today — and how should America balance civil liberties with national security, media bias, immigration, and the rise of polarization?

In this powerful Part 2 conversation, former U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton returns to Tales of Abundance to break down the First Amendment, press responsibility, government overreach, and why healthy public discourse is disappearing in America.

Johnny shares decades of insight from the justice system — from Houston’s crime waves and gang crackdowns to modern immigration challenges — and explains why nuance, curiosity, and humility are essential for restoring trust. The hosts and Johnny also examine the role of social media, the decline of shared narratives, the rise of political tribalism, and what it will take to rebuild thoughtful, good-faith dialogue in a divided country.

This is a grounded, insightful, and timely discussion for anyone interested in free speech, civil liberties, American politics, media trust, immigration policy, and the future of public discourse.

The First Amendment, Government Overreach, and Media Bias

What you'll discover:

  • In the Briefing: how XPRIZE funds moonshots, humanoid and micro robots, and cheaper, safer energy
  • What the First Amendment and free speech mean today, and whether the press ever had a golden age
  • Why political anger feels worse now, and what healthy discourse should look like
  • Government overreach: civil liberties vs. national security
  • El Salvador's gang crackdown, Houston's crime years and tougher sentencing
  • Immigration enforcement, nuance, and kids growing up with phones and AI

Timestamps

  • [00:00] Abundance Briefing with Randy and Anthony (John is out), and a preview of Johnny Sutton Part 2
  • [00:47] The XPRIZE: how Peter Diamandis's prize model funds moonshots
  • [03:27] XPRIZE examples: water scarcity, wildfire detection and autonomous response
  • [07:35] Robots: Xpeng's humanoid and the pace of robotics
  • [10:58] Robots that fold laundry vs. microrobots that could treat cancer
  • [12:55] AI and robots "demonetizing everything," and Zipline's drone deliveries
  • [16:07] Why poor people today live better than kings once did, and technology for good and evil
  • [18:20] Energy: safer nuclear, cheaper solar and the power of the sun
  • [21:27] Briefing wrap-up: put XPRIZE and robotics in your news feed
  • [22:18] Break: Premium Cabinets business opportunity
  • [22:54] Welcome back, former U.S. Attorney Johnny Sutton, with John and Anthony
  • [23:22] What the First Amendment and free speech mean today
  • [25:42] Was there ever a golden age of the press?
  • [28:48] Newspaper fortunes, TV news and the media's lost credibility
  • [31:04] Area 51, the Marfa lights and why we like conspiracy
  • [32:05] Kids, social media and getting outside
  • [35:15] What healthy discourse should look like
  • [38:30] Why political anger feels worse now: tribes, Tip O'Neill and Reagan
  • [41:15] Live and let live: Houston, and friendships across the aisle in old Washington
  • [43:43] Moving past "one way of seeing the world"
  • [46:00] ESPN, debate TV and arguing to win
  • [47:02] Government overreach: civil liberties vs. national security
  • [47:49] El Salvador's crackdown on gangs
  • [49:39] Houston as murder capital, tougher sentences and the crime drop
  • [51:38] Immigration enforcement: going after the most dangerous first
  • [54:16] Model residents, legal status and the case for discourse
  • [57:33] Real discourse means nuance, and social media's role in losing it
  • [59:36] Kids, phones and uncharted waters with AI
  • [1:00:37] Bipartisan friendships and the culture gap
  • [1:03:04] Next time: the Fourth Amendment, and wrap-up

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About Johnny Sutton

Johnny Sutton is a former U.S. Attorney. He first joined Tales of Abundance in Ep 43 to talk about his path from college baseball to the courtroom, investigations and cartels, and returns here for Part 2. He draws on his years in the justice system, including time in Houston.

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Meet the hosts: Randy Lorensen · Dr. John Oberg · Anthony Marino

Transcript

A full transcript is below. It comes from the episode recording and has speaker labels and time markers, which line up with the published audio. It hasn't been proofread, so expect some errors in names and terms.

Randy Lorensen [00:13]: Listeners welcome back to tales of abundance why settle for less we are sadly missing dr. John today, but we got Anthony and myself So I think you're in good hands Anthony. We're doing good today

Anthony Marino [00:24]: doing good, even though my right air pod isn't working, but I think I could survive. So we're doing okay.

Randy Lorensen [00:30]: Okay, all right. Well, later we are going to have Johnny Sutton on who if you remember we did a part one with Johnny that was fantastic. We got a lot of good feedback. So we're going to be doing a part two with Johnny here in just a little bit. But in the meantime, Anthony, we're going to just talk about in as we're calling this the abundance briefing instead of current events at the beginning of the show, we're going to change it to abundance briefing the X prize and You know, we talked about this. In fact, we tried to record it last week and we had some technical difficulties. What's your, what are your takeaways on the XPRIZER? Do you want to kind of explain to people what it is?

Anthony Marino [01:11]: Well, know, it's a Peter Diamandis and a gang of very influential technologists and entrepreneurs have figured out a way to pool resources and to give opportunity to people that are underfunded or unfunded to search for what they call moonshots, which are successes or revelations or inventions that can solve some of the world's biggest issues, whether it's removing carbon from the atmosphere, figuring out how to get rid of plastics in the ocean, gigantic problems that were faced, and also inventions that we haven't thought about. It's an extremely ambitious group. There've been multiple successes, not as many commercially viable that they would like to see, but it's a giant fund of tens of millions of dollars, depending on the subject matter, that gives an opportunity to people that otherwise wouldn't have that opportunity because of funding to go after these things. So I think it's just a virtuous group. Its goals are limitless. I'm sure we'll see some great successes from it in the long run.

Randy Lorensen [02:46]: And this isn't a new concept, right? Like this was, know, that Peter Diamandis is the one that runs this, but his inspiration goes back to Lindbergh crossing the Atlantic or flying from New York to Paris in the spirit of St. Louis. that goes back just, you know, doing some quick research. But in 1919, Raymond Ortigue, was a user Frenchman that had a hotel in St. Louis. He came up with this prize and offered a $25,000 reward for whoever could fly from New York to Paris in either direction and a lot of people tried to win this and That was why Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic in the first prize. our first place So now if we talk about, know, some of the things that are going on Like give people an specific example I mean, I know there's lots of these you're interested in but what's a specific example of one that you find interesting Anthony?

Anthony Marino [03:41]: Well, there's some active ones that are huge. There's a 119 million dollar prize out there. If someone can solve the water scarcity issue, either through seawater desalinization or other ways, there's a hundred million dollar healthspan prize looking for ways to not just extend the healthy human lifespan, but to make the last part of the health span, you know, functional and enjoyable. And then everyone's excited about, you know, the wildfire prize. You know, we've been touched by that terribly this year, all over the world. And the idea there is to use space based wildlife detection and autonomous response. So that brings us into robotics and AI and so on and so forth. So those are three that are on my radar that I think are just amazing. And imagine if you could make progress on any and all of those, what the impact would be to the world, literally.

Randy Lorensen [04:57]: Yeah, like you referenced the X prize for health span and for those on YouTube you can see this, but $101 million is the prize and look at the team. So it's a seven year contest. The winners are. It'll pay out 101 million, but 749 teams are currently in this right? And the vision, ensure a future where innovative solutions meet the needs of an aging populations and shifting healthcare demands. Precision medicine breakthroughs revolutionize individualized patient care while healthcare systems shift from reactive treatment to proactive equitable care, blah, blah, blah. Anyway, you know, it's a pretty cool, pretty cool that they could, you know, for 101 million, get, what was it? 700 and 749 teams, right? Yeah.

Anthony Marino [05:42]: Yeah. I mean, this is, know, it's it's it really you may be at this is maybe asking why are we talking about it? This is creating abundance, right? This is absolutely creating abundance across multiple areas, subject matters, things that impact us, things that impact people outside of the United States, those that may be. Unable to have the local talent or technology or resources to go after and attack some of these things. if the teams that are working on these prizes can solve those problems in an efficient and effective way, it can just have a tremendous impact on the universe. So I think it's just. They should get credit just for trying, in my opinion, be perfectly honest with you.

Randy Lorensen [06:34]: Yeah. Yeah, the water scarcity one is another big one, right? Because we have so much water in the world. I think I heard a stat recently that of all of the available water we have on Earth, that we're only using 0.5 percent. one half of one percent is what goes toward our drinking water. The vast majority of the water is just almost unavailable. So here there's a five year contest for one hundred and nineteen million dollar prize and they have six hundred and seventy nine teams. you know, working on it. And basically it's being just the summary. I won't read the whole thing, but it's it's how do you take saltwater and turn it into clean drinking water and do it using minimal energy and, you know, keeping the price down. But just a lot of really great challenges. So I would encourage people go to XPRIZE.org and look at it. And I think it's just it gives me hope. I think, wow, if we can solve these problems and there's one for wildfires and there's just there's a whole bunch of them on there. Let's talk about robots. This has been a fairly something we've talked about and I've got I Man when you search for robots, there is so much stuff that comes up Just over and over but here's you know, a Chinese EV maker X ping who I don't know but evidently they're massive and they're going all in on humanoid robots, know, as we have, you know, we have Tesla and figure or the big US companies and what did we say, Anthony? There's like 50 other companies or when we were talking about this before, some like that.

Anthony Marino [08:14]: It's something like that. And I got to tell you, I was reading an article this morning and I can't remember if was Forbes or where it was. they listed. No, was an accounting firm, big accounting firm. I'll remember it in a minute here, but they listed five hundred, the five hundred fastest growing private companies in the United States. And I can't tell you, I didn't get through all five hundred, but just look at the top hundred dozens of them. are robotics companies. If they're not AI companies, they're robotics or some form of software. And so what I took away from that is these companies are going to interlace what they generate in AI, what they generate in software, chip making. And it's going to have a tremendous effect on robotics, both humanoid robotics, which I sent you guys an article this morning about the BMW factory in the United States that builds X3s, they just decommission their humanoid robots because they want to relaunch with the new version where they've solved many of the problems. But they've proven that you can use a humanoid robot, not just the arms that weld things and things like that, but you can actually have a humanoid robot. that can go pick up a piece of sheet metal, drop it onto the table where that welding machine is, within, you know, with high, high, high capability, high success rates, 99 point something success rate of getting it exactly where it has to be with intolerance, they can be successful at it. So you and I have had, you know, a little bit of fun with robotics in the past where You know, everyone's excited about people, robot folding your laundry. I think that's cute. I think it's unnecessary. I think I would rather guys figure out how to do difficult human tasks that are that having been in automobile manufacturing plants, other plants that take the dangers and the wear and tear away from humans and puts them on. Call it a robot, call it a machine, call it a combination of a you know, a humanoid robot and a machine, whatever you want to call it. I think that's, those are the advances that are going to really change and change our productivity and enhance people's health. Yeah. And there may be a ton of money in, you know, laundry folding robots that, that doesn't interest me very much. This other stuff does, you know, the article we talked about the, the robot that's the size of a pea, less than size of a pea that they're inserting right now into animals to, with the use of a magnet, drag that to a place where they can conquer cancer cells using that robot, either through some form of radiation that only goes to that spot. So you have this giant machine in a BMW factory, and then you have this thing that looks like a speck of dust that's going to be traveling through your body that might be able to cure a cancerous tumor. So I think it's just, I just think it's so exciting. That excites me. That makes me feel good about where technology is going.

Randy Lorensen [11:59]: Yeah, I think it's all of those, right? Like if somebody wants it to make their life easier because it can load and unload the dishwasher or fold their laundry, who knows what that frees them up to do? That's fine. But if it can cure cancer, better yet, or, you know. the robot that can just go into a place and do a dangerous rescue or run into a fire or a hazardous area, like there's lots of benefits to humanity, right? And one of the challenges seems to be population. A lot of countries are shrinking and there's demand and need for workers. True abundance, Elon Musk says that in 10 or 20 years, humans are all going to be, we're not going to have to choose like UBI that we're just all going to basically be rich because robotics will, and AI will demonetize everything and make everything so cheap and so easy. I mean, what he's envisioning is that making the, the robots making the cars, the robots making the food, you know, delivering it. know Amazon or not Walmart and your company's zip line. that you love, right? That they kind of got started delivering drugs and saving lives in Africa. They're working with all kinds of countries and companies in the US, delivering their burrito on Chipotle. We talked about that on a previous time, but now multiple stores, I think it was 14 or 15. Somebody have to fact check me on that exactly, but different Walmarts are going to be doing drone deliveries. I think some are like in San Antonio, not that far from us, that they're doing drone deliveries and delivering stuff within an hour. I mean there's just man there's so many things right I mean but I would like both I would like the one that worked around my house and the one to make everything else so much easier

Anthony Marino [13:52]: Yeah, just as long as you know, the engineers working on open on AI and the software and robotics and Elon Musk, if Elon Musk is empty, his dishwasher that I want him to have a robot. Those are the people that I want to have free time to continue to invent and advance humanity. know, Anthony's dishwasher, you know, who cares? And, you know, I know I'm just I'm being silly about it, but, you know, the I don't want to overlook. you know, the real incredible impact that technology in general is having in its the acceleration. You know, it's just amazing to me how fast things are moving. know, Gemini now is the leading jet, the LLM and tomorrow, you know, Grok will pass it. And back in the day, back in the 2000s when the iPhone got in invented and released and the iPad, iPod, you know, there were, there were, you know, years between revisions to those things. Now it seems to be revisions are coming through and advances are coming through hourly. It's just incredible what's happening. So I'm really excited about what's, what's, taking place. and I did send the list of fast growing companies to my son so he could give it to his kids someday. That's where they should be applying for jobs. And you're talking about companies that are 1500 % annually. I mean, it's just incredible what's going on. So right in front of us.

Randy Lorensen [15:30]: It's yeah, it's exciting, right? Like, I mean, things are moving. It's almost like all of these things. think we're even we're underestimating how fast things are changing because it isn't just robotics. It's robotics. It's AI. It's new materials. It's health care. All of these things are happening simultaneously and they're all speeding each other up and leveraging each other. It's almost like. It's where, you know, Ray Kurzweil talks about the singularity. can understand. We're getting close. We're getting really close. And I love the world where people don't have to work. Now that creates a new challenge. But the fact where robots are doing everything and you can just live and pursue whatever you want. And everybody is basically wealthy because. Right now, poor people live better than kings and queens lived. in the old days, right? Like they have way more technology, way better lives, know, indoor plumbing, et cetera. Well, I think people in the future are going to live, you know, even the poor people are going to live better than how the rich people live now. Might be some tough times, some bloodshed in between, but that's where we're going. So true.

Anthony Marino [16:39]: Let's not take it down. I think there's enough good in the world that this technology that's being harnessed will be in the hands of good more than it'll be in the hands of bad. Whatever, if someone's got ill thoughts or ill actions that they want to take, think the world will love a part of them. We'll know before they know. but that's what they want to do because the technology is predictive. So I'm very hopeful. I may not live to see it, I'm.

Randy Lorensen [17:16]: There's, that's been true of every, well, that's been true of every technology in history, right? Like almost every technology, there's a use for good, there's a use for evil. And I, I'm with you. I think there's way more good people than there are evil people. And it seems to have been that way throughout all of history. It's just now we're playing with a little bigger stakes.

Anthony Marino [17:37]: Yes. Since the first first guy took a rock to another rock, technology has begun advancing from that moment forward, you know, with fire in the wheel and so on and so forth. And it's these you look back on that, you say, is that really technology? Hell, yeah, it's technology. It's advances. It's using tools to, you know, make life easier and make life better. And, you know, we're just now in a place. And I'm sure the acceleration, it felt like acceleration to them when they figured out fire, right? my God, this is amazing. It's happened so quickly. But to me, compares to what's going on right now. So very exciting.

Randy Lorensen [18:19]: Well... Even energy, just in the last couple of days, I've heard things about there's a new nuclear process that's safer and can't melt down and they're replacing the rods with little balls or something. I don't fully understand that. But also both Bezos, Musk, and I think somebody else are talking about putting these really efficient solar reactors in orbit, beaming the energy down or having data centers in space. And Elon Musk just said a couple of days ago, it was something like a hundred gigawatts per year he thinks will be I forget starting in a couple of years but they'll be able to add a hundred gigawatts per year of solar arrays in space with these data centers to put that in perspective I think the US only has like 400 to 450 you know so that'd be like 25 percent of the US or 20 25 percent of all US production going into space adding you know within a couple of years on an annual basis. So that's pretty exciting too and solves a lot of other choke point problems there.

Anthony Marino [19:28]: If it was up to Elon, we would put 100 % of our resources into solar. Every bit of research, every bit of development should be in solar because of the absolute mass of the sun. Yes, nuclear is an option, but it can't produce it. can't produce as much energy as the sun no matter how many of those things you build. you know, he's always far to an extreme, but, you know, if I'm placing a bet, I'm placing a bet over there.

Randy Lorensen [20:06]: Well... So in our universe, or our, no not our universe, sorry, our solar system, in our solar system the sun makes up 99.8 % of the total energy. So if you take all of the energy coming from earth, Jupiter, comets, asteroids, everything else in this solar system, it's a rounding air. It still rounds up to 100 % of energy comes from the sun.

Anthony Marino [20:39]: think he said if you burned Jupiter as fuel, it would be one tenth of one percent of the energy of the sun.

Randy Lorensen [20:49]: Right. Right. It's a rounding there. Right. So, and I've heard multiple people now talking about a Dyson spear. Like people used to say in the future, we could have a Dyson spear, by the way, would be something that we would in essence surround the sun, capture all of its energy and then have, who knows what windows that opens up with basically unlimited energy. But this seems to be like, I mean, it might be 100 years in the future or 200 years in the future, but that seems like it might be possible at some point. we are living in the future. And I think it's all coming together. Any last words here, Anthony, before we go to Johnny?

Anthony Marino [21:25]: time. No, I think we covered it. Again, I'm excited about the two topics that we touched on. Looking forward to see what's happened next. I'd advise our listeners and viewers to get your newsfeed straight. Put the XPRIZE in your newsfeed. Put robotics in your newsfeed and keep up with things that are going on. Because if you don't keep up with it, it's going to pass you by.

Randy Lorensen [21:57]: Or just keep coming back to Tales of Abundance. That's why they download and subscribe so that we can give them updates every week and keep them in the know.

Anthony Marino [22:04]: Yeah, go to our YouTube channel and subscribe and help us out there and talk to you next time.

Randy Lorensen [22:08]: Yep. All right. Listeners, we will be back after the break with Johnny Sutton on a part two. Hope you enjoy.

Randy Lorensen [22:53]: All right, listeners, welcome back to Tales of Abundance, Why Settle for Less? I'm still here with John Oberg and Anthony Marino and back for his second time, Glutton for Punishment, Johnny Sutton, former US attorney is joining us as well. So, gentlemen, welcome, Johnny, especially welcome, welcome back to the show.

Johnny Sutton [23:11]: Good to see you all. Thanks for having me back.

Randy Lorensen [23:14]: All right. Well, yeah, we enjoyed the first episode, so we thought we'd we thought we'd pick your brain some more. Let's kind of pick up a little bit where we left off last time or not where we left off as much as a topic we hit. talked about the First Amendment and free speech and and what does it mean? Let's just.

Anthony Marino [23:14]: Thanks for joining us.

Johnny Sutton [23:21]: Sounds great.

Randy Lorensen [23:36]: I don't know that we went into what it means, we talked about healthy discourse, but when you hear somebody talk about the First Amendment and free speech, what comes to your mind?

Johnny Sutton [23:46]: Well, I'm not a constitutional scholar, I I kind of think the first thing that comes to my mind is the old fashioned way, this is America, we get to say what we want. I mean, the First Amendment basically limits government's ability to curtail speech. And I think it's probably the first and second amendment are probably the most important rights we have, because if you're not free to speak, you're really not free to think. And, you know, there's been times even recently in the country, it just seems like you couldn't say things out loud for fear that people were going to hate on you and try to cancel you. And if you can't say things out loud and, you know, I think it's a recipe for disaster. One is when there's bad speech, we need to confront it. If someone's got a terrible idea, we need to confront it and explain why it's not a good idea and why people shouldn't follow it. And I think the more more free speech we have. I'm almost a free speech aposylutist. mean, you can't incite violence. You can't go out and, you know, encourage terrorist activities. aside from some kind of violent thing, I think it's one of the most important rights we have. And I think it seems to be coming back. I don't know. Y'all have a finger on the pulse more than I do, but it feels like the country's backlashing from some of the we can't hear these arguments. You know, it's just, it's just too much. We're going to just cancel you for saying some.

Dr. John Oberg [25:15]: What about Johnny where you have like, because it's more than just freedom of speech. The First Amendment has a number of things. Freedom of speech is one, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, I think religion's in there, right petition's in there, but like the press in particular has become an industry, a for-profit industry. And so you see that there are people where the press goes out and it doesn't matter which side you're on, they'll eviscerate the other side and do so without the same level of seemingly, I don't know if is too true, but seemingly not the same level of rigor that the press had had, you know, times past. Is that just me being kind of an idealist? Like, was, things were pretty ugly in revolutionary times in terms of, you know, name calling and character assassination. Has that always been the case, or was there actually a golden age of, you know, the press really being a fourth pillar and having some rigor, or is that just me being, you know, an optimist?

Johnny Sutton [26:09]: Yeah, it's good question. I kind of feel it that way, too. It seems like when we were growing up, maybe it was a golden age and maybe we were naive that the press was in the tank and we just didn't know it. But it didn't feel like it felt like reporting was just trying to get facts. There was an opinion in news every every night. And and of course, it just seemed like the business model isn't broken like it is now, where, you know, they're looking for clicks. The most, you the scariest, most over the top thing is what gets you the click. So then instead of getting the news, getting the facts accurately, people are trying to be outrageous. And it does feel like there is serious bias. I've always felt it as a conservative. mean, being in a presidential campaign and governor campaigns, it was just amazing how the press was just universally against us. Maybe that's not fair. Maybe that's in my mind, but I think it's bad. Now, of course, back in, you know, Jefferson and Adams, mean, those guys had their own newspapers that hated the other side. But you kind of knew what the angle was. Now you've got papers pretending to be impartial when it's obvious to anybody that they're not.

Dr. John Oberg [27:25]: Did that really come about when the, because it used to be you had to both sides got equal time inside of a media outlet. Was that the big change from your perspective as a, looking at the law?

Johnny Sutton [27:37]: I think that's one pretty huge change, which is in the past, a reporter would get both sides of the story. They'd sort of hear. And even if one side was a little bit crazy, they'd at least report what they're saying. I think now so many of these reporters have graduated from elite schools with ideologies that seem to go to one side that there really is no other side to this argument. There's only this side. And if we give the other side any time, all we're doing is giving oxygen to whatever name they're calling people these days. And I think that's wrong. And I think we're seeing some of the backlash from it right now with some far right folks that have gotten traction on the internet. And these were people that they really stomped down and tried to put out of business. now it seems, I don't follow it as closely as many, but it seems like some of these folks are coming back with a vengeance.

Dr. John Oberg [28:30]: Yeah, I think.

Anthony Marino [28:30]: was a different, different channel, type of channel management through the 50s, 60s and 70s. Every every major city had at least two newspapers, you know, the Boston Globe and the Boston Herald, one came at it, the globe was a little more dominant, they were more liberal, you know, the Herald was, you know, kind of the upstart conservative guys, little grittier, New York had, I think New York had a half a dozen or so.

Johnny Sutton [28:46]: Right. Okay.

Anthony Marino [28:58]: There was good money in newspapers. The money was in news in newspapers, right? There was, you know, Murdoch and Hearst and all those guys made their fortunes in newspapers. When the fortunes moved to TV, that's when things really started to change. And now the key thing was not only do I want an audience, I want a specific kind of audience that I can present to my advertisers who are going to pay me a lot of money.

Johnny Sutton [29:03]: Right.

Anthony Marino [29:29]: to deliver a million or more people a night for this particular thing. And it's just feeding on itself. It's feeding on itself and it's gonna kill itself eventually because we're not believing what we see. Someone said it earlier, they're coming off as if they're non-biased but you can see clearly see that they are biased. So I think it's gonna kill itself in the long run. I don't know what that definition is in long run.

Johnny Sutton [29:37]: Yeah.

Anthony Marino [29:57]: But I can see that coming.

Johnny Sutton [30:00]: I think that's right. If you look at the polls and what the American public's opinion is towards media, it's extremely low. Now, it's extremely low against a lot of folks, politicians and others. But yeah, I think they've lost a lot of credibility. I've been arguing for years, there's gold nuggets all over the ground and the media is not picking up any of them. And now finally, some of these bloggers and YouTubers are picking them up. But of course, then they're you know, connecting dots that are not there, you know, and that's, mean, to me, there's all these interesting stories that just don't get reported very much. and now you've got these bloggers and, and YouTubers picking them up, but they're not sophisticated enough or good enough researchers to see what's true and what's not. And, you know, I'm not a big, you know, I'm not big on conspiracy theories. I worked in government for 21 years. I don't have a lot of confidence that the government could could hold together a secret or a conspiracy for five minutes, much less 60 years, 20, 30, 60 years.

Dr. John Oberg [31:04]: So wait, you've never been to Area 51?

Johnny Sutton [31:06]: I've never been there, not yet. I need to go. I I spent a lot of time out in West Texas and I've been to see the Marfa lights eight times and I've only seen them once. A lot of people went out there and they thought they saw them. Those were just the car lights on the highway. When you see them, you're gonna know you saw them.

Dr. John Oberg [31:26]: That's awesome.

Randy Lorensen [31:26]: Alright, John went to Aliens. I went to JFK. I wanted that, but we probably don't need to open that can of worms, but that's I was going to go.

Johnny Sutton [31:30]: Right. All right.

Dr. John Oberg [31:35]: Randy, you made a note when you prepping for today about what's fair on social media as far as the First Amendment, where people's rights to, I don't know those are privacy rights or what the case may be, but social media has really changed the game for free speech, hasn't it?

Randy Lorensen [31:50]: Yeah, I mean, I. Well, I think I think you Johnny what I mean, what is fair game on social media?

Johnny Sutton [31:50]: Are you talking to me? No, I'm sorry. Well, it's a hard question. I gave a talk this week at the University of Texas, LBJ school. And one person asked a question about that, what social media means. And here, I'm kind of an old guy at this point. And I'm like, hey, look, get outside and see the sun and play in the grass and talk to your friends. But in the world that some of these kids are in, that's just not even an option. You know, there's these just geniuses that are developing algorithms and developing techniques that are just so highly addictive. And I myself am addicted. mean, it's, know, when YouTube came out, I was just, I really thought YouTube was heaven. I mean, this is what heaven is going to be like. You're going to be able to go and say, I want to go back in time and see what the, you know, the battle of the Nile was, you know, with Napoleon, whatever. I want to see what it is. In YouTube, there's so many at the beginning, there were so many cameras out, something that happened. Literally, you could see 50 angles of the event yourself in live time. Now, unfortunately, they killed all that. And, you know, lot of that stuff that was there is gone. But I mean, I think I think the answer is it's it's going to be rough. And I'm not sure how to do it. mean, I really am proud of guys like you that are, you know, experienced and not just crazy bomb throwers actually trying to have good discussions that are healthy. and do research and be fact-based. And I think in the end, that's going to work. Although, you know, people are like, Johnny, you're so naive. They just want to hear, they want to hear what they want to hear and they're not going to hear anything else. I think that's wrong. think human beings are tough-minded and they may not want to hear it, but I think they want to hear the truth. And the question is, how do you find that? And it's a challenge.

Randy Lorensen [33:48]: And once you've convinced somebody of something, I just heard this recently and it made so much sense or was so obvious once I heard it and I wish I could give credit to the proper source, but it was something along the lines of it's much easier to convince somebody of a lie than to convince them that they've been lied to. And when I heard it, was like, wow, that's really is true.

Johnny Sutton [34:06]: Well, that's right. I think it is true and that's my experience. mean, when these tragic things happen, I was a prosecutor for many years and I saw so many murders and just horrible events, children being killed and it was just, it was very sad. And especially in murders, people don't want to believe that some schmo can kill some president of United States, that some... dummy kid can go get his grandfather's deer rifle and kill Charlie Kirk. mean, it just seems impossible that that could happen. unfortunately, World War I started by a ridiculous assassination. And it was a comedy of errors, my understanding is they tried to kill the Duke for several minutes and couldn't do it. And then all of sudden they were depressed and they looked outside and there he was, just parked on the side of street. Our minds don't want to accept that. We like conspiracy and I'm not sure why.

Randy Lorensen [35:15]: All right, well, what would you like to see? And we hit on this on episode one a little bit, but healthy discourse. What would you like to see and what should that look like? I think it's worth it.

Johnny Sutton [35:27]: You know, it's funny, we were talking about this on, I guess it was, when was that? Tuesday night at the LBJ school. I mean, one of the things that first came to mind for me when, you people are saying, well, how do I have healthy discourse? First thing that came into my mind is curiosity. And I'm an extrovert and I, you know, I really enjoy talking to people. I enjoy finding out about them. The first question that I asked somebody is,

Anthony Marino [35:41]: Thank

Johnny Sutton [35:55]: Hey, where are you from? And they'll say this town. A lot of times they'll say, I'm from Austin. And I'll say, oh, really, where'd you go to high school? And they said, oh, well, you I went to high school in Vermont. I moved here three years ago, you know, which of course I said, well, you know, you're not actually from Austin, but there's a reason why they didn't want us, a lot of people.

Johnny Sutton [36:12]: But I don't care where they're from. I'm interested where you're from and where you went to high school and learning a little bit about you and talking about you. People love to talk about their favorite subjects, which is themselves. I think when you start a conversation and you get to know people, it's so much easier to have dialogue because a lot of times we don't know anything about the other side. And a lot of times we're talking anonymously online and that's the very worst way to have discussions. I don't like to have discussions in writing. I like to have discussions in person. And if you can't do it in person, do it on the phone. that's the first thing that comes to mind for me. I just, I don't know, for me, it's getting to know people. don't believe in there's such a thing as quality time. I think there's only quantity time. But of course that's hard to do when you're in a hurried rush society. And of course, the other thing is I don't, my experience is you can't really win arguments. You have an argument, you can't really win. mean, even if you win, you may have won the argument, but you lost a friend. And so I have a tendency in conversations to plant seeds, just to open their mind to think about something. And then they can go home and say, that possibly true what that crazy guy said? And then when they start to do the research, God, it turns out that was true. Maybe I don't understand this subject as well as I thought. But, and of course, so much of it's just having a good attitude, not being hateful, not using name calling and not thinking of your opponent as evil.

Randy Lorensen [37:55]: Thank

Dr. John Oberg [37:55]: I questions

Anthony Marino [37:55]: Thanks.

Dr. John Oberg [37:56]: too, I was talking to my son yesterday and he asked a question about somebody who was really grading online and he's like, do I, know, like what's the right way to engage and how do I, like, how can I be helpful without trolling? And there's this really interesting conversation and, you know, questions, people don't ask questions in that way very often, do they?

Anthony Marino [38:21]: You know, why are people so angry about whatever the topic is? mean, I don't know. mean, Johnny and I are probably close in age. I just don't remember this type of anger between political parties. And my hypothesis, it's the government's fault because They've created such a divide that they forced us into tribes and they're mad at each other. They're angry. They got nothing good to say about the other one. And it's been this way for 20 plus years now. And I think it's just fostering this, this unreasonable anger that makes us deaf to anything anybody says. I mean, I always tell the story. My father was a a politician, you know, a select ran for a select of a small town back in outside of Boston. And he was best friends with the guy he ran against. He was my dad was a Republican in Massachusetts, of all things. And Mr. Sirianni was a Democrat. They were they hung out at the Sons of Italy together. They they went out boating together. It was like, OK, whatever. They had completely different views on how the government should run and all that. But

Johnny Sutton [39:29]: Right.

Anthony Marino [39:45]: It just wasn't that kind of anger. Tip O'Neill and Reagan are probably the most famous example of two politicians who couldn't have come from more different backgrounds and beliefs, but somehow figured out how to work together. So I just don't know where it came from. I hope we can solve it. That's all I can say about it.

Randy Lorensen [39:48]: Making your Anthony, you're talking about like they're forcing us into two political parties or trying to. And I agree with that. I don't fit in either one of those political parties. I really don't like either one of them very much, right? And I agree with the left on some things. I agree with the right on some things, but lots of things I don't agree with either one, but you're right. They're, trying to force us into the two and it's similar. Johnny was mentioning the media earlier how it's, you know, there's the right and the left and the same thing. It's like, like he was saying how they can't have equal time. Like I don't feel like I'm represented at all if I watch it, right? Like, cause I, it's not even having two sides. Cause I'm, I just don't, people are messy. We don't fit into those buckets that cleanly, but for whatever reason, they're trying to force us into them.

Dr. John Oberg [40:53]: Well, not for whatever reason, Randy, for advertising reasons. mean, think that's the, you know, he's gonna get to follow the money a little bit. I think, and it's an important lens for people because, you know, if people have motives, that's okay. Like I think very few people in the world are not conflicted at all. like, this for me, when I watch the news, like I at least want to understand the motives and where they're coming.

Johnny Sutton [40:53]: See you later! Yeah, I think all of that is right. And I think there's a big group of people and I may be kind of in this group on the conservative side, which is you feel like, you you just want to kind of have your kids go to a good school and live in a decent house and have a decent job and live in a safe neighborhood and and live a normal life. And I feel like a lot of people like what happened to our normal lives, you know? And and of course, I grew up in Houston, Texas, where, you know, It was a very diverse city of all kinds of things with a very large

Johnny Sutton [41:48]: I'm sure that some people might disagree, but at least in the world I was in, it was a live and let live society way, way back. it was kind of a, when you come to Texas, just work hard and don't scare the horses. You're gonna get along just fine. But now people wanna force your nose into whatever they're doing. And in the past, like you were saying, could, Anthony, you could agree to disagree. Those guys didn't agree. but they could have dinner together, was no problem. And that's the experience I had in the Harris County DA's office. I was in trial all the time with my friends and they were duking it out and they were defense lawyers making my life miserable and sometimes accusing me of stuff. But after it was all over, we'd go have dinner. And I say, hey, that was kind of nasty, you accusing me of lying. And he's like, what you talking about? I got no defense at all. My guy confessed, you got him on video. I'm just doing the best I can. you know, so, but again, you knew each other. And I think what happened in Congress is because of travel, a lot of guys don't live in Washington. And the old days, think they did at least spend a lot of the week there and they would all go, they'd live together, they'd go to dinner together and they were friends. And, know, and now it's just siloed. And we do have to find a way to fix that. And a lot of people call me and say, Johnny, you're a reasonable conservative. Please explain this stuff. Where do I go? to find decent, accurate news. And of course, it's a hard question to answer because you got to read 20 different things. And also, I have friends that I call.

Dr. John Oberg [43:25]: But I think the other thing you said that's really important is we also have to make room for other points of view, like that live and let live. I think that's a part of it too. Yesterday talked to my son, he was engaging with some people that there was one way, there was only one way, that was the way. And I think that's a pretty tough world to live in. And by the way, I used to live in that world. I used to be the guy that there was one way of seeing the world and it's way that I saw the world.

Johnny Sutton [43:52]: Right.

Dr. John Oberg [43:54]: Looking back on it, it wasn't my finest point of view.

Johnny Sutton [43:58]: Yeah. Well, a big part of, and I change, I've changed a lot in that way too. You know, I came out of the rough world of super competitive sports where we were there to do one thing, win national championships. So it was serious business and we weren't always the friendliest to people around us. And in the DA's office, you know, it was the same thing. You know, somebody had gotten murdered and this was serious business. But later in life, I got into Al-Anon and I don't know if we need to explain to your listeners what Al-Anon is.

Dr. John Oberg [44:27]: I know what it is, let's say it anyway.

Johnny Sutton [44:29]: But anyway, Alan and is basically a 12 step program for the loved ones of alcoholics. If you have an alcoholic dad or a sister, a brother, a wife or girlfriend or whatever. And I learned so much in that to one, to mellow me out, two, to get humble. And you just, they give you these little tools like when you're in an argument, to saying something as simple as, know what, you may be right. You may be right. If you could just say those simple words. A lot of times that will keep things on track as opposed to, you're an effing idiot and you don't know what you're talking about. That just doesn't, that doesn't get anywhere. And, and I think we need to get a little bit back to that. But again, the business model doesn't, is not excited about that. They want a debate. They want somebody to be crushed. They want, you know, just the crazies on both sides. Although I think people getting tired of that. And that's why you see guys like Joe Rogan.

Anthony Marino [44:59]: Thank

Johnny Sutton [45:26]: and other podcasters having three hour discussions with Bernie Sanders or some politician who's never in their life talked to somebody for three hours and had it recorded.

Anthony Marino [45:36]: All right.

Dr. John Oberg [45:38]: my gosh, you just made me think of that old Arnold Schwarzenegger movie, The Running Man, talking about someone getting crushed and making it great TV, and how just ridiculous that was when the movie came out. Like how just over the top fantastical. you know, it's maybe not that.

Johnny Sutton [45:45]: Right. Right. Yeah. And they just remade it, by the way, with Glenn Powell. I haven't seen it yet, but it's been remade.

Dr. John Oberg [45:59]: Alright.

Randy Lorensen [46:00]: Yeah, that argument, makes me think of, you know, I used to watch ESPN a lot and ESPN turned into a lot of this just two people taking sides and arguing and not having intelligent points, frankly. And I haven't watched ESPN in years. Like I might turn on a game that's on, but watching their regular programming, I mean, it went from probably my number one station I watched to almost not on my radar other than. other than games because they've taken that approach too. Like it's just, it's not interesting to me, right?

Johnny Sutton [46:33]: Yeah. No, I feel the same way. haven't. used to love watching those, the recaps and the great, you know, they had those great announcers that would make those recaps so fun. But now it's just people arguing about some stupid thing that doesn't even really have to do with the game at the time.

Randy Lorensen [46:50]: Right, absolutely.

Dr. John Oberg [46:51]: And Stuart Scott was so great. I want him back. That's right.

Johnny Sutton [46:55]: Yeah, there was some

Randy Lorensen [46:55]: cooler than the other side of the pillow.

Anthony Marino [46:58]: Nope.

Johnny Sutton [46:58]: stars back in the day.

Randy Lorensen [47:01]: All right, let's transition to government overreach and civil liberties versus national security. I think that's a real debate.

Dr. John Oberg [47:14]: Randy, you're not the political guy. like, yeah, I'm not right. I'm not allowed to be on the center. We're to start with over, not just government reach, overreach. I love it. I might have picked up on that at some point.

Anthony Marino [47:23]: Okay.

Randy Lorensen [47:24]: Well, I tend to want a smaller government, John, if you've never noticed. Yeah. Well, look, I'm, Johnny doesn't know me as well as you guys, but I am definitely a freedom maximalist, a free speech maximalist. mean, I'm freedom and sovereignty are really, really core to my being and my belief system. But I've watched El Salvador really interestingly the last few years. I mean, El Salvador was, I believe the most dangerous country, highest murder rate in the world. and they elected Bacchale who has come in and he's been basically a dictator in a lot of ways, kind of a benevolent dictator, but he's come in and just started locking up everybody. He just filled the prisons and in the process they took all of these people that probably are innocent. Like I don't know what percentage, but it's not zero percent that they're just in solving the problem they had overkill and My core is like, oh, we can't put innocent people in prison. But as somebody that went to El Salvador and watching what it's done, I don't like thousands and thousands of fewer people are dying now. it's, it's, it's went from super dangerous to super safe, right? It's safer than the U S now. So

Johnny Sutton [48:44]: There. Yeah. Yeah.

Dr. John Oberg [48:47]: Unless you're one of the guys who's innocent in prison, that doesn't seem very safe.

Randy Lorensen [48:51]: Well, yeah, so that's an extreme example, but I think we're, you know, to a lesser extent, think we're battling the same problem in America, right? And at what point, I mean, I don't know, I'll stop there. I'll let you talk.

Johnny Sutton [49:06]: Yeah, well, we go through this cycle about every 40 years and I'm not saying I don't know enough about El Salvador. My instinct on what's happening down there is they had a gigantic gang problem. mean, they had criminal gangs that were basically taking over the country and they just said, you know what, if you're in this gang, you're a criminal. We think you're participating in criminal conspiracies that are killing people and doing all kinds of bad stuff and you're going to prison. you that couldn't happen in the United States because we had to be able to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that you committed a crime. But back in the, you know, the 70s and 80s, I think we talked about this maybe last time, I Houston was the murder capital of the United States or close to it back in the late 70s. And people just got sick and tired of it. And they decided we're going to build some prisons and we're not going to let these people get, you know, if they get 10 years in prison, they get 10 months there. It's a revolving door. And we're going to start prosecuting especially violent criminals. And once they started locking up murderers and aggravated robbers, people that are using guns and knives to kill people and rob people and rape and kidnap people, those guys started getting hammered with, you know, 20, 30, 40, 50 year sentences where you had to do 50 % of your time. So these bad guys were completely taken off the street and we saw the crime rate just drop like a rock.

Anthony Marino [50:05]: But.

Johnny Sutton [50:31]: in the 90s. I mean, it was incredible. And it's pretty much still low. I know there's a few cities that have ticked up, especially after COVID, during COVID and after. I COVID, the crime went down because nobody was on the street. But it works. The problem is, Randy, just like you said, you can't overstep it. And then all of sudden, the government goes too far. I I lived it. I mean, I was in Houston when the Black community was complaining. Why is there a drug dealer standing in front of my house? Why are there prostitutes when I'm trying to walk my kids to the bus stop? This is ridiculous. This wouldn't happen in the rich part town. And then the police started coming in there and hammering those drug dealers and arresting those prostitutes and cleaning it up. But then it would go further and further and get worse to where people were just getting stopped for riding their bike in the neighborhood. And if they found an illegal gun or some crack pipe, they were arresting them. And then All of a the community would say, well, didn't, you we wanted to get the drug dealer with a gun, not the dummy kid who's riding his 10-speed and happened to have a crack pipe in his pocket. So it's a,

Anthony Marino [51:38]: Well, we're in the same place now with the immigration situation. It's exactly the same place.

Johnny Sutton [51:42]: We are. No, it's definitely the same place. And you're going to see, I think that's what President Trump is doing. You're going to see a very aggressive, you know, and what he's doing now is he's arresting all the felons and departing people who've been previously deported or they have a felony conviction. They are aggressively arresting him and taking him out. And once those folks are gone, and of course, in the old days, you get deported and you come back right back and nothing would happen. Sometimes people will be deported two and three times and arrested again and nothing happened. What they're doing now is they're prosecuting those folks and also deporting the ones that haven't necessarily committed a new crime, but they've got a criminal record and they're illegal and they're not gonna stay.

Anthony Marino [52:29]: We're also running into sweeping up, you know, guys that have been here for eight years, you know, at the Home Depot looking to be a contractor, go do some roofing. Yes, they're here illegal, but they're not, they're not a menace to society. In fact, they're contributing to society and may likely paying taxes. so if, and unfortunately, lot of it has to do with non-cooperation by local governments, which is making it more difficult.

Johnny Sutton [52:40]: Yep.

Anthony Marino [52:59]: That problem's got to get solved because everyone agrees, no one disagrees that the worst of the worst need to go. there are certain people in government, in power in this particular government that feel like overreach is the only way to go, I guess, unfortunately.

Johnny Sutton [53:22]: Yeah. Well, and that's the challenge is identifying who are the really bad actors who are dangerous and getting them first, as opposed to the guy who's never committed a crime in his life. He's the hardest worker you've ever seen in your life. So that is the challenge. I'm less worried about the person who's been here eight years than I am about the person who's been here 30 and has a bunch of American kids and all those things. But on other hand, we've just got to find a way to fix this and I don't know. think they're They're starting by just stopping the bleeding and stopping the flow, getting the most dangerous out. And then they'll start evaluating, okay, how are we going to do this? Who goes? But even if you've been here a long time, I you forgot the advantages of you've learned English. You've probably made a lot of money. It's not the worst thing in the world to go back for everyone. But I agree with you. There are certain people who, you They've committed the crime of coming in the country illegally, but other than that, they've been model citizens. And that's the challenge is how do you identify those people where we might kind of get them on some legal status versus other people who really need to go back. it's a challenge. I like the old days better when, you know, there were folks who would come across just for the season. The Mexican worker, the men would come across, they'd work the season. and then they'd go back and they'd make more in five months than they could make in four years in Mexico. And it was a pretty good, and that's what, know, that's the guest worker program. A lot of people don't like that, but there's gotta be some legal way where we can let these people come and work and then go back because, you know, they're not gonna become permanent citizens illegally and they're not gonna vote. And that's, that is a non-starter for conservatives.

Anthony Marino [55:10]: Maybe there's a way for their existing employer to sponsor them in some way. And, you know, we did that at our company. We sponsored a guy from from Mexico and, you know, got him got him his working papers and you can be here now for five years and then become a citizen and all that. So it can be done. We just got to have discourse. Right. We have to have some dialogue about this thing and stop yelling at each other and say, you know what?

Johnny Sutton [55:17]: Okay. Mm-hmm.

Anthony Marino [55:40]: There's a couple of million here that are pretty valuable to us in various ways, whether it's building houses.

Johnny Sutton [55:47]: Well, I think, no, it's right, but I think there's some real anger on the conservative side because, you know, look, we've got big hearts and all those things. We don't want to ruin someone's life. But on the other hand, you the idea that you just let 20 million people into the country when all these people all over the country are trying to get in legally and it's... And of course, that's the thing is if you're in a place like Maine or Nebraska or Utah, and you've been in this city for all these years, your grandfather went to this kindergarten, your dad went to this kindergarten, you went to this kindergarten, your son, your kid to the kindergarten, and 80 % of class doesn't speak a word of English, two years later, I mean... That's a giant problem. it's nothing against those little kids. I those kids didn't do anything. They're just little kids. But it's just, there's gotta be some order on how immigration works. And that order has not been here. And I think Brevin is trying to fix that.

Randy Lorensen [56:56]: It's so, it's just like what we were talking about earlier. It's extremes again. We talked about it, you know, right and left and media, but like nobody seems to be able to have a nuanced conversation. It's either, it's either one side is saying, look at all these rapists and killers and the, like, they make all of them seem extreme. And the other side's like, they're just working and

Johnny Sutton [57:11]: you

Randy Lorensen [57:21]: building houses and the truth is it's a lot messier than that, right? Like some of the people are rapists and murderers and some of them are just contributing to society and then there's a whole bunch of people everywhere on the spectrum.

Dr. John Oberg [57:32]: Well, we're back to discourse, right? Like think the reality is that, you know, real discourse means being able to have a nuanced conversation. A lot of people, don't know if it's unwilling or not skilled at doing it, but it doesn't seem popular to do, or we don't want to the time to do it. you know, there's a whole lot of questions under like, you know, when do you close the door on immigration? Was it after the pilgrims? Like, cause that would have been bad for my family. So I don't know. I think. from my, again, this is just my perspective, trying to stay pretty apolitical about the whole thing, is like, how do you find a way to honor the foundations that the framers put into the country? How do you try to draw a little bit more nuanced lines in the conversation so that people aren't brushing massive broad strokes? And Rainey, to your point about being kind of like on the kind of small libertarian side, like if someone's gonna participate in the school systems,

Johnny Sutton [58:20]: you

Dr. John Oberg [58:29]: Cool, they're gonna participate in our healthcare system, cool. Just pay taxes like the rest of the people do to support that, participate equally, cool. I don't know.

Randy Lorensen [58:39]: Yeah, I think social media is again, we blame everything on social media, but I kind of think rightfully so a lot of times. Like I really think it is highly responsible for this and the loss of the nuance, right? Because it used to be, know, Anthony's example of his dad and the other guy, you were in the same town.

Dr. John Oberg [58:47]: Ha

Randy Lorensen [59:03]: You almost were forced to be friends with these people. On social media, you can go and it doesn't matter what idea you have, whether it's agrees with 90 % of the world or 1 % of the world, even if it's 1%, you can find an echo chamber of a whole bunch of people that will agree and reinforce. And you just, I think that has really crushed. It's like.

Anthony Marino [59:06]: Mm-hmm.

Randy Lorensen [59:27]: that muscle hasn't been built and isn't necessary for people to build the way it once was is, it's my take on it. And I'm gonna stick with my story that is social media's fault.

Johnny Sutton [59:38]: I think that's a big part of it. That's a big part of it. unfortunately, you know, with AI and all this stuff, we're really heading in uncharted waters. And I don't know how we get there. And I don't want to be draconian about phones. But of course, you know, the studies are showing that these kids are really addicted to their phones. You pornography is a giant problem. know, kids aren't getting married. They don't feel like they can ever afford a house. I mean, there's just some hopelessness.

Anthony Marino [59:38]: Awesome.

Johnny Sutton [1:00:07]: And then, you know, they get on their phone and they can at least enjoy whatever they're doing, you know, playing a game, watching their favorite music video or whatever. mean, it's a it's a challenge. But I do think that we can train our kids and ourselves to have good conversations and to, you know, learn etiquette and be gentlemen and not insult people and, you know, say you may be right. And even though we know they're not right in our heads. and continue that conversation. But it's hard to do. And a lot of times, you I'm in these organizations that are very bipartisan. I have a lot of friends across the aisle. And when I'm talking to them about complicated conservative situations, you know, sometimes they just me a pat on the head and said, oh, you know, you're so cute, you know. But and that's the other problem from the conservative side, because the culture is pretty much liberal in the media. You conservatives speak fluent and liberal just by osmosis. But most liberals do not speak conservative at all. And they'll say, well, I watch Fox News occasionally. And I was like, well, that's probably not where you should be picking up your policy. know, I mean, they're throwing the bombs over there.

Dr. John Oberg [1:01:18]: But in fairness, I'd say that I know a lot of conservatives who don't speak liberal either. think that's, I think that's, I think, think, so like maybe we shouldn't call that a right or left issue. That's a polarization issue, right? Like the further out you go on the wings, the less likely you are to speak the language of the other, probably. Maybe. Maybe you're right, Johnny. Maybe you're right.

Johnny Sutton [1:01:25]: That's true. Yeah, I guess I think that's I think I think it's right. But it's just, yeah, you might be right. I think I think that's right. But I think that the difference is, is we grew up in, you know, all kind of watching the same media. And then we we didn't realize we thought Walter Cronkite was just grandpa and was just conservative, good grandpa who was, you know, rock solid Christian, all these things. And, you know, it turns out he was he was very far on the left. He just he just

Dr. John Oberg [1:01:43]: Ha

Johnny Sutton [1:02:06]: kind of kept it together. I guess what I'm talking about fluency is, you know, nobody is reading, you know, national review or, you know, first things, you know, where everyone is getting a dose of the New York Times or, know, whatever, whatever setting, you know, my, my Google news comes to me every time I open my computer, you just get it when I have to go other places. And especially in the religious world, that that's another big change that happening is There's so much fewer Christians and a lot of the younger people, just have no Christian foundation, which was another place that was teaching you to love your enemy and feed the poor and visit the imprisoned. mean, all these tough things. But on the other side, they're saying, hey, you can't get divorced. I mean, you can't have sex before you're married. I mean, these are things that seem ridiculously old fashioned. But basically, most Christians believe that for 2000 years up until five minutes ago.

Dr. John Oberg [1:03:06]: I think next time I want to get into like the Fourth Amendment and we can talk about like the separation of church and state and how those things are important for discourse. think that's amazing. It's giant. there's, you know, we've got a list of 10 more topics for 10 more shows. We're really excited to have you back today and excited to continue the conversation as we talk about how to hopefully raise the level of conversation in the country.

Johnny Sutton [1:03:32]: Yeah, no, it's my pleasure. This is always fun. I really enjoy talking to y'all, so I'm happy to do it anytime.

Randy Lorensen [1:03:37]: Love the wisdom. So love the wisdom.

Anthony Marino [1:03:41]: Thanks, John. It was nice meeting you.

Randy Lorensen [1:03:42]: All right. Yes. And listeners, thank you for supporting us. Tell your friends, tell your family, download wherever you get podcasts. Anthony wants to make sure everybody goes to listens to us on YouTube. He wants 100,000 people on YouTube. Subscribe, follow us on YouTube, but wherever, if you go to Apple, Spotify, or go to talesofabundance.com. So thank you gentlemen. It's been great.

Johnny Sutton [1:03:43]: Nice meeting you.

Anthony Marino [1:03:58]: And subscribe when you go there, subscribe. YouTube's the future.

Johnny Sutton [1:04:12]: Y'all have a great day.

Anthony Marino [1:04:12]: Yep.

Randy Lorensen [1:04:13]: Hi. Hi.

Dr. John Oberg [1:04:13]: Thanks, Johnny.