Juan Uribe’s Fight to Save His Son, Scott Tranter Breaks Down the Midterms, Paul Fisher on Classic Hollywood

Westwood One presents America at Night. Here's your host, McGraw-Milhaven. Hey, let's jump right into it a little bit later on. In this hour, we're going to check with a polar, somebody who was the data director, for Marco Rubio's 2016 presidential campaign. He's looking in the numbers and we'll see what he says coming up a little bit later on in our number one. This first half, we're going to talk to a parent. Name is Juan Uribe and he shared a TikTok post last month for the first time. Seems his son has a rare blood disorder and he needs a stem cell transplant. So he went to TikTok and in the short time since the February 10th video, it has gone viral. And as a father, all he's looking to do is help save his son and we thought we would invite him on the show and get the story. Juan Uribe, who was a managing director and senior partner at Boston Consulting Group in New York, his 15-year-old son, was diagnosed with a rare blood disorder. Juan Uribe, welcome to America at Night. Thank you, McGraw. Very nice to meet you and thank you for the opportunity. You betcha. Take me through what your son was diagnosed with first and then we'll go to what a rare disease it is and why you went to TikTok. What was he diagnosed with? Yes. So essentially to throw medical jargon at you, it's clonal cytopenia. Cytopenia basically meaning that all of his blood counts, red, white and platelet counts are low and much lower than normal. Cloonal in that you also have clones growing in his blood at this point. So that's the diagnosis. The root cause remains a mystery. He's done extensive genetic testing and it's clear that it wasn't something he was born with that's not inherited. It's something that he's somehow acquired along the way. The doctors told you that he needs a stem cell transplant. That's right. When they did a bone marrow biopsy in August of 2025 and they came back with a number of quote unquote pink flags, they said that he was clearly on the path to bone marrow failure and was going to need a stem cell transplant. That that would be the only way to cure the bone marrow. Now I did not know this and you sort of rang the bell. Stem cell transplants, you need to have a match for the donor. That's obvious. But it's a unique situation for your son. What about your son's situation? Yes. So you ideally a perfect match donor based on something called HLA type, which is looking at a number of genes and number of alleles. And there are hundreds of millions, if not billions of potential combinations. So finding that perfect match donor is very tricky. And it's particularly tricky in my son's case because heritage and ethnic makeup is a determinant in the number of potential combinations. And my son is half Caucasian and half Colombian or half Latino. And that just makes it that much more difficult. So originally in a registry of 42 million people globally, we thought we had two perfect match donors. So that's one in 20 million to give you a sense of how tough the odds are to find that perfect match. Okay. So you felt that by going to TikTok was a, what a Hail Mary. Why did you, what did you post on TikTok and why? Yes. Hail Mary is a good way of describing it. At the end of January, we learned that those two perfect match donors we thought we had were not available. We don't know why based on confidentiality reasons. But when I knew the odds were that low that we would actually be able to find a perfect match, I needed to throw the Hail Mary and say, how can I get access to the most number of young people out there to try and encourage them to sign up and join the registry? And the only thing I could think of was TikTok. And so that's what led me to open up my first TikTok account and post my first video. And your post went viral immediately over 20 million views. And you asked people what you asked them to get tested. The ask was simply to join the stem cell registry. And the way to do that is it's a two step process. Step one is to simply do a 30 second cheek swab to get yourself added to the registry. You can go to a site like swabfermax.com request a kit. They send you the kit to your home. You do the cheek swab, you return it, and that's how you get added to the registry. And that was the simple ask so that we can get as many people in the database not only to help my son, but to help the countless other patients that are out there like him in a similar desperate situation. And also really to build a safety net for everyone that's listening on your show. Because these rare diseases are much more prevalent than I would have thought. And they don't discriminate on anyone regardless of whether you're healthy, whether you're wealthy, whether you were a good student, a good athlete. It doesn't matter. Anyone can fall victim to these diseases. And the more people we have in the registry, the better chance we have that families don't have to go through the hell that our family is living through right now. Juan, you rebate. How you've had 20 million plus views and counting. How many people have signed up for this swab for Max? Yes, it's been amazing. In the past week, we've gotten another 10 million. So we're actually over 40 million views on the initial video. Unfortunately, though, that has not really translated into the volume we need. Only about 120, 130,000 people have actually signed up to join the registry. And given the ethnic makeup of my son, I think we need about a million. So there's still time, but we need everyone listening to go to swabformax.com and request their kit and register. One of the things that is most interesting about this is I didn't know it was based on your heritage and your race when it came to blood donors. That's something new. I don't think many people knew that. No, when it comes to like blood stem cell donors agreed. And I have to admit, I didn't even know what a blood stem cell donation was until six months ago. Many people write me and say, oh, I'm positive or I'm negative. Can I donate for your son? It has nothing to do with blood type. It's this thing called HLA type that looks at the proteins around your cells that really are whether you'll reject the donors' cells or not. And that's what's important. And it's typically on a scale of eight or 10 or sometimes 12, whether you're an eight out of eight, a 10 out of 10, that's what you're striving for in finding that perfect match so that the donor cells ultimately don't attack the patient's body when you do the transplant or really it's a transfusion. It's a transfusion of stem cells that the patient receives. Why are the odds less for a mixed heritage as opposed to somebody born of just solely European parents? It's a great question. I wish I had a very good answer for you, but I think there's an element of just having some rare genes and rare alleles in some of these populations in different parts, especially in South America and where there's some indigenous blood. It just makes it much rarer. So as an example, if you are Caucasian, you have an 80% chance of finding that perfect match. If you're Latino, it's less than 50%. If you're African American, it's less than 30%. And when I began looking into my son's situation, there are some alleles that are just very rare. They're typically associated with people with Afro-Latino heritage, but the incidence is like less than 1% within people of that ethnic makeup. And so then when you extrapolate that across the overall population, it drops to fractions of a percent. So it's that historical heritage and what certain populations were made of going back hundreds, if not thousands of years. So it has nothing to do with the fact that maybe fewer African Americans get tested or fewer Latino people get tested. It's just the fact that it's easier to match a European blood type than it is a European or an African American? Well, you bring up a good point. I think there's two factors that compound on each other. One is that Latinos and African Americans have a more complex genetic makeup that has some of these more unusual alleles. So that's factor one. But you bring up an incredible point, which is factor two, that in these registries, for a number of historical reasons, there is a significant underrepresentation of minorities. And we need to try and cure that. So as an example, take Latinos in the U.S., probably about 20 percent of the population. But if you look at the makeup of the registries with Latino donors, it's about half of that. So there's a significant underrepresentation because of historical reasons that we need to address. So any Latinos that you know, encourage them to sign up for the registry. Any Latinos that are listening to the show, please sign up for the registry. So go to swabformax.com to sign up because the two factors compound each other. We're not going to be able to cure the makeup of the genetic composition of people, but we can address the lack of representation in the registry. That is within our control. Also, isn't there used to be a bone marrow transplant, right? And a bone marrow surgery, that's totally different now as well, isn't it? It is. I'm glad you did this up because first of all, when people hear bone marrow stem cell transplant, I mean, all of those words can sound intimidating and scary. And there is the need to educate people that this is no longer scary and difficult. So I know that, for example, for the HLA typing as an example, if you go back 15 or 20 years, the way to do the HLA typing required a blood draw. Now it's just a simple cheek swab. And so similarly, the transplant, in 100% of the cases that used to involve a needle into a hip bone to take out bone marrow, and I think that was a more invasive and more painful process. Now in 90% of the cases, if you are called to be a donor, it is a peripheral blood draw where they take blood from one arm, they harvest the stem cells, and then they return the blood to you via the other arm. It is a same-day procedure. In all cases, it is simple, it's painless, and it's costless to you, and you save a life. Why would you not be someone's hero and save their life? Before we run out of time, one Iribae, who is the father of a 15-year-old son, Max, who's diagnosed with a rare blood disorder, how can people help? Where can they go and how can they see your TikTok video? Yes. So on TikTok, you can go to JP as in Paul, you 307, and you'll see the long history of TikTok videos there. Or on Instagram, it's JP212. But if you want to help, I'm encouraging you to go today to swabfirmax.com, and please request and sign up for a kit. It'll take you less than two minutes to go through the registration process. They'll send you a kit to your home, you swab your cheeks, and you return it. And you're in the registry, and you're in a position to potentially match with someone like my son and save their life. And you're asking for everybody... So swabfirmax.com. Yeah, you're asking for everybody, not just people who are half Colombian, half European. Everybody listening, you are encouraging to do this. I am encouraging everyone to do it because we are so underrepresented in the registry relative to other countries. If you take Germany as a percentage of the population, they have twice as many people in the registry. So we need to add or should add 20 million plus people to the registry. And I think everyone should register because you never know what your genetic makeup is. Ironically, the best partial match that we have for my son is in Germany. I never would have expected that. So you have no idea what people's makeup is. You have no idea where that partial perfect match should be. So everyone should just register. Swabfirmax.com. I have about a minute here, Juan. Tell me about your son, Max. He's an incredible kid. He is very disciplined. He's very diligent with school or any activity. He's very curious. He also loves sports and he's a wrestler and he's a tennis player and soccer player. But one of the things that really makes him stand out is that he's also a piano player and he composes his own piano music. So you can check him out on Spotify at Max Uribe. He has four albums of original piano compositions. So I know every parent is going to gush about their child. I'm going to be the stereotypical parent gushing about my child. But I want to make sure that he survives and that he can live a nice, long, prosperous life because I think he's got a lot to offer to this world and he's a great kid. Juan Uribe, you keep doing what you're doing. Stay strong, keep the faith and we'll keep you in our prayers. How about that? Thank you. I need all the prayers we can get. So please keep our prayers up. Juan Uribe is the father. Max Uribe is the son and the website. Swab, SWAB, for Max.com. Juan, good luck and keep us in the loop on your journey. Will do. Thank you so much. You got it. America at Night. Back in a moment. From the heart of America, this is America at Night with McGraw-Millhaven. Welcome to America at Night with McGraw-Millhaven. Hey, coming up in just a few minutes, we're going to talk to Marco Rubio's polling guy and find out what the polling looks like when it comes to the midterms, President Trump's approval rating and all that. So we'll get into some of that. What's it looking for? The House of Representatives, all of that coming up here on the second half of this hour. Just got word that President Trump is announced that he is going to speak to the nation tomorrow night about the ongoing bombing effort in Iran. White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt wrote on a social media post, tune in tomorrow night 9 p.m. Eastern time, 8 central. President Trump will give an address to the nation and provide an important update on Iran. So we'll see what happens there. That's tomorrow night. President Trump all day long has been expressing frustration with allies who are unwilling to support the effort. And he's now telling them to go get your own oil in the Strait of Hormuz. We're also hearing all sorts of stories that President Trump has said, both privately and on social media accounts, that he is very much open to stopping the bombing in Iran with the Strait of Hormuz closed. I guess he would just declare victory, close up shop and head home with the Strait being closed and leave it to Iran to decide who knows if there's a back channel deal that he's trying to get Iran to say, face who knows. We'll just have to wait and see what he says. But he's also said that he's looking forward to attacking their energy infrastructure. So he's kind of said everything. So we'll just have to wait and see. But as of tomorrow night, President Trump will be speaking to the country. The markets today, the Dow was up big. The Dow finished up well over 1,000 points, 1,125. The Nasdaq was up 795. The S&P was up 187. All on the rumor that Donald Trump was going to announce that he was stopping the bombing in Iran. So we'll wait and see. But that's tomorrow night. Coming up in just a minute, we'll talk to Marco Rubio's polling director. Find out what he says. What do the numbers say? We'll do that next. America at Night, back in a moment. You're listening to America at Night with McGraw-Millhaven. Hey there, I'm Paula Pan. I help people make the smartest money decisions possible. Do not ever worry about your salary. You need enough to make sure that you aren't in a bad financial position. Once you have that, your salary becomes moot. What matters from that point forward, upside gains. Any type of ownership stake or ownership potential, that's the money. Remember, you can afford anything, just not everything. Or anything. Follow and listen on your favorite platform. This is America at Night with McGraw-Millhaven. All right, we're having a hard time hooking up with our guest. We'll get to him here in just a second. We'll be running down a couple of text lines for you. 1-8442-Migraw, 1-8442-6247-29 from the text line. Rare form. The textures are going on today. Somebody out there just does not like Tiger Woods. What is to admire about Tiger Woods? Will anyone recall his winning a tournament in 500 years? A drug addict with a terrible driving record. Actually, he's a very good driver. He's just not a very good putter. Haha. I did there. Made a joke about his driving. I don't think anybody will remember much of anything we do, any of us do, in 500 years. Tiger Woods is a story, by the way, it announced today that he's stepping away from golf. And he will not be joining the Masters in any way, shape or form. And apparently he's going in for some treatment. He was found with hydrocodone pills. I believe that's a form of an opioid. So that's not good. Tiger Woods needs to go get healthy. He needs to go figure out how to live as Tiger Woods and live in the world he has created for himself. It's tragic. Hope he finds some peace out there. It's a shame. Wonderful golfer and all the money in the world. And he needs to try and find some peace out there. Alright, now we've got our guest. He is Director of Data Science at the Decision Desk HQ. He works for News Nation now. He's on there all the time. He was also the Director of Data Science for Marco Rubio's 2016 presidential campaign. Scott Trainter, welcome to American Night. Thank you for having me. I'm excited to be here. You betcha. First, let's talk about some of the things that are going on, including the redistricting. How much of that is going to be an issue and change the numbers here for the upcoming 2026 house races? Sure. So look, that is the question I get a lot. And you know, I'm sure your listeners heard stuff about Virginia and Texas and Utah and all these states. And we should get into them. But the bottom line is between what the Democrats are doing in California and the Republicans are doing in Texas and what happened in Utah and all that right now, it looks like it's going to favor the Democrats by about one or two seats. And now what could switch it is, we've got Virginia coming up in three weeks. They're going to have a referendum about whether they're going to redistrict. And it's a democratically controlled state. So if their referendum passes, which it looks like it will, and they go with the map that they're talking about, they could add two or three seats to that total in terms of, you know, seats will be favored to win. I don't want to say they're going to win them, but when we look at the numbers, they look like they'll be favored to win. Any of the districts cut it too close. In other words, they try and get too many Democrats in there in enough states and they're going to, they're going to lose it because enough Republicans are in there, right? Or too many Republican districts, they put too many Democrats in and they could sort of, it could backfire, it could boomerang on them. Exactly. Well, yeah, it's really tough. The data guys think they're too smart, but they're not smart enough because they're trying to slice the salami too thin. Places in Utah, what's the, what's the Republicans did in Utah? And that was actually a court mandated redraw. I wasn't, it wasn't initiated by the legislature. There are some districts there that on paper look good for the Republicans, but if the Democrats have a good year, which the generic ballot and the way it's going, it looks like they might, they might be able to take one of those seats. Conversely, in California, the Democrats, you know, how redistricting works is if you're a member already, it's supposed to be an independent commission, but the, you know, the members like to submit their preferences. And if you're an incumbent member, you don't want to necessarily give up some of the safer parts of your district because you want to win reelection. And some of those, those old time members were able to maintain parts of their district. So some of those districts in California that were supposed to be strong, you know, moved over to the strong Democrat. They didn't get as strong as they might. So there's a chance there's one or two seats, especially in the San Diego area where the Republicans might be able to hold on there. But those are kind of the two states we're looking at where the data guys might have gotten a little too cute and based on where some of this stuff goes, they might, they might not go the way they wanted. All right. So, uh, what talked to me about, uh, polling in and of itself, I actually think polling is held up pretty well. Yeah, there's a couple of outlets, a couple of stakes here or there, but overall the polling for all that being maligned, I think they've got it right. And they think they got it in the margin of error. What do you say Scott trader? I agree. Look, if you look at the polls as much as I do, and it sounds like you look at it a lot too, is you can't look at him as absolute like, Hey, the poll says this guy's going to get 51. And if he gets 52, the polls wrong. That's not how polls work. Polls are approximations that come with margins of error and things like that. And when we look at the polls at a halt from 2024, on average, the polls missed by about two points. So someone might say, well, Scott, it's by two points. And I'd say, look, if it missed by two points, that's a pretty good error rate, especially when you compare it to say 2016 where the polls on average missed over by over four points. So again, they're not meant to be perfect tools, but they were pretty good coming out of 24. And you know, just to plug the news nation, the hill, next star polling averages, which we do, those were the best polling averages coming out of 2024 is independently verified by the New York Times. Others were the closest ones in states like Pennsylvania and Georgia and North Carolina and Arizona, which were, you know, deciding states and the presidential. How much does the model and the formula have to change because of people lying to pollsters, people turning off their landlines, going to cell phones, people not answering cell phones? How much of that formula or that equation has to change? Quite a bit. I don't think pollsters think about a lot. And the analogy I like to give is, look, polling is a lot more of an art than people like to realize. It's kind of like cookie, right? Like every, every, every time you sit down to cook a meal, your ingredients might be a little bit different. So you got to adjust, you know, how much salt or how long you cook it or how long you bake it or whatever it is. Pollsters have to do the same thing every cycle because look, I get too many text messages a day that I don't want to read. I get unknown phone calls. I don't want to pick up. I get annoyed by someone asking me something. So I lie to them thinking, thinking that they're, that if I lie to them, they're not going to call me back. And so pollsters have to deal with that. And the way they deal with it, the good ones, they will make more phone calls. They will send more emails. They will even knock on your door and ask you, ask you, you know, to your face what you're doing. And those, those messages are a little more expensive, but those are the things they do to get around some of the stuff that you and I experienced, you know, just the polling fatigue. Let's talk about the couple of special elections we've had around the country. If you listen to MSNBC, it means a blue tsunami is coming. If you listen to Fox, no big deal. Let's talk to Marco Rubio's 2016 presidential campaign data guru. What do you think these, these special elections say? My personal opinion is they're great headlines and they're good engagement and they're fun things to talk about. But the data show that year in and year out, they don't have a whole lot of predictability for what's going to happen in November. Right. Like let's take a look at the one that was the big headman. There was a state Senate seat in Southern South Florida in Mar-a-Lago. Mar-a-Lago was in this district. The district that went Trump pretty heavily back in 2024. And a Democrat one there and everyone's like, oh man, Donald Trump's seat, you know, Donald Trump's home, home, home seat, it's flip to Democrat. That means Florida is going to flip itself or the district is going to flip itself. And while that was a win, that wasn't, that's usually not predictable to what's going to happen because in these special elections, they're on weird nights. They're on times people don't necessarily are used to, to, to voting. And so they get a unusually small turnout profile. And so they, they can get weird results like we're seeing. They're good headlines. They're fun to talk about, but they're not really predictable to what's going to happen in the fall. What do you make of all these congressmen and women retiring, not running for reelection? Well, and that, that's the other thing, right? A lot of these, a lot of these folks, they get, they get tired of their jobs just like everyone else. I don't want to deal with this. I don't want to deal with all of the craziness and the weird hours and the gridlock and all that kind of stuff. And so we see retirement every cycle, but this cycle, we're seeing a higher number than the normal retirement. Also, a higher number of some of these folks saying, Hey, Congress respond, but I want to run for governor or I want to run for senator or I want to run for mayor or something like that. Everyone laughs. Why do you want to go Congress to mayor? Well, look, mayor of a city, you're, you're an executive. You're not, you're not one of one of 435. And a lot of ways that looks better. I think we're about to see some more retirements too. And that has some, that has some bearing because the house, the house of representatives is so close. If they have one or two more retirements on the Republican side, it could, it could mean even more deadlock. And I think that, that just becomes of itself cause a lot of these folks, they're just saying, I don't want to deal with this anymore. I want to go make money or I want to go do something else. And, and I, I think we're going to see that play out in the, in the rest of the legislative year because bills are going to get harder to pass. How many true purple districts are there, aren't they? Aren't, isn't most of these districts baked into the cake that no matter who runs the Democrat or the Republican is going to win? Yeah. That's the other fun stat, right? 35 congressional seats. They're up every two years on any given cycle, any given two year cycle, figure between 30 and 50 of them are really up for grabs. So out of 435 seats, these both parties are really only fighting for about 30 to 50 of them. And the rest of the seats are very safe Republican or very safe Democrat. It's a lot less. If we were having this conversation say 30 years ago, that number would be closer to 100 to 150 seats that were purple or battleground. Wow. Talk about that generic ballot you mentioned that favors the Democrats right now. What does that mean? So generic ballot is something we like to think of it as like a brand tracker, right? Like if I were doing a poll of what do you like more Burger King or McDonald's? And if, if, if someone said McDonald's, then Hey, they're more likely to order McDonald's and someone said Burger King, they're more likely to do Burger King. Same thing with the public as the Democrats. We don't put any names on there. We're just asking, what do you think of the Republican generic Republican, not any name or generic Democrat? And right now the Democrats are ahead. And what the data shows, because we've been doing those polls for, I don't know, 60, 70 years now, if whatever party is pulling ahead in the generic ballot, they are favored to win more seats come this November. And the number right now is the Democrats are favored in our average by about two and a half points. And that pretend to them probably picking up 10 or 15 seats, which would be more than enough for them to pick up control the house. Now the caveat to this is it, it March, almost to be April. We've got many months to go and that generic ballot moves around quite a bit. So there's a lot of chance for the Democrats maybe to increase that lead. And there's a lot of chance for the Republicans to maybe change their, their brand perception and flip it the other way. What about Donald Trump's base, the Magus? Where are they in all this? So they are still solidly behind him, right? Like if we look at it, I know there's a lot of headlines now about Donald Trump's approval rating at its lowest it's been in over a year. And while that is, you know, quantitatively statistically correct, when we look at the crosstas and we dig into the data, his core supporters, they're with him. And they've been with him since day one and they haven't really moved where these numbers are moving around though, or the independence that people could go either way. And right now they're, they're shifting away from Donald Trump. The Magus base, it's pretty solidly behind him. And I would expect it to stay that way, you know, throughout his term. What about the Latinos that Donald Trump did very well with? What about the blacks that he did somewhat better with than other Republican candidates? Where are they breaking? So when we look at those crosstabs again, look, depending on what exit poll you're using, Donald Trump won anywhere between 20 and 40% of the Latino vote and anywhere between 10 and 20% of the African American vote, which is high watermarks for a Republican. The last time a Republican won 30, 40% of the Latino vote was George W. Bush in the early 2000s, you know, Mitt Romney got somewhere around 10%. So Donald Trump did pretty well, but we're seeing, you know, even, even Donald Trump is giving some of that Latino vote and the African American vote back. And you know, they're not, they're not sitting at home. Those are the types of voters that if they voted before they're going to come out and vote again, they're just going to vote Democrat this time. What about the men vote, the bro vote? Are they sticking with my president Trump? Yeah. So the bro vote, that's interesting. Let's divide the bro vote up by age, right? So men under the age of 30 and men over the age of 30, the men under the age of 30, two things about them. One is they're still predominantly sticking with Donald Trump, but they don't turn out nearly at the rate as the men above 30. And the men above 30, those are the ones who are moving a little bit early. They're moving a little bit away from Donald Trump than they were say a year ago, but that's the, that's the demographic that if I were the Republicans and Donald Trump, that's when I would attract very closely, especially over the ones over the age of 30, because those ones turn out at a pretty high rate. Actually, what about the women vote? Ah, that's another one. He did surprisingly well, maybe not to some surprisingly, but you know, he did pretty well, the women vote in 2024. He has given up significant ground there as opposed to the male vote. And that's across all age groups, whether you're under the age of 30 or over the age of 30, I would say he, you know, in 2024, based on the exit polls, he was winning between 48 and 50% of the women vote. He's, depending on the poll you look at now, the crosstads have him at, you know, in the low 40. So he's given up some significant ground there. So interesting that the women just did not come out and vote for Kamala Harris. Yeah, look, that's something, you know, as political scientists are going to study for a while here. And it is one of those things we saw. We, everyone expected a little bit more. They just, they just did not attach to that message for whatever reason. That being said, they are a voting block. They do turn out, they just don't, in 2024, they just didn't turn out as much for Kamala Harris as she was hoping for. Yeah. A couple more questions. I have a minute left. AI, artificial intelligence. How is that changing your world? Oh man, it is changing everything from polling to how we advertise the campaigns, right? These campaigns, they can put out all these images and these AI videos that are really quick to turn around, right? You might get a news headline at nine in the morning and you can have a full AI video out by 930, you know, in your, in your, in your, in your mom's WhatsApp or in your dad's email or whatever it may be. I think campaigns are really leaning into that as rapid response messaging. Huh. Interesting. So as of now, the takeaway is the generic ballot Democrats, two and a half. And as of right now, that can translate into a 10 to 15 house swing. That's what you're telling us. That's what I'm telling you. The other thing I would tell you is if this were a baseball game, we're in the third inning. Democrats are ahead by a few runs. We got six more innings to play. Tell me what's going to happen in November, Scott. Come on, man. How good are you? No, I'm just kidding. Yeah. Great. Hey, good stuff. We will check you out on news nation. Scott Tranter is the director of data science at the decision desk for a news nation. He was also the director of data science for Marco Rubio's 2016 presidential campaign. Scott, good stuff. Thanks for joining us tonight. Thanks for having me. Have a good night. You got it. America at night. Back in a moment. America at night with McGraw-Milhaven, where the nation comes to talk. This is America at Night with McGraw-Milhaven. Hey, there's some news with the trial of Tyler Robinson. He is the man accused of shooting and killing Charlie Kirk. Their attorneys have asked for a preliminary hearing set in May to be delayed. So they have more time to review the evidence. In a recent court filings, the Robinson defense team said it has analysis from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms and Explosives that could not conclusively connect the bullet fragments recovered during the autopsy to the rifle they found in the wooded area shortly after the shootings. His attorneys, Tyler Robinson, the man accused says that it may be used, the analysis may be used to clear Robinson of blame during the preliminary hearing, which would be shocking on the prosecutor's side. They say the DNA is consistent with Robinson who was found on the trigger of the rifle. The cartridge casings and the two unfired cartridges, defense attorneys, however, say forensic reports indicate multiple people's DNA was found on the same items. But they're saying that the bullets that were recovered do not match the gun they found. Now that's just one story. We'll have to wait and see, but it's definitely worth keeping an eye on. Hey, stay right there. We are just getting started. Next hour we're going to talk to a man who looked at Francis Ford Coppola, George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg, and how they changed Hollywood forever. Paul Fisher is out with a brand new book called The Last Kings of Hollywood. And then of course, phones after that, our executive director is Alex Sinton. Our engineer tonight is Richard Good. I've got a cold, but I'm croaking through the show. I'm a grime mill haven and this is American Night on Westwood One. At EDF, we don't just encourage you to use less electricity. We actually reward you for it. That's why when you use less during peak times on weekdays, we give you free electricity on Sundays. How you use it is up to you. EDF, change is in our power. Westwood One presents America at Night. Here's your host, McGraw-Millhaven. All right. We've got a phone hour in store. We'll get to the author of the new book, Last Kings of Hollywood, Francis Ford Coppola, George Lucas, and Steven Spielberg, and how they changed Hollywood forever. Got some breaking news, though, out of the Wall Street Journal. President Trump said today that the U.S. would be leaving Iran in two to three weeks, addressing reporters in the Oval Office. Trump said that the U.S. has eliminated Iran's nuclear threat. He said, quote, it'll take 15 to 20 years for them to rebuild what we've done to them. Trump does plan to speak to the nation tomorrow night at 9 p.m. Eastern time. Earlier in the day at a news conference, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said coming days of the conflict would be decisive, and the number of projectiles launched by Iran in the last 24 hours represented the lowest during the war. They also, General Dean Cain, Chairman of the Joint Chief Staff, commented on as well, and they were talking about how they're trying to wrestle the control of the Strait of Hormuz from Iran. So President Trump speaking tomorrow night at 9 p.m. Eastern time. Stay right there. Coming up, open phones next hour. Don't forget the text lines always open, 1-844-2-MAGRA. But straight ahead, Paul Fisher has written a book called The Last Kings of Hollywood, Coppola, Lucas and Spielberg. We will do that next. America Night coming back after this. This is America at Night with McGraw-Millian. Our book tonight sits on the New York Times Best Seller List and we're talking Hollywood. The Last Kings of Hollywood is the name of the book Coppola, Lucas and Spielberg and the Battle for the Soul of America Cinema. It is written by Paul Fisher and he is our guest. Paul, welcome to America at Night. Thank you very much for having me. So before Coppola, Lucas and Spielberg, they're the new Hollywood and they came along as the old Hollywood that was dying. Why was the old Hollywood dying? It was a combination of things. So these guys come in 1968, 69 is when they meet each other and the old Hollywood really, the guys who had founded Hollywood back in the 20s, 30s were still around, aging out, didn't really understand their new 60s, younger audience and also had to compete against television which was still a new thing moving into people's households, European cinema which is kind of more avant-garde and groundbreaking and on the kind of frontier of stuff. And because the studio system was still kind of big and unwieldy, run by these older guys, they had a hard time adapting and they also had this system where traditionally in American cinema filmmakers were employees of the studio and you kind of did what you were assigned to do and meanwhile in Europe filmmakers were independent artists who were able to make stuff that was more personal and more relatable to new audiences. And so at that time when these guys are still kind of in their 20s and coming in, the American studio system is playing catch up with this industry it's invented. Yeah, it's really interesting. Did they know it at the time or did you have to wait to write the book to realize, right? You have to wait 20 years before you realize there was a changing of the guard. No, they knew it at the time and that's one of the things these guys benefited from was this feeling that the older guys knew we're going to need some younger people coming in and they knew they'd have to give opportunities to younger people. They just didn't know how or what the opportunities were and they would try stuff like, oh, we'll make beach movies and we'll have pop music in it and we'll have pop stars doing concert events and all stuff. There were really kind of, you know, older people making movies for younger people. The younger people immediately thought, well, this is lame. And Francis Coppola specifically, he was the first guy who came out of a film school and was trusted by a studio in this case Warner Brothers because they felt, okay, we don't understand the audience. We don't understand the future, but this guy sounds like he does and he's of the right generation and he talks a good game and so we'll trust this guy and he kind of opened the door or crack for a generation of people, including Spielberg, including Lucas, including others that he kind of vouched for. Yeah, it's not just the money side of it, but it's also, I mean, you can really tell there's a line of demarcation in how movies and stories were told. And I think that's sort of where these guys just told a story in a different way. Yeah, they wanted to tell stuff. They wanted to be able to be darker, to be a bit more experimental, to be a bit less naturalistic. And they also wanted to be able to be kind of kinetic with their cameras and to go, hey, we're filming stuff on backlots. You know, the film Coppola directed for Warner Brothers that he met George Lucas on, Finian's Rainbow is like a big musical adapted from Broadway. It's got, you know, 200 year old Fred Astaire dancing in it and it's filmed on the back lot with like fake trees and fake bushes. And these guys were saying, no, look at the French New Wave and people in Europe and Fellini and they're going out with smaller cameras and they're filming in the street and they're filming real life. And we think it's about time we get to do this here in California. But on the same kind of scale you would make a studio film on. Yeah. The book is called The Last Kings of Hollywood, now newly minted on the New York Times bestseller list. The Last Kings of Hollywood, Coppola, Lucas Spielberg and the battle for the soul of American cinema. I didn't know the three of them knew each other before they made it big. How did that all happen? They knew each other really early. And that was one of the draws for me in writing the book was I went to film school and it's a typical film school thing, art school thing where you go, hey guys, we should get a barn somewhere and we'll make meals for ourselves and you'll edit the films and I'll direct the films and we'll work on each other's stuff and we'll use each other and we'll change the world. And one of the interesting thing about these guys is they did that thing. So really young Coppola is a screenwriter, Warner Brothers, they give him a shot directing this Finian's rainbow picture. And while he's making it, there's this hotshot kid at USC called George Lucas who wins a scholarship, gets to be a kind of observer on that film. And the way these guys tell it, they're the only young guys, the only guys with beards, the only guys who aren't in the union working on the film. And they kind of speak the same language. And so they become friendly and they have this similar drive of this system that we're in now on the back lot is dying. And we've got to do something else and we can change it. And Coppola, you know, there's stories of him stashing film and cupboards going, we're going to take this with us when we leave and we can do our own thing. And so they start hatching this plan. And then in parallel, Spielberg, who's a little bit younger and he hadn't gotten to film school because his grades weren't good enough. So he's in Long Beach at college, but he's keeping his finger on the pulse of film school. And he goes this same year to a film screening of graduate short films from USC students. And he sees George Lucas's electronic labyrinth, THX 1138 for EB, which is his graduation short film, which is this dystopian sci-fi thing. And Spielberg watches this and it's the most popular short film in the nation in the swimming awards. And he thinks, I'm never going to be as good as this guy, but I've got to befriend him. And just like, so essentially right out of film school, when there are no bodies and they feel like there's no opportunities for people like us and we'll have to kick the door down. These guys are already aware of each other and aware that they speak the same language and aware that they're kind of on the same journey. And it was just a question of, you know, which direction do we each go and what do we do together and what do we do alone to try and become, you know, established filmmakers? Yeah, later on in life, they all work on each other's projects, producing, directing, writing backwards and forwards and everything. But in those early days, were they friends? Were they acquaintances? I mean, how were they friend of me? Take me through those early years. Well, in the really early days, Coppola and Lucas are very close friends and they're kind of sympathico partners in crime. They wrangle some money out of Warner Brothers and they go up to San Francisco and they rent a warehouse on Folsom Street and they set up a company of their own. And within 18 months, that company kind of fails because they get the money and Coppola spends the money on like an espresso machine and a pool table and girls and, you know, fancy art on the walls and everything except film stuff. And so they only make one film, which is Lucas's adaptation of THX. And then they run out of money and they bicker over who spent all the money and why, you know, how did this happen? It's your fault. It's my fault. And then this film comes in that's a trashy kind of gangster film that they offer Coppola to direct and he doesn't want to do it. And Lucas tells him, look, you got to pay the bills. They're going to chain the door. And so he accepts the offer to direct this film based on a book called The Godfather. And then he goes off and does that. And so, especially in that very early period, those two guys are very, very close. And even in the years coming after that, you know, Lucas would get opportunities because Coppola and even more so after The Godfather would say, hey, I'm going to produce this guy's films. I vouch for him. I'll look after him. You can trust me when I tell you George Lucas is good. And kind of made him who he was. And Spielberg in the meantime, his thing was he was attracted to the studio system. He was also kind of scared of working outside the system more independently, like the two guys did. So very early on, he gets a very old fashioned seven year contract, making television a universal and realizes that's a dead end. And so he's kind of isolated on his own, making TV that he thinks is beneath him until he makes a TV movie at a week called Duel. It's kind of a cult classic now. And it's kind of it's jaws with a truck, basically, you know, salesman guy goes on the road and guy driving a truck tries to kill him for no apparent reason. And then it's tense and it's a thriller. And it's really even though they'd met a few times, it's really after duel when Lucas watches duel when it airs on that Monday night that he goes, oh, wow, this kid's got something and we should get closer. And that's kind of how the closeness between the three of them starts. Let's go back to the to the Godfather. What I it's a famous story, right? Francis Ford Coppola had to be talked into the Godfather. But how realistic was he? Was he really going to turn it down? I mean, how close and how much did Lucas have to force Francis Ford Coppola to take that take that role? I honestly think without George Lucas, there is no Francis Coppola directing the Godfather because they had this ethos of we hate trashy genre stuff. And at the time, gangster films, pre Godfather, about as trashy as you could get. And the book was kind of trashy. Mario Puzo really only wrote the novel for similar reasons where people told him, look, you got to stop writing kind of elevated novels and just write a crime thing, your Italian do that. And Coppola really didn't want to do it. Their whole thing was we're going to make personal, grounded films that are about our lives and our kind of artistic take on the world. And so this project was kind of anathema to everything they thought of themselves as filmmakers. And then you add on top of it that Paramount, which is the studio behind the Godfather had a terrible reputation at the time that just brought in Robert Evans to head the studio and people knew him mostly as they made fun of him as a failed actor, who had no experience as a producer. And so speaking to people around them and people around their company at the time, it really was a thing of day after day after day. Coppola is going to Lucas's house and they're editing THX 1138 and the phone calls are coming and he's saying, I don't want to do this. And Lucas, day after day, saying, look, make the thing. If they say it's low budget, make it low budget. If they say it's in St. Louis in 1975 and not in New York in the 40s, like the book, just do it. We need to pay the bills. And he finally caved and he caved partly for the money and he caved partly because he read the book a few times and shared it with other friends. And there were bits in the book that both he saw, OK, that's kind of like my family and friends would tell them, oh, there's kind of stuff in here about drugs and racial politics and how crime families work together. That actually feels quite modern. And so he figured, OK, maybe I can't make a personal film. Maybe I have to make this film. But if I make this film, maybe I can turn it personal. I can find something personal in it. But it was weeks and weeks and weeks of having to be sort of badgered and to make it. The Last Kings of Hollywood now on the New York Times bestseller list, Coppola Lucas Spielberg and the battle for the soul of American cinema. Paul Schiff, Paul Fisher is our guest. The thing that each one of them had, the Godfather, American graffiti, Jaws, I mean, these these are legendary films. It seems like, Paul, that each one of them, and let's stay on the Godfather, the studios before they were released thought they were had bombs on their hand. Is that true? In every case, you know, the Godfather, they were cutting the final cut to the picture and Walter Merch, who worked on the sound and he added and everything. You know, he told me the studio said this is self indulgent and long and boring and dark. And, you know, where's the sex and where's the violence? And this is, you know, really kind of up itself and it's expensive. And they kept pushing the release date. And an American graffiti was the same thing where they kind of thought, all right, at best, this will be kind of bottom of a double bill B movie. For the kids, you know, with Jaws, the word on the street before it came out was, oh, Universal's putting it in so many cinemas because they went a hundred days over budget and his kids been out on the sea with mechanical sharks that don't work and it's going to be just a gigantic disaster. And the reason they're releasing it so big is so they can try and trick people into seeing it before word of mouth gets out that it's awful. And the interesting thing is that at times these filmmakers, even though they really believed in their films, you know, they would feel like, oh, man, maybe I've made a bomb. There's these points with all these classics where each of them, you know, in so many words has said, I thought that was the end of my career. I thought that film was so bad and people would hate it so much that I have to go back to television. And obviously, they all became, you know, the biggest pictures you can imagine. Yeah. I mean, there's there's something where all artists have that self doubt, right? Talk to Picasso or talk to any famous artist or sculptor, playwright or actor or anybody who makes art. There's always that sort of self doubt. But it's amazing how the experts got it so wrong. And these newbies got it so right, right? They ultimately stayed true to their inner core and knew they were right, even though they weren't really convinced they were right. We're going to do it. I don't know if I'm right, but I'm going to do it my way. Every time. And Brian De Palma told me he had this great thing of he told me we knew we would win against the executives because they're looking after their jobs, their reputations, their paycheck, their pay rises, what's being said in the trades that everybody's going to read. All we have to care about is making the movie and making it as true and as good as we can make it. And the purity of that loyalty to the project, I think, is how they all had cases where, okay, we're over budget. Everybody tells us this is bad. I think I'm going to get fired any minute now, which is what Coppola thought on the Godfather and Spielberg thought on jobs, for instance. It's going to ruin my reputation. It might bankrupt me. I'm miserable. But I just have this one thing I have to honor that I'm convinced about. And then you're right. You're so committed, I think, for such a long time, telling everybody, you know, this is the way it's got to be. I have so much belief in it that I think there's a natural moment then of almost coming off that high where you go, oh my God, what if I was wrong? Oh my goodness. Maybe I am full of it. No, I mean, but every artist, right? Every author, every talk show host, everybody who's every teacher who stands up and is in the spotlight in some way, shape or form has that moment of doubt. And you've just, that's the genius of it, right? That's don't cave when they're telling you, no, cut it, take it out. The artist has to stand up for themselves. And oftentimes, you know, that's the, that's the other maker of rake. Paul Fisher is our guest, his book now on the New York Times bestseller list. The Last Kings of Hollywood, Coppola, Lucas Spielberg and the Battle for the Soul of American Cinema. We're going to come back, talk more about Francis, talk more about Lucas and Steven Spielberg back in a moment, America at Night. This is America at Night with McGraw-Millhaven. Relax, you're listening to America at Night with McGraw-Millhaven. Our book tonight is The Last Kings of Hollywood, Coppola, Lucas Spielberg and the Battle for the Soul of American Cinema. It's now on the New York Times bestseller list. Paul Fisher is our guest. We were talking about Francis Ford, Coppola and George Lucas last segment. You mentioned they started the company together. Lucas convinced them that they were going to be the bestseller Lucas convinces Coppola to do the Godfather. But there's a rift when Apocalypse Now comes up. I didn't know that George Lucas was supposed to direct that and then somehow Francis takes it over. Tell me that story and did that cause a rift between the two of them? This is one of the great forks in kind of film history and that split happens later than you would think. So even in the late 1960s when George is still at USC Film School with John Milius, the screenwriter, they come up with this idea for a film called Apocalypse Now that originally they kind of envisaged as a really kind of black humor, dark-hearted kind of satire of the Vietnam War and the war is still going on. And their pitch, you know, this is a description for the film nerds, but they're like, this will be the Battle of Algiers. So very kind of documentary style cinema verite meets Doctor Strange Love. So kind of elevated satire, goofy, really out there. And for a deck, they can't make it for a while. Obviously, people are still depressed about the war in Vietnam. They're told by executives, no one wants to see this. Their own plans to make it are kind of crazy. You know, originally George is like, let's take a couple of cameras and we'll go to Vietnam and we'll film it kind of undercover with the army. And people tell them, that's crazy, you're going to get killed and also you'll never get permission to do this. So then they go, okay, maybe we'll go to the Philippines or maybe we'll shoot it in rice fields outside Sacramento. We'll make a really gorilla and small and black and white and edgy. And it sort of never happens. And then Lucas has a success with American graffiti. And there's a schizophrenic thing in the sense that he really wants to make this Vietnam satire, but he also really wants to make this like flash gourd and knockoff space opera kids film thing. And he just happens to get the money to write the flash gourd and space opera thing that becomes Star Wars first. And he spends months and months and years and years trying to get the money trying to convince people that this thing is going to work. Trying to write it. He wasn't a very happy writer then like writing and now he's coming up with this whole world and planets and aliens and all this stuff. But he's also a very stubborn guy. And so once he's embarked on what's going to become Star Wars, he's kind of, you know, like a dog with a bone between his teeth is like, I'm not letting this go until it's done. And in the meantime, while he's doing all of that, Coppola does Godfather and Godfather too. And he wins enough awards to like make a chessboard and he gets a lot of money. And he thinks, okay, I can try and be independent again. I can try and pay for a film myself again that I can own because usually your studios own the picture. And you know what, maybe because of the contract wranglings when we start the Duffers company, technically my company owns Apocalypse Now. So technically, it's mine. And the way I think about it is this is an action film, you know, it's Rambo. It's a big, easy crowd pleasing movie. And so he goes to Lucas and he says, look, we have a chance to make this, can you direct this? And I don't know how much of a genuine approach that is, but predictably Lucas goes, well, no, I'm doing Star Wars. I can't do it now. And Coppola tells him, all right, well, then I'll do it because I own it and now's the time and I have the money and I'll make it. And obviously Coppola being Coppola, the easy accessible action film becomes this whole other adventure that becomes this big artsy experimental film. But I think for a couple of years at least, Lucas clearly felt you stole my movie and claimed it was yours just because of the technicality. And Coppola felt, well, it was mine because I owned it. And if you'd wanted to make it, you would have made it. And I did think that caused some trouble. Let's talk about George Lucas because he's very different from Coppola. Coppola would spend his last nickel making a film. And it seems like Lucas made billions off of his films and then sort of stopped making films in a sense. Really interesting guy. You know, we all have this image of George Lucas in our minds. And then researching the book, you go back to the 60s and you go, oh, young George Lucas is actually, he's a very cool hip kind of guy. He doesn't really love movies all that much. He's only making them because he discovered them after kind of an initial love for car racing. But he had a car crash that kind of spooked them off that. And he's edgy and he hates companies and he hates narratives and he hates corporate filmmaking. And he says, all I want to do is make underground experimental kind of mood poems and not tell stories. And then he makes this first film, THX 1138, that is that kind of film. It's kind of a mood poem and it's dark and it's depressing. And no one really likes it. And both Coppola and his wife, Marsha Lucas, who is his editor, they both kind of say, look, George, maybe just do something with human beings in it with like feelings and actual stuff that happens in real life. And he says, okay, well, out of spite, I'll do exactly that. And he makes American graffiti almost out of spite. And that does extremely well. And then he goes in completely the opposite direction of the filmmaker he claimed he was. This appears in the Star Wars, which is very obviously story driven mainstream for kids. And because he plans it out, originally as nine to 12 films, and then boils it down to three films, but essentially he spent a decade making these films. And I think he realized making those films, I hate directing films, I hate writing films, I kind of like just being by myself. And my interest is, I think as much in the machinery, be it cameras or the special effects or the business side of it, as it is actually in filmmaking storytelling. And so after Star Wars, he kind of stops making films at all until the prequels again, and has never really made anything that wasn't a Star Wars film as a director since. And you'll speak to people who know him who say, Oh, no, George always says, you know, one day when he's really rich and as time he'll make more underground films again, and maybe he's making them privately and he claims he was going to do that too. And then you have other people who know him very well who say, No, that was always nonsense. You know, he got rich and he can indulge other interests like normal rockwell paintings and education initiatives and building museums and big houses. And he doesn't care about film in that sense all that much. But he's an interesting guy because you go, he's a could have been a filmmaking genius. But as a person hated everything about filmmaking. It's so interesting. The book is The Last Kings of Hollywood, Coppola, Lucas, Spielberg and the Battle for the Soul of American Cinema. Paul Fisher, our guest of all of these films of all of their blockbusters, right? They were, as you mentioned, right? One would top the other at the box office and they just kept breaking records. Star Wars. Take me through the studios. They must have thought, I still don't understand why it's a hit. What was the genius of Star Wars? I mean, okay, it might have been a Saturday afternoon, you know, serial cartoon type of deal. But what did he, was he really that smart or did, was it just dumb luck? No, I think he was smart. I think there was the key thing was everybody was making big films were all dark, somewhat depressing films, right? It's America after Watergate and, and, you know, there's films like The Godfather and the Exorcist and Polanski films. And it's all kind of seedy and sweaty and comfortable. And it's about the dark underbelly of everything. And even Spielberg at the time had a reputation as someone who was too dark. You know, his first film, The Sugarland Express is about, you know, a convict trying to, to escape and see his kids. And people thought that was dark and depressing and then jaws. People really enjoyed it. And it was fun, but it's still the kind of movie where a kid gets eaten up halfway through. And, you know, the same year as Star Wars, he had closing counters of the third kind coming out, which in the reviews at the time people went, you know, Steven Spielberg is going to have to figure out how to be a crowd pleaser because compared to Star Wars, this is depressing. And so Lucas kind of knew there's, there's, there's a hunger for going back to something positive and hopeful. And he also knew that there was a generation of kids like him and people younger than him who had grown up on flash cord and comic books and B movies and all this stuff who would flock to something that was that kind of thing, but on a higher budget. And there was kind of ambitious and there was kind of artistic and it was artistic. You know, you can tell with those early Star Wars films that you have a filmmaker there at the helm who's referencing Japanese films and he's referencing European films and he's referencing silent film. And it's a very visually literate type of filmmaking. And so I think he just hit all the undercurrents. They were kind of primed for a very wide audience, be it 12 year old boys, the kind of couples on their first date to older people who had discovered comic books when they were younger, just a huge mainstream cross of people. There was there to be made any sense that whereas the studios who thought in a different way, they thought, well, this is robots and, you know, guys in dog costumes and words that make no sense you've invented. And they thought of it as very niche. They thought of it as you know, I'm kind of clashing my references here, but they were like, okay, all the comic book guys from the Simpsons are going to come and see it. And that's 12 guys. And then it's going to die of death and it's super expensive to do. So why would anybody do this? I don't understand it. So no one else is going to understand it. And it really lived through George's conviction and through Alan Ladd's conviction, who was an executive at 20th Century Fox, whose approach was look, I don't get this either, but I believe in you. So I'll back you to do it. But it really, really was a battle until it came out. And, you know, the crude and believe in it, the cast didn't believe in it all that much. And then it comes out and they start going to conventions and low and behold, they realize, oh, it's not just the geeks and the dorks and the Star Trek fans who love this, but everybody is relating to this and enjoying this sort of hopeful optimistic thrill. Yeah, you really have to wonder if you're the Hollywood exec at the time, whether or not you would have had the same intestinal fortitude to say, I don't get it. I'm still writing the checks, but I believe in you. Right? I mean, that's that's an interesting place to be in as somebody who writes the checks. Yeah. And, you know, Alan Ladd, the film people, he's one of those legendary guys, because he did that a lot where he would go, look, I don't need to believe in the material I believe in you as a person. And that worked for him for a while. And then he had a couple of times when I misfired and it didn't work. And that was also the system, right? Is the studio, it's kind of like the house at a casino, they can lose a few times and keep on coming back. But if you're an executive or a filmmaker or a producer and you take those kinds of big swings, you know, you strike out a couple of times and you're done. Yeah. So, you know, fewer lives than the house had. Paul Fisher is our guest, his book that now sits on the New York Times best seller list. The Last Kings of Hollywood just came out, Coppola, Lucas, Spielberg and the battle for the soul of American cinema. Real quick with our couple of minutes left, let's talk about Steven Spielberg. It's interesting because the first two, right, Coppola and Lucas were talking about, you said that they wanted to do it outside and as an independent Spielberg, right, went the more traditional route within the studio system. And his filmography, if you just take a look at it, it is unbelievable. People forget, okay, Jaws, Close Encounters, Raiders of the Lost Ark, E.T., Poltergeist, The Color Purple, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, Schindler's List, Saving Private Ryan. I mean, that is an unbelievable filmography. 10 times what the other two did. Yeah, unparalleled. And even, you know, recent films, the West Side Stories, the Minority Reports, they're all great films. And he very, very much thought, I don't want to be outside the system. I want to harness the system. And that's what he became very, very good at doing was starting within the system and then using all the toys that you get if you're playing with house money. And, you know, in the period in the book that I wrote, his peers, the Palma, Lucas, Coppola, they would joke, you know, the only person who seems to know exactly what the audience wants every time out is Steven Spielberg. And he's done it for half a decade, half a century now. Yeah. So now at the end of their careers, I know they didn't talk to you for the for the book, but are they friends? Are they, is there a certain amount of respect for the three of them? What's their relationship like now? I think they're great friends. You know, and I spoke to people who were like, look, Francis and George are still best friends in the world. And they see each other for lunch and they live nearby. And Spielberg, I think, lives in a more rarefied kind of space, but they're still very close friends. And that was one of the things that was interesting to me was in a very human way, they've been through all this stuff, they've had falling outs, they've had stuff they consider betrayals from each of them, they've had resentments and jealousies. But at the end of the day, still kind of came back to each other. And I thought there was a more kind of hopeful and human and true assessment of that history than just pitting them as rivals. Yeah. Yeah. Scorsese, where is he in this, in this, in this world? He's, you know, he's kind of one A to those guys. And the thing that set him apart, and he was an outsider at the time of his own kind of design by being in New York and by doing other things, but he didn't want to take over the system, didn't want to work independently from the system. He just wanted to make films and make great films and kind of transcendent and experience through making films. And so he's in the book and he's in the book a lot. And he's almost a counterweight to those guys because he's very close with all of them. I think particularly with Coppola at that time, because they had similar concerns about life and religion and family. And in this period where they are working on how do we make films and also be financially and creatively independent artists? Scorsese was a counterpoint in the sense that all he wanted to do was the creative independent spin. He just, you know, the raging bull was a film he spoke about as almost, you know, an end of life note. If this is the last film I make, I've got a compromise on nothing. And so he's in there a lot as an interesting kind of different approach to how these guys wanted to make personal films and be in charge of their own fate. It's an interesting look at artists who, right, stand up and say, this is how I'm going to do it. And we'll let the chips fall where they may. That's what makes it so fascinating. The book is The Last Kings of Hollywood, Coppola, Lucas Spielberg and the Battle for the Soul of American Cinema. Paul Fisher is the author. He's also our guest. Paul, thank you very much for the time. Good luck with the book and good luck down the road. Thank you again. Thanks for the shot. You got it. America at Night. Back in a moment. Live from coast to coast. This is America at Night with McGraw-Millhaven. Hey, tomorrow's going to be a busy day. President Trump speaking from the Oval Office tomorrow to the nation at 9 p.m. at 10 a.m. tomorrow in the morning. The Supreme Court is scheduled to hear oral arguments regarding birthright citizenship. The case concerns a two-year-old boy who was killed in a car accident. The case is a two-year-old boy who was killed in a car accident. Regarding birthright citizenship, the case concerns a 20-25 executive order by President Trump aiming to limit birthright citizenship. The lower courts have blocked them. The ruling is expected to be late June or July. Well, at 10 o'clock a.m. at the Supreme Court building in Washington, D.C., it appears that Donald Trump will be in attendance. He was asked today if he was going to go and listen to the oral arguments in person. And he apparently said, quote, I'm going. I think so. I do believe now, of course, he's can change his mind at any moments. But if President Trump attends the oral arguments, according to experts, there is no record of any sitting president attending any oral arguments before. This would be truly an unprecedented event where the President of the United States would sit in the gallery of the Supreme Court and listen to the oral arguments. So interesting. They say that they'll decide by late June, early July, as the normal session ends. But birthright citizenship is on the agenda for the tomorrow in the morning. And then he's speaking to the country at night. So there's a lot of news going on tomorrow. From every indication, it looks like President Trump is sort of at least throwing up trial balloons that he is going to declare victory of some kind and head home and apparently leave the Strait of Hormuz closed and just wash his hands of the whole situation. He's floated that idea a couple of times over the last 48 hours. Stay right there. It's open phones next hour. 1-8442-Meghra. Open phones and open text line. 1-8442-Meghra. Our executive director is Alex Hinton. Our engineer tonight is Richard Good. I'm McGraw-Millhaven and this is American Night on Westwood One. Keep going. You're doing it. That's the sound of Sam learning to swim in a Hilton resort pool. Oh, that's delicious. And that's the sound of Sam and his family enjoying dinner in the hotel restaurant. Good evening. Welcome back. With stays in your favorite destinations and everything taken care of, you can savor what's important. When you want your holiday to feel like a holiday, it matters where you stay. Book now at hilton.com. Hilton for the stay. Need anything from Tesco? Like Tesco Finest salted pretzel or caramelized biscuit chocolate Easter eggs. 12 pounds each with your Tesco Club card or Tesco Finest extra fruity hot cross buns. Two packs for just three pounds because every little helps. Selected hot cross buns, majority of larger stores and online and 6th of April Club card or app required. Exclusion supply. Westwood One presents America at Night. Here's your host McGraw-Millhaven. All right. It's a Tuesday night here. McGraw-Millhaven. In the hot seat tonight, the phone numbers are 18442 McGraw 18442 6247 29. It is Tuesday night and it is open phones. So the hour is yours. What do you want to talk about? You can go rogue. You can talk about the news of the day, something that caught your attention, something that's been tickling your fancy, something that is got you somewhat perturbed. Maybe you have a dilemma that you need some expert advice. I am great at solving everybody else's problems. Not very good at solving my own problems. So I'm here for you in that sense. By the way, what does UConn, UCLA, Texas and South Carolina have in common? UConn, UCLA, Texas and South Carolina, all four of those women's teams are in the final four. All four are number one seeds and all four were in the final four last year. UConn, we need a crack staff here. Maybe Alex or Richard can look this up for me before we get to the break. What was the last time a women's team and a men's team both made the final four in the same year? I wonder if that happens very often. UConn men get in on that unbelievable shot over the weekend and then UConn gets in. So for the women's team gets in. So kind of a, I don't know if it's rare or not. I don't, I have to go to the record books and find out a little more. But anyway, phone lines are yours. 1-844-2-Migra 1-844-262-4729. Text line is also alive and well. We'll get to all of that as well. Let's go to Scott in St. Louis. Scott, thanks for holding on. Welcome to America at night. Scott, yeah. Yeah. A proxy of Iran in Iraq, I think they're called Khatib Hezbollah. They kidnapped an American reporter. Yeah, I saw that. Yeah. And you know, the FBI, I mean, they, apparently they warned her multiple times that she was on a list and she didn't believe it. So I don't know. I hope that works out. But, you know, it, I mean, it doesn't look like, like they're giving up. You know, I mean, they're still fighting. They're still firing missiles at Israel and, uh, Oh, you mean Iran? Yeah. Yeah. They're straight up still closed and, um, you know, I, I don't know. I mean, I guess if he's really gonna, you know, pull out of there, you know, he's, he sent all those troops there. I don't know. Well, it'll be interesting to see what happens, right? Because in the last 72 hours, the man has said everything. The man has said, right? The man has said, I'm all in and, uh, go get your own oil. I'm done, basically, right? Uh, he said that he said tonight or at some point today that, um, it's going to take 15 to 20 years for Iran to reconstitute their nuclear arsenal. Six months ago, he said he obliterated it. Um, so, you know, who knows, right? Man says whatever he wants, whatever he wants. Uh, so we'll have to wait and see. Maybe there's a side deal. Maybe there's a quiet deal where he leaves and Iran saves face and he leaves. M M M. Maybe the deal has already been struck where he says, I'll leave you open up the street of hormones and, um, you know, I don't know why they wouldn't just tell us that, but maybe there's a, he wants to try and who knows, uh, we'll have to wait and see what Iran does. Are they going to still continue to allow friendly nations of theirs to get through, but not unfriendly nations? Two million dollars a boat. Yeah. We'll have to wait and see, uh, how that, how that, how that plays out. But if, if regime change was the goal, which he now says wasn't, but they keep talking about regime change, uh, that it's already happened. And if it was, if, if we were able to degrade their nuclear sites and everything else, we're not going to go and get the uranium apparently. So I mean, there's, we'll have to wait and see what the man says tomorrow and what happens in the next 24 to 48 hours. But, uh, the, the markets, the markets think that, um, good news is coming. And so that's why they were up over a thousand points today. Yeah. Except, uh, the oil, it rose over $100. Yeah, I do. Yeah. I guess one of the, our, our fineries over there got hit. And so, um, yeah, we'll just have to wait and see. Scott, we don't know. We don't. We do not know. Scott, thanks for the phone call. Appreciate it. Paul and Boise, Idaho. Paul, welcome to American night. Thanks for taking my call. Sure. Thanks. Yeah. What the heck? What the heck? Better to do. You and me both, baby. You and me both. Now I was just thinking about this man I've known for 22 years and we've both belong to the same organization. And I happen to be there as a greeter waiting for somebody to, to make them feel welcome. And, uh, was this guy and that was 22 years ago. And the thing about it is we have a relationship where we just, we know we can't get our point across without the other ones starting to yell or jump up or down. We floor our hands up in the air. We walk away from each other and, uh, we, we revisit it the next day or the day after, even two days, maybe sometimes. And, and you can get your point across a lot quieter and the other person will actually sit and listen. And so therefore you don't lose a friend by trying to out yell the other individual and then they sure that they understand your point. And it's, it's one of those types of relationships where I used to see a lot of them back in the day and that was he, he had his particular political party and I have mine and they're both, they're just different as it's night and day. But by doing that instead of trying to, um, force our opinion on the other one, we, we floor our hands up in the air and we walk away and then we're able to think about what was just said to each other. Yeah. Well, I'll tell you, I'll tell you, Paul, it is, it is heartbreaking. It is heartbreaking to hear stories of families that don't talk to each other anymore or brothers and sisters who don't talk anymore because of their different political affiliations. Look, I don't, I don't expect everyone to agree with me or everyone to agree with their brother or their sister, but, but to, to, to destroy a family over, over politics is, is, is heartbreaking. Um, you know, you don't have enough respect for your sister or your brother to just look, uh, uh, let's just, uh, not, let's just avoid politics because we're, we're just gonna disagree. And so why even talk about it? Right? I mean, well, it's more important to be right than to love your, your brother or your sister or your wife or your uncle or your aunt. It's just heartbreaking. It's absolutely heartbreaking. And I blame every single elected official who pours gasoline on the fire and, and they don't, you know, it's, it's just, it's heartbreaking. And we lose, we lose sight of what's really important when you would rather defend a stranger in Washington, DC than to support your own family. It's crazy. It's just crazy. It's heartbreaking. I got, I gotta tell you that I'm not to extend it, but my mother was a staunch Democrat. My father was a staunch Republican. And when it got to the six months cut off before the, whatever election it was, they, they both had a truce, no discussion about politics in the kitchen. When they're eating dinner or breakfast or whatever it was. I have, I am most proud of the fact that I have dear friends and family members that are Trump supporters. I have dear friends and family members who are big Democrats. And, you know, we're all mature enough to say, look, whatever I think, and however I vote, doesn't affect my relationships with my sisters and, and aunts and uncles and, and friends and colleagues and our friendship and our, our history is way more important. It's a bigger bond than all of that. And unfortunately people get sort of wrapped up into it and they, they fall down a rabbit hole. Hey, Paul, thanks for the phone call. I gotta go. Hey, we got a couple more. Catherine, Robert, Danny in Rala, hold all those thoughts. The text line is open. 1-844-TUMER-GRAW, 1-844-262-4729. We've got a couple of lines open for you right now. If you want to chime in American night, we're just getting started. Open phones and open text line back in a moment. Call now, 844-262-4729. That's 844-2 McGraw. Join the conversation. Call 844-2 McGraw, America at Night with McGraw, Mill Haven. All right, let's go back to phones here. We've got Robert in New Haven. Robert, welcome to America at Night. Yes, thank you for picking up the call, as always. And I don't know if this is good topic, but Tiger Woods with his recent incident. Yeah. And they wanted to do like a urine sample on him. But my question is, Columbine, strong, thermin, Florida school shooting, Sandy Hook, Uvalde's, Texas school shooting, did they want to test the children to see if they were on Adderall or Ritalin for decades or years prior to this? And is there a HEPA law? And why are they picking on Tiger? I get it. He shouldn't be owning a driving school, but that was just, what is your opinion on that? Okay. Are you equating the school shootings to being on Adderall with Tiger Woods being somehow impaired in his drunk driving? I don't know why they wanted to test Tiger Woods. I don't know that Adderall, I mean, I'm certainly no expert when it comes to medication. I don't know either. But Adderall is not necessarily a altering drug, so you can't drive on it. And I don't... He was prescribed certain medications. Well, you are prescribed certain medication, but there's also, you know, when they say don't lift heavy, don't lift heavy, you know, don't operate heavy machinery. I get all that. Yeah. I mean, look, look, there's a lot we don't know about this, this Tiger Woods story. But he wrote in a statement today, I know and understand the seriousness of the situation I find myself in today. He says, I'm stepping away for a period of time to seek treatment and focus on my health. This is a necessary in order for me to prioritize my well-being and my work towards a lasting recovery. Sounds to me like the man has some type of substance abuse problem. These are two, but can I ask one more question if you don't mind? Yes, you may, Robert. Go ahead. Did you ever hear of attention deficit disorder? It's called AIDS. Nothing to do with Tiger. This is a totally different thing. Yes. And if you have, if you have, I have a checker to count, you have a checker to count at the end of the month, we are in a deficit. That's not good. But is there called the opposite of deficit would be supplement, but do any children have attention supplement disorder? What? Were they focused? Were they focused? Were they focused too much on a subject? No, I'm only kidding. The parents got to give the kids more attention. Well, that's, that's yes. I agree with that. If you, attention deficit is going to cause what's happening with these computers and the iPhone, whatever, but there's no such thing as, Oh, this parent is giving too much attention to it. Well, that's, that's called the helicopter parent, Robert. Uh, evidently, but I like your show and um, you know, I'm glad tiger, you know, he's got a his club, you know, public relations people, but um, nobody's perfect. And you go for one, you go for all and don't make him take a urine test when you don't get these shooters or go into school. So they test in them. That was the main purpose. Well, I mean, that's a whole other issue, but Robert, in exactly, I thank you for the phone call. Thank you. Keep up the good work. You got it. We appreciate it from the text line. How about screening some of these callers? Not only do we not screen the callers. We purposely don't screen the callers, as you can tell from Robert in New Haven. I don't believe in screening the callers. I don't like screening the callers. We make sure you're somewhat coherent, but after that, we take all commerce. That's the best part of late night talk radio. No, we don't, we don't screen callers. I don't juggle the lineup. I say not 85 to 90% of the time I take the phone calls in the order in which they come. And yeah, no, I don't believe in that. I find it exhilarating to see who's on the other line. So no, we, we don't screen the phone calls. We take them as is. And that's just the nature of the beast. Here's a text message from Sheboygan. We're old. I we're old enough to remember seeing Willie Mays play for the 73 Mets in the World Series. I remember watching when they played the World Series game in the day. Yeah, I remember the 73 series. And I remember when Bud Harrelson, Pete Rose, going into that fight in the playoffs too, in the 73 playoffs. I remember that quite well. And yeah, I was six years old. They sat me in front of the television. And I remember watching every single bit of that World Series. Let's see here. The being a graduate of the High School Class of 1985, my friends and I were jammed into that genre of AOR. I never did care for Queen, more of a Ronnie James Dio fan. Freddie Mercury rubbed me the wrong way. I went to a Ronnie James Dio concert. I don't remember much of it. Uh, text lines are all over the place. I would get to that as well. Plus you got a lot more to get to when it comes to phones. Stay right there. It's America at night. It's open phones. No screening. Never have never will. 18442 McGraw, American night back in a moment. You're listening to America at Night with McGraw, Milhaven. Yes. Spring's Blooming at Starbucks. A new season calls for new discoveries like our iced uber vanilla matcha latte. Smooth, creamy and nutty, balanced with notes of vanilla. It's a treat for the eyes too, with vibrant lilac hues to brighten your spring mood. Hot or iced, there are so many ways to love this stunning serve. Uber vanilla, pouring now at Starbucks. Subject to availability while stocks last. The floor is yours. Call or text 844-262-4729. That's 844-2 McGrath. Alright, I'm taking them in the order in which they're coming. It's open phones. Let's go to Steve in Albany on line one. Steve, good morning. You are on America at night. McGrath, thanks for taking my call. I heard you recently talking about the first time you ever witnessed a major baseball game in person. So when I heard you describe the memory that you had, which was correct, you said that Ted Simmons hit a grand slam, correct? Yes, yes. Alright. Yeah, well, that was a twilight doubleheader. Do you remember that? Was it the second game of the doubleheader? Yeah, it was the, I believe it was the eighth inning, maybe the ninth. I think it was the eighth. But anyway, this you'll find is interesting. Ted Simmons was a switch hitter and he was pinch hitting for another switch hitter, Reggie Smith, which never would have happened, but Reggie Smith, I believe, had a bad back, something like that. So he was ailing a little bit and the Cardinals manager, whoever it was, was at Red Shane, still at the time. I don't remember for sure, but he decided to bring up Simmons to pinch it for Smith and the pitcher who he hit the grand slam off of was normally a starting pitcher. I'm talking about John Matlack, okay? Left hander, yeah, Simmons is getting right handed. Matlack was brought in by the Mets manager, Yogi Berra. Okay. Yogi claims that he warned Matlack that he might be needed in relief late in the game because the Mets pitching staff was a little bit fatigued. Matlack claimed that he was never told by Berra that he might be brought into the game in relief. His position was that he was in the ball principally, soft tossing or whatever for a future start, whenever that would have been. And so that's what happened. It was a double shutout for the Cardinals. It was one, nothing in the first game. And then Simmons, Grand Slam, won it for nothing for the Cardinals in the second game. I had just graduated from high school. So I took the Amtrak train down to the city with three of my buddies and one of them knew Queens as a former resident of Queens. So we get off at Grand Central Station and left it up to him to get us to Shea Stadium. And that's my recollection of that night. So you were at that same game? Yes, I was. Come on. Really? I have a good memory, McGraw. It's either a curse or a blessing, but yes, I was there because when I heard to say Ted Simmons hit a Grand Slam at Shea Stadium, I knew immediately what you were talking about and where I was that night. I was there in Shea Stadium. So when you heard me, somebody asked me on the air, what was your first game when we were talking about the first game? And I said, I remember it vividly. I was, I don't know, what was that, 75 or 74 or 76? June of 75. 75. So I would have been eight years old, which is about right. And my father took me to the game and I remember it vividly and Ted Simmons had a home run and then on the way home, we were in the station wagon and on the radio, he says quiet. The guy who hit the Grand Slam is talking on the radio and I was mesmerized that this magic box could take me into the locker room and hear the guy who hit the home run and I'd fallen in love with baseball and at radio all on the same night. And you were at that game. Well, I've known a lot of people, especially in the mid 80s and it's changed so much since then. I mean, I used to get there for batting practice and go down to the field by the dugout. And one day, I was in Fenway and I got half the Minnesota twins to sign my program. And that's what I wanted a lot of, I just wanted to talk to the players. You can't do that today. I'm talking for 40 years, 40 years ago to me is nothing, but it is a long time ago. Okay. I'm an old man now. Well, you can, you can still go for, for, for batting practice. They open the gates up depending on where you are, sometimes two hours before the game. So you can get there kind of early. And I'm with you. I get there early and just sit there and listen to the sounds, you know, eat your hot dog, have your soda, talk to the person you're with is nothing better. I hope you enjoyed my recollection because it's great to be able to use my memory and give somebody else a good memory too. Steve, what an, what an unbelievable story. I thank you for calling in. I thank you for sharing it. Have a good night, Steve. You too. Thank you. You got it. Steve and Albany, what are the, what are the odds? What are the odds? What are the people are at that game? What are the odds of the guy being at the same game? You know, it's interesting because my older sister, my father came home and said he had tickets to the game and he drew straws and my sister, Cheryl, won the contest to go to the game and they, they agreed at that point that I was too young to go to the game. So he takes my sister and she has no recollection of this, but I do. So I was, if I was eight, she was probably seven maybe and she comes home from the game and I sit her down and I, I interrogate her like she's like it's a hostage negotiation and I wanted to know where you were sitting, what were you doing, where were you going, what was it like? And, and so she kept saying that, oh, we were sitting in a box. We were, oh, it was a box. They were box seats. We were sitting in the box and it was great. And I kept thinking to myself, why would daddy put you in a box? It doesn't make any sense. Why are you at the ball game? What are you doing sitting in a box? And I actually thought she meant like a big like refrigerator box or a box where a, where a dishwasher would come in and I'm like, why are you sitting in a box? I didn't understand like box seats, the terminology for, for box seats. I told her that years later, she's like, I have no recollection of that. She remembers going to the game, but she doesn't rear me in interrogating her. And I was, I don't want to know everything about it. Wow. What an unbelievable story. All right. Let's try Antonia in California. Antonia, welcome to American night. Hey, last night I tuned in too late to tell you about my meeting in Paris with the Beatles in 1964 at the Olympia theater. So I thought I'd call tonight and take a chance. Yeah. Tell me about it. Well, um, I had worked to move to Paris. I wanted to go to the Sorbonne and live in Paris. So I worked at Frank Sinatra's casino in Calneva, uh, in California and became friends with Trini Lopez and his, and Mickey and Dave, his accompanist. So I heard that I had just arrived in Paris about two weeks before and I heard they were going to be at the Olympia theater. So I thought, Oh my God, I'm going to go visit Trini, my old friend. So I walked in in the afternoon. It was wide open, sat down in the seats for a while, made my way backstage and, uh, Trini was there and the Beatles were there. It's like, I had never actually heard of them that much. They were like skinny little guys with tight suits and this mop hair and Trini introduced me. It was, they were sort of unremarkable. It was kind of like, hello, hi. I mean, I actually like jazz better than pop anyway, but that was my meeting with them and my grandchildren loved to hear about that. But now hold on a second. Did you, you just didn't see them. You talked to them? Yeah. Well, yeah, I mean, kind of talk. They were backstage with my, you know, with Trini. I was visiting with him and he says, here's the Beatles and I think I'd heard of them. They hadn't been to the States yet. They were, you know, sort of starting to, I mean, I guess they were popular in Europe because they were appearing at the Olympia Theater in Paris. It was, I think I went to the very first, the first show was January 16th, 1964 and they were backstage and, you know, I was just introduced. It was like, hi, hi, hi, you know, that was kind of all it was. But then of course afterwards they became famous and it was like, Hey, I met the Beatles, but I'm actually more of a fan of like Dave Brubeck and Miles Davis. But anyway, it was just kind of fun to think about it. So you met the Beatles before they were the Beatles. Yeah. Well, they were the Beatles and apparently they were, I mean, as I said, well, they were the Beatles at the Olympia. They were pretty well known. Yeah, but, but they, they might have been the Beatles, but they weren't the Beatles. If you know what I mean. Well, they hadn't, they hadn't hit the US. Right. There wasn't the British invasion yet. So I, I looked it up. I just looked it up last night to find out when their first appearance was in the US. Did you, did you find, did you find John Lennon sexy? Did you find Paul McCartney sexy? Did you? No, they weren't guys. They weren't like my kind of men. I, they, no, I didn't. So you blew, so you blew off John Lennon and Paul McCartney? Actually, one time I had to blow off. No, no, that doesn't sound nice. Anyway, no, I never mind. No, Trini got a little aggressive one time, but I had to turn him down. This is a family show. Hold on a second. Hold on. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. I know. It wasn't meant to be like that. But anyway, I'm just saying that I didn't meet the Beatles and it was kind of unremarkable, but I met the Beatles before they were famous. You should have had a selfie with them with your cell phone back in the day. Antonio, what a great story back in those cell phones. There were no cell phones. Antonio, thank you for the great story. Have a good night. Thank you very much. Look at that. Checking out, hanging out with the Beatles before the British invasion, pinky and upstate New York. What story do you have tonight? Thanks for joining us on America night. Thanks. I'm not sure. I don't think I told you this. I grew up in Miami and my daddy worked for politicians, Democrats. And his life was very strange. And one day, I remember, he took me off to the side and he said, pinky, and he told me all this because they ultimately murdered my father. He said, sweetheart, you're going to go down the road of life and you're going to have to make choices. He said, sweetheart, promise me, pinky, when you come to the stop and have to make a decision, he said, pinky, please go right, sweetheart, and you'll be okay. And not long after that, they killed my father because he started bucking them. And who was they? Who was they? The Democratic Party. He worked for a politician in Miami and he just got fed up and he started talking back and telling them, you know, what, what the family is wrong with you people? You know, did they ever catch the men who killed him? Not really. It was so connected with such a huge group of influential people. It was never questioned or no one cared. Yeah. When he said, when he said, when he said, go right, did he mean, did he mean do the right thing? Or did he mean politically go right? Politically. Because he was in politics and he said, choose people who are going to care for other people and make the world a better place. All right. And that was pretty darn good advice. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, pinky, thank you for telling that very, very personal story. Have yourself a good night, pinky. Thanks. You too. You got it. Danny and Rala, you're on American night. Hello. Hey, a couple of machine guns things. 1982 game seven, my first game and we want it. Game two of the World Series in 1982 was your first game? Game seven. Game seven. You mean Bruce Suter's game seven? Yes. That was your first game? Who gave you the ticket? My mom and dad owned several bars in St. Louis and we got all kinds of stuff from Gray Eagle, the beer distributor. Sure. So we all got tickets and that was my first game and it was awesome. That's some game to go to. In those days, you could still storm the field. Well, after the last out, I started to take off. My mom grabbed me by the neck and said, where you going? I said, down there. She said, no, you're not. Anyway, first concert, Ronnie Millsap. I'm not a country guy, but that was an excellent concert. And I think that you were correct that Robert's kind of mixing up his things, driving and shooting somebody's two different things. The main reason I wanted to call, you said something last night after I got a phone with you. You said something about Biden's last day in office, comparing the gas prices then with the gas prices today. And I think that's disingenuous because in, and I looked all this up, June of 2022, gas was over national average, over $5 a gallon. In first, I said it was, I said it was higher at one point, but it had come down. Right. But between October and December of 2025, national average was below $3. So when you take one day, yeah, it almost, for stupid people, they would think, oh, well, gas prices were lower under Biden. Not everybody's extremely analytical. Well, the text I got, the text I got said, Biden had higher gas prices than President Trump. And while that's true, and sometimes, and other times, it wasn't true. So, and I said that, I just picked out the day Biden left. Right. I mean, and that, so that was, yeah, no, I don't disagree. I mean, I wasn't trying to skew the numbers. I just had, I just happened to have at my fingertips, gas prices on January 20th, 2025, and gas prices today. You know, the other problem was that, but I did, but I did say, but I did say that during Biden's administration, gas prices were higher, and they had gone down by the time he had left office. But as it may, President Biden didn't have much to do with the price of a gallon of gas. Oh, McGraw, I disagree. The man went in and decimated our national reserves to try to keep the price of gasoline down. And it wasn't until Trump got back in that are not saying, hold on a second, hold on a second, hold on a second, hold on a second, hold on a second, releasing the national oil reserves brings down the gallon of gas. What did he do to put the gallon of gas up? Did he invade a country? He restricted everything, fracking, they, yeah, but that doesn't, yeah, but that's that. But, but, but if that's the case, it would have remained high at the end of his, at the end of his administration, it was whatever I said, it was 320 a gallon or whatever. So it came down over the course of his four years. So you know why? Because he was already voted out. They knew Trump was coming in Trump's firm. It was down because the president, because the president doesn't have much effect on the price of oil. Now, if you invade a foreign country like Iran or Iraq, and you sort of curtail the supply of oil, that will affect the oil prices. But I got to go, Danny, but Joe Biden, Joe Biden did not affect a gallon of gas. And the president normally in the normal course of the presidency does not affect a barrel of oil, except for things like invading Iraq or things like that or so on and so forth. I got to go. I got to break. Thanks. All right. It's America at night. Back in a moment. Hey, got just enough time. Do a little quick check here of the Googles. The price of a barrel of oil was $120 in 2022 during the Biden administration. Most of the reasons was the gyrating of the supply chain after the pandemic. Also, the big one was the Russia invasion of Ukraine. That's what pushed price of a barrel of oil to $120. If you want to blame Biden for Russia invading Ukraine, okay, I guess he had something to do with the price of oil. But the price of oil when he left office was at roughly about $76 a barrel. So, you know, it's, it is what it is. Again, the president doesn't really have much of a say in a barrel of oil. But if you invade a foreign country that uses oil like President Trump, I mean, I think we could all agree that he's the reason why gas prices have gone up at least in the last month or so. But before that, they were, they were, he was questioning but again, not, not much to his credit or demise. So they get too much credit and too much blame, but they don't really have much to do with it. All right, we're done. Thanks for listening. Thanks for putting up with me. Our executive director is Alex Sinton. Our engineer tonight is Richard Good. I'm McGraw-Millhaven. This is American Knights. We'll see you tomorrow night. This is Westwood 1. Vince Collinaze is redefining news talk. I'm Vince Collinaze, host of the Vince podcast. 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