Property Rights: The Founding Principle Mamdani Wants New York to Forget | Bill Norton

[00:00:28] Welcome to The Jenny Beth Show. Jenny Beth Martin Welcome to The Jenny Beth Show. I'm Jenny Beth Martin, and we are back in this special series with Bill Norton, who is a constitutional scholar and an author. He's recorded First Principles training for us. You can find that at tpartypatriots.org forward slash 1776. And these conversations are kind of follow up to the training that Bill has done for us.

[00:00:57] Bill, thank you so much for joining me again today. Bill Norton, The Jenny Beth Show, New York You're welcome. Thank you for having me. It's great. The Jenny Beth Show, New York So we are following up today with the second lesson you did, and both the first lesson and the second lesson tied to the Declaration of Independence. Can you kind of give a summary of what the second lesson is about? Bill Norton, The Jenny Beth Show, New York So the first lesson gets us up to all men are created equal. And then for the second lesson, we get endowed with certain unalienable rights. So we get into life, liberty, pursuit of happiness.

[00:01:27] And kind of what all that means. We touch on a couple of the grievances. We only touch on a couple because, first of all, it tends to get a little tedious when you go through all 27 grievances, even though they're interesting.

[00:01:40] And for history nerds out there, you'd probably have a great time going through all of them. But I do touch on just a couple of them so that I can show people how they should approach the grievances and how they can interpret them and kind of figure out what they're really about. So I talk a little bit about history behind the grievance and then what natural law principle it's violating and then what remedy the founders had.

[00:02:08] Because every single one of the grievances, we actually remedied in either the Constitution or the Bill of Rights. Every one of them. We put provisions in those documents so that those wouldn't happen again. In fact, one of my thesis, which we can get into with this on this lesson, is that the slavery grievance that was completely taken out from Jefferson's draft, so it did not end up in the final document.

[00:02:39] But had it been put in the final document, then I think just like all the other grievances, I think by the time 11 years later that we wrote the Constitution, that we actually would have done more to resolve the issue of slavery. Because it would have been much more part of the conversation for that 11 years because it would have been in the document.

[00:03:02] And so I wished it would have been left in there because I think we would have gotten further ahead with the slavery issue had it been there for that amount of time. And that part was in Thomas Jefferson's original draft? Yeah, not only was it in his original draft, but it's the longest grievance. It's the one that he got in the most detailed. It's one that he indicated was one that he felt was among the most important. It was one that John Adams said was his favorite.

[00:03:32] And so it's very significant. And it's a very interesting grievance to dive into. And when you and I were chatting before we were recording, I was talking about John Quincy Adams. John Adams and John Quincy Adams and Abigail Adams really felt compelled to do all they could to end slavery in America.

[00:03:59] And John Quincy Adams wound up helping in a very, very important way with that. Because after he was president, he went back into Congress and served in Congress and worked to get rid of slavery. And he wound up serving in Congress with Abraham Lincoln. And I just find that an amazing bridge from our founders to the end of slavery in America.

[00:04:26] Yeah. And one point that you had made is John Quincy Adams, his age. Yes. When he was, you know, he was a diplomat as a teenager and during the founding era. And so I like the way that you frame the fact that he should be and could be considered a founder because he was actively involved in that founding era, even as a teenager. And so I love that.

[00:04:56] It's not just a bridge from the founders to Abraham Lincoln and to emancipation, but it's a direct connection. Yes. It's that a founder was directly connected. A founder touched Lincoln. That's right. Physically, emotionally, mentally, intellectually, and had a direct impact on being able to help get us to the point where we ended slavery.

[00:05:22] And John Adams and Abigail Adams, they wanted that to end. They really felt like it was not just felt like they knew it was wrong and they knew it had to be addressed. And their son made a huge difference with that. And most founders felt that way. You know, really, there's two states that kind of pushed against against it, South Carolina and Georgia.

[00:05:50] And other than that, basically, most of the other founders felt like it most certainly felt like it eventually needed to be done away with. Some of them wanted it done away with immediately. I think that it's important to remind people of that because the left makes such a big deal about the fact that there was slavery in America. But we know that and it was wrong. And I don't want to see anyone enslaved.

[00:06:19] And it was wrong then. And I don't want to see it now. And I think it's also important to understand that there were a lot of people in the history of our country who worked and gave all to end it. Yeah. Well, and what I find interesting is so many people that want to really criticize and beat the founders up for it.

[00:06:43] And they portray the founders in regards to slavery in a really negative light, like the founders are evil with it. And so much so that they exaggerate with it. And what I find interesting about that is slavery is abhorrent. It's the worst condition that we can put our fellow man in. And it's such a terrible thing.

[00:07:12] It doesn't need any kind of exaggeration or anything to make it worse than it is. It's already as bad as it gets. And so you don't need to revise history. You don't need to villainize the founders more than what they should be in relation to this subject. Because it doesn't make it any worse. It's as bad as it gets. And so that's where I find it frustrating because it actually hurts the argument.

[00:07:38] It hurts the discussion, I should say, about slavery and where the problem really was with it. Because slavery really wasn't about race. Sometimes it is about race. Sometimes it's about religion. Sometimes it's about gender. Sometimes it's about a lot of different things. But slavery is primarily about superiority.

[00:08:00] It's whenever a group of people start thinking that they are superior over another group of people, then they are in danger in wanting to enslave the so-called inferior people. Do you think that we're ever going to get past the issue of slavery in our country? And do you think that slavery recasts our entire history the way that the 1619 Project claims it does?

[00:08:26] So I don't think we'll ever get past it per se. And we really shouldn't. Because we should always remind ourselves of what people are willing to do to each other in a negative way. You know, I think that is something that's very important. One of the things that I focused on in several podcasts recently is talking about the rise of anti-Semitism in America.

[00:08:54] And some people will say, can't we just get past the Holocaust? And we would say, no, you have to remember it and learn from it so we don't repeat the mistakes of the past. And I think that's exactly what you're saying about we have to remember that slavery happened and learn from it. And so we don't repeat those same mistakes in the future. That's right. And so we do need to have it there.

[00:09:18] And even, I mean, like Jefferson said, he said, you know, I don't know that we'll ever even be able to live with each other in harmony because of that past. But, and so because of that, I don't think we'll really get over it and we probably shouldn't. But I think we can learn from it, number one, and we can be redeemed from it.

[00:09:44] Like if you've done something bad in your life in the past, if you've committed the most heinous sin, you know, we're a people that believe in redemption. And so you can learn from it and you can become a new person. And it doesn't make it so that that sin didn't happen, but it certainly makes it so that you can become better because you've grown from it. That sin is still part of you. You're not going to erase it.

[00:10:12] You're not going to, you know, act like it never happened. But you certainly can be a better person as a result of it. And so I think the same thing as a nation. We're not going to ever get over it, but we most certainly can grow and learn from it and become better because of it. Okay. I think that that is a really good, good answer. And it's just, it's something that we do have, I think we do have to address.

[00:10:40] And I don't mean that like from the same aspect, I think, that the 1619 Project is coming at it from. But I mean, basically, I already, I would repeat myself to say it, but it's important that we learn from the past. And the only, you have to learn. That means you've got to acknowledge it. Most certainly. And it's also important at the same time then that we really understand the context of it all.

[00:11:07] So instead of just painting the whole thing like this terrible, bad picture, there's things that we can learn from it. But the founders themselves, they grew and learned and progressed and they did amazing things to try to get rid of the institution. And that brings us back now to the slavery grievance. So one thing that Jefferson complained about in the slavery grievance is there's three major complaints in there.

[00:11:32] Number one, he's saying to the king, he's really condemning the king for taking a people from their land and bringing them to foreign lands against their will. So kidnapping, really bad thing. And nobody has the right to do that. And so he's condemning the king for that.

[00:11:55] But he then also condemns the king for having what he calls a negative, which is basically a veto against the colony's attempts to try to get rid of it. Now, that might surprise a lot of people. They might be like, well, wait a minute. They tried to get rid of it? Yes, absolutely. They did. In fact, Jefferson tried to pass a number of bills in Virginia and ended up passing a bill in Virginia regarding the importation.

[00:12:25] But the king, time and time again, refused to assent to those laws, meaning he refused to accept them. And so we were trying to get rid of slavery in some ways, large ways, some small ways. And the king refused. So that was the other complaint. And then the last complaint was that the king then, after doing those two terrible things, then offers freedom to those enslaved people if they will rise up against us.

[00:12:55] So he's like, you made them a victim. You made us a victim. And now you are pitting those two victims against each other. Now you victimized us with these victims. And now you are trying to get those victims to now victimize us some more. And it was just terrible. That would also victimize them even more, too. Correct. Because there was going to be a war and a war was happening.

[00:13:24] So he was basically saying, OK, I will free you, but I'll make you my pawn instead. Sure. And the pawn is the piece that you're OK losing. Yeah. And they wouldn't have been taken care of. He wouldn't have governed them well. He wouldn't have given them, you know, a place to live or anything like that. He was just trying to, yeah, he was using them as a pawn.

[00:13:46] And so that's what, you know, really was the big complaint in the grievance was you have perpetuated this terrible institution in this slave trade. And you have forced that upon us and you won't let us get rid of it. And so it's just it's such an important grievance to pay attention to because of because it kind of illustrates what was happening with the slavery issue.

[00:14:13] Now, Bill, the left over the last several years has complained about Thomas Jefferson and Monticello. And they think that Thomas Jefferson is a very bad founder because he had he had slaves himself. So how do how do you square the fact that he had slaves with writing out the grievances about slavery and the fact that he tried to stop the importation of slaves? So and this is and that's where it gets complicated.

[00:14:44] One tough thing about having humans are complicated, though, aren't we? Yeah. Yeah. It's show me a person that's not complicated or show me a person that doesn't have contradictions. In fact, my wife and I were just talking about this the other day about how we should have contradictions, because if we don't have contradictions, then it means that we're not trying to be better. Right. Right. We we should not be as good.

[00:15:08] How can I put this? We should want to be better than we are at all times, which means if we have this high standard for ourselves and we're really right here, then there's always a contradiction. OK, because we should always be striving for better and better and better. Right. Yes. And so if there's not a contradiction in you, you know, something that might somebody might look at as, you know, hypocritical, then then that probably means that you're not striving to be better.

[00:15:36] And so that's the first issue is Jefferson. Jefferson absolutely wanted to be better and do better in that area. So one thing that he did, and this is what's hard about having this conversation is because sometimes when you have these conversations, it appears as though I am a slavery apologist and I am not. Again, it's abhorrent and it's a terrible condition.

[00:16:00] And so to to to say anything that sounds like but makes it sound like I'm excusing slavery. You don't have to say but just say and. That's right. And because both can be both happened in the same person. Correct. And so Jefferson, while he was a slaveholder, he also took responsibility for that.

[00:16:25] And he we need to realize he was born into slavery as well, as far as the culture and the institution and all that. He couldn't just free his slaves legally for a couple of different reasons. Number one, in Virginia, you couldn't. And number two, they weren't really his. He inherited most of them from his wife's family.

[00:16:46] And back then there's these remnants of feudal law, which was a way to keep estates intact for generations upon generations. And so when you owned an estate, you didn't really own it. You were just the trustee. It was your responsibility to take care of it while you are alive and then to pass it on to the next generation. And so that was the same thing with these enslaved people.

[00:17:11] So Jefferson, in that under those circumstances, became the best person he could in that he recognized that it was his job to to care for his enslaved people, meaning to educate them, teach them, make sure that their needs were met. And so Monticello is on this little hill. In fact, that's what Monticello means is a little mountain. And up there was just it was like a little village in and of itself. There were multiple homes.

[00:17:41] There was there was blacksmith shop, candle making shops, all these things. And so it was just this little village that was self-sustaining. And everybody, you know, worked for each other, helping each other and learning and growing. And and so it was this it was a community that that seemed to be a pretty happy community.

[00:18:00] The slaves had had some different conversations with each other and through their journals and things in which they indicated that that Jefferson was really good to them. Some of them were able to be they could hire themselves out. They could keep the money that they would make when they'd hire. Most of them were able to freely travel and go in and out of town, whatever. And that does. And again, that doesn't mean you're saying slavery is good. They should never have been slaves in the first place.

[00:18:29] You're simply saying that within that condition that he was these are things that he did. That's right. And Washington did the same thing. Like George Washington, if you go to Mount Vernon now and you see the slave quarters, you see these bunk beds and there's a brick structure. Underneath the beds where they would pipe the smoke from fires through these these ducts, these brick ducts to heat the beds up.

[00:18:56] And so slaves in his quarters had had heated beds. And and they so they lived better at Mount Vernon than a lot of just common free people lived elsewhere. And but having said that, it's still a terrible condition. I don't care if you're living in a mansion, you know, eating all the food that you want to eat. If you're a slave, you're a slave. And it's terrible. Right. Yeah.

[00:19:25] And it's it's a bad condition. And so no matter how great they were treated, the condition is still terrible. But. Wouldn't you be. Yeah. And that's right. Wouldn't you be grateful if if if you were enslaved and you were treated, you know, more humane than where it really got bad was in the 1840s, 50s and 60s.

[00:19:52] And primarily because we had put a provision in the Constitution where after the year 1808, then the importation of slaves was completely illegal. Which, by the way, Thomas Jefferson was the president at the time. He told Congress over a year in advance, hey, this is coming up this date that we can actually do this. This is coming up. So be prepared. And they were prepared and they passed the law.

[00:20:20] And on January 1st of 1808, Jefferson signed it. I mean, the very first day that they could possibly stop the importation of slaves, they did. And that was Thomas Jefferson. That was like 27 years after the declaration was written. Correct. Which isn't that long in the grand scheme of things. We're only in 2026 right now. And people who were our age can remember what it was like in the year 2000. That's right. Yeah.

[00:20:49] And yeah, it wasn't that long a period. And it was that long because at the Constitutional Convention, they had a compromise. The Southern states said, you know, we recognize that this thing needs to be done away with, but give us 20 years to work it out. And so they did. So that's why that date was specifically put in the Constitution. And so they did that.

[00:21:14] But the unintended consequences was that it made it so that the slaves that were currently on the continent, their value went up because there was no new slaves coming in. And so supply and demand made it so that the value went up. And then it made it so that the only way to produce more enslaved people was to breed them. And so now you get chattel slavery, which made it even worse.

[00:21:45] And so the Southern economy ended up being based on slavery. The South's argument was we need to keep it because cotton is king. Right. And so that was that was the phrase. Cotton is king because it's the number one export out of the United States. And and if we don't have slavery, then we don't have cotton, which means we don't have our economy.

[00:22:06] So there was a gentleman by the name of Frederick Almstead, who he was a reporter and he went and toured the South in the year or so just prior to the Civil War, kept touring during the Civil War. And and but he was a journalist and he had bought into this whole cotton as king idea, too. He was from the North. And so when he went and toured the South, he discovered cotton is not king.

[00:22:35] Cotton is not the engine of the Southern economy. Slavery is that there is more money made in the in slavery and in the transfer of slaves and the purchasing and buying and selling of slaves than there is in the country. Cotton. And that it had first of all, he he recognized that it totally destroyed the culture in the South. It made it so that people wouldn't work hard because they thought that was beneath them.

[00:23:05] The whole term, you know, working work like a slave was a negative term. And it was and so people in the South, the culture was that you needed to seek pleasure and to and to live comfortably. And so even poor people wouldn't go work because that was beneath them. And so it really destroyed the culture. It destroyed, you know, here it is. The North is just bustling industry, lots of stuff going on.

[00:23:33] And the South was really having a lot of struggles economically. The areas where it was easy to transport slaves and easy to transport the cotton, those were fairly rich. But you get in into the. Into the inland, away from rivers, away from the ocean and stuff, and in the South was not doing very well. And so Olmsted recognized this, but he also recognized, like I said, that cotton wasn't king, that the economy was really a slave economy.

[00:24:02] And so we we really needed to get rid of it. So that's when slavery became this even more abhorrent because now it was chattel slavery. Now the economy revolved around it. And so it was going to be very difficult to remove it. That's why I wish that we would have kept the grievance, solved the problem in the Constitutional Convention,

[00:24:26] because we would have avoided getting to that stage of chattel slavery to the point to where people were willing to fight a war in order to keep it. See, in 1776 and 1787, even South Carolina and Georgia, which were the two states that were really pushing against it, they weren't ever talking about fighting a war to keep it. And even though they were wanting to keep it and all that, they weren't they weren't talking about going to that level.

[00:24:55] But eventually it got to that level by the 1860s. OK, and I got my numbers wrong there. I said 27 years. It was 32 years. So it was off by five. But at any rate, it wasn't it still wasn't very, very long in the grand scheme of things. It wasn't even 50 years, much less 100 or 250 like we're talking about this year. It would have been good had they they kept it in there. They did not.

[00:25:25] And and we we know some of the history because of that. When they when they were talking about unalienable rights, is there a time and a point at which a person should lose an unalienable right? I mean, certainly those slaves should not have lost their rights. Yeah, especially since they didn't ask for it, didn't do anything to deserve it. Nothing.

[00:25:50] So that's that's tricky because if it's unalienable, then how do how are we alienated from it? We don't really have the right to alienate ourselves, let alone somebody else from those rights. But there has to be there's got to be some kind of principle there when when it comes to abusing the rights of others. There has to be something some kind of guideline that we're following when it comes to punishment. Right.

[00:26:20] So the founders talk about, you know, Bill of Rights and other places, cruel and unusual punishment. So how do we know when something is cruel? The punishment is too far. How do we know that it's enough? And so we can actually turn to ancient Israel to get some good insight here. And this is where the concept of an eye for an eye comes in. So in ancient Israel, you had this eye for an eye idea.

[00:26:47] And it didn't mean that if you poke somebody's eye out that you got your eye poked out because that really wouldn't be very productive. You just would have two half blind people walking around. Right. But there needed to be some kind of justice. And so in ancient Israel, if you stole somebody's sheep, then you had to give back two sheep. One to return the one that you stole. And the other basically as punitive damages.

[00:27:17] Now, the reason why that was a legitimate or a just punishment was because you were willing to deprive your neighbor of their right to that one sheep. And so your punishment is that you get deprived of that one sheep. So it's an equal punishment, eye for an eye. And so that makes sense, right?

[00:27:43] If you are willing to deprive somebody of their unalienable rights, then whatever you are going to deprive them of, then you get deprived of it. So in essence, you are agreeing because you're agreeing to that. You're agreeing that, hey, if I have the ability to deprive you of a right, well, I need to recognize that my right can then also be taken away.

[00:28:08] But what's great about that is that also tells us now when we've gone too far, when it's a cruel and unusual punishment. Well, if it goes way beyond that, what you were taking from somebody else, then we've gone too far with the punishment. And why should the victim profit from my original crime, right?

[00:28:34] And so the victim should just be restored, and the extra that they get is basically that person sacrificing theirs. Now, again, using the ancient Israel code, there was a time when you had to give back more sheep. So if you stole somebody's sheep, there's a time when you had to give back four sheep. And the way that they determined that was if you were in the business of stealing sheep. And the way that you determine that is repeat offender, right?

[00:29:03] If somebody is constantly being caught stealing people's sheep, then we can conclude that they're probably in the business of stealing sheep and reselling them. And so the reason why you'd have to give four back is because it's assumed that you're probably getting away with some of it. And so you really need to take the profit out of it. And so you steal a sheep, you've got to give four sheep back. So, yes, to answer your question, there is a time when we lose our unalienable rights.

[00:29:32] But it's us that's making that decision by being willing to take the unalienable right of somebody else, which is also what justifies capital punishment, right? Is if you are willing to take the life of somebody else, then in return, you lose your life. Yeah. And you have the right. You have liberty and you have these rights as long as you aren't infringing on the rights of others. That's that's part of what you're saying here.

[00:30:00] Like my rights, my rights end when I start interfering with your your rights. Exactly. In fact, my favorite definition of liberty comes from Thomas Jefferson. So Thomas Jefferson, he says he talks about liberty and rightful liberty. And I wished he would have used slightly different words because basically he's talking about liberty and rightful or correct liberty, which means the first liberty is the incorrect liberty.

[00:30:26] What he's really explaining when he's talking about just raw liberty is really he's talking about freedom. And he defines that. He says freedom is the unobstructed action according to one's will. So basically do whatever you want. It's unobstructed without consequence. He said, but rightful liberty, which I'm just calling liberty, is the unobstructed action according to one's will with a boundary drawn around them by the equal rights of others, which is exactly what you just said.

[00:30:56] Right. When once you trample on somebody else's right. So that's that's just a beautiful picture, though, because it makes you realize you can do whatever you want. But but there's a boundary drawn around you by the rights of other people and they have boundaries drawn around them by the rights of other people. And so, yeah, the moment we are willing to overstep that boundary. Now we can. Now our rights are are can be taken.

[00:31:26] Yeah, I think that is. Something that. Honestly, I think that's something that elected officials forget today when they're passing laws. So they'll go and they try to pass a law to fix some sort of problem. And in fixing one problem, they will create another one because they're they're messing with with another group of people's rights. That's right. Exactly. It's it.

[00:31:53] And that just brings us back to why making sure we stay grounded and founding principles is so important so that we understand and we can apply it to things that are happening today. That's right. OK, so talking about today in this lesson, you talk not this conversation, but in the corresponding lesson that we did, which can be found at Tea Party Patriots dot org forward slash 1776.

[00:32:21] You talked about property being inherently connected to individuals. There are a lot of people who believe in this Marxist theory today that they believe in Marxism. And one of the things they talk about is workers of the world unite. And and how how do you square that? What do you think of that?

[00:32:45] And what do you think of of the Marxist philosophy compared to individual individual rights and property rights? So and that's a great conversation. Just a simple little question there. That's right. We're just going to solve the whole world's problems. Yes, let's do that. So so in the lesson and in a couple of my books, you'll find this.

[00:33:09] So in behind the Bill of Rights and then the new book behind the Declaration of Independence, I outline what property really is and how we obtain it. Because the original phrase was not life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It was actually life, liberty, property. That's what the founders were originally using. And then and then it got converted to life, liberty, property and the pursuit of happiness. And then property was dropped because pursuit of happiness is essentially the same thing.

[00:33:38] And this is how it's the same thing. So I use this equation. Life plus liberty equals property. Property is the fruit of what you do with your life and liberty. So so that very literally is the pursuit of happiness. So property is much more than just your physical property. Property is your education. It's your relationships. It's your your your reputation.

[00:34:05] Just anything that you're using your life and liberty to obtain or create. That's your property. So even your sins. Right. You've heard the phrase owning your sins. Well, you do. You own it. You purchased it. You purchased your sins with your life and liberty. And you can also tell what how much value you place on your life and liberty by what you're purchasing with your life and liberty. And now there's probably people out there that are wishing I didn't say that because they're like, oh, yeah, there's times in my life when I've purchased some pretty bad property.

[00:34:36] But but it's good to remember that when you're purchasing property, when you're buying things or when you are spending time with things, it's your life and liberty that you're spending here. So so make the best of it. Well, and we have that phrase, the fruits of your labor. That's right. That's kind of what you're talking about. That's absolutely what it is. And this all comes from John Locke. And and he talks about how, you know, if you're out in the wilderness and you take an apple, whose nutrients is it when you eat it and stuff like that?

[00:35:05] And he's talking about how when you take something of yourself, your labor, and you add it to nature, then you combine something to nature that wasn't there before. And that's what gives you the right to that particular thing. So long as you didn't take it from somebody else. Right. So if you're eating an apple, it's it's a wild apple tree on nobody's property. Right. You're not stealing that apple. Correct. Because otherwise you'd have to give them two apples back. Exactly. Or maybe four.

[00:35:35] So. So. So now when you think about that. So, OK, so property is inseparably connected to our life and liberty. And I talk about how if somebody takes your property, then just like your algebra teacher taught you that if you take from one side of the equal sign, you have to take from the other. Well, if they take your property and never give it back, then they've also taken the life and liberty that you use to to purchase that property. Right. And so that's a lot bigger deal.

[00:36:04] So if somebody steals your car, they didn't just steal a material possession. They stole, you know, months or years of your life in order that you had to save up for that car. So. And so that's where now we think, OK, well, does that play into Marxism and the fact that, you know, our labor is ours and nobody has the right to profit from it?

[00:36:25] And, you know, our bosses are terrible people because we're working so hard and we only get paid such and such an hour. But yet they're profiting so much on it. And so I've taken that equation, which, first of all, before I go there, because that property is inseparably connected to our life and liberty, we don't have the right to take it. Government doesn't have the right to take it.

[00:36:51] But that's why taxation without representation is a big deal, because we have to be represented. We have to agree to that taxation because we're the only ones that that can agree to it because it's it's ours. And so when you have things like, you know, the mayor of New York is talking now about taking people's property. You know, let's let's play that clip through our new citywide campaign. Fix the city.

[00:37:20] We will focus on the worst landlords in New York City. When necessary, we will take aggressive legal action to remove negligent owners and property managers. And for buildings that have suffered chronic neglect, we will work to transfer ownership to responsible stewards, stewards that include community land trusts, nonprofits or even the tenants themselves.

[00:37:45] But boy, Bill, that is that is he's talking about taking property from people taking it. That the can the government do that? And he's putting words around it to make it sound like it's justified, like like they're neglecting or they're, you know, chronic neglect. But who who's going to define that? So and he's and he's talking about using the force of law to do it.

[00:38:10] He's he didn't talk about how, you know, we need to sit down as a community and start talking about what kind of standards we want to have for our buildings and go ahead and pass laws that we're all agreeing to that. These are the standards and that if you don't follow these standards, then you can be fined and all these things. I mean, those are all legitimate. But we have to have the conversation. We can't just stand up as a politician and say we are going. He said this. We are going to transfer ownership.

[00:38:37] Yes, that's that's a very clear declaration. He's going to redistribute wealth. And he said to nonprofits and to community land trust. And there's applause. And then he says to the tenants themselves. And that had the loudest applause. We're going to take the property from transfer the property from the owners to the tenants. That's right. And hang on, because there's another thing that I want to show you.

[00:39:06] This is from Oscar, who is in our documentary, Surviving Socialism. He's from Venezuela. And we're not going to show the whole entire documentary, but we're going to show this little clip because he had this very thing happen to him back in Venezuela. I spent over 15 years with my company building homes. I really, I really like the door. I build over 500 homes and I help a lot of people.

[00:39:34] I never, I never asked people where their political party was to sell them a home. I was building this neighborhood and I have this guy that he stopped making the payments. And he was promising he was going to get a loan and this, so I hold it. One, two, three, four, six, ten months. The home was done. So he came to me and he said, you know what? I don't have the money. I said, well, man, I'm sorry.

[00:40:03] You know I've been waiting for you. I gave you all the chances. A week after that, he showed up on the side with the National Guard, the Chavez political party all dressing red, taking over that home. Breaking the door and telling him, this is your home. I mean, you don't have to pay anything. I felt like they put a gun on my head, you know. You give him the house for free or I put you in jail. I had to give up.

[00:40:32] I had to give him the home without paying, okay, for free. And all the persecution started. So it's like, wow, this guy is one of those builders that Chavez said were stealing the people's money. Every time somebody knocked at my door, my heart was going to explode because I thought, this is it. They're coming for me, you know. So I told my wife, you know, we have to leave the country.

[00:41:00] I won't build any more in here. Oscar has already experienced this in Venezuela. And people around the world who've lived under communism and even just socialism, they have experienced what it means when someone comes in with nice sounding words like we're going to transfer ownership. It makes me want to cross my arms because I'm so angry, but not angry at you. Yeah.

[00:41:23] So it's a really important issue to pay attention to because just like if somebody steals that property, they've stolen your life and liberty. Well, if you protect that property, then you've protected life and liberty. So when government makes laws, all of our laws should always just be for the protection of rights. Because just like you said earlier, when we start playing with other things, we end up abusing somebody else's right. And then we have to pass a law to make it so their rights not abused.

[00:41:51] But then it ends up abusing somebody else's right because we're giving special privileges or doing whatever. And if we just focus on laws being passed purely for the protection of rights and we can focus on just property, because if we focus on protecting property, it automatically protects life and liberty. In these countries, under communism, socialism and all that. And apparently New York City. And New York City.

[00:42:18] I can't believe that it's just so amazing to hear that speech in America. I mean, Republican, Democrat, whatever, it just doesn't matter. But if you and if you talk to most Americans, they would be appalled with communism. But yet they're cheering it. Yes. And when it's framed the way that he's framing it. So there is no right, first of all.

[00:42:46] So government can do like eminent domain and all that. And the courts have ruled pretty decent on some of that in recent years. The Supreme Court hasn't been that great at it. But some of the state courts have done pretty good where they make it really clear that government can only take property like this if it's for a public or government need. And not to transfer ownership to somebody else because you think that other person is going to be a better steward.

[00:43:13] Well, based on whose standard and whose friend and whose relative and who's, you know, all this is all there. And if you are a tenant and you gang up together and go, you know, if we just quit paying, the property will probably go into disrepair or the we could say the owner is negligent. And like you could you could conspire together and wind up. It might take a few months or a year or two to make it happen.

[00:43:41] But if you all just quit paying rent, you probably could find a way to get the property transferred to yourself. That's right. And not even pay anything for it. It's it's despicable. It is. And Abraham Lincoln actually talked specifically about this. He said he said, let not he who is houseless tear down the house of another. He said that men that some men are rich and some are not. He said, I don't have a problem with that.

[00:44:07] He said the fact that men are rich means that other men can become rich. And if you tear down the house of another, then all you're saying is that when you end up with a house, yours can be torn down as well because you're agreeing to that. You're agreeing to this concept. So these tenants might initially think, yeah, this is great. Let's let's us own the building. Well, once they're building owners and say they get, you know, fairly well off and they can go and move and and live somewhere else.

[00:44:36] And now they have tenants. And those tenants want to then take over the building. Well, the old tenants have to accept that because they themselves agreed with the taking when it was when they took it from somebody else. And so we've got to be consistent. And if we're consistent, then they're going to be upset eventually because it's going to be taken from them.

[00:44:57] And in the Soviet Union, I've read stories about people who worked inside of of the party and they were given a great place to live because it had been taken from somebody else. So they have this place where they're able to live. But the entire time they're there, they understand that if they do anything wrong, they could lose a place where they live.

[00:45:19] And there aren't proper incentives at that point because it's no longer my labor and my liberty creating the the ability for me to have property. But it is favors and curry and and whose side am I on? And have I said the right thing? That's right. It's very controlling at that point. It is. And it gets us into this mentality that we think that there's only one pie and we want a piece of that pie.

[00:45:49] And if somebody else gets a big, bigger piece, then somehow it's robbing us of our piece. And and that's that's the bad state of mind when it comes to this. Workers of the world unite and it's my property and all that. So so that gets us into now this next level on wealth. How is wealth actually created? And so I've taken that equation and I've changed it slightly. So instead of life plus liberty equals property.

[00:46:17] I've put life plus liberty times property equals wealth. And the reason why I've done that is because wealth isn't finite. There's not just one piece of there's not just one pie. There is an infinite number of pies that we can that we can bake. If you think that somebody else has too big of a piece of pie and you want a piece of that pie, you don't have to go get a piece of that pie. Just bake your own pie.

[00:46:46] You can have a whole one all to yourself. You can have a dozen of them. Because our labor is really the natural resource that causes that generates wealth. So if you were to take the ingredients that for to make a loaf of bread, it would cost about a dollar. With inflation, maybe a dollar twenty five. But once you make that loaf of bread, you could sell it for three or four, maybe five dollars.

[00:47:15] If it was an artisan loaf of bread, you could sell it for even up to fifteen dollars or more. Right. So what is it? How is it that you can take that one dollar and turn it into four or five dollars, four or five times more? What changed? It's the same ingredients. What changed is you. You took your labor, your creativity, and you added to it. So you actually made it so those natural earthly resources of these ingredients now have more value.

[00:47:44] So you've increased the wealth. So with those ingredients, you only had a dollar's worth of wealth. But now you have five dollars worth of wealth. See? So it has this multiplying effect. Now what's cool about this is when you combine people, you and I combine and we add our labor together, then we can actually make even more wealth than we could do just on our own.

[00:48:12] You and I together could make more loaves of bread than I can accomplish on my own. And more than just twice as much. Right? And so now it's multiplying even more. So this is why a business owner has all the right in the world to profit off of your labor. Because that business owner is taking your life and liberty, your property, your labor,

[00:48:35] adding their intellectual property to it, whether it's a product or a system or marketing or whatever they're adding to it, so that it has a multiplying effect. So if your labor, if you're working for $25 an hour, but the business is actually making $50 on what you did with that $25, then that's absolutely deserving of them because they added something of themselves to it.

[00:49:03] And you shouldn't be upset because you didn't make that $50. You only made it for you as only what you could only generate $25 out of it. You weren't able to generate the $50. If you can generate the $50, then more power to you. Go and own your own business, do your own thing, and make $150 per hour. And so that's... But you still had the opportunity to earn the $25 rather than nothing. That's exactly right. And that's what you agreed to. Right.

[00:49:33] That's what you agreed to, and then the business owner took all the risk, took the intellectual property, did all that stuff, and mixed it with other employees, because that's the other thing you need to realize. You're not the only person. And so all that labor is being mixed and blended together to create, just like the ingredients of the bread is being mixed to create more wealth, well, the ingredients of the business is mixing all these labors together to then create this new loaf of bread that's now worth more money.

[00:50:02] And so we shouldn't look down upon businesses for making more out of our labor. And that's really where communism and this workers of the world unite thing fails, is that because they are bitter or because they have contempt for their boss making more money, then the whole system falls apart. And then you don't have extra wealth being made.

[00:50:31] Because at that point, you don't have these businesses that are actually making more and more wealth. Bill, in our last conversation, you talked about needing to make sure we're learning to speak the right words, especially when we're talking about liberty and America first and conservative values. When it comes to things like what Mayor Mondami has done and is saying in New York,

[00:51:01] how do you think the best way to counter that is? What is the language to counter it? So first of all, so when Mark Kerr and I wrote Speaking the Language of Liberty, we discovered some really cool things about language and how important it is to speak the language of liberty. When you speak the language of liberty, then in the future you'll have liberty. You speak the language of captivity in the future, you'll have captivity.

[00:51:26] Well, and he's definitely speaking the language of captivity and he's going to create captivity in New York, which is such a shame. But the tricky thing is, is to his audience that are applauding, it's sounding like the language of liberty to them. Yeah, because they're going to get to own the property or to have the property. That's right. And the same thing can happen. You can speak the language of what sounds like the language of liberty.

[00:51:55] We can talk about liberty sounding words and stuff and speak the language of captivity. And sometimes the language of captivity, what sounds like it is actually the language of liberty. So it can be confusing. So it's not just the actual words that we're using, but it's the meaning behind the words. It's the sentiment behind it. It's your own mentality. It's what the purpose is and all that. So his purpose is definitely captivity.

[00:52:21] But he's making it sound like it's the language of liberty because he needs the tenants and some of those groups to agree with him in order for him to actually make what he wants to do happen, happen. Whenever you have something that's socialism or communism, like when Obamacare first came out, my question that I would have with that is,

[00:52:50] if you're going to have socialized medicine, okay, all right, whatever. You want to agree to that. That's fine. But how are you going to enforce it? Like, what does it really look like? And when you're socializing things, there's only one way to enforce it, and that's through force, right? That's why the mandate had to be there with Obamacare. Without the mandate, there is no socialized medicine. So it requires force.

[00:53:19] But you have to have enough people agree with you to stand behind you while you are forcing others. And so that's why Mandandi... I know. It's tricky sometimes. That's why he has to sound like he's freeing the tenants, and he's freeing all these people that are being oppressed by these terrible rich people. It's because he's got to get them behind him so that when he does bring the captivity,

[00:53:48] he's got supporters and he's got people that are agreeing to bring that captivity. So your question, though, is the messaging. It's really important that we continue to speak liberty and that we help people understand, again, the value. So let's reframe it. Yeah, some of these buildings might be pretty run down, and some of these buildings might be having a hard time.

[00:54:16] And isn't that unfortunate for the landlord? I would venture to guess that most of those landlords, with most of those buildings that are in poor repair, are probably not very wealthy. Because most business owners recognize the value to keeping their products up. And if they want to keep making money, they have to maintain their product. And if they're not able to maintain their product,

[00:54:46] it probably means that they're not doing so well themselves. And so we need to recognize that they're human too. They're struggling too. We could certainly say the same kind of rhetoric that the mayor is saying against government and government regulation. We can talk about how government is, chronic disrepair in our government is causing it so that landlords can't even afford to fix their faucets.

[00:55:15] We can say the same stuff and make it so that those landlords start feeling like we're speaking in their behalf, right? So what I'm getting at is if we stick with these fundamental principles, like if we understand property, then we can quickly recognize when a mayor like that is violating those rights. And we can call that out and we can make it clear. And most people,

[00:55:44] when you make it clear and you bring these principles out, most of the time they're like, oh yeah, I guess you're right. I guess that would cause a problem if all of a sudden we're just arbitrarily, you know, transferring property. Most people would. I'm not sure that 25 and under completely understand it. But they will. They will. I think that you're right. They will. But they haven't been taught it in school. Correct. At all.

[00:56:14] And maybe even 30 and under. We just went through this period where we are trying to come out of this period where the public school system just went really off the rails. With affordability, that is a huge, huge buzzword right now. And the left has used it and Mondami used it to get elected.

[00:56:44] And because of inflation, prices went up. And there's no doubt about it. Things are much more expensive. And it is much more difficult to be able to afford things that you were able to afford before the lockdowns. And then all of the insane spending that went with COVID. And then on top of COVID, just Biden's spending. And Congress, they can't get back down. They aren't bringing the spending back down. They've brought it down a little, a little.

[00:57:14] And they've reduced the speed at which they're increasing. But the politicians just won't quit. They won't quit on either side of the aisle. They just spend and spend and spend. And the spending from the government led to inflation because we had this influx of extra dollars coming in from the government that wasn't natural to the market. And the market reacted.

[00:57:42] And when there was more money, the price of goods wound up going up as well. And that made things less affordable. I think that when people voted for President Trump in 2024, they wanted this magic fix that was going to just turn everything around on a complete dime. But if you did that and you brought all the prices back down, then we'd be in deflation. And that would be bad, too. Like, both are bad.

[00:58:11] What President Trump is working to do and what the one big beautiful bill is working to do is to grow that pie. You talked about infinite pies. They're trying to take the small pie and turn it into a much, much bigger pie so that wages, that we can earn more money and hopefully prices are stabilized so we earn more money and things become more affordable to us because the wages have caught up with the prices.

[00:58:41] That's what they're trying to do right now. And they're trying to do it for real. And they are trying to do it for real. And that's why it takes longer. It does. Because there are gimmicks that President Trump could have done to immediately make it look like the economy was doing great. Like the mayor of New York is about to do. That's right. And so those gimmicks are not being done because they are just that. They're gimmicks and they actually make the problem worse in the long run.

[00:59:10] Whereas what's being done right now is an attempt to stabilize for the long term. Right. And I beat up on both sides for spending too much. I am part of the Tea Party movement. It's what we do. But I can also acknowledge that they addressed fraud in Medicaid, not nearly as much as they should have, but they did address it. And now that bill passed on it.

[00:59:39] It was signed into law on July 4th of last year. And where we are today versus where we were then, especially when it comes to, I think, the political, the body politics will to address fraud is in a much different place 11 months later from when the bill was passed into law. And the reason that I see that is because of the work that Nick Shirley, an independent journalist

[01:00:06] and some mainstream journalists, not as many as there should be, have done to expose fraud. And that fraud is massive. If we can get rid of that in the spending, we're not going to get that money back. If they've spent it, I'm sure it's gone. But if we can figure out where it was, identify it and stop it, stop the flow of that money going out, I think that will help as well.

[01:00:33] And I say all that because you're right. They're not using gimmicks. They have addressed fraud. I hope that when they do another reconciliation bill that they come back in and address the fraud even more. And I hope that Democrats, they can love government spending. I will disagree with them on government spending.

[01:00:58] But I hope even if I disagree with them on government spending, we can agree that stealing my tax dollars for fraudulent programs is not what they ever intended with those programs in the first place. That their thinking for why they thought we needed those programs in the first place was probably well-intentioned. Even if I didn't agree with it, I don't think that most of it came from a place of malice. Maybe some of it did.

[01:01:28] Well, probably in some money laundering aspects and things like that. But yeah, for the most part, I agree with you. But they didn't intend for it to be abused by people who are just stealing money in this way. And so I guess I'm just kind of ranting and going off about affordability because it ties to property and it ties to wealth. And it's a big deal to everyone.

[01:01:54] The number one issue every time people are polled is the economic, where we are economically and where we are individually economically. And these founding principles are so important when Congress is trying to address it, when elected officials are trying to address it, when politicians are running for office and when we vote and we're making decisions about who we're voting for. Absolutely. And things like the fraud stuff, you know, some people, it's a lot of money.

[01:02:24] But some people I've heard say, well, I mean, it's not going to solve our deficit problems and all that. And it won't by itself. But one thing that we're forgetting is all the billions of dollars of fraud, we're borrowing that money. And so if we continue to borrow that money, it's costing us more. I mean, if there's $20 billion in fraud, it's costing us a lot more than $20 billion because we're borrowing it. We're putting it on our credit card. I agree with you on that because we are putting it on our credit card.

[01:02:53] We're $39 trillion in debt. You know, if we air this in two days from now, it might be $40 trillion. I don't think it really will be. But my point is, it's going up very rapidly. Elon Musk, I've said this several times, and I keep coming back to it because I just think it's so important. Elon Musk, when he was inside the government doing Doge work, he told elected officials

[01:03:19] that he thought he could cut a trillion dollars from the budget. And members of the House were like, oh, wow, in 10 years? Because they think in a 10-year budget. And he's like, no, this year. And they all laughed and scoffed. Well, I think that the fraud may actually total hundreds of billions, if not a trillion.

[01:03:46] And I don't know that Elon Musk thought that it was all from fraud. But I don't think he, none of us thought that there were just buildings that are completely empty that are being used for all of the purposes that they're being used for. And if you add that up in 50 states, that's a lot of money. Yeah, this has only been, I mean, two or three states have been, the curtain's been pulled back. Yes. Yeah. It's massive.

[01:04:14] And so, okay, yeah, a billion dollars here and a billion dollars there, little drop in the bucket. I totally understand that. And yet, if it is 100 billion in 10 different places, or you add it up, and even if it's just half a trillion, that is a massive amount of money. It's a huge amount. Sorry.

[01:04:39] I just, this is a really, I think it is an important issue because I think that that fraud is driving up the cost. And so the people who are committing that fraud are actually infringing on the rights of the taxpayers who worked hard with their labor and their liberty to create the money or to earn the money to pay for those tax dollars, they're infringing on their rights. They're infringing on the government's rights.

[01:05:07] They're just, they're infringing on everyone's rights. And that is one reason why it's important to understand this property thing, because since it is inserpably connected to our life and liberty, we can ask the question, what is a life worth? Well, I can answer that. A life is worth about 1.4 to 1.5 million dollars. And I'm sure there's people questioning, well, how are you putting that? The average person will make that much in their lifetime.

[01:05:34] That's how much they can make in their, in just an average working lifetime is about 1.4 million. So that means if you think about it with that equation, life plus liberty equals property, that means for every 1.4 million dollars that we spend in tax money, we just spent a life. It took a whole person's life to generate that. So when we're spending billions and even trillions, then we are spending a lot of lives.

[01:06:02] And it's, and I've had the chance to teach the seminar in the constitution to a couple of state legislatures. And when I've brought that up to them, they literally, the look on their face, I mean, they go white. They should go white. Because they realize, I've just spent, I've spent hundreds, thousands of lives. Yes. Gone. Think about all that it took for you, for that, because they think of it, they don't even think of it as other people's money.

[01:06:30] They just don't think of where the money came from. And it's not only is it other people's money, but it's their life. Yes. It's their life. Yes. And that's, so now when I look at like money that's being wasted and stuff, it's so painful to me because it's just like, oh man. Yeah. But that's also why, if you've ever been a victim of a major theft, like a car or your home has been broken into or whatever, that's why you feel so violated.

[01:07:00] Yes. Because they took so much more than just a material possession. They took a piece of you. And when, when politicians are spending tax dollars, that's how we should feel. We should feel violated if they're using it for things that are not legitimate or if fraud or whatever. I mean, I, yeah, when I see Nick Shirley, Shirley's reports and stuff, I literally feel violated like that now because of my view of property. And it's like, how dare you? Right.

[01:07:30] And as a religious person thinking that they're knowing that there is a, you know, judgment in the next life, I feel really bad about those who have taken the lives of others by taking their property. As a religious person, I'm very glad that there's judgment for some people. But man, and I think they're going to be really surprised. They're going to be like, what are you talking about? I didn't take a life. Yeah, you did. You took 20 of them, in fact. Right. Because you stole their money.

[01:08:00] Right. And, and that was, that was their whole life they spent. Right. Generating that. And when Mandani says the things that he says like that, just so flippantly, he's not thinking about the fact that the, the people who own, the own these buildings, they put their life into it to be able to own the buildings. And who knows what he's going to decide is negligent. I mean, he is a leftist.

[01:08:30] So he could say you're harming the environment because of, or who knows? Or you don't, you don't have a hot tub in each unit and that's, that's terrible for the people's health. Right. And so, so that we're going to consider that neglect. Yeah. That's, it's totally left up to, to him and the government officials to decide that. And that's, and that's one of the things that's, and of course, this is where corruption gets in. Right. You know, comes in. And, and, and that's why I said, it depends on who their friends are and their family members are and all that because, because all that's going to work its way in. Right.

[01:09:01] So you see that life, liberty, and property are individual rights that start when the individual starts. So when does the individual start? So this was such a cool realization that I had when I was writing behind the declaration. So as I was getting into life plus liberty equals property, I usually just jump right into the property thing. Cause that's just, it's tangible and I can really explain it. And life and liberty is pretty abstract.

[01:09:30] You know, we think life is tangible because we think of life as in this body, but, but John Locke actually indicated that this body is actually our property. It's not our life. Um, what animates this body is our life. And that's a little bit harder to understand. Right. And you get into theology and all that when it comes to what animates the body. So, but in this book, I felt like, I probably need to, to give a little bit more time, uh,

[01:09:57] and focus on life and liberty itself and what those things really are and what those rights are. And so as I'm writing about life, then suddenly my writing starts going down. The, the area of toward abortion inevitably. And I didn't really set out to write a chapter on abortion. In fact, once the chapter kind of started looking like it was about abortion, I actually pulled it back and realized, no, that's just, it's just a side issue on this life thing.

[01:10:26] So the, the chapter is about life, but we do, but I do talk about abortion. And what I just discovered was, um, as I'm trying to think, okay, when does life begin? That was my question. And so that's why you always, you just go to abortion. If you're talking about when does life begin, because that's the abortion argument, right? And as I studied and I have my own views and I knew other people's views in general, some religions and things like that. And, but I wanted to understand a little bit better.

[01:10:56] So I started studying other religions deeper and seeing what were some of the religious beliefs out there. And if we are to follow religion for determining when life starts, um, because in the founders era, by the way, when they followed science, um, the only scientific evidence they had of life at the time was what they called the quickening. And that was when the mother felt the baby leap or when they felt the baby kick.

[01:11:24] And so that would happen different phrase, different phases in the pregnancy for one woman to the next. Um, but that was it because they didn't have ultrasounds. They didn't have all those, that equipment. And so that was the only physical scientific evidence that they had that life existed. And so in the founding era, um, even though people have tried to reframe it today, there's articles out there saying, oh, the founders were fine with abortion and it was a common thing. That's just not true.

[01:11:53] They weren't fine with abortion, but they were absolutely completely 100%. For sure against it after quickening, because that's when they knew that it was for sure a life. And they based it on, here's our, here's our, our knowledge. So I'm going through all these different ideas religiously. And I discover that some religions believe that life starts at conception. Actually, some believe it even starts before conception, but some believe it starts at conception.

[01:12:23] And some believe it starts at the quickening. Some believe it starts when the crown of the head first appears. And some believe it starts at first breath. And so that's a pretty big range from conception to first breath. So then I start looking at, and that's, you know, going back anciently and stuff. And so then I start looking, okay, modern day, where have we gotten to?

[01:12:46] So in, you know, thousands of years of human history, we have moved from conception to first breath all the way down to today, believing that life starts somewhere between conception and first breath. We haven't moved an inch. No, we haven't moved. And so we can't use religion as our guide for this because we're all going to disagree. What law are we going to pass that we can all agree to?

[01:13:14] So we can only use science because that's the only thing that we can, that we can say. It doesn't matter what your opinion is. This is what the facts are. So my view for the longest time has been that scientifically life begins when we can, when we can prove that it's an independent life from somebody else.

[01:13:38] And we can do that through DNA and, and new DNA is formed at conception. So I've always been an at conception guy that, that life, that life starts at conception. So as I'm writing this and stuff and my wife and I are talking about it, cause she, she always, you know, reads my, my stuff and I bounce the ideas off of her. And we're having this conversation and I realize we've been asking the wrong question.

[01:14:07] The question isn't when does life begin? Because life is an unalienable individual right. No different than liberty and the pursuit of happiness. So to ask when life begins would be the same thing as saying, when does liberty begin? Or when does the pursuit of happiness begin? That's not the question. What comes before those three fundamental rights is the individual. So the question is, when does the individual begin?

[01:14:34] So that completely gets us away from the whole religious argument on when life begins, or this whole argument of, that's, that's, that's really nuanced because life is so difficult to really define. When does the individual begin? Because if we're just, are going to claim that these rights are individual rights, well then they, they obviously start when the individual starts. So let's answer that question.

[01:14:59] And that question again goes back to, okay, scientifically, when can we say that this being, this, this life force, this whatever, this body, when is it identifiably an individual? When is it different than every other individual out there? And again, DNA, conception. So scientifically, even the individual begins at conception.

[01:15:27] So as I was going through this, I'm trying to, so I start, whenever I have some ideas, I always start bouncing it up against extremes or other ideas and stuff to see if it holds, see if it holds true. And there's one thing that I came across that I thought, well, maybe there's a failure, there's a flaw here. Because there is one time when we see identical DNA and that's identical twins.

[01:15:52] So I start researching identical twins a little bit more and starting to figure out, okay, are they really the same DNA? And yes, at conception, they are the same DNA. But because DNA, it drifts, right? So when your cells split apart, the DNA sometimes can have missing parts and things. And so it can change.

[01:16:20] And so twins, by the time they're in their early childhood, sometimes even into their teens, eventually, if we do a DNA test on them, they'll show up as different, different DNA. And if we do other DNA tests, not just the typical ones, we can go all the way back to about when they're in infinite and start seeing differences. But scientifically, we know that because of cells splitting, DNA starts changing.

[01:16:48] Scientifically, we can then bring that all the way back to the very first split because the DNA has to. So that still continues to hold true, that once those cells split and you have two individuals, those immediately are going to drift from each other. And so again, we can say that those are—so that held up. So as far as I'm concerned, the individual begins at conception. I don't care what your opinion is on abortion.

[01:17:16] I don't care what your opinion is on when life begins, your religious view, your non-religious view. Which, by the way, I think that pro-abortionists, it is their religious view because that is their religion. Yeah, I think that that's right, at least for the ardent. I mean, there are people who are in favor of abortion who I think are—that isn't their religion. But then there are people who are pro-abortion. And that's why I say that, pro-abortion.

[01:17:46] Pro-choice people, not necessarily their religion. But pro-abortion people, absolutely their religion. It is a deciding factor in their life. It makes a difference in decisions that they make in their life. And that's what—like the Supreme Court has even ruled, that a religion is anything, any set of principles or guidelines that we use to guide our lives or to make decisions in our lives. And I think pro-abortionists are that way. Environmentalists are that way.

[01:18:13] And, you know, a number of these secular belief systems, I think, are just as religious. In fact, I've got an aunt and uncle that are atheists, and I always like to explain them as devout atheists. Because they're religious about it. So, anyway, I don't care about anybody's view on abortion. Because, to me, abortion is a conversation well after the real question is answered. When does the individual start?

[01:18:42] And if the individual starts at conception, then that means we need to start protecting their rights at conception when they become an individual, which is protecting life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which would include making abortion illegal, but not for the sake of making abortion illegal, for the sake of protecting the life of the individual. And the rights of the individual. Correct. It makes a lot of sense to me, Bill.

[01:19:12] I'm sure there are people who will be frustrated, and then they aren't going to know exactly how to argue with it, because you're talking about it from a scientific standpoint and what makes them individual. That's right. And I've gotten away from the religious stuff altogether. And I'll have my own personal religious views, but to answer this question, just get away from it altogether.

[01:19:35] So, when I wrote Behind the Bill of Rights, Jeremy Nelson and I, we sent the book to a publisher in New York, an editor, rather, and they do what they call a critical review. And so, it's not like a copy edit where they're finding typos and all that. They just read the book in its rough draft and just give you their opinion. And they're in New York, this one. That's right. Okay.

[01:20:02] And so, they give you their opinion on, is the subject matter good? Are your arguments laid out well? Is the flow good? And all that. And the sales guy with the company, he said, you know, based on the topic of this, the Bill of Rights, and kind of based on our conversations, I'm kind of guessing you guys maybe lean toward the right. And we're like, yeah, you can probably say that. But the book, we're trying to write for everybody. So, the book isn't for just people on the right.

[01:20:29] He said, well, I'm just bringing that up because you realize that you're talking to a New York company. And so, you know, most of the people that work for this company are going to lean toward the left, probably fairly far. And we're like, we're good at that. So, it turns out the guy that was assigned to do the critical review is very much on the left. I would actually say that some of his views are certainly Marxist.

[01:20:53] Because when we came to the property stuff, he had a really hard time understanding it because he didn't necessarily believe in the right to private property. Which was fantastic. Because now I had somebody who's like, I don't understand this. I mean, I can tell people about property. I can tell conservatives and people on the right and all that about property and they understand it because their worldview is that way. So, it was great to have a conversation with him because I'm like, okay, how can I explain this so you'll understand it?

[01:21:22] Were you able to? Mm-hmm. Yeah. So, he now understands it. He may not agree with it. All right. But that wasn't the purpose. The purpose of the books are not necessarily to get people to agree. It's just to get people to understand. Okay. And so, anyway, so he came back. We just had some great conversations. So, I made sure with this new book, Behind the Declaration of Independence, to send it. I wanted it to be assigned to the same editor. And so, it was.

[01:21:51] And one of the reasons why is because I was hoping that this abortion issue, I was hoping he would, you know, call me to task on it, you know, because I really wanted to know where it was rubbing and wrong. And to my disappointment, it didn't rub him wrong. He's like, you explain this and your argument is really solid. He never said which way he believes in abortion and stuff. But he's like, pretty solid argument. It's a good chapter.

[01:22:21] That's amazing. It is amazing. That's really good. And who knows? Did he do your third book? I haven't. So, behind the Constitution, it's still just in rough draft form. So, it's not quite ready to send him, but almost. He knows you might be able to convert him by the end of it, Bill. I might. Because, you know, with the property stuff on this book, he didn't bring any of that stuff up. In fact, some of his comments kind of lead me to believe that he's understanding some of these principles a little bit.

[01:22:49] But these principles shouldn't be Republican. Correct. I mean, Democrats used to agree that we have property rights. Yes. And it just—and individual rights. And Democrats, they stand up for civil liberties. Well, and that's why there's a big group of Democrats that don't have a home right now. Because they are Democrats that believe in these fundamental principles.

[01:23:19] I mean, that's why we have— They like bigger government than I do, but they still understand liberty. That's right. And that's—but that's why we have, I mean, quite frankly, Donald Trump was a Democrat. But that's why we also have RFK. Yes. Or we have— Colsey Gabbard. Yeah, exactly. I mean, we have a number of people that are showing that they really understand some of these principles of good government, even though they've been Democrats their whole lives.

[01:23:44] And I shouldn't have said it that way because it made it sound like I don't think Democrats are capable of that. But my point is, is they are. There are radical Democrats right now today who are not capable of good governance. Exactly. They are capable of Marxist government. But not—so—but there are people who are Democrats in the traditional sense that—in the traditional sense in the last 50 or 60 years,

[01:24:15] that want bigger government than I want, and they also think that America is a good country, and they also understand that we have rights. That's right. And I think when it comes to the, you know, just the average American Democrat, I think that's most of them.

[01:24:36] I think this radical arm of the Democratic Party that's controlling the party right now, I don't think represents their core, their base, which is why the party is really in a lot of turmoil right now. Well, and I think it gives the opportunity for your book to hit home with more people. And you're not trying to really—when I said, oh, you might convert him, I don't really mean convert him to being a Republican.

[01:25:03] I just mean make sure he understands what our principles are. That's right. Yeah, I have no desire to have them be Democrats, Republicans. Either way, I don't—I could care less. Let's just understand these principles. That's my goal. Yeah. And like I said, understand them. Like I don't write these books for my voice to be heard. I understand—I write these books for these principles to be understood. Well, I think you do a very good job explaining the principles. All right.

[01:25:32] People can get the books by going to our website at tpartypatriots.org forward slash 1776. We're linking to the books and we're linking to all the training that you're doing with us. Bill, thank you so much for having another conversation with me today. You're welcome. It's been a lot of fun. It's awesome. Thank you. If you enjoyed today's conversation, go ahead and hit like and subscribe. It really helps us reach more people who care about liberty and the Constitution.

[01:25:58] You can find this and other episodes at JennyBethShow.com, as well as Facebook, YouTube, Rumble, Instagram, X, and your favorite podcast platform. The Jenny Beth Show is hosted by Jenny Beth Martin. The Jenny Beth Show is a production of Tea Party Patriots Action. For more information, visit teapartypatriots.org.