Explaining War to Aliens | 04-08-26

The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Entertaining and informative on the Red Apple Podcast Network. Everybody, this is Lionel with you on The Other Side of Midnight, and this is Warrior Wednesday, an institution here where we take one, it takes more than this, but one program, one segment, one hour, I should say, to go through what is happening involving so much, not so much AI, but children and predation, but in this huge conglomerate. And right now, we're going to be talking about which is the most incredible. Let me give you a story. Let me give you a number. $30 billion. $30 billion. Is this for war? No, maybe. That's how much this country has spent putting laptops and screens into classrooms across the country. Thirty billion dollars. And what we are now seeing is something that we should that should stop us cold. A.I. Look what happened. You think they're putting screens in there to make our children smarter, to make didactics more powerful, more pointed, more poignant? No. Right now, what we're seeing is reading scores are down. mass scores are down, attention is collapsing, and we were told this would revolutionize education. We were told that this would empower students, and instead, we've been engineered into thinking that distraction is somehow normal. Let me stop going on. Let me turn it over to the expert. Full disclosure, my wife, Lynn Shaw from Lynn's Warriors, lynnswarriors.org, on YouTube at Lynn's Warriors, and Lynn's underscore Warriors on X, I bring you Lynn Shaw, and this is Warrior Wednesday. Good evening, my wife. Or good morning, my husband. I mean, morning. I'm sorry, I'm confused. Let us not carry. What is happening? Is it as bad as I said? It's worse than you said, but the reason we are always showcasing, and thank you for providing a platform on your program about these issues, because you're not going to hear about this. in mainstream media on cable news. You're just really not going to hear about this. This is something that is further proof, and we at the Warriors always work on, we can back everything up we say, with proof, with studies, with stats. So this came out, and I thought this was completely mind-boggling, that in the year 2024, the government spent $30 billion, B-I-L-L-I-O-N, as you said, Lionel, on replacing textbooks in the classrooms with the laptops and the tablets. The effect, this is more proof how putting children in front of screens, right, results in disaster because this is the first generation that is less cognitively capable than their parents, the first generation. And we have a great study by Dr. Horvath, okay, H-O-R-V-A-T-H, who put all of this out. It's also projected that the government will spend double this amount. We're talking $60 billion over the next five years or some incredible amount. Why are we doing this? We know the results. We now have proof. We just have the two verdicts with the cases in New Mexico and California holding big tech accountable harms caused to children. We have plenty of studies now about the effects of the iPhone and screens on children, and now we're facing AI, and there's really no regulation so far. There's no anything with this artificial intelligence. What are we doing to our kids? So we've realized, finally, what's happening with all of this big tech. And I don't understand, Lionel, just forging ahead with artificial intelligence. Have we learned nothing? I mean, the question is really simple. Did we make things worse, you know, spending $30 billion and encouraging all this screen behavior? Or are we doubling down and just going straight into AI? It is completely frightening what's happening. Well, who is responsible? I mean, is it, I don't want to say the Trump administration. Is it Linda McMahon? Is it local school boards? Is it the teachers' union? is that who made this pact with the devil to contaminate? By the way, there was so much distraction in our kids' schools as it is. Who's responsible, do you think? Well, I think it's a question of everybody responsible. It's interesting because I heard, you know, the education department, Linda McMahon, she recently said to somebody, you know, we're basically kind of just, these are my words, not hers, you know, like a figurehead. Okay? Like, it's up to the states and the school districts what they do. We're just kind of there to suggest things. Now, does that even make sense to you? No. Because that's what I was told, because she currently has been on a 50-state tour. Probably nobody even knows this, right? going, or so we're told, going into different states and different schools and meeting with them and talking to, you know, their school boards and things like this. But we're talking about $30 billion, okay? Where does that money, so that comes from the federal government, right, trickling down into the states. I don't know, we see these harms. The point I want to get at is I don't want to go back and I don't want to because it's done. It's over, okay? The monies are spent. Now we've got monies allocated. But we're sitting on top of this AI. And by the way, let me remind everybody, it's already being implemented into classrooms across America. How exactly? How parental consent. Well, AI tools, okay? AI companions, AI tools. When we at the Warriors, right here, the other side of midnight, or the cat's round table, we're always talking about AI and chatbots and AI companions and how bad it is for kids. Yet they're going full steam ahead. So I'm going to say it comes from the top down being pushed into all of our schools. Because who in their right mind, seriously, would do this to harm children further? And we have experts such as Dr. Horvath coming forward. We have the psychiatrists, the psychologists, the educators now. We've got the parents coming forward. We've got kids themselves. We had the young woman testify in California about what social media did to her, and there's thousands of kids. And you know we at the Warriors, we work with survivor parents. We know the harms caused to kids. So why are we not putting the brakes on this? Look, we're all about tech. We're pro-tech innovation. But we want it to be crafted to help kids, not harm kids. So I'm not understanding the full federal government push for all of this artificial intelligence. Do you think that the teachers' unions themselves feel that somehow they have not been at all threatened or that maybe AI somehow will make it easier for them perhaps to maybe to work less? Because they haven't said a word about this. This has not in any way affected them or frightened them or in any way impeded or interrupted their ability. So obviously they must think this benefits them. Well, you know, that's a separate program. We have basically two different teachers unions, and we know how they've really just become a tool of, what shall I say, the government. Take that. Right? I don't know what else to say. And interestingly enough, and you pointed out, you think they'd be all over this Because we know, despite what propaganda you read or PR, glossy PR releases from big tech companies or even the government themselves, we know that AI, artificial intelligence, will replace teachers in the classroom. Therefore, less jobs. Now, don't you think they should be speaking out or would be speaking out about this? Yet they're not. They have been zipped their lips, which I find very interesting. And you know what? We know. We know what's happening. It's happening right under our noses. And nobody is saying anything. And I want to just, like, go over AI. We work with a lot of ethical tech people, okay? There are good people out there working on things. We could have. There is AI that could empower teachers, okay, help them, right, and also with lesson plans and help them with their research and all of that, okay? So be a true companion to help them. And we know the same goes for children, to help them. Yet it's being used the other way around, replacing. Replacing the teacher, so replacing that job, and with kids giving them the answers. And we have this cognitive decline the first time in history we're seeing this, okay? So why aren't we working to turn this around? That is the big question I ask, because if we have this tech that empowers, look, the bottom line always is making money, profit over people. Let's be real, everybody. But you could still have profit if we used it for good. So I'm not understanding destroying jobs, destroying kids and their thinking. A couple of things. We're talking to Lynn Shaw from Lynn's Warriors. This is Warrior Wednesday. When you and I have talked about that there have been much to the horror and the chagrin and the shock of individuals whose kids were involved or who kind of moseyed into this world of bots and the like. We found out that some of these bots were telling kids to commit suicide, asking them where their parents kept the knives and the matches. Now, how is it, do you think, that if this happens, who is going to be watching to hear what they're saying? There's also, I read a story last night, yesterday, about in Korea, South Korea, the elderly population is through the roof, inordinate. So they are now handing bot to handy, but they are using bots to help elderly people, which is very, very successful. The problem is, I'm thinking, wait a minute, elderly people thought, how do I know this is going to somehow try to brainwash them into suicide? Now, what I'm saying may sound very dark and dank and what have you, but that is exactly what I'm thinking about because people think still, they still think of AI as being somehow benign. What sayeth you? It is anything but benign. Again, artificial intelligence, let's get this over with. Yes, we know it can be used for good, for health care. We hear that one all the time. It can be used in warfare. That's another one we hear all the time. But putting it into the hands of developing minds of children, okay, without real training for the teachers, for the parents, and for the kids is going to be disaster. We saw this with all of this social media that was thrown at everybody beginning in 1996. So innocently, connect with friends, and it was connect with friends and family. I read a study two days ago, and it said most people now, yes, it started with on social media platforms, you connect it with your family and friends. And now the majority of the public is connecting and watching strangers. They're not even connecting with family and friends. What do you mean? What do I mean? Yeah, what do you mean, strangers? They're watching TikTok videos of strangers dancing. They're looking at somebody's Facebook posting of somebody in a hospital bed. So, in other words, the content. There's so much what they're calling this slop now. Okay, that's the word I'm seeing used around a lot. Instead of really, it sounds very innocent, right? Like connect with family and friends in the beginning. It sounded good. You know, you could talk to grandma across the country and things like that on Facebook. And it actually started in universities. It was for college students to connect to friends at different campuses and connect the schools together and all this stuff and hear how everybody's doing on their campuses. Then it became, okay, families as well. That sounded very nice, right? But now, fast forward, and the study shows most people are not even connecting with the family and friends anymore. They're watching content from strangers. And this is more of the progression. We can so clearly see this now. We have the proof from 1996 that the harm's done, okay? They're watching strangers, more isolation. We talk about kids. You're isolating them. You're giving them the devices. So they're watching more content from strangers. Therefore, wherever the kids are, so are the predators. So there's this predation. And we work, all these stories that you know about, and we work with it, the warriors, from sextortion to kids feeling lonely, so buying with two clicks on Snap, drugs, to cyberbullying, which is so intense, to these TikTok challenges, okay, and all this. That's all basically strangers directing and doing things to our kids. So now we've got the AI, and as you point out, okay, now we've got forever I was getting this little dog jumping at me. that was a fake little dog. It was very cute, like these ads, you know, online, that you can replace, you know, a real dog now. You can have this fake little dog. Let me ask you to stand by for one second. I have this thing that we must break. It must be a mandatory interrupt. We're talking to Lynn Shaw. This is Warrior Wednesday on the other side of midnight. We have more coming up on the other side of midnight with me, Lionel. The other side of midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. It's the other side of Middiamond with Lionel. Alrighty, Lionel with you. This is Warrior Wednesday. This is... By the way, don't let anything that appears to be extended fool you. Everything has a reason. No rhyme, but a reason. I guess, of course, is Lynn Shaw, my better half from the other, well, from Lynn's Warriors dot org and on YouTube at at Lynn's Warriors. By the way, we just did a brand new video together that is absolutely just tearing up. I mean, the numbers are going through the roof. Please go to Lynn's Warriors on YouTube and find that. We're talking to her about AI and the like. Now, let me ask you this question. When you see, and I'm not trying to be mean. I'm not trying to be mean. But when I see our wonderful first lady walk down the White House with a robot. And, oh, isn't that nice? And it's like, you know, and then here you come along, this mean old anti, you know, AI person. Don't you think, wait a minute, we're not talking about robots. We're not talking about kids. We're not talking about that. I still don't think people understand AI, it is a neural link. It's a thought. It's a way of thinking. It's not a robot. It's not a Roomba. It's not Danger Will Robinson. Again, I keep going back to, I don't think people really understand what we're talking about. Robots are terrific, and they're great for kids. Listen, sometimes if you, put it this way. Let me see if I can explain this. AI would be great if you could trust it. Doesn't that make sense? I mean, if you could trust it, it would be fantastic. But we can't. That's the problem. Look, you just opened it up. I have 50 different responses right now. First of all, community creates change. This is why we do what we do with the Warriors. This is why we come on your program. We come on the Cats Roundtable. We go on other programs. We put out this information, okay, to educate everybody. This is happening. Wake up America. We say wake up America. This is happening around the globe, everything we talk about with kids as well, but we focus on right here, America first. Okay? America. Okay? We want everybody to be a warrior in your own home and community. It is not like, you know, two years ago, five years ago, 10, 20 years ago. We have to all participate today in all of this. Now, I want to say something. We are doing something called cognitive offloading. Ooh, that sounds dangerous. What is that? It does sound dangerous, and it is dangerous. But here's the thing. The studies, Dr. Horvath, the studies show, and other studies, that students, so screens in the classroom, okay, on their tablets, on their Chromebooks, they spend a significant portion of the time on non-academic activity when using the devices. So this changes the entire landscape of learning because learning requires what? Focus, effort, and the screens fragment attention. So when attention breaks, it's really quite elementary. When attention breaks, right, memory breaks, and when memory breaks, learning collapses, and there you go. I mean, distraction. This is such an issue. I want to say something about our First Lady. It is very disappointing to me, okay? Look, we sit on innovation. We are here. Again, we are pro-technology, pro-innovation. We want to progress. We want our kids to be the best kids, right, and be the smartest and have tools available, okay? We can't stop artificial intelligence. Anybody who says that or poo-poos, forget all that, okay? It's here. So let's all – I don't understand. Let's all work together. Let's put, you know, a council of parents, you know, at the White House who can work with these technologists. Again, I understand the big picture. I think a lot of people do understand the big picture. It's always big tech profit over people. But my goodness, and this is a family program, we need Americans at that table as well, parents at that table, especially these survivor parents who bravely use their voices to relay their children's stories, their family stories of what happened to them so it doesn't happen to any other kids and families. They need a seat at the table, and this is the part I have a problem with. So our First Lady can enter a very nice, you know, glossy piece of coming down a hallway with some sort of robot that looks completely frightening to me and having 45 nations sitting there watching this and wants to bring the world together with all of this, but they're forgetting the biggest piece, putting parents at that table, okay, who have a voice to work with technologists, to work with government officials, to work. Why, after all, it was just announced less than two weeks ago, there's a tech council now. Did you know that, Lionel? At the White House. I did not know that. That is why at the Warriors we are rallying for, we want a parents' council. If you can put the tech council, right now I believe it is 12 to 14 people, including people like Mark Zuckerberg. Okay. Mark Zuckerberg, Meta, everybody, Facebook and Instagram, WhatsApp, who just was held accountable in these two big groundbreaking cases from New Mexico and California, harms to kids. Sam Altman. Oh, God. Who's another one. A lot of things are coming forward. We've known about, but are now coming forward in the media about Sam Altman, which is a good thing. Is it Ronan Farrow investigating him? Okay. And lots of credit to him. He has spent over a year and a half really going in and finding out about Sam Altman. And, frankly, the bottom line is for everybody who will not read it, but I suggest everybody do read his recording, okay, about Sam Altman, is he's a creep and he doesn't listen to people and he does his own thing and he's going to harm people. That's kind of the bottom line. Like, I'm just doing that for you. So if you can put it, the White House, the people's house, right? The government works for us. We pay the taxes. Then you better, you know what, because we're a family program, put a parent's council in that White House to also have a voice, okay? It is completely disrespectful not to do that, But to put this handful of big tech trillionaires, zillionaires, I don't even know what you call them, Lionel. They have so much money. Money equals power, right? Put them at the table at the White House, but you're not putting our Americans, our parents, who have to deal. Remember, nobody signed up for all of this. This was just all thrown at us from all these big tech platforms to all of this predation. And I and everybody out there listening and everybody across America should put their foot down, say enough. We want a seat at the table. You work for us. Enough with these people, this handful from Silicon Valley, right? And, again, the AI could be used for such good, true empowerment. But we see where it's going. It's replacing people, replacing jobs, and replacing our children's thinking. So when kids stop thinking for themselves, think about they can't become a fully formed adult. Do you remember when we were at, I think it was like a CVS or something, and they would have somebody who would come over and say, oh, can I help you? And they would help us use the checkout. They showed us how to basically destroy their job. And I thought it was so ironic, so strange. It was so sad. It's like, do you know what you're doing? And, well, that's what I see sometimes what teachers are doing. And what's going to happen is at first they're going to, people are going to listen to this, and they're going to say, how would you like to have your child have an individualized focus? Because let me also tell you, people are going for tutors. Eventually, schools are going to be outlawed, not outlawed, but eliminated, and you're going to have tutors. And tutors can either be somebody actually in, you know, viva voce, live performance, live testimony, live existence, or something like the Khan Academy or others, they are doing much, much better. And at first, I'm thinking, okay, fine. I don't want to care how our kids learn. I really don't. So they're already kind of weaning us from the notion of conventional school and the red schoolhouse and the teacher and that sort of thing. Okay, fine. And also, you're going to see numbers go up at least initially. at some point people say this might be better it might be easier and eventually don't you think they're going to want to have schools at home they're going to want to destroy they're going to want to remote learn everything they don't want kids together they want to scatter people they want to scatter kids no more roles and Department of Education will take on a much I don't know different thing don't you get that impression don't you think that they want to just Well, absolutely, and our First Lady basically put out a statement the day she walked recently with this robot, okay, that very creepily was saying hello to people in different languages. That was not, from what I hear, very well accepted among the crowd. They thought it was basically, from what I heard, I was not there, creepy. That's the word I use, okay? It didn't really impress anybody. but she basically said we can individualize the study for the child and this will empower them and it can be done in your own home okay well she walked it back a couple of days ago and said we're not going we don't want to replace teachers you know and I know Lionel this AI these few people at the top of the mountain the Silicon Valley Mark Zuckerbergs and Sam Altmans, and there are others, okay? You know, why do they do this? Because they can, okay? Money means nothing to them. They have so much of it, okay? They're laughing at us. And now our government is partnered with them, basically, you know? So here's the thing. Of course, AI could be a true companion to help a child, right? But, again, suggesting that kids should be at home, not with a real person, okay, more of this contributing to kids not thinking for themselves because they're relying on tools. Because you know what I know. The AI is giving the answers. Just like kids right now, we hear from teachers across America, they're using the chat GPT. You know, all the essays are so glossy in the fifth grade, and they all have the same kind of information. So the kids are using the tools, relying on the tools, as opposed to the tools are empowering them. So over time, very little time basically, the mind is weakening. The reasoning is weakening. Problem solving. Independence. Again, the kids will be reliant on these machines, okay? They are machines. A chatbot is not real. I want to keep reinforcing that. You may have one and form one and talk to it and it's all nice and you hear the answers you like, but eventually it will start thinking for itself basically, right? And it will scrape the Internet for everything and it will turn on you perhaps. So this is dangerous. If laptops, and we're telling you right now in the Chromebooks and all this, can you imagine $30 billion in one calendar year, the money that could be used towards really empowering the innovation system? And by the way, let me also add, that wasn't $30 billion for STEM, for music programs, for athletics, for playgrounds. Because what happens is, it's funny. You know, recently we were, don't you, haven't you found every now and then there's like a, not a regression, but a rejection of something where kids want to go back to the way things used to be. We always hear these stories about they like certain things. They like, kids are liking more board games. Kids like. The malls are going back to the malls. The malls. But there's a reason for that. Remember a while back we read something where the movie, the TV show Friends, a lot of, now I get them confused, Gen Zers, Boomers, I have no idea who they are. But anyway, the kind of teens and adolescents saw Friends, the show Friends with Jennifer Aniston and others. And they said, wait a minute, is this, did people act like this? Yes, and they were enamored and loved the idea of friendship. People are becoming more and more isolated. And it's done. By the way, all you have to do, I ask everybody listening, do yourself a favor. Go to any kind of platform, whether it's YouTube or anything. Just watch Sam Altman speak for five minutes and ask yourself, what the hell is wrong with this guy? What is the matter with this guy? Seriously. This guy, put it this way. He is devoid of any kind of humanity. And this is something that I'm sorry, but a lot of us are going to be actually, it's going to go by without anybody really paying attention. So anyway, tell us some of your, you know, since we last talked, you are still, every day, every week, you're still talking to parents who lost kids through this extortion, suicide, and they're there. They haven't gone anywhere. Bring us up to speed on that. Well, there's thousands of parents across the United States. A lot don't even come forward. How can you with all this trauma? With, you know, TikTok suggesting a choking challenge and subway surfing and, you know, try a Tide pod and go out and steal a Kia car. And we know kids do dumb things and they're egged on, you know, groupthink and all that stuff. We've all been there as teenagers doing things. Kids are doing it. But kids are dying. You know what? Dying. That's what I have to say. And people better wake up to all of this. What I'm finding out is there is a lot of hope because we have more parents and also Americans, right, communities stepping up. They're aware now. Thank goodness. I feel like in the last two years this is really speeding up where more people are aware, more parents are coming forward, okay? They all have the same stories, even if they don't know each other. We cannot allow another family to go through this. We cannot allow another child wake up. And the most hurtful thing a lot of these parents have told me is from these two recent groundbreaking court cases, okay, just two weeks ago, these two verdicts, back to back, right, that to sit in the L.A. courtroom with Mark Zuckerberg, who brazenly showed up with his entourage wearing meta glasses, I mean, how ridiculous is that? That is a... No shame, this guy. That is flipping off, yes. But that's like giving it to the judge by saying, I mean, that is unconscionable. Well, in his mind, he's thinking, I dare say, okay, everybody's talking about the meta glasses, more sales for me, because that's the way the guy thinks. But what I want to say about this is that the parents sat there because one parent texted me and told me she had to leave the courtroom because they knowingly, from the internal memos and the whistleblowers, they knew they were harming kids, and yet they amped it up. They kept going and going and going because they called, you know, children herd. They're like a herd. You know, they all follow each other, and they're just animals and this profit over everything else. And people who worked there, you know, were told, you know, keep your mouth shut or you don't like it, get out or we'll take care of it, we'll move it up the chain. People saw what was happening, you know, these brave whistleblowers that came forward. And then the internal memos talking about our kids like this, okay? And so for these parents to sit in a courtroom, and that was the thing that made them so sick that they knowingly, these platforms set out. And now there's the proof. We know about it. So what are we doing? We're stepping into AI. And so we're feeding more into this, this constant interruption. But I want to point something out. There's a great new platform called Alliance for a Better Future. Betterfutureai.org is the website. Say that again, slower. Betterfutureai.org is the Alliance for a Better Future, recently launched. And this is, you know, America first. build the AI with our children in mind, with all of us in mind. We don't work for AI, okay? AI has to work for us. So the schools have to get on board with all of this. And interestingly enough, you pointed it out, they're very silent recently on all of this AI, which means... What does that tell you? Yep. Well, it tells me a lot, and that's another program. It tells me a lot, but the most concerning thing is when we're getting drips and drabs, and then people coming forward, teachers, educators, quietly, they're putting it. They're making us use, you know, AI already. We're not having parental consent. Parents have to consent. And parents have to also step up and wake up because I will ask them all the time, right, because I'm always about focus groups and getting, you know, boots on the ground information. Oh, did you sign a consent form at the beginning of the year or during the year about do you know what your child is doing online on the Chromebook? Yeah, I checked off the boxes. I checked off the how many boxes? Oh, maybe 25, 30. Well, are they using Gemini? Are they using, I don't know. I just checked off the boxes. So I'm here to say, you know what? I'm tired of saying I'm not judging. I'm not blaming. But parents, wake up. This is a different world. Don't check off boxes. When you get a form from the school or online, you've got to see what you're checking off. Because this is what parents don't know in caregivers. You don't have to use those screens in the classroom. You can say no. Okay? They try to say, like, we have to do it, all the kids, it's mandatory, you've got to use the screens and all that. It is not. You can ask for a paper package back to old-fashioned. Talk about the pendulum swinging back. There is a movement. It's called pen to paper or pen and pen to paper. Oh, I love this. This is great. And kids are starting. And interestingly enough, the parents are spreading it throughout the United States. Now, I dare say you're not going to hear this on cable news, okay, where you say, no, I want my child's assignments. You know, give me the month's worth. Give me the week's worth. In a package, actual papers. And other kids are seeing this, we're hearing, and they're like, oh, that's kind of cool. Like, I want the papers too. Like, I want the package now. I want to get up the screens. I mean, kids are just inundated with screens. Again, not their fault. And parents are made to believe they have to. They have to work on these screens. No, you don't. So pen to paper, everybody keep that in mind. But you must consent. So I am up in arms about now the AI, all these harms coming forward. We know. We have proof. We've got parents, okay? We can't testify anymore in front of Congress. They're not listening, okay? This is the one issue. Bipartisan belongs to no political party. Everybody in Congress should be standing up for our kids and our families, and they're not, okay? So we have to do it. We have to become the warriors. But you know what? Know what your kids are doing. You've got to get in there and ask the school, what are you doing about AI? How is it affecting my child's classroom? Parents have to come together and spread the word. Like the pen to paper that's going around the country, this is the way it has to be done. It's unbelievable, but it's hopeful because we have this now. And we have different groups like Parents Rise. We've got Parents SOS. I mean, there's hundreds of thousands of members, but you would never know it. Because my life comes from the Warriors. There's a bunch of great groups talking about it. There is a movement. We are waking up. We're talking to Lynn Shaw from lynnswarriors.org, and also lynnswarriors on YouTube, and lynns underscore warriors on X, or it used to be called Twitter. Changing the subject just a little bit, every now and then you'll forward to me a great article about the return of handwriting, the return of books, the return of board games or balls or dating or something. I think that once people get a – I would hope that when kids get a chance to kind of see the way things were, they will embrace this. What can you tell us about that, especially handwriting? I don't know why that is of interest. Yeah. Well, first of all, I want to say something. Gen Z, Generation Z, they have been used as the guinea pigs, okay? And that is kids born, those born 1997. Okay, then we have, let's stick with Gen Z for now. They have been used as the guinea pigs. And there is an uprising among a lot of these young people when they realize, wow, we were used as the guinea pigs. Seeing all these studies come forth and how they were introduced to the iPhone, you know, and they thought it was cool in 2008. So their parents and grandparents bought it for them. And then we see the cognitive decline and all these studies coming forth. So there is a pushback on this. There's also a study just out that says at the rate we're going, handwriting will basically disappear. That's killing it. Because starting with Gen Z, everybody's printing. And frankly, you can have some beautiful printing, but you and I know, because we talk about this a lot or see it, The printing is barely, you can't even read it. This printing coming out of, you know, 25-year-olds and, you know, almost 30-year-olds, right? It's crooked. It's backwards. It's not. So, again, they stopped teaching the handwriting in most schools. It's disappearing. This study was pointing out it will basically at this rate disappear altogether. There's that story that we always share where a colleague. Yeah, I was just going to ask that. Said, you know, in a very prestigious university, like the teacher, the professor said, like, stop using handwriting, cursive, because I don't understand it, you know. And I said, well, how old is this professor, whatever? Oh, probably in their 30s. Okay, that's number one. Number two. And also, don't use it around other students. Again, a very prestigious, okay, university. it's giving them anxiety you're using cursive you're using what that's another one so that can you believe this and children are not being taught this cursive okay that's one however there is also a swing back ever so slightly there's the alpha generation and they're born uh let's see they're born around 2010 so they're still young but this is the generation so gen z before them, okay? Now we have Alpha. Those are the ones they are finding hardcover. Books and libraries, interesting. Okay, the little studies we have, they are going to malls, which have been dying across America because they think it's fun. Now, granted, a lot of them are posting videos online like TikTok, but they think it's actually cool going in and looking at clothes and trying them on and posting videos. They're getting back. They can't believe, like, people used to hang out at malls all day, right, and do these things and eat at the food court and all that. So there's a resurgence there. We do know there are 300 new bookstores in almost the last year opening across the United States, not only, you know, something like the chain like Barnes & Noble, independent bookstores, which we always promote. So there's a thirst for that there. We know some kids are getting back into cursive writing thinking that's cool. We know kids are returning to faith. Okay, they find that interesting. And also they're putting down, look, we can't get rid of devices. It's the world we live in. We don't want to, right? But they're putting them down more, which is a good sign. That's all we can do with all of this. You know, put the devices down and get back. There's nothing new here. Get back to walking the dog. Get back to going outside and, I don't know, pulling some weeds, you know, back with nature with your kids. Get back to setting the dinner table. Get back. It sounds very elementary, but this is the point we're at. we have to return. And this alpha generation thinks those things are cool. Can you believe it? Mom's saying, okay, now you set the table. These basics that we grew up with, right? But there was no reason. And we have to retrain the brains. Remember, the brains are adaptable. We've got to get back there. They're very protean. They're very malleable. Let me stop right now. Let me just remind you that you're listening to Lynn Shaw. This is Lynn's Warriors. Actually, this is Warrior Wednesday on the other side of midnight. We are, just so that you know, please make note, take note, Write this down, lenswarriors.org, and on YouTube at lenswarriors, and also on X or Twitter at lens underscore warriors. We will finish up after this. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Alrighty, Lionel with you. This is The Other Side of Midnight and Warrior Wednesday with Lynn Shaw from lynnswarriors.org. In the last segment, if we could, I want to, I'm finding myself, and maybe you're the same way. I'm repeating myself over and over, hence the term repeating. And I can tell right away that people really just do not get. And I'm not trying to sound superior. I don't think people understand what I'm talking about AI. They don't get it. The other day, we had a wonderful caller who suggested that maybe AI was programmed. And that it is the problem of the programmer. And it was the, and I told you, and we heard about this, at Anthropic, they did a test to see what would happen. They were reviewing an AI version, and they set up this idea that there were people that were going to shut down this AI version. They also intimated, or let it be known, to AI, whatever an AI is, that there were certain members of the team, one in particular who was having an affair with his wife. And with just that alone, the anthropic AI system came up with the idea of threatening to blackmail this hypothetical person in order to prevent him from turning off the system. This is on their own. Nobody programmed it to do this. this goes to show you that there's almost their own form of, I guess, a treachery or morality. That's why you can't turn bots over to your kids and think that all will be taken care of because some program or some way removed all of the chances of threat. I mean, absolutely. I want to point something out. We are not against technology at all. We are pro-child. This AI needs to be employed with children and families in mind, not the other way around. Right now, it's on the road of, you know, it's about the AI, not the kids and the families. So the data is telling us something we cannot ignore, that these screens, finally we have studies and we have people speaking out. Screens do not equal better outcomes. We were sold a bill of goods about innovation and we'll be the best for, you know what, garbage, okay? I want to point a couple of things out. Always 988, that three-digit number, if your child is having problems or you have questions about self-harm, please use that 988 to call, okay, and ask questions and get local resources. We always suggest that. Okay, also, our colleagues at Fair Play for Kids have put out a terrific, They want to, they have a letter everybody can sign on to. It's Fair Play for Kids. They want a pause on AI for five years because they want it studied, and that's fairplayforkids.org. They want five years' worth of studies to see how this affects children and their brains and learning and all of us. So that's another great resource. But I want everybody listening, okay, ask your child's school how technology is being used, especially AI because the focus right now, forget Facebook, Twitter. I mean, it's there. It's dangerous. Snap and all that. It's the artificial intelligence. That's where big tech is putting all their money right now. Also, set boundaries around screen time at home. Again, devices aren't going away, but you've got to put them down an hour or two a day and get on to other activities like encouraging reading, writing, and deep thinking. Encourage your kids to ask questions where finding kids are not asking questions anymore. Their brains aren't going that far because they can put something at the chat GPT and get an answer. So they're not even critically thinking, analyzing, not asking questions. Encourage your kids. Questions are good. Okay, be cautious about these AI tools replacing effort that we're seeing. Come on, chat GPT. Maybe use it a little bit with doing it with your child here and there. But do not talk to them. Kids are smart and savvy, especially all about this big tech stuff. They know. Talk to them about the dangers. You have to stay engaged. You must be an engaged parent or caregiver. Do not assume the school's doing the work for you. Do not assume the system is, you know, working, the government's working for you because they're not. Absolutely. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Lynn Shaw from Lynn's Warriors, lynnswarriors.org, on YouTube at lynnswarriors, and also on x, lynns underscore warriors. Thank you, my darling. As usual, you were fantastic. Thank you. Now, coming up, I do not want to talk about war within the context of this. Though something tells me I'm thinking, I'm going to ask something which I know cannot be done. I know cannot be done. I cannot, I know, I know this can't be done, but I'm going to try it anyway. if somebody somewhere from another planet were watching us right now right this moment getting a feel for kind of what we do how we act what our motivations are how if they were going to do kind of a report what would they say to us regarding uh international relations war and the like. What would they say about us? Not the United States, but humans. Can you follow this? I'm going to try this. If it breaks down into the usual war discussion, which I swear to you I'd rather drink bleach than hear this. It is mindless. It is mindless. That's not what I want to discuss. I want to discuss because right now, as you know, there are people, there is so much information about connections we're having with UAPs and the like. And they want so much to know about us and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. What do they think about us? And also, how do we as a species today justify our religion with our military exercises? And also, the biggest threat that nobody ever talks about is one that scares me more than anything. And that is called the absence of water. Hydroimperialism. My friends, can you handle this? Can we do this? Is it possible? I suggest that maybe we do it. And the reason why I think is important, because I don't want to, how do I say this? Everybody can be usual. Everybody can be, and like I said, with all due respect, I respect anybody in their perspective. I don't want to discuss that. I want to discuss very simply this. What do we say about us? Who are we? Are we bellicose? When people, when Jane Goodall used to look at the bonobos and chimps and talk about how one group would go into another village and kill, and they fight among each other. They spoke about it in terms of this bellicosity. What do we say? What are we? Are we a peaceful people? Are we an organizational people? Who are we? Our number is 800-848-9222. 800 More coming up on The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network This episode is brought to you by Rakuten. The big secret all savvy shoppers know, Rakuten makes your money go further. Shop with Rakuten to get cash back on top of seasonal sales. Discover fashion, tech, beauty, and more at hundreds of your favorite shops, like M&S, JD Sports, and Just Eat. It's free and super easy to use. Just shop as normal and stack cash back on top of sales and savings. Join for free at Rakuten.co.uk or get the Rakuten app. That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N. Up next is Red Flair and his new band. Oh my God, I'm back again. On Bed Bear Casino, everybody's there. Gonna bring new games, gonna show you now. Yeah, yeah, new game party. Find new Dropping hits every week. Find the new slots. I'll bet you steal tonight. 18plusbgamblerware.org That's right. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Entertaining and informative on the Red Apple Podcast Network. Everybody Lionel with you. This is The Other Side of Midnight. I have a difficult time explaining this to most people but I will tell you because you're my friends and I think I owe it to you for anybody who cares if it makes any sense I am a political atheist I don't even understand how people can assume a position when it comes to something that is variable I don't I've never understood I've never fit in I don't and people will always say well because I don't necessarily take the position of whoever I'm talking to, they think, oh, I must be from the other side. I'm like a walking Rorschach test. They see in me what they think about the others or whatever. I'm not really sure. And I've always been like that. I'm like that with music. I don't have a name for my music. I don't have a name. I don't have a side. I'm more interested in the bigger picture because I'm always looking at myself and all of us as an organism. That's who I think we are. What are we? Constantly. I love to step back and I have these thought experiments and one of them I always want to have is I want to have this I want to be a liaison a liaison with somebody from another planet who comes here and I try to explain to them things like sports religion fashion language argument cursing anger emotions I would imagine that somebody from another planet would not have a moment We're not having emotions. I don't know if getting angry is something that I think, I would imagine much of us, much of what we do normally would have been lost evolutionarily by a superior species who is much, much better than we are. But I'm going to ask you the question, and I want you to answer this. And I want you to imagine that I am from another planet. I'm not a human. I'm not of this realm. I'm from elsewhere. Because I know you're fascinated in me and my people and my critters, but I'm going to ask you a question. We're fascinated with you earthlings as well. Anybody care to answer this one? Why do humans, I've noticed this, memorialize war with monuments and ceremonies and movies, yet you struggle to remember this thing called peace with the same intensity? In fact, that doesn't even, that's almost perhaps maybe it's presumed. Or you don't seem to think of people who've done something good. You're like, oh, okay, that's nice. Where's Einstein's, what, statue? Huh? Where is that? Why do we love war? It's not just us. Since Caesar, go down the list. There is something about Genghis Khan. There is something about bellicosity. Why is that? The warrior dances with wolves. You don't, we love the idea of the brave warriors, tribal spears. We love this. It is in our DNA. What is our sports? What is our sports? War. That's exactly what it is. Football? Hello? Well, why is that? What does it say about you that the same act, and help me with this one, that is called heroism by one side is an atrocity by the other? Explain that one to me. Is that called moral relativism? What would you, what do you call that one? Just work with me on this. Anytime you want to weigh in. I'm just curious because I love your analysis. Because this is difficult because sometimes I want to take you to the abstract, to the abstruse, a little bit different. This is the other side of midnight. Remember this. Do we report war to inform people? Or to shape emotion and allegiance. Think about that one. What is the goal of this? Is it to fill you in? And what happens when both of your sides, so to speak, both, let's assume you have two political sides. What if both of them actually report everything identically? Is war, this is my question. Remember, I'm somebody from outer space. Is war an aberration of humanity or a recurring expression of something that's kind of like embedded in us or maybe organic? Is it kind of who we are? Do we just do things? Would we be at war no matter what? If you started us, put us on another planet, another island, and you took humans and you put them, and they somehow, I guess, were to develop independent how they'd be fed or whatever, What would they do? I respectfully submit that humans would communicate. They would have language. Language. We have language. Dolphins don't have language. They have communication. We have language. We have tents and we have all types of vegetation. But we would do that. We would also have some kind of competition. We would have some kind of sport. We would have some physical endeavor. We would dance. humans have this inherent love of dance. Not I, mind you. As the great Marcus Tullio Cicero said, no sane man will dance. If ever you see me dancing at a party, somebody slip me something. I'm not well. But that's it. Let me start with that. All of you brave philosophers in the light. Can you follow this? Remember, I don't want to go into this, this is not about Trump versus Biden. No, no, no, no, no. That's boring. I want you to talk about the bigger picture. 800-848-9222. Can you do that? Are you able to do that? We're looking for our brighter callers. Our brighter. Not our brighter listeners, but our callers. Callers and listeners, as you know, are two different things. Because I want you to look above this. I don't want you to look at the story. That's easy. Anybody can do that. I want you to go above that. because I am fascinated by it. I am fascinated by your fascination with war. The art of war, the Sun Z, and that is one of my favorites. It's always this notion of war. Marcus, Magnus Carlsen, excuse me, the goat of chess, talks about chess as war. It says it's war. War. It's war. Yeah. It's war. And I love to watch a lot of YouTube stuff on war. I was an ex-Delta operator. And I was a Navy SEAL. And I was special ops. Yeah. War. Yeah. Great. And the first thing that people would do, anybody who's been there says, I don't want to talk about it. And I don't ever want to do that again. And I don't want my kids to be doing it. But it's this fascination. In the same way, by the way, we're also fascinated. We'll talk a little bit later about the bad guy. Have you noticed all of the mob? I never, I never thought we would ever be able to tune in on YouTube and see so many ex-mobsters with, you know, doing YouTube stuff. I just thought Omerta was something that was real. I just thought they just never said anything. Oh, was I wrong? It's fascinating. So that's it. 800-848-9222. One part of me says, you're wasting your time on this. This is not, no, no, no. This is, I think, yeah, no, they can do it. No, they can't. Yes, they can. Yes, they can. This is the greatest subject of the world. You know, this past week, this past week, there was this, there was a tweet that our president tweeted out. and some people did not care for it. And I'm not going to go into whether you liked it or not, whether it was appropriate, but it was on Easter Sunday. And some people were taking great umbrage. This kind of language would dare be said on Easter Sunday. I'm saying, really? And this, now follow me on this. I said, okay, that's interesting. So what do you say? You know, Jesus, the Lord, whatever. That's another subject which fascinates me. Like you cannot believe. They always say they'll never talk about politics or religion. Why would you talk about anything else? So I said, this is interesting. Yes, because you don't understand. It's blasphemy. It's heretical. Okay. I said, let me ask you this question. What do you think? What do you think would be? What do you think? If old Jesus came here and I said, what do you think about this? What would Jesus think if he walked around and said, what are you people doing? that's what I want to know because I have a feeling I have a thing that we are always fighting our instincts what we are born with what we are what we are I don't want to say tendentious but what we have a tendency and a penchant to do what we are doing the way we are in real life we are liars because that's called prevarication and the like. We are sometimes unrealistic and we love the idea of this Manichaean's subject of good versus bad. And we love there to be an absolute. We want to know who the good guys are and who the bad guys are. And we want to know that the good guys win. And more importantly, we want to know that we're the good guys. and it's a part of us it's who we are and I want to also go back to something when you were a little boy girls I can't help you with this nobody told us what to do we played cops and robbers used to play cowboys in indies before it was politically I don't think anybody even realizes what that is but war and it was fun and we had G.I. Joes and there I was little girls were walking around with mommies and buggies and here I am celebrating and lauding war, soldiers, rifles, guns. It's fascinating. What sayeth you? I want the best and the brightest callers. I'm sorry. I want to hear from you. Let's start off with Robert. Let's cross our fingers and hope he understands the assignment. Robert, you're on the other side of midnight with Lionel. Lionel it's very simple the reason we have wars is because it's a business it's like any business it brings work it vitalizes the stock market brings it back up and that's why we have wars it's because it's a simple business now I appreciate that and I love people who say that they try to reduce it to something very very simple business money stocks maybe people say sometimes it might be some sexual thing here is the bottom line you have a lot of people who have nothing to do with it who will make absolutely no money from this whatsoever who don't care anything about it. Yes, other people will benefit. There's no doubt about that. But there are too many people who say, no, no, no, you don't understand. It's something else. I have no connection with... There are people who are lauding this. They were applauding this, who were happy, who say, this is terrific. We are happy. Whatever it is. And this is throughout history. It has nothing to do with war. There was a time in this country when people... There was no military-industrial complex. there's another reason why we go to war 2 I appreciate the fact of what you're trying to accomplish but you do realize that's too simplistic that doesn't even come close to it but here's another reason why we go to war 2 is the technology has gotten so far ahead that all this equipment that we build guns, artillery cannons, bombs, jets they have to use them, they have to display them again I appreciate that and I think it was interesting but I would say to you, you are forgetting something since time immemorial when we had sticks and a rock and maybe somebody said you know if we take the stick and we make the stick sharp, it's kind of like a, we'll call it a spear I don't think the spear industry did this. Don't get me wrong. I love when people try to say, well, it's about this and that. Yes. Qui bono to an extent. Yes, yes. But it's more complicated than that. Go deeper, my friend. Go deeper. Go Freudian. Go inner core. Go atavistic. Go to the source of our behavior. 800-848-9222. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. It's The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Sergeant Barry Sadler. Whatever happened to Sergeant Barry Sadler? I remember I saw him on Ed Sullivan. Oh, you missed Ed. You weren't around for Ed Sullivan. Ed Sullivan was Sunday night. It was one of the most fan... 1966. This is so incredible. This song, the story of Barry Sadler is one of those strange American arcs that starts in patriotism and ends in mystery exile. And a quiet death far from home. Sadler was a U.S. Special Forces medic, not a Green Beret, a real, well, you call him a Green Beret. He saw combat, he was wounded, and while recovering, he wrote and recorded the ballad of the Green Beret. And that song exploded in 1966. It hit number one on the Billboard charts and became one of the defining pro-military anthems of the Vietnam era at a time when the country was already starting to fracture over the war. I remember that. John Wayne came in with the movie The Vietnam. Remember this from Capra on. his music career faded pretty quickly as you can imagine he left the army tried to stay in entertainment even wrote a series of pulp novels about a mercenary character called Casca they sold decently but nothing really matched the impact of that song then came to turn in 1978 Sadler was involved in a shooting in Nashville he shot a man named Lee Emerson Bellamy during a a dispute. Sadler claimed self-defense, but he was convicted of voluntary manslaughter and served time. And after getting out, he more or less disappeared from mainstream American life. He moved then to Guatemala, of all places, where he reportedly worked with the locals, sometimes described as doing humanitarian or community-type work, though details are rather murky then in 1988 another bizarre chapter saddler was shot in the head in guatemala not in combat not in any official capacity just shot and the circumstances were never fully clarified some accounts suggest robbery others hinted something darker he was brought back to the u.s in critical condition and died about a year later he was just 49 years old it's not something not in war not not on the battlefield but that song was unbelievable rambo tom clancy tom clancy many suspect and i wouldn't be surprised he didn't write anything that was pure 100 well maybe he wrote it but that was 100 psyop propaganda 100%. And there's not... Listen, this has been since... Remember, nothing is new. Why? Why does mankind go to war? Go deeper, deeper. Why? Don't say because of bad, because of geography. No, no, no, no, no. Now, Michael in the Bronx. Michael, you're on the other side of midnight with Lionel. Good morning. Again, you're my second favorite person other than my wife, Alicia. Excellent. When it comes to war, when it comes to war, we are being manipulated by a higher power. Alicia always said that this is a zoo. The higher power manipulates us? Is that what you're saying? Yes. How is that? Well, Alicia always said this was a zoo. Well, what do you think? I'm sure she's a wonderful woman, but what do you think? I believe the same thing. This is a zoo. If you look at it, all the species in the galaxy are placed on one planet, and we can't get out of here. We tried to get out of here, but there's a barrier that either makes us, you know, stop it. I hate to be a problem. I want to stop for one second. First of all, all of the species of the galaxy are not on this planet. There are some species elsewhere, perhaps that we don't know of, that are not on our planet. That's number one. Number two, a zoo is organized. A zoo is a prison. A zoo, you separate them. And for the most part, even if you let them go, animals don't do anything. It's not wild. They're not woolly. They're not out of control. They're actually very, very tame, and they're very, very good. We always use the word animal as something out of control. So explain to me how the higher power wants us to be in war. well if you look at it there was a sound a couple years ago and everybody thought it was either Laurel or Yanni and at that time that's when everybody decided to take sides there was no grey area it was either good or evil if you heard Yanni or if you heard Laurel that made you put Laurel or Yanni do you know about this Laurel or Yanni Laurel and Hardy I know This was some kind of an internecine battle over a song? Is that what you're saying? It wasn't a song. It was a sound. A sound? Everybody heard it. Yeah, it was a few years ago. Where was the sound heard? Wait a minute. Hang on. I should have known. Hang on a minute. Our resident cryptologist, Yuri, knows all about this. Yuri? Yeah, I have come across this, but I don't know the details of this controversy. Hang it up. It reminds me of a previous one where there was a black and blue dress, and there's all that controversy between whether people are seeing blue or gold. I always saw blue. I saw green. Now, Michael, let's start this again. So why does the higher power want us to fight each other? You have your yin and your yang. Okay, now listen, you've got to give me a favor. You've got to give me a favor. you got you can't and i love you but you can't give me trite at 30 past the hour and then that's right that's terrible um kind of axiomatic expressions you got your you got your you got your soul and your charybdis your rock in the hard place no no tell me be specific be behavioral why because it's a chess game to them they enjoy it to god to god to let's Let's just call it God or to the higher powers. It's not a God. Well, it's not a God. It's just God is in the afterlife. Right now we have beings controlling us. Ah! There are beings now. And where do these beings inhabit? Or what do they inhabit? Or where? It could be the earth. It could be, like I said, David Keeper's. That doesn't sound very certain. are they among us? Are they ghosts? Are they spirits? What are they? Well, during the Greek time you had the gods during the Greeks and the Romans you had the god of war you had Ares and of course Was Ares dead? No, Ares is a live entity. So God that God is not like the deist that God is in quotes the afterlife I would venture to say and many people would say that God as we envision God today is much with us now, not in the afterlife. Well, the whole thing, the thing is that when we die... Okay, now we're, now we're, I thank you for that. Now we're getting way... You see what's happening? This is, when you say something, and I say, wait a minute, what does that mean? The, and I thank you for that call, by the way, I really appreciate it. We have to focus on as little extraneous kind of subsidiary information as possible. Okay? Let's go to Damien in Massapequa. You're on the other side of midnight with Lionel. Lionel, good evening. First time caller, how are you? Thank you, sir. Welcome. Thank you. Number one, I'd like to disagree with the previous caller. Go ahead. who said that it's about money and business. And I think what people fail to realize is that humans don't inherently love war in the sense of love and destruction or suffering, but we're drawn to other things that war concentrates. It concentrates a clarity of purpose. It concentrates an intensity of belonging. It concentrates, which is sad to say, a powerful moral storytelling. Yes, sir. It's almost like war is a magnifying glass for human nature. There must be winners. I like what you are doing. I like this. I like this. I like where we're going with this. Proceed, sir. And it just amplifies instincts that are always there. and unfortunately in present day society war used to be distant it used to be filtered now it's live streamed into your phone, into your pocket you know it's funny you say that you bring in so many things first of all I cannot applaud you enough do you remember of course you remember one of the most important implements of war one of the great instruments of war was the was the longbow and up till now if you and i wanted to go out i said all right go get them and i gotta go by the middle of you and i've got a battle axe or something and i'm gonna try to hit you and i'm looking at you and i can see your eyes and we're fighting and i can smell you and i really gotta i really gotta i really gotta want to do this you know what i mean i really really want to do this right then then comes something else the longbow allowed you to pretty much sit back, maybe even on your, of all things, maybe on your back, and you can fire one of these babies, and you don't even have to see what you're doing. You don't have to get to look in his eyes, and you tended to be a little bit more willing to engage because the commitment was less, and because it was far away, and because it was noncommittal, we tended to be a little bit more. Now, what you bring up is interesting. because we bring up photographs and video and the like, we're bringing it back again. It's undoing. Television coverage is undoing the whole notion of separation. Not only is whatever happening on some air base in the middle of Tehran or Angola or Cuba or Vietnam, you're right. In fact, in Vietnam, you remember how they would take a roll of film? They would rush into this plane. They would fly the film to the Philippines. And then they would fly it back. I mean, it was barbaric. And each of the pictures were, by the way, were so good because you had to be very careful. So it's interesting how we've kind of gone full circle. But technology makes us aware about it. Now, my question for you, Damien, is are we becoming more sentient and appreciative of the horrors of war? or are we becoming more habituated to it and conditioned because it's ubiquitous? Well, I think this changes everything psychologically. I mean, now the suffering is the visuals are immediate. They're unfiltered. They're constant. It just becomes much harder to sustain some, I don't know, romantic or simplified view of war as it was, you know, as recent as, say, Vietnam. You know, the modern audiences don't just hear about the war. Now everybody experiences it. Now you bring up something else that was important. Do you think that we are, let me give you a terrible analogy years ago. Years ago I represented these Cuban folks who were cockfighters. I love saying that. I'm 67 years old. I still laugh when I hear that. Anyway, I think I want to hear the name of the great Honoré Balzac. That cracks me up. Anyway, they were trying to explain to me one time in this terrible English, not broken English, they said, you don't understand something. I am not taking a species of bird and I'm making it do something it does not want to do. Let me show you. And these chicks, there was a strain of them from Spain. And these men couldn't write in English or they weren't educated in anything, but they knew Mendelian genetics like you can't imagine. They had books of who was who and now they cross-bred. Anyway, make a long story short. When these birds were born, they would start attacking each other. They would start picking each other before they could even see. It's their nature. So he said to me, and I was like, well, it's kind of an interesting legal argument. How can you possibly, if it wasn't for me, they wouldn't be here. They'd kill each other. I'm not training them to do it. They do it anyway. Right. It's like having a dance contest for this bird that dances. So is there something deep within the chromosomal, atavistic, primordial hardware, the genetic blueprints of us, that there's this bellicose, pugnacious warrior in us? Well, it also ties back to your analogy about sports, right? There must be in every facet of life, as minuscule as, you know, T-ball to the presidency, there must be a winner and there must be a loser. And I am not going to, there are very few things that I enjoy doing just for my own personal satisfaction. I do think sometimes my sport, most sports are, they say, it's team sports. No, it's to beat you. I have to beat you at something. It's not that we're doing this, hey, why don't we go out and just run together? No, no, no, no, no. Let's just play golf. No, no, no, no, no. Let's just hit it. No, no, no. Let's keep track. No, no, no. Here are the rules. Hey, that was a bullock. There's something, I think, in us. And it's who we are. Put it this way. Go to divorce court. Go to court. Just where is, where are these vile, combative? So that's kind of where I'm going. I find it. And then what happens is the real jokers are the ones who rise above the table. No, no, no, no. I'm not. This is not somatophistic, this patellar reflex of mine. I'm doing it because I'm warranted. This is noble. Don't you understand? We're, here we go, the good guys and you're the bad guys. I'm the patriot. You're the terrorist. I'm the warrior. You're the insurgent. You're the militia. You know what I mean? You are. This goes back. Go back. Before Frank Capra, I mean, just uniforms, belonging, military, drums, music, the bagpipe. Oh, my God, we love this stuff. It's all tied back to craving purpose, belonging, and needing in a DNA-trapped behavior. I think it is as normal as the sneeze. Damien, thank you, my friend. An excellent, excellent point. Mark in Illinois, you're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. hey Lionel how you doing tonight I love the show I just started listening to it it's pretty cool and I want to say something real quick before we get to that my aunt died my wife's aunt died like years ago but anyway I've been going through all their stuff and I found that 45 of that marine guy you're talking about oh Barry Sadler he was a special force 45 with the sleeve his picture on there that was weird but anyway what I was trying to say was yeah, you know how you're trying to get to the meaning of all this. I think it's like the ancient people had the same thing. You've got this story with Adam and Eve and the serpent, and then you've got the other guy, Ecclesiastes, nothing new under the sun, you know what I mean? So I think people have been struggling with this for many, many millennia or whatever you want to say. Right. I mean, your point is that it could be ingrained into people like, I was listening to our call, about sports, it seemed like, yeah, everything's competitive. But it's also competitive and it's also it's a sense of, it's tribalism. It allows me to say this is my team. My team, we have a song maybe. Go back and look at, and when you really want to go, go back and look at Genghis Khan, or you as I say, Genghis Khan. Look at Genghis Khan and it is unbelievable. Also, ask Americans about our own wars. Here's a good one for you. I guarantee you. The next time you're someplace, ask somebody, I'll give you 20 bucks. If you could even remotely tell me what the Federal Reserve is. Just remotely. And they'll looking to keep your money. And here's the best part. Okay, here's a easier one. And you've got to know this one. 50 bucks, explain World War I. What happened? Why were we in it? What did it have to do with us? Watch that one. The war to end all wars. Absolutely horrible. Do yourself a favor. Go to YouTube. Check out battle. They call it the battle fatigue. Shell shock. excuse me from trench warfare have you seen those people walk have you seen this go back and look at world war one this isn't some guy with a with a dog i believe me i'm not please don't don't think for a minute i'm trying to to to minimize this we're talking about people who are shaking they can't they are paralyzed they can't stop they can't blink they're just in a tremor there it I don't know what happened. I don't know what happened. But my God. And it's one after another. It was the most barbaric. It was horrible. The sun and oh my God. Anyway, the war to end all wars. Never again, they would say. Uh-huh. So much for that. so maybe 30 years later because of that war we did it all over again Vietnam Vietnam was in my my way and I'm not arguing pro or con I know it sounds like I am I'm not but I remember the time people said wow this is this is really something we cannot let we we learned a lesson yep we sure did learned a lesson no and now we're talking about something keep an eye on what's happening with Taiwan and others as well. Because here's the bottom line. If I were to go to somebody and say, now listen, and I'm going to defend war now. I'm going to explain to my fellow from the outer space. Like, okay, here's what I want. Number one, and we'll talk about this, I want water. I want a particular... Do you understand when you talk about the Strait of Hormuz, Do you know why that's important? Look at the configuration of it. Look at the way you have to turn. It's a very narrow piece, but you need help. It's harder to negotiate than you would think. There's also the other one for the Red Sea is the Houthis, and it's one of these incredible, I've got to show you this. Anyway, so here I am talking to somebody from another planet. I'm saying, listen, do me a favor. I want you out of here. I want you to do this. I want you to do whatever it is. Okay, you got that, Taiwan? No. What do you mean no? No. Now, listen, I'm going to ask you one more time. I really want you to back off or I want you to open this sea lane or I want you to stop. Whatever it is that one side says. And it starts off like that. No. No. Okay. Mr. Outer Space, what do I do then? Tell me. Negotiate. I tried negotiating. What do I do? And then the person with outer space, you mean they won't get along? Nope. We do not work this out. Sometimes the wars may be harder to understand. So one could argue that it's a very, it's a natural, it's a very, very natural result when certain options cannot be agreed upon. However, there are other people who might be a tad rapacious, a tad bellicose. Look at, when you look at Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, oh my God, millions of these. This was not for merely territory. This was for something a little bit different. Derek in Queens, you're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Hey, well, it's great to talk to you, first-time caller. Thank you, Derek. Excellent, sir. I appreciate you. I think we just have almost like a borderline mental illness because we're not looking at ourselves as interconnected. And we keep, you know, one of your callers were talking about belonging, and it's true but the problem is that we're creating these artificial connections and not realizing we have a larger connection with all of us and because we do that we say oh I'm an American or I'm a Canadian and then we're willing to kill each other based on these things on the geographical thing or I'm black or I'm white. Well, that may be, but you know what, I think, listen, there are some folks who, we can go through this repeatedly. There are people, I don't want to bring up Hitler, but this was something that was so, this transcends, no matter how many people try to explain it. Well, it was the Treaty of Versailles, and there was Liebensraum, and you know, no, no, no, no, no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That might be the part of it. But this is a little bit different, you know. Now, but here's the point. But the problem, Derek, is somebody might say, listen, I tried my best. We really did. Our goal, honest to God, despite what you think, is not to go in and start, you know. Right now, you've got China telling Taiwan, I do not want you to do this. Taiwan says, excuse me, we don't answer to you. Oh, yes, you do. Oh, no, I don't. Whatever this is. And then the other people in the world say, we, we, we, you know, we, we benefit from that. You know, that old Taiwan there. And I'm using this just as an example. So it really kind of makes sense. I mean, somebody says, OK, look, we want this and you're not paying attention. What do I do, Derek, when I go and I can't? I'm telling you to leave me alone. You are accosting me. I'm in a parking lot. I have a gun. I don't want. I'm saying, back off, buddy. Give me your wallet. You can have my wallet. Or you're not. You're in my face. Or you're just threatening me. And I don't know exactly what you have in mind. What am I supposed to do? You see what I mean? That's when war kind of sometimes makes sense. But there are other people, I think, Derek, who enjoy it a little too much. Also, how about when little boys love to play soldier? Did you ever do that when you were a kid? Did you ever have those green little soldiers in a bag? Definitely. Absolutely. Definitely. Yeah. No, I think we do enjoy those things. But I think also, even as a little kid, right, when we enjoyed playing soldiers, we knew that was make-believe. But if I had, I remember if I even, you know, heard a dog or something, I never did, but if I, let's say, I heard a dog or an animal or maybe a bug, I would get upset and sad. So instinctively we understood that hurting things that are real is bad. It seems like as adults we kind of forget those things when we're much closer to humans than we are to animals. Well, it's funny you say that. You're right about that. And then I think when we were kids, we certainly absented ourselves from the reality of any kind of hurt and harm. I understand that. That's a different thing where we didn't really know. But I remember at the time thinking to myself, I had a G.I. Joe. I had a G.I. Joe with a weird butt rifle. And they go, this is great. I also had a cap gun. I loved guns. Loved them. Now, I had no idea what guns did. I don't know. I think it was part about being a boy. Or, excuse me, being a human boy. And look at our counterparts, Derek. Did you have a sister? Your sister was like, oh, there she is playing house again, playing mother, playing teacher, instructional. You know, there was a study when they gave they gave blocks to little boys and the boys. They piled the blocks up to make almost like a like a building or something to see how high can you and you do it. and little girls would take the blocks and spread them out like making a house inclusive wow maybe maybe the part of us that makes us who we are are testosterone because after all you know when you when people are roided up they become violent maybe we're just we're just screwed up and it It comes down to this. Maybe we're just mutants. Maybe we're a vile, like that strain of chicken or chick, that we start killing each other. I don't know. But, Derek, I enjoyed speaking with you immensely, sir. Please call again. I appreciate you. Thank you. All right, sir. Our number is 800-848-9222. 800-848-9222. More coming up on the other side of midnight with Lydell. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. We're talking about, if you just tuned in, not one side or another, but what about the inherent human atavistic evolutionary aspects of why we are so, dare I say, I say that a lot, don't I? dare I say, bellicose. Ed in Evansville. You're on the other side of Midnight Wood. Lionel. Hey, Lionel. How are you? I was just recanting with a friend today about Woodstock and how a friend of mine, he went to Woodstock, and he woke up on a Sunday morning to Jimi Hendrix screeching. But I was telling Yuri about this one song. He didn't do it at Woodstock. It's called Third Stone for the Sun, and it was about how a chicken, excuse me, an extraterrestrial came down to Earth and explained that he had to destroy the planet because the humans, he thought that the chicken was the most intellectual thing on the planet. And he wanted, he's good. I can't, you know, they don't understand us, so we're just going to destroy your planet. So it was kind of comical, but it's like the 60s and war, you know, and, you know, it doesn't make sense, and it didn't make sense then, and I don't know, it doesn't make sense now, you know. Well, I mean, sometimes things at first don't make sense because you don't understand. Yeah. I mean, have you ever, like one time it was so funny, when I was a kid and I saw Old Yeller, I can remember this, and my parents took me to these damn Disney movies, which were horrible, and they had that, remember Old Yeller? and they said, come on, Paul. And the dog was like, you know, with the foaming, the hydrophobia. And the dog, no, Paul, no. And my father said, they're not going to shoot the dog, are they? He said, well, I said, why don't they call the vet? And I said, there is no vet. What do you mean it's rabies, huh? And I said, no. And bang, I said, what the hell is going on here? And my father said, you don't understand. I said, what do you mean I don't understand? Now, what if I told you the idea of, let me explain to you, amputation. Amputation, wait a minute, no, no, no. You lose an arm? Yeah. I lose your, I cut your arm off to save you. Or it's so injured. Now, that is a concept which is very difficult for people to understand. To save me? Yes. And then when somebody explains it to you, you say, oh, okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I dig it. Okay, maybe. So that's the realism part. And then there are other people who are just, you know, the people who are not able, like Luxembourg, the tiny countries, you know, they don't have war. They do just fine. They don't want anything anybody else has because they can't shoot anybody or have any. Somehow they get along just fine. if you want them to become bellicose and pugnacious, give them a strong military, and they'll be invading everything. Think about that. The countries that can't do it. What was the last time you heard Peru ever going after anybody? Never. No. And it's not because they're good people. It's not because they're the same as we are. But they just don't. Switching gears, Arthur C. Clarke, the movie, he wrote the book, but the movie, what was the movie, Dan? But the ape... 2001? 2001 Space Odyssey, thank you. When the historic human, humanoid, whatever he was discovers that the bone could be used as a weapon and it just starts their little clan there started destroying the other ones Did you ever see please see The Gods Must Be Crazy Have you seen that one? Yes, I have. One of the greatest. I remember the time, and thank you for this. I remember the time I got this and said, this is the worst movie. And I said, wait a minute. Wait a minute. He throws the Coke bottle out and hits him on the head. Wow. Wow. Isn't that funny? I got more out of that than a lot of stuff. Coming up, I want to continue with this, whether you like it or not. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Entertaining and informative on the Red Apple Podcast Network. I'm going to Lionel with you. And this is the other side of midnight, and we are discussing the interstitial, the rudiments of warfare. At this particular time of the day, I have the opportunity to do a couple of things here. First, to walk around and go through people's desks. I kid, of course. But I get to watch, for the first time, a lot of cable news because I just don't watch any. I don't watch any of it. I don't know anything. But I don't want to watch the same stuff. I don't know what they're going to do. But I also flipped through. I got my clicker. We call it the clicker. My family, we call it the clicker. I don't know. That's what I call it. And I was watching, you know, it had key and peel on, which is so brilliant. It's kind of funny. And then I was watching other things, too. They have these, what is called the aging heart. You know, these anti-inflammatory ointment ads, you know, three in the morning. But now I'm watching on channel something or other. There is a huge, I'd be recorded, but a cricket match that is just absolutely, they are going berserk. And I don't know anything about cricket. Wickets and all that other kind of jazz. Batters and what have you. But it is warfare. It is warfare. It is 100% a group of people trying to mimic clobbering each other. And it's not enough for me to say, hey, I'll bet you I can hit this ball farther than you can. Yeah, okay. Hey, that's good, Matt. Hey, it's good, buddy. I'll try it too. Hey, that's good. That's not the way we do it. We say, I'll bet you I can beat you and you suck. Wait a minute. Hold it. What are you doing? Let's have points. And for the last three times I beat you, I say, can't we just play? No. We're not going to play a game without keeping score, without a time limit. No. I want to beat you. I've got to get my trophy. I've got to get my trophy. Do you ever go, like, into high school and you know all these trophies? Like an old football from 19 foot. What is the point of this? Who cares? But you know what that football represents? the other team went home with nothing and to this day they've never gotten over that just like Jimmy Breslin says he would always go to the locker room of the losing team everything that we do is not we're not interested in doing stuff we just we're just like them and then women want to come along and say we can do it too yeah okay no we can do it yeah no I know you can do it Why was it better? No, nothing. What are you getting at? What are you suggesting our sports aren't as interesting? Yeah. Yeah. Name one thing or two things. The women's sports are better than men. When you say, you know what? Let me, I prefer to watch women's sports do this. What is it? Good luck. Think about that one. Think about that one. When you say, you know what? No, no, no. Because after all. But anyway, but the point is, women try to use this pugnacious, bellicose roar, so I'm going to beat you, we're going to beat you. Even here in New York, opening day at Yankee Stadium, I'm going to beat you, we're going to beat, we're going to kill you, you suck, I hate you, you suck. Boo! I got a fifth home, number one. I'm number one, you mutant. Got it! It's what we do. It's what we do. So there are people, remember in the old days, it was actually during the, if you think about it, it was during, I think, maybe Medellin cartel, where they shot, I think it was Columbia, where they shot the ref or something, it was a soccer game, they killed him. They didn't like his ruling. I mean, this is very serious stuff. So what I'm saying is I think there might be something to the fact that this is kind of who we are when it comes to war and the like. What do you think? Let's go back to the phones, back to the phones, because I like you're able to do this very, very well. Kurt in Brooklyn, you're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Yes. Hi. The longbow put it into, like, the nice and shining armor. I found that out when I was reading one of the author of Sherlock Holmes series, Arthur Conan Doyle. Yep. And it's called The White Company. the rich and what do you call it? Dukes and Earls Aristocracy or the landed Right but the English longbow could be used by a common soldier and it was a long distance weapon it would hit the knights and penetrate their armor far off from them so it kind of democratized soldiery But it also separated the up-close and personal nature of war. You didn't have to see really what you were doing. Oh, but it's absolutely wonderful. They're just clip-clopping away in the field, and all of a sudden there's a hail of arrows coming from nowhere. So, yes, you're right about that. Do you think? And the horses had armor also. That's right. They certainly did. Because otherwise they would collapse, collapse, the night would be just standing alone, maybe surrounded by a bunch of salvage. Kurt, between you and me, my friend, between you and me, I would go right for the horse. I don't know about the guys and the horse I could hit. The guy with it, I don't know. Let me ask you this, Kurt. Do you think there is something in humans, in us, do you think there is something that we have a tendency, a penchant, a predisposition towards violence and war? Yeah, but not only that, but honor, glory goes with it, like for combat warriors and so forth, especially in ancient times. How does honor, explain to me honor and glory in killing? I understand the answer, but isn't that interesting? Honor, leave it to us humans to say this is honorable. Fascinating. Fascinating. Let's go to, let me see, in the order. Ah, yes. Martin in upstate New York, on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Good morning there, Lionel. How are you this morning? Good, sir. All right, I think you're trying to get at the psychology of it all. Nothing gets by you, Martin. Nothing gets by you. You are sharp as an attack. Yeah, you know me. So the thing is about war. We are right and they are wrong. Correct. We are good and they are not. Correct. You've got it. You've got it. They are an existential threat to our continued existence and they, it's either us or them and they have to go. You know what? I cannot tell you how perfectly that was stated. Absolutely perfectly. Michael, Staten Island on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. One point before I did it, that soccer game that you're talking about, it was not a ref. It was the Colombian goaltender who committed what was called an auto goal. He accidentally kicked the ball into his own goal. Yeah, the own goal. Yes, yes, yes. And then obviously that cost somebody a lot of money. I stand corrected, good sir. Now, when I was growing up in the 60s My father and all my friends' fathers were veterans of World War II Yes, sir And we used to play war not because of anything ingrained in our DNA We were assassinated by the stories And Mattel Toys had a whole industry Every toy store had the rifles and the machine guns But wait a minute You kind of sloughed over, or you skipped over that. It wasn't, for you to be fascinated by something, there had to be something in you. You weren't fascinated by fathers who came home and played, you know, with their kids. You didn't, your friends didn't mimic playing dad. Your friends didn't say, let's be a teacher. No, it was war. and one of the reasons was either because of something inherently either pugnacious in your being or maybe there's something that's masculine. Maybe there's something but it was something internal. Absolutely. Oh, okay. I get that. Okay, so look. So how about this? Historically, humans went to war to gain territory, power, and wealth. Simple as that. And on the other side, they went to war to defend themselves. Yes. However, there were people, this is the most important thing in the world. It is the leader. It is the king. It is Alexander the Great who said, you're going to do this. Now, most people said, I couldn't care less about conquering Persia or wherever. I don't care about that. I'm not rich. You're rich. I'm not going to, but you know what? It's, I guess, during the Civil War, people said, what was it that people fought for? Was it for slavery or was it for states' rights? It was neither. They fought because their brother fought, this one fought. People don't fight because they necessarily, how do we say this? Because they necessarily had something to this avarice. I knew a guy one time in college. He was older. And his father was a German pilot. He was a Stuka dive bomber, which I thought was great. And he explained to me how the Stuka dive bomber, the wheels were fixed. They weren't retractable. So they would be great at diving, but they could never, there was a certain limitation of it. Anyway, his father took great pain saying, I'm not a Nazi. I'm a German. And people would say, well, what's the difference? He goes, but it was my country. And I was defending my country. Yeah, but you're, you know. So anyway, it was the same thing for him. But in conversations, they said, well, were you some type of Hitlerian acolyte? He goes, no. It had nothing to do with it. think about this so many people in our country normally born in let's say 47 was like the perfect year for this Vietnam came along and they came as as one of our callers said their fathers were in war their grandfathers were in war and it was a tradition you fought for your country you served your country and you applied that. Listen to what he said. You served your country. Nothing to do with how you served your country. Teaching, reading to the blind. No, no, no, no. It was war. It was ingrained. It was hereditary. It was a subject of pride. It was manliness. And they didn't even know, well, before I served my country, can you give me an idea of what I will be involved in what this war is no just do it okay but give me a hint where am i going to be serving my country vietnam huh why communism okay that'll do excuse me how stop asking questions do you want to serve your country or not okay i will i mean you could nobody ever thought to say well, you're not going to send me, you know, and you would think after Korea later on afterwards, you think after that still fascinates me, Korea, because remember, we're still at war. That was just a ceasefire. But you see the way people think? Nobody ever thought, excuse me. If I said to you, hey, Blaze, give me a favor. My neighbors give me a hard time. Why don't you go over there? Take this battle. By the way, a battle axe is what you want. this is a club this is the greatest thing you can keep in your car and it just splatters people i mean it is the most it doesn't look like much but it's serious take this battle axe and i want you to go next door and just do this for me okay most people say wait wait wait wait wait wait wait first of all i don't why am i doing this that's the way most people will act except when it comes to war. War is different. It's romantic. It's a, it's, it's, I, I swear to you, Jocko and all these other people like Valhalla is one of those who is terrific. Sean Ryan. If this isn't a, a PSYOP, I don't know what is. If this isn't military, if these aren't, if this isn't a CIAOP to basically romanticize Fantasizing law and war, I don't know what is. That's my point. 800-848-9222. What are the reasons? Explain the interstitial, the reasons why we so love war. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. It's The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. 800-848-9222. Let's go back to the phones, back to what I call fun. Let's see who has been on. We have a, oh, here we go. This is, of course, Todd of Chicago. Todd, you're on The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Good morning, Mr. Lionel. But you're talking about hope and war. Nothing gets by you, Todd. Nothing gets by you, my friend. A war is not really created by man, but it's a planet refurbishing in itself. You seem to be in pain right now. Is there something I should know about, Todd? No, no, no, no. Okay, okay. But, uh... You sound rather dyspeptic, like you're a borborygmic, like you're erupting. No, sir. Okay. But it's the planet refurbishing itself. Because if you believe that all these people and the war was never created, how many people could this planet survive or take care of? So you're saying that war is natural, is a necessary weaning to winnow excessive population members. It gets rid of, that we would be overpopulated were announced for war. That's right. We would be overpopulated and the planet couldn't survive us. So what you're saying is war is a good thing. It's not so much good or bad. It's to keep the planet from being overpopulated. All right. I thank you so much for that. That is the most painful. I don't want to ask what's wrong with this man. I feel in a weird way. It's almost like he, I don't think he has a tracheotomy. It sounds like he's in a lot of pain. And I don't want to ask too much questions. I don't want to ask him a lot of questions about, why are you doing that? So the best thing to do is just cut him off. This way we're not in any way unsettled or ruffled by his apparent agony that he is in. See, I don't want to ask him. I would just rather go. See, I know because you wanted me to do this. Because you were wondering just now, what's wrong with him? So that's a good theory. So here's the story. So right now, all of a sudden somebody says, you know, I think it's about time to have a war. Why? I don't know. It's like it's almost like crop season, you know. It's that time. I think we need to thin the herd. I don't know how that would work. Like, hey, General, what? You know this crazy idea that we have to invade that country? Yeah. You don't think we're doing because of the population, do you? You know, we could be. So all these people, they just happen to have a legitimate beef. What if there's a long period of time when there's no war? Or when the wars are rather de minimis? Just a thought. Jim in Chicago, you're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Well, I know. Yes, sir. I love the smell of napalm in the morning. It smells like victory. You think that's funny? Yes, I do. You must be a very demented man, and I like that. I like that in you. Back to the subject, though. What goes around comes around, and like everybody's complaining about what was said by our president of what was going to happen to that country and this and that, you can't baby talk them or get a hold of Dr. Phil and figure it out. You've got to tell them in a way that they understand and mean. It's like, hey, we mean business. Now, let me ask you something, Jim. Let me ask you a question, Jim. Yeah. I know in your own heart of hearts you're saying, I think I'm going to make a good point on this call. I know you thought when you said I'm going to make a good point I'm going to say something that really nails it number one I don't think it's a matter of clarity I don't think it's listen you're going to have to say it clearly I think people understand what war means you don't have to say anything you really don't I mean there's a couple of things about it I think it would be a good idea But sometimes underselling it, I think, is important. But I don't want to argue the framework. The question is, is there something about humans that enjoys, that needs war? We love it. Yeah, it's in our DNA. Ah, why is that, sir? I'm not sure, but... You'll make something up? I think it's trying to change it. Are our friends from another planet or whatever it is? Ah, here we go, here we go, here we go. Yeah, yeah. Get ready. Kids now, young kids, five years old, stuff like that, not only here but all over the world are finding that the kids are highly intelligent. They've got weird, they call it weird, what they're doing is like they can blindfold them. Hand them a book, and they can read the book. Blindfolded. Yeah, blindfolded. How is that done? I don't know. Where is this done, sir? It's happening with the next generation that's coming up. Kids are being able to read while blindfolded? They can do that. Where did you hear of this, sir? I'm just curious. Where did you hear of this? This was on the History Channel on Monday nights. On Monday night. Well, you know what? Stay no more, my friend. 800-848-9222. They can read it blindfolded. Okay. I'm sure they can. Jay in Cincinnati. Jay, you're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Hey, Lionel. Great show. Thank you, sir. There's a couple of Daredevil brothers north of me up here in Dayton that invented flight airplanes. And what do we do? We weaponize the airplane that they invented. They were looking to market it, and their first, who's going to buy a $5,000 toy, you know? So I guess the Army was the first. I think that there is something, for example, somebody along the way, I don't know what his name was, but he said, hey, I just came up with this thing. what well i took a took a piece of metal and i forged it and i made one edge real sharp and you know what we can do we can we can skin animals with it we can cut meat we can we can cut the vines for housing hey this is pretty good can i see it yeah and as soon as he handed it over to somebody, it was like, you stabbed me. Yeah, I know. It's like we will find things no matter what. We will find means of hurting people, but it only makes sense. But aside from the planes and all that, what is this idea of ours that says, remember, it's only the countries that can do this. you will never see Peru say, okay, I've had it. We're going into Canada. It just doesn't happen. It's only people who have the means and the power to perform war. If you don't have it, you're very peaceful. And somehow, you know what? The Peruvians are like, you know, we can do better, but we're doing all right. Yes, we have a museum up in Dayton, the Air Force Museum. And it's basically a museum of warplanes, pretty much. Well, what do you think the Air Force would, seriously? Right. Well, you know, I mean, the whole thing was weaponized from the beginning. You know, the first airplanes were made out of wood and cloth. Yes. And they were more deadly flying them. But what do we do? We weaponize things. You're right. But does that surprise you? Right. I mean, who else is going to buy one? No, no, no. It's not about buying it. Right. It's the idea that if I've got something, if I've got a delivery system. Remember the old days, somebody said, you know, this may sound crazy, but we can drop mail. We can do a lot of things. And I've got this crazy idea. Let me see if I can drop a bomb. And that, by the way, that was the fight between aircraft carrier folks and an airline. And, you know, airplane folk. But the thing is, is that why is it? This is the most, this is the biggest question. Why, when countries cannot resolve something, do they kill each other? You don't kill your neighbor. We don't kill each other. We figure, we do a lot of stuff. We are not allowed to kill unless there's a threat. But countries have this idea that says, think about this. we can go in and we can attack your country. All we have to do in this country, in our country, is to have somebody declare war. We go to Congress and ask them to declare war. And nobody ever says, is it right? Is it wrong? Is it correct? No. It is presumed to be correct. I'm fascinated by that. And when we do that, we say, let's go in. And imagine what it's like if you were, let's say, in Vietnam. And you were in a village and you're, you know, you have a rice paddy and you've got a water buffalo and you're not bothering anybody. And all of a sudden you hear these helicopters and they start attacking you. And you're thinking, why are you doing this? And the answer is communism. What? This is a domino effect. You're going to spread communism. What's communism? You know, Ho Chi Minh. I know him. He's our hero. There you go. see he's a bad guy what do you mean he's a bad guy he is a bad bad guy okay by the way just now want to let you know in New York City there's a freeze warning I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that but they love it I've got this weather app and it just loves to go off all the time pollen warning wind anything hot sun tanning index uv rays it they just don't want you to go outside They're constantly saying, there's a freeze warning. There's a wind. Be careful. Watch the UV ray. Be careful. Don't go outside. Riptides. Okay. Just stay home. Why? To imprison you. They don't want you perambulating. Let's go to Joanne. By the way, Joanne, I think, is our first female caller, our first distaff caller. I don't know, but it seems like it. Joanne, you're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Hi. Well, I think the nature of this planet is predatory. Everything on the planet is predatory. Well, what do you mean? And we kill each other and eat each other, with the exception of, I'd say, trees and other plant life. You mean trees don't kill each other and eat each other, or we don't kill trees? They're self-sustaining. That's it. Well, let me ask you something. Okay. You've said something rather matter of fact, young lady, and I think we ought to get to the bottom of this. First and foremost, does that in any way surprise you? For example, in the animal kingdom, do you think it would be likely to have a non-predatory biosphere or a group of animals that don't prey on anything? They just self-sustaining, maybe they're vegetarians, I don't know. But do you think that predator and prey is something that is inherently evil, wrong, or is that just part of the cycle of life? Part of this planet. Well, aside from this planet, do you think there's something impaired with it? Impaired? That is an impaired existence on our part, to have people do that. Do you think? Well, in my opinion, yeah. I mean, great. I like that. So, for example, if you are a lion and you are looking for your protein, that's what you eat. You eat it because you're programmed. You don't want to do it. You're not a bad person. Where should an animal that needs protein go to satisfy for satiety of that particular need? Where, pray tell? Well, okay, but I'm just saying in general, we are predatory, whether it be a lion, a tiger, a person. But is there anything wrong with that? What I'm saying is, is there something wrong with that? Good question. Because God, God, one would say God, made us in a way sort of predatory. You know, it's interesting. if if somebody were to catch us some species did not know how to communicate with us and wanted to keep us in captivity the first thing they would want to do is to know what we ate so we'll probably look at our teeth to start with to start with and it was saying huh that's interesting obviously grain this thing eats grain why look at the molars a lot of molars our canines are rather so probably grain and we say oh no no no no no no no no no we are carnivores and they look at you and say you sure about that yes we are carnivores okay well if you're a carnivore you are a predator by your very nature you either go after them on the on the serengeti on the savannah and you catch them or you set a trap or you domesticate them and then slaughter them but you're going to be a predator if you're a canine i mean that's that's that's it not a canine but a carnivore i mean it is what it is okay thank you i like when i try somehow to pull something And I go, that's the way it is. If I sat there with God and said, listen, God, I'm always asking God all the time. Hate to bother you. What is it now? Here's my question. Did you have to do this? Did you have to do this? You know, do you ever watch, remember when you were a kid and you saw the little gazelle? The gazelle, David Attenborough. And on the savannah, the little gazelle is drinking his water. You know, a couple of things. You'll see, oh, he's getting a little too close to that riverbank. And this crocodile comes out of nowhere, takes it, pulls it in, spins it around, breaks his neck. Come on. Or you'll see the little baby seal. And you'll see the big, and I still have a problem with this. The orcas, the killer whales are vicious. I always thought they were nice. They're at SeaWorld, but they're vicious. You have to do that. And then you see the poor little fawn out in the savannah, and here comes the lion. And the lion's got little babies. The lion says, that one there, that one looks slow. That one's got a bit of a limp. That one looks a little patso, a little destarura. I'm going to go after that one. Why? Survival of the fittest? Darwin? No, he's slower because he's lame. And lame gazelles taste as good as fat. Maybe better because they don't run a lot and the meat's juicier. God, what? Did you have to do that? Can't we just be all into plants? Why? Well, what about the thinning the herd? There you go with that thinning the herd. Is this your idea of a system? Seriously. When you have fish in a bowl, do they start eating it? No. And so we just accept it. My question is, I think there is something, not only we're not killing people because we're consuming them, we're into something a little bit different. And when you get into the mindset of the serial killer, ask yourself this question. What's really the difference? Rick in Arizona on the other side of midnight with Lionel yes Lionel you triggered an old memory of a quote that it's not possible to make an anti-war movie and I did a search and the origin of it apparently in my mind comes from Roger Ebert and it's mentioned this is his review of Platoon and I'll quote real quick. It was Francois Truffaut who said it's not possible to make an anti-war movie because all war movies with their energy and sense of adventure end up making combat look like fun. And that's my statement. So you're saying, oh a minute, no, no. So what you're saying is it is impossible to make an anti-war movie showing the horrors of war. right? Well I don't know I'm Francois Truffaut said it in Roger Lee I'm asking you to interpret what Truffaut said Okay well I agree with it 100% Explain to me what he meant Well if you watch Black Hawk Down which I you know is horrible I mean pulling veins out of your leg and putting a well that isn't that an anti isn't that an anti-war movie well I don't I don't know let me go back Rick do me a favor I know we this is our phones we can't talk at the same time Rick I want to go back tell me true foes explain his idea that you cannot make an anti-war movie is that the quote say the quote again you can't make an anti-war movie Right, that was... I have no opinion. No, no, no, wait, wait. No, no, no. I'm asking you to explain what he said. Finish the line. You can't make an anti-war movie because of what? Okay, it says here, I'll repeat it, because all war movies with their energy and sense of adventure end up making combat look like fun. Good. Do you agree with that? I don't know. I'm asking your opinion. I haven't seen Black Hawk Down for a long time. Forget Black Hawk Down. Forget Black Hawk Down. Put it out of your mind. You quoted something like this. I love you, though, Rick. You quoted Truffaut, and you're not even sure if you agree with him. I think I understand a little bit of what he's talking about, a little bit. But I think it's an overgeneralization. there is a movie and I do not know what it is I saw it one time it is known how do I say this it is known in the business as one of the most oh my god the most horrible examples and it's a little boy or a boy soldier who is so terrified in this one scene It's just one of the most incredible acting anybody's ever seen. And I think it's awful. I think that sometimes certain war movies, war itself, I don't necessarily, well, put it this way. An anti-war movie, if you wanted to show anti-war, what would you think? Let me ask you this. Full metal jacket. Is that anti-war or not? This is Kubrick. Is it anti-war, pro-war, or is it neither? Remember that scene. The beginning of Full Metal Jacket was R. Lee Ermey. Remember this? He's the Marine drill instructor. And he was the technical advisor. And he basically snaked this actor out of that role because he was the one who basically went around this guy's back and told Kubrick, I know what I'm doing. I'm really a DI. I'll show you how to do this. I've been in war. I didn't get a tooth to turn. The guy was legit. I remember at the time thinking, this is great. I loved it. I said, I don't want the boot camp to end. The other part was like, I don't want to see this stupid thing. I know. Let's go back to the boot camp. And why'd you kill him? Anyway, spoiler alert. but that's now do you know how recruitment went up they couldn't get enough of that and i said what what could they put here's a sadistic guy how does that work why would anybody have you noticed for example the way there are ads for military have you ever heard about this listen to ads that pull you in what do they say hey join the marines you get three squares a day get to work out and get save enough money for your college that's not it that's not it at all think about it what do they lure you with it's brilliant and by the way this is not deception I'm telling you this is the truth. They don't tell you that. They don't say, hey, join in the Navy. No, no, no, no, no, no. They always have sounds of war and guns and planes, and that's what it is. And what do they tell you? What does they do? The few, the proud. And you know what people say all the time? They said this during Vietnam. that what got them was when the Marine recruiter would show up with the dress blues. People went nuts. They went crazy. They went crazy. They went, that's what I want. Remember Gober Pile, which is still one of the greatest Marine shows ever. But that's what they want. They're showing you the hard work. There's nothing easy about that. That's the way they lure you because they give you this attention. Let me tell you a true story. And when I, years ago when we had a juvenile court, they were experimenting with this thing about boot camp. And they would send, sometimes parents would send their kids. And some of these kids were really bad, bad. And nothing worked. And actually what they did was some of these, what am I trying to say? These facilities were terrible for kids. All right. So what happened was they went ahead and they would have them go. Sometimes a judge, the parents could say, well, go to these boot camps. Well, one morning we had the courts, they had the kids from the juvenile facilities were there. You know, where they're effing this and just sloppy and chained together. And on the other end was this lone boy, no chains, no nothing, shaved head with this, not a Marine, but a DI. It was his particular accompanist, the sergeant that accompanied him to court. and this kid was ramrod stiff and this drill instructor, whatever this was, was watching over him and he didn't, when they called his case, they didn't just say, all right, go ahead. They said, how are you doing all that? Whatever he's yelling in. And the kids who were in chains, their mouth dropped open. They go, who's that? Oh, he's in boot camp. Boot camp? How do you get to boot camp? Oh, you don't want to go there. No, wait, wait, wait. What is it? How do we get there? How do we have that much attention and order and purpose? I'm walking around here with these stupid clothes that don't fit. I got a chair. I don't want that. Isn't that interesting? Because not only does the thought of war, forget the romanticization of war, but the military itself it's always been something that people have loved uniforms where do you think uniforms come from where do you think this is initially it was to make sure my guys from your guys just like raid jackets police always have a jacket that says police so they don't shoot each other that's not what happened later on it became a sign it became a means of identity it's it's militaristic. We are human beings and we are, as you know, replete and filled with symbology, semiotics. We love, if it's symbolic, we're there. It's my rifle, this is my gun. This is for fighting, this is for fun. It's my rifle, this is my gun. This is for fighting, this is for fun. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Let's go back to the phones because we're talking about the bigger picture of war and the, dare I say, the atheistic, primordial parts of it. Ron in Michigan. You're on the other side of midnight with Lionel. Good morning, Lionel. Lionel, real quickly, the movie that you were talking about, it's not a Russian World War II movie named Come See, is it? Because that's about a boy who his family is slaughtered in their village by Nazis, and he is orphaned. He's picked up by a Russian partisan. Tell me the name of it again, please, sir. Come See. Come See. oh come and see yes let me see if this is it I thought you said come see it sounds like an Asian I believe this is it I believe yes yes this is the one where the kid oh my god come and see this is not for this movie is so powerful that you will say stop this Stop this. It is so effective. And Lionel, I'm a Vietnam veteran dying of Agent Orange. And thank you for your service, sir, and I'm sorry about that. I knew going in. I knew Agent Orange was out there, and I knew going in there I had that possibility. It was just like getting shot or wound or blowing a leg off. That's okay. Thank you. But, you know, President Trump said he's going to bomb all the infrastructure. We did that to Vietnam. And we bombed it for years and years and years and bombed everything, schools, huts, little dams to keep the fish in. And then what else we did to Vietnam? We used napalm. We just invented napalm in World War II, and we used it on the Japanese real heavily and some on the Nazis. But we just poured napalm on Vietnam. So as far as infrastructure and war crimes, We never pay for the war crimes that we perpetrated. Well, you know, one of the things I find interesting, and I find that I don't want to get into the semantics of it, but I find one of the most oxymoronic notions is war crimes as opposed to one would say war is a crime. I don't want to get into that. But the idea that my favorite, the rules of war, the rules of war. I like when they say the same for UCMJ purposes as well as police. you can refuse an illegal order. Good luck. One more thing, if I may. Have you ever seen the movie Hacksaw Ridge? Yes, sir. Yes, I did. This is about the conscientious objector, correct? So the adventist, right, who becomes a war hero by saving lots and lots of them. Did you ever hear the story of the man who was shot so many times that the Japanese stopped because they thought he was divine. And I saw him, he was deaf, might have been blind. He kept going after, pulling people, saving men. And the Japanese, they stopped shooting him. They said, this man is from, he's not human. What's also, I think, This is a terrible thing, is how war sometimes creates and unleashes some of the most incredible bravery. That has nothing to do with a flag or country, but just one man looking out for another. It is... There may be one more reason the Japanese would stop shooting him. The Japanese in World War II, there's evidence that they perpetrated cannibalism on American soldiers. because they were starving to death. So maybe they were still saving a few succulent parts for later. Ron, I'll leave it at that, my friend. I thank you for your service, and I hope you get the help and the attention that you need. You don't hear that too often, don't you? Cannibalism, the succulent parts. You don't hear that on regular shows. And for good reason. The final hour coming up with a little bit more to go with also the war that will end all wars, Wait to hear what this is. Coming up. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Entertaining and informative. On the Red Apple Podcast Network. Everybody, Lionel with you. This is The Other Side of Midnight. This is the fourth final hour. And I normally find that a particular subject kind of wears thin, but I cannot tell you enough how I am so impressed and so fascinated by your take on this subject. I mean that. And the reason why it is simple. I love certain things to look at it from almost an anthropological point of view. and I find your well your take the most interesting the most fascinating because we talk about this all the time And also there nothing better And let me rephrase this I love when somebody tells me the way a war, the way a military action is effectuated. And when you say this, we have a lot of people, as you know, who are, well, how do I say this? Some people are a little bit, they're not the deepest of thinkers. I'm sorry, I don't know how to say this. And they interpret any type of criticism as to the strategy, as to the means by which war is enacted. they look at it as though somehow you're being well as though you're being negative or you're being un-american or somehow what you think you know what i'm talking about you've you've seen these folks before it's kind of how they are and i love i'm sorry i don't like war i don't want anything about war. I don't think it's a good, I think it's bad. What was it? War is something that's, what was the expression of the 60s? War is negative or disadvantageous to small animals or whatever. But I like when somebody comes along and he says, I'm going to do something a little bit different. And in the world of warfare, there were folks who came along and they had some different takes on it. And one of them was the idea of General Patton. And Patton was the one who took the idea of the armor service. And this was something that was kind of brand new. And he made it his own. He made it his own. He was something else. And despite what you think about Patton in terms of George C. Scott, the individual himself showed a prowess that was the most fascinating. This was the guy who was a genius. And he was so good. And for all practical purposes, a waste of flesh in real life. He married very exceedingly rich people, women. He had lived in the incredible wealth, polo and horses, and he was just incredible. But what he did was he thought to himself, you know what I'm going to do here? I don't understand why I should just sit around and wait. Kind of just wait as this, you know, this tank. I'm going to go after people. And he started to move and he chased people and he completely redefined, reinvented this notion of warfare. And you look at it now and you think, well, it kind of makes sense to me. But at the time it was considered genius. Curtis LeMay. Curtis LeMay who came up with this I'm going to bomb you into the Stone Age Curtis LeMay who was the Strategic Air Command and all types of things he had Bell's palsy and he always had a cigar in his mouth he later ran for president along with George Wallace in the Green Party Curtis LeMay and he said why do we fly these wonderful bombers like let's turn them into like dive bombers I don't know if it was the B-19, the B-whatever. I don't want to mistake it. But the point is, he revamped the way they delivered this. General Sherman. Oh, my God. Civil War. He said, if I make war as horrible as possible, it will not be. It will not be something people would ever want to do again. And then came the other subsidiary theories such as mutual assured destruction and mad. And then there were others as well. George Marshall. George Catlett Marshall, probably one of the greatest, the greatest military minds in Americans, Nobel Prize, Secretary of State, the Marshall Plan. He's probably my hero. My absolute hero. Had a countenance about him. And a respect people have. when he was originally started as a young officer he was in general pershing's uh uh outfit or whatever it was or not outfit and pershing blackjack pershing by the way one of two one of two six star generals general of the armies general of the army is five star general of the Army is six. The other one was posthumously George Washington in 1976. Anyway, what he did was when he was a young officer, here was Pershing. And he went and he said, I want to ask you a question. Sir, you're not answering my question. And Pershing said, that is all. And he walks out and, and, and, and, Marshall grabbed him. that's like grabbing a made man or a boss of the mob is like you're dead you're finished you're through they said you're done they looked at me said that's it you're finished not only did did did personally respect him but he was i think he was marshal was the best man in his wedding or something they were the closest anyway those people were geniuses and by the way they're not doing push-ups and pull-ups. They were so badass. There is a picture of these generals sitting around. I wish I could. It's just oh my God. I think it's half Arnold. It's Doolittle. It's everybody. I think all the five stars. But Omar Bradley, Patton, Ike. Incredible. Just incredible. And World War II brought them out and they were just such respect for them. And then we have General Zhukov, the Russian. Genius. Brutal. You do not want to go up against him. He is just one of the greatest generals ever. His idea was, I'll get the job done. This showed a tenacity. There is a, I'm sorry, there is an elegance and there is a beauty in war which sounds oxymoronic, it sounds contrary it's a genius and the one that I think of them all that I think is so interesting is General Jap I'm pronouncing it perhaps incorrectly but this is the Vietnamese he lived to be 102 or 3 little guy badass like you cannot believe and he along with Ho Chi Minh said we're going to show you guerrilla warfare And they laughed at him. They said, you just don't have, you don't understand who we are. And his line was, his famous line, he says, grab your enemy by the belt. Pull him in. Pull him in hard. So they can't shoot themselves. They can't call artillery in. Move in and then take off. Some people in Vietnam said they never saw the enemy. Never. They might have seen a booby trap or they might have seen some remnant. It was a war nobody had ever seen. They used conventional war. and it is just so there is something about the beauty I'm sorry to say this about something which is so terrible not to mention the naval Halsey and Nimitz and oh my god geniuses and how they fought and remember one thing which is important remember one thing which is important and if there's one thing that history taught us if you push somebody far enough no matter who they are they will throw caution to the wind Japanese knew they're not going to beat the United States they knew this but they had to so what happens is you take politics you take history and you take strategy you take the best minds there are and you ask yourself before you engage in anything I don't want to involve myself in any kind of military action just for political reasons I don't want to play soldier. I want to listen to the people who say, where are we going? Where is this place? What is the terrain? What's the weather? What's the equipment? What are the logistics? How many do we need? All this. There are people who just, that's all they do is they think about this. And it's unfortunate. It's terrible. I think in the long run we'll find out of the humanistic. It's unnecessary, but it's beautiful. There's a genius to it. it's orchestrated it's balletic it's the way people remember the old who was it sherman uh sherman u.s grant actually born hiram but ulysses s grant drunk like you can't believe raging alcohol roaring alcoholic and you know the old line they went to lincoln he said he's an alcoholic he said well find out what he drinks and send the case of it to all my generals. He showed an ability. He showed an ability nobody's ever seen before. And this was, and I'll never forget, somebody said one time, if you could have had, if there could have been one device, one instrument in the Civil War that would have changed everything, what would it be? What? Artillery, aircraft, no, walkie-talkie. Just being able to talk to people. And to walk how that war was. The bullets, the rounds. Remember when they would, I think it was Shelby Foote, they said that when they would go to the various battlegrounds. Remember William Matthew Brady, here in New York, he would go there and in order to raise money for the effort, people could go and watch the war. They would show up like a parade ground and they would commence the war. Antietam is still the bloodiest thing anybody's ever seen. But anyway, but Shelby Foote said that when they would go, they did battlefield amputations, and oh my God. But when they found these corpses, the bodies, their shirts were ripped open, ripped, and they said they didn't know why. Why were their shirts, their blouses, as they call them, ripped? It turns out that the wounds were so horrific because they were not even sometimes rifled, basically musket, balled. It was so horrible that they would lose an arm or a leg and they would rip their shirt up to see where they were hit, how bad they were. They think maybe the final number might have been 600,000 more. It's just beyond horrible. Wave after wave after wave. That's it. that's the way it was done. And if you talk to any of those people, why are you doing this? Would they have said slavery? No. Would they have said Lincoln? No. It's because my brother's here, my father's here, my family's here. Was it romantic? I don't know if it was romantic. But it was a different... And how about, oh my God, Appomattox, the whole notion of the gentleman. Remember these, I remember Lee and I think both were at West Point. Lee was the first in his class. And when he showed up, he got there early at the home of this, whatever, Braddock, whatever his name was. Anyway, Appomattox. And he was in his best uniform, crisp, waiting, waiting. He had his, what was his horse? Traveler or whatever his name was. And all of a sudden, here comes U.S. Grant. On his horse, dirty, probably drunk, but dirty battle. dusty. He gets off his horse. He told everybody, he said, any cat calls, I will imprison you. When Lee shows up, nobody, no hoots, no hollers, no cat calls, no nothing, but respect. And they even had this one fellow one time, I forget what the story was, it was a confederate, a confederate soldier who broke through and was charging, this could be a bit embellished, a bit apocryphal. Anyway, he was charging towards S. Grant, U.S. Grant. And he looked and he said, is this guy going to kill me or what? Maybe some crazed, you know, confederate who didn't get the memo. And he stopped and he tipped the head. There was a provision out of respect where the horse tips his head, you put your stirrup out with a sword. I mean, the honor that they had. And they gave everybody back their rifles and they go home, it's over with. and out of that horror came this I hate to say it this bloody horrible pageantry this respect it's oxymoronic The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network It's The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. Alrighty, Lionel with you. 800-848-9222. We are discussing, unlike other, I don't want to get into the politics. Who's right? Who's wrong? No, no. I'm talking about this. And so far, by the way, your calls have been splendid. the intellectual, the sociological, the behavioral connective tissue of war. Let's go back to the phones, back to the fun. Let's go to Tom in Chicago. You're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Yeah, Lionel, I was thinking like you were saying earlier, where do we get this mentality from? Like boxing, you know, or something like boxing. You strategize and it's barbaric. one-on-one, and the mindset of the boxer, he got to strategize. Is it barbaric? Well, yeah. Think about it. I got my fist. As you say, I got my fist. If I pound my fist into your face, I can beat you. You see what I'm saying? We love it. But here's the thing. You're right about that. But aside from that, my favorite was, I think, maybe the initial part of this was ancient Greece with wrestling. Right. Did you know that wrestling was nude? Now, listen to this. And these are the Greeks, too. That's all. Yeah. They came up with a lot of interesting stuff. And they had, how do I say this on a family show? In the middle of the night. they sometimes men will become dare i say excited so they would have to tie down or render inoperative certain uh appendages and accoutrements now okay i don't know about you but i think that would have a tremendous effect in terms of me wanting to be disinclined to want to wrestle you if i'm sitting there and you're coming at me and you're happy to see me I'm going to say, you know what? Not this one. I give up. I'm done. That's it. I'm done. That's right. I throw in the car. Thank you. Thank you very much. But the next step up from that was, while I'm rolling around with you, let me try slapping you around. It just makes sense. Well, think about this. Think about the mindset of the guy who got the hard-on for you. That's crazy. Well, he was. That's crazy. He want to beat you. And he's happy about that. And he's happy. Now, let me also say something. Have you noticed, what do you think of folks who love to talk about UFC and this brutality? I hear it all the time. Sometimes I like Joe Rogan a lot, and he'll talk about John Jones, who is the greatest UFC, and blah, blah, blah. Well, you do it, too. You do it too. Wrestling, when wrestling come on, you just get excited, man. You just go crazy. Here's the story. Here's the story. I don't want to see wrestling. Or wrestling, as you say. I don't want to see that. That is not even, that's the least of my concern. I want the theater of it. That's what I want. Right. I never want that. Other people. You see, when you was watching it, he was getting excited. Like, oh, yeah. Oh, you know why? Because I want to see the character. I want to see this guy come out and act like a fool. And, yes, the wrestling has nothing to do with it. It almost has nothing to do with it. Now, let me ask you this question. While we're on the subject, there was this Ronda Rousey and others. Some people said it is barbaric. They said, in fact, Dana White one time said, I'm not going to have women fighting each other and beating each other to a pulp. And I said, I may understand that, but why is that? and I love the idea of somebody saying, now listen to this, listen, I don't mind if Tom from Chicago is in a coma, I don't care, but if Tomasina is in a fight, I don't want to see that, why do I have this, again, I keep saying atavistic, this, whatever, this developmental evolutionary distaste for seeing a woman fighting, Why? I don't care one way or the other. Well, would you say when Playboy has the football and they have lingerie football, would you watch that? Well, you know what? If they had that, why don't you just say, forget the football. Why don't you just cut to the chase? You know, what are you doing? I hear you. But here's the thing, though. What if you had, I just, I guess one of the things is when you have these weird boundaries. When Jack Johnson came out, I thought this was the funniest. When Jack Johnson said, I'm going to come out and I'm going to beat up white people. And they said, oh, no, you don't. He said, oh, yes, I am. That was beyond. Here's a guy dating white women, man act. I mean, this is crazy. Then we got into regular sports, just plain old sports. You know, baseball, whatever it was. That's kind of mild. Football, oh, absolutely warlike. War, you've heard the George Carlin thing. But football, though, here is the game. Imagine this. All right, Tom, bend over. What? Bend over. Now, here, take this ball. I'm going to put my hands between your legs. Now hand me that ball between your legs. I got your ball. Okay. And then somebody said, this is not my idea, but to show you how tough, this guy coming out wearing silk, blows a whistle, prances out, and tosses down his hanky, and everybody stops. What is this? What is this? What are we doing? But, you know, I'm not a footballer. I'm not a sports person either. I just, I don't, we put too much emphasis on it. But I'm just back to the boxing part. That mindset of that boxer is turned on. Now, you meet this boxer on the street and confront this guy. He can't turn that off. Yeah. And it goes like with us, with war. We're, like we say, a superpower, you know. We can't turn up. We have to say, okay, I'm going to bully that guy. I'm going to force him to do this. Right. Why? Because I can. Well, there's also something interesting, which I find, and nobody really wants to address this, and I say it very gingerly. There's something about people who say, why I like this, this is masculine. This is a very masculine endeavor. I say, really? I say, yes. I say, well, you know, I don't want to go into, like, jujitsu and things like that. So, you know, I don't want to do it because I don't want to roll around on a mat 30 past the hour with some guy. I don't know some dude. And I'm putting my head between his legs and I don't want to smell his armpits. I just don't want to do it. I'm not. I am not interested. Now, if I have to know how to. OK, maybe, you know, if. But for me, but for fun, I'm going to join a dojo or something so I can roll around the mat with some guy. I don't want to do that. Now, they said, here's the best part. I am considered less masculine because I don't want to roll around with men on the floor. Now, you tell me how that makes sense. I don't get it. I don't get any of this stuff. Well, they consider Donald Trump very masculine and his power moves. Well, what's not to consider masculine? That's what I'll say. The thing is, he's not beating nobody. He's just saying something like, go to war. He's not going to war himself. You know, he is like... But don't you put it this way. If you are going to go to war, don't you want somebody who has a certain degree of certitude? For example, like, you don't want to have the president say, Look, you go to war, you go to war. Do the best you can and hope for the best. Wait a minute, what? Wait a minute, what? That's not the support we want. No, I'm not like that. No, I'm not like that. Here is, let me tell you what I would do. Here is my story. I would be the first person to say, okay, listen. Watch what we do. I'm not going to tell you folks, but I've got to buy. I hired every nerd I could from every from I got a family. I'm going to turn off. I know how to hack their power. Watch this. I'm not going to drop a bomb. I'm just going to turn it off. I'm just going to turn. Now, that's no fun. That doesn't sound great. That don't sound. That don't sound. No, no. Imagine when you have like John Wayne and you bring in somebody with a pen protector, some weird guy who does this thing. He said, I'll take care of this. I'll jam the system. I'm going to use AI to send people the wrong way. Or, you know, that's what I want to do. But that's not it. I sit back and I look at this and I ask myself, what is it? How much of what you do, do you do because deep down in the core of your genes, somewhere, some trait which led as a positive trait for the perpetuation of the species, some aggression, something or other. How much of what you today do apply? Well, think about this. As you got with animals. in order to mate they got to show masculinity they got to show I'm bigger than he and we as humans do the exact same thing women love love all this is for women women love somebody who's masculine able to protect so they go after that guy they love that you know and we do that everybody want to come to America why because we can protect we can do that we got this thing and us like, oh, man, I'm the biggest and the baddest. And that goes, if you stifle that down, that goes to society. You know, you get these guys and, like, you consider the wimp, and next thing you know, women attracted the bad boys. Right. You know, all of them. You know, it's funny you say that. After 9-11, remember, the NYPD blue, NYPD, the cops, New York cops, homicide kojak crocker you know everybody was okay after 9 11 guess who the heroes were firemen firemen and everybody wanted their daughter to marry a fireman now here's something kind of interesting going back to this again this is again i have these thought experiments i'm sitting around with with uh god one night and god said let me show you some things which i did which i think are terrific let me show you some mating rituals i was in a weird way i was kind of crazy i don't know but i came up with this watch this poor this is about some you ever see these poor birds they got to fluff up their feathers they do all these dances and the woman's the woman the female says uh-huh does it looks plain uh in order in order to to be camouflaged because you don't you know the peacock and the pea hen this poor peacock he's got 20 pounds of feathers he says what the hell am i doing with this i hate this it's heavy i open it up if i get wet it takes forever to dry i look like i'm just like a sitting duck nobody wants me so anyway so this guy gets horny so what is he gonna do okay hey sister over here hey look at me i'm shaking my and she's like this uh-huh Okay. Now, who is superior? The woman. The woman. That's why I say everything is done for the woman. Think about it. Every car you buy, you don't buy. Oh, I bought this for the family. No, you bought it because the woman. To get attracted. Sports cars. All that is for the woman. Well, I think, Tom, I think we're learning a lot about you. And by the way, let me ask you something. What does the woman do to attract the man? She just stands there. She just stands there. That's an easy job. All right, Tom. Thank you, my friend. All right, sir. Let's go back to the phone. Let's go back to the phone. Anthony in Mississippi. You're on the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Thank you for taking the call there, Lionel. Let me ask you to consider this. Now, there was a war in heaven according to the word of God. Okay. Now, Satan rebelled out of jealousy towards God, And God cast Satan out of heaven, down to the earth. Now, the devil being a serpent down on the earth, influenced Cain to kill his brother Abel. You sure that was the devil or that wasn't something else? But go ahead. I'll play along. Go ahead. All right. Go ahead. Go ahead. All right. Well, the devil influenced Cain. Whatever you say, sir. Whatever you say. Okay. Got jealous of his brother Abel, and therefore he killed his brother. All right. So I think that when we find ourselves as human beings on the earth in various types of situations throughout life, whether it's because one person is jealous of another because they don't have this that another person has, They become envious, jealous, various human emotions. That is sometimes why we enter into wars, whether it's with one another or with nations. Well, that may very well be, and that's an interesting take. Or it could be something even simpler. I want what you have. I'm going to get it. Or I don't like what you're doing. Or you've taken something from me. Or strategically, it might be better for you to be, let's say, out of the way. And I'm going to use something pretextual. Remember, always go back and look at the theories, the ideology behind neoconservatism and Leo Strauss. It's a fascinating idea. And people often use the term neocon as somebody merely who just wants war. That's not what it means. It may very well involve that, but that's not what it means. We'll talk about that perhaps for another day. Chris on Long Island, you're on the other side of midnight with Lionel. Hi, Lionel. How are you doing tonight? You've got a lot. You know, you're covering a lot of ground. Yes, sir. And it's really interesting. I love military history. So many advancements in humankind has been achieved through military development, believe it or not. The first syringe was used on the battlefield in the Civil War. But going forward, because you had touched on do animals have a soul, you know, When they kill something, the morality, there's no morality, animals. It's inferred, and theologians have been arguing about that. Animals have a sentient being where human beings have a soul. But I want to go forward. I want to look forward. And I want to talk about, I can use an example. The F-35 fighter is developed as a force multiplier. That is its advancement. Explain that. Explain what that is. Absolutely. The pilot, the single pilot in an F-35 has the ability to control three to eight hypersonic, full-size military attack jet drone fighters. These are not just fighters that we have today. These are going to be fighters that we are developing now into tomorrow, hypersonic fighters, hellfire fighters. Also, the F-35 pilot has the ability to control certain cruise missiles that have a loitering capability. In that example, the cruise missile that has the loitering capability, which allows to orbit around the battle theater and then identify a target autonomously. And then it will feed that target back to central command for verification. Then that order will be sent to take that target out to the drone cruise missile. This is now. This is what we have now. But going just one little step with AI integration, We, I'm not even talking about robotics now, I'm just talking about drones. Just one little step. That means that in the near future, we'll see autonomous AI fighter squadrons loitering around battlefields. field. And there'll be one more step when we remove the human command and control and we set up technical dynamic guidelines that will dictate how that drone will operate in an attack against humans. We hope. We hope. And they will operate against human beings, human combatants. Now, what happens, because we've already seen videos, I mean, I hope you've seen them, of these Chinese robots that are, you know, they go haywire. And you're talking about, even though it's the size of maybe a 13-year-old child, you know, it weighs 120 pounds. And when something goes haywire at 120 pounds, it can hurt you, you know. That is true. So what will happen if you get an error code? And we're talking about AI that's crunching numbers at an astounding rate. And the code that they imply, impose into it, just one error can systematically. And let me also throw something into it. And by the way, I appreciate the fact that I share with you a sense of awe over the technology, even though it's lethal, to be sure. Not because I love death, but I just like, just for purposes of just appreciating the technology and the genius, that's one thing. But here's one for you. Let's assume that, let's go to what Peter Thiel's doing with Palantir. Let's assume that it says, listen, we're not going to go out and we're not going to wait to be hit on or to be hit on, to be attacked. We have, for example, in this case, Chris, a series of pieces of data that we put into this metadata gumbo. And we found out, based upon a lot of things like weather, social media, we know not only are there people who pose a threat to us in terms of weapons, but the people who ideologically pose a weapon, or a threat to us, and we're going to have you, we're going to have this, target those people. One of them is, for example, somebody who is a proponent of terroristic activities. This other person goes and he's ruining the minds of students at universities, and he's publishing. We don't like him. And we've also targeted some people that we're not really sure about, But by virtue of these algorithms, we are told this is the person we want to get. This person is a physics professor. So now we're talking about interfacing actually two software technologies. Well, that's going on now. Right now. Yes. Predictive technology. Not only predictive technology. Active action technology. Not only predictive, but what if I were to say to you that I want to get every male over the age of 35, and it says, okay, we can do that. Now, it's not going to ask you why. It's just going to do it for you because of your algorithm. So what happens is, and remember, little by little, bit by bit, one of these days, remember what the first rule of AI is, recursive self-improvement. The first thing AI wants to do is to write its own code and get you out of the picture. And if we impose quantum computing into that. Forget it. We're on a next level. I've heard engineers say that they can take your metadata without imposing any technology like hacking into your password. And just through your metadata, they can predict and calculate and determine your passwords. Imagine that. Remember when somebody said there was a, I do not remember the name of the challenge or the math problem, but there was something which would take people 20 septobillion years. You know, some ridiculous number of cases. And it did it in like less than 30 seconds. Now, something along the lines. Now, let me stop there. I want to remove this back to my thought experiment, and I want to introduce you to God. And Chris says, God says, well, you must feel pretty proud of yourself, right? Yeah. So let me ask you something, Chris, with all of your technology. Is the world better or worse or more dangerous? What exactly have you accomplished? You ooh and ah almost, dare I say, seductively over this. What have you done? What is the net effect of this in terms of the world, of the balance sheet of humankind? You can say, I have no idea. But it's cool. But it's cool, Don. It's way cool. Yeah, exactly. If you impose a benevolent dynamic and force-focus the technology on benevolent problems, such as a cure for cancer, because cancer is so diverse, you're not curing cancer across the spectrum. But you could, with AI and using quantum computing, you could target multiple types of cancer within a spectrum. and really solve it finally and really get rid of a scourge. Then when the great creator says, well, I know you're oohing and aahing, but what have you done? And I go, well, I cured cancer, which some will say is a devil's disease, you know, and in a benevolent world. But benevolency is, you know, it's on high demand. Okay, let me go one step further. Okay. So God tells you, all right, I'll take you to cancer. Good for you. But here's a problem I've noticed that you've been doing, Chris. First of all, you were extending. I noticed that you were doing a lot of Alzheimer's and stuff. Yeah, yeah. And you do know that I never intended man to live to be 80, 90 years old. What are you doing? And another one, too. You, too, Dr. Chris. I noticed you're doing a lot of in vitro and a lot of women 40, 50 years old are having children. What the hell is the matter with you? This is not what I intended. And you say, well, what do you mean? No, I've got a purpose. You might not understand it. You might not like it. But I don't want organisms to live significantly longer than they have to. I want them to live long enough to support their offspring and then get the hell out of there. But here you come along with your fancy schmancy. And you can say, wait a minute. You can say, wait a minute. God, are you upset? Are you upset, God, that I'm extending? Yes. Because remember in the 70s, remember the chiffon commercial, margarine, it's not nice to fool Mother Nature. Where do you get off with this? I've never intended. Well, that goes back to the Tower of Babel, believe it or not, where the Lord was not happy with the fact that the emperor built this tower. Out of, in order to meet God. How dare you? Right. Now, wait a minute. And that's all you're trying to do? Is build this tower? Now, here's my question also while we're on that subject. Imagine this poor guy. There's ten of us, okay? All of a sudden, zap. It's like, hey, what's going on? Mishka. Hey, what are you talking about? Oh, you're Italian. I am, yeah. Where do you go? Italy. Where the hell is Italy? Somebody had to have lucked out and said, I'm going to maintain this language here. I like that. But if you are Japanese, where do you go? It's like, okay, I've got to. You've got a long walk. And you've got to wait to run into somebody. Wait a minute. That sounds familiar. Hey, Jerry. Yes. Finally. You know. Finally, I met you. And here's the question. Does your wife understand you? Yeah, this is true. Chris, I'm glad we had the time to discuss these imponderables, and I wish you a great day, sir. Thank you. Thank you for taking my call. Indeed, sir. All righty, 800-848-9222. Some of the most fascinating subjects that we have discussed, all thanks to you. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel on the Red Apple Podcast Network. The Other Side of Midnight with Lionel. I think we're going to have time for one more call. I think it's Ruth in Chicago. Ruth, it's the other day, the other side, other day. I'll put the other side of Midnight with Lionel. Try that. Yep, I'm calling from the other side of yesterday. You know, I'll spell the Bible wherever he wants to go, wherever he wants to go, wherever he wants to go. I'll spell the old man wherever he wants to go. Soldier boy. Well, you know, my name means friend of beauty. So that's quite interesting, which would be Ruth. Now, I called. As opposed to David. Yes, I understand. Yes, thank you. I called with I wound up the fourth hour floor and the fourth estate. So I have to wait for that comment for another day. Indeed. Because I'm going with where you're lingering previously for this evening, this morning. Indeed. So I have a message from Libby Custer. Ah! They're buried not far from your city of New York. You know, she worked as a secretary for the Decorative Society in New York. This is George Armstrong Custer's wife? I have a message from George Armstrong Custer's wife, Libby Custer. Uh-huh. Today's her birthday. Yes. She was born on April 8th, but she passed away on April 4th, four days before her April 8th birthday. But in this life, she was born in 1948. And so as the story goes. You mean 1848? No, she came back in 1948 in this life. She came back? Again, born again. How did that happen? Born again Christian. Okay. Reincarnation. Now, do we have, as far as where is General Custer buried, and is there anything left of him? Aha, he's at West Point. I've been there. Really? Actually, both of them are buried there side by side. So she was with the New York Society of Decoratives in the 1800s. What is he decorative? What is that? Household items, decorative things. Okay. You know, she was a secretary there. That was like a wild group. Yeah. Two houses in New York, one in the Bronx. But anyway, aside from that, I wanted to give you a message from her. We can juxtaposition the ink spots with the song The Gypsies, and I'm not too sure that I've consulted a crystal ball for this message. I certainly don't do medium type of things, but I do remember past lives, interestingly enough. You remember past lives? Yes. What do you call your ability? Is there a name for it? What do you call it? Also. Been here before. Done it, been here before. How many times have you been here? That I know specifically? Yes. The first time I knew it in this life was while I was paid for my own trip to Washington, my own prem. By the way, Frank Sinatra Jr. was performing at the London House where I went after my prem from St. Mary's High School. So, okay, I'm at Mount Vernon, and I'm sitting overlooking the Potomac River. and I said to the person sitting next to me, a fellow student, I've lived here before. I know everything in George Washington's Mount Vernon home. I know the back staircases. I know the rooms. I've lived here before. And I could not explain it. In George Washington's home? Mount Vernon, right. And what do you think you would have been? Was this during his time or after he died? Or you don't know when? No, I don't specifically know the time, whether it was... Did you ever find out how many people lived there? I mean, I would imagine it's not a lot. So wouldn't you be able to find out, because I'm sure they would have kept records, that one of those people... Oh, they've got a historical society. Yeah, but I'm saying, wouldn't you have been able to find out that one of those people was you? You figured out who you were? I never looked under that avenue of approach to study it further. Oh, I was first looking to say, who was I? My name is Murray Leibowitz, and I was at Mount Vernon. I had no idea. That's who I was. I might have been a servant, but I wanted to get back to Libby Custer's message. Please. For you, because you have brought up all of the generals. And I also wanted to make a comment about a couple of World War II movies that were my favorite. You know what? Unfortunately, I'm telling you, Ruth, please, we must. Don't use that word. China owns us on a fortune cookie. Okay. I have no idea what she's talking about, but she's a delightful woman. It's like Irwin Corey on acid. You know what I mean? I love her. I love her. Ruth, you call her any time. She's fascinating, but I don't know what she's talking about. It doesn't matter since when did that stop me. Ladies and gentlemen, that seems to be the end of our particular traipse down this valley of intellectual indiscretion. Yuri, thank you. Mr. Blaze, thank you. and thank you, my friends, for watching. This is Lionel with a reminding of the monkey's dead. The show's over, Sue, you. Da-da. Thanks for listening to The Other Side of Midnight. If you like the podcast, share it with your friends and listen anytime at WABCradio.com and download the WABC Radio app. Hit that subscribe button on all major podcast platforms. Plus, follow WABC on social, on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and X. See you next time for a new episode so you never have to wonder. What the heck is going on here?