This is Busted Pencils, fully-ledded education talk.
Here are your hosts, Dr. Tim Slecker and Dr. Johnny Lupinacci, educated educators talking
education.
Ah, there it is, Busted Pencils fully-ledded education talk, educated educators talking
education.
Yes, that's Tim, not Johnny.
I'm back, man.
I'm back, Dr. Johnny Lupinacci, Jess in the boards, working in the studio.
They're producing so glad to be out of the car, everybody.
Seven days, 52 and a half hours in the car with my daughter from Ohio to Wyoming, Wyoming
back to Ohio, and here I am back in the real Busted Pencils saddle again, so feeling good.
Oh, Tim, we're excited to have you back, man, and to have had some moments where you
were able to call in and share from the road with your daughter heading across the country
and then back through.
I mean, we've had just an amazing time discussing things, chopping it up, we had onion
just on, we had great guests.
I know you were able to listen, so I don't need to talk to you.
You know what it is, Tim, and I think you forgot, I think the whole driving thing might
have jared you a bit because it's TGIFBP, that's a TGIFB, that goodness, it's Friday, Busted
Pencils.
You know what's so awesome about Friday, Johnny?
Look, if you're in Madison, it's a great time to go to Monaco, a brewing company, the
tap room, you know why?
Because Busted Pencils is sponsored by the Monaco Brewing Company, who sued the state
of Wisconsin to end its parasitic voucher system that hurts public schools, Monaco
Brewing Company is making Wisconsin great again, one beer at a time, check out Monaco
Brewing Company dot com to see where you can buy their progressive beer.
Yeah, Johnny, that's it, you know, because Friday night in Madison, Wisconsin, what
a great place to stop the Monaco Brewing Tap Room right up there, right across from
East High School, everybody's checking it out, love it, you know, spending time, but
you did, man, what a week, I got to, got to listen in the one night and that was great
and listening to you and, and Jess and on, you're just kicking butt, it was just a great
show and then I got to listen back to the educators, amplified episode and then got
to call in the last night, but you guys were busy this week, tell me what just help, help
me figure it all out though and help me make sense of the week.
Well, I don't know if we can help you make sense of it as much as we can help you feel
it.
That's it.
It's like we're learning to f with our feelings, right?
And we're hearing from educators like educators amplify, but our callers have been calling
in, our listeners out there, you know, we've just been talking about the importance of,
you know, flipping our lids, neuroscience, regulation.
It's all building too awful before you, we're out on your, your road trip, you know,
you brought in the discussion around mindfulness in the classroom and we talked about school
safety.
I mean, it's just all been converging on this stuff and then, and then, and then, it's not
like bad news.
It's just like it hit kind of like, like a big explosion.
So I mean, let's come back to because we had an exciting show yesterday that by the end
of that show was like fast thumbs, L.A. Tom, one of our favorite listeners out there.
We love all our listeners, but L.A. Tom, we got special love for, right?
He calls in.
He's a listener and, you know, he shared some amazing thoughts, as always, within Tim and
L.A.
Tom agreed, which is good.
We talked about that, even with how we have with our feelings, how important it is to
be able to disagree and to navigate both their feelings and our logic.
So facts and feelings together with that.
And so how'd that kind of going on?
And it was exciting.
Why?
But what happened?
I mean, Jess has been in the studio for all of this, right?
What, let's give us a recap, Tim.
Jess, what's happening in the world these last couple of days that everybody is talking
about?
Oh, Jess.
Come on.
You go for it.
Well, for those of you who are new to listening here, new to hearing my voice, I am a new producer
in training here.
So for the past couple of weeks, I've been learning how this whole talk radio thing works.
You're in training?
I thought you were a skill.
Well, the training wheels are off at this point.
Okay.
Good.
Oh, yeah.
However, I'm still learning.
I'm still learning how the board works.
I'm still learning how this whole system works.
And yesterday, there was enormous national news that broke on this station.
And so we were, we were hoping it would break during one show, it didn't end up breaking
during that show.
It broke at the very beginning of the next one.
And it's coming in.
This is out of Manhattan.
Yeah.
We've got one charge guilty, two charges guilty, four charges guilty.
Seven charges guilty, 10 charges guilty, 11, 12, 20, 33, 34, all counts, all counts guilty.
This studio is relatively small, but it erupted.
It erupted.
People were screaming.
People were calling in so overwhelmed with emotion.
It was a wonderful time to be in live radio.
And I remember I was listening to it too, and I thought, oh, man, this is just, this
is going to dominate, particularly talk radio, which civic media is largely doing a lot
of talk radio.
But you know, I took this to think about this, and this is, you know, the disagreement
with LA Tom was to kind of throw this back into and recognize, you know, we are an education
show, public education, and the amount of content that this would kind of beg teachers
to deal with here is just extraordinary.
But man, when I'm thinking about this, so just again, we'll hint at this, the disagreement
Johnny between LA Tom and I, Tom, and again, I don't know if it's disagreement as much
as just, you know, he was, he was, he was celebrating, he feels very passionately that Donald
Trump, the past president, being convicted of these 34 felonies, that this was justice
and justice served, and was a wonderful thing because nobody's above the law.
And maybe this is going to be the turning point.
And I don't disagree, except for the fact that I worry, and I didn't always think this,
but I heard somebody put forward the idea of saying, the best thing Biden could have done
would have just pardon Trump from all of these things and let the election go on as if
none of these things had happened because all of these court cases just provide more support,
more camera time for Trump.
And this just builds his base even stronger.
And there's something to that that frightens me to the point of going, yeah, because I,
you know, I've had Thursday Thanksgiving with the Slecker family, some of the Slecker
family has, you know, gone to that side, and I'm telling you, they are rabid, rabid
about this stuff, and I'm just concerned, you know, and what happens when Trump's found
guilty, you've got my cousins going, see, Timmy, we told you, we told you, you know, this
was a sham.
This is, you know, I'm going to go vote for him twice.
I'm like, well, isn't that election interference?
And I'm like, well, no, you know, you know what I mean to me, you know, I mean, no, you
can't do that.
You can't vote twice, but I'm worried.
So that was the disagreement between L.A. Tom and I was to kind of look at that and
go, hmm, I, yeah, I'm concerned that this provides a lot of ammunition.
And it really galvanizes a lot of Trump supporters.
Maybe though, maybe I'm wrong.
And maybe there are so many Trump supporters out there that just didn't turn anybody into
a Trump supporter that his supporters were already there.
Yeah, Tim, I think there's a, there's probably a middle ground on things because your
view and L.A. Tom are both bringing up, I think, really poignant, you know, aspects of
a complicated situation, which I think is historically unprecedented in this country.
Hey, hello to Sherry.
We've got the messages coming in from Sherry saying hello.
But you know, with Tim, I think I don't want to oversimplify either what you, what you
are saying here or what L.A. Tom is saying.
But you know, I think about this in terms of, I disagree with the Biden pardoning thing,
but I agree with the whole, the whole, like, this is going to, this is going to be part,
this is part of Trump's campaign.
This is who he is.
It's always been who he is.
He's not apologetic.
He's not remorseful.
Right.
He doesn't hide from these things.
They are in every way part of his strategy to point and say he's already done it.
He's broken, you know, the log, wow, being on trial about it, broken this the gag.
This has been his MO.
The whole way is to have this sort of bravado and non-remorse, like macho, I do whatever
I want, attitude, and there's a whole lot of people who vibe with that.
And I think that's part of the larger message that bring both you and L.A. Tom together is
Tim, you're like, hey, man, like the more attention we give to this, the more almost sort
of free publicity we get, give to someone campaigning for it.
I know.
I know.
And then the same time, you know, L.A. Tom is saying, but this is a really awful person.
This is not just somebody who is, you know, running for office, who we might disagree with
or be against.
This is someone who openly advocates for not only harm to people in our communities,
but to destruction of our democracy, like he is unapologetic about all this stuff.
I get very little credit to this man for much, but I will give him credit for his consistency
and his transparency.
Garbage, I'm telling you I'm garbage and if anybody wants to affiliate with that, that's
your choice.
That's right.
Right.
And that's where I kind of get rolled into like, let's get into, you know, what this ends
up meaning for teachers and, and, and, and that's sort of our expertise too, right, Tim?
Right.
Like we are thinking about this as a historic moment.
It absolutely is.
And I think this is one of those situations where I really find this, this, I usually,
usually love to take a side, but I see L.A. Tom's point and I see your point and I'm holding
them both really equal because they both have a lot of merit to them.
This is a complex kind of thing right now.
As I've said before, an unprecedented and imperative moment for us to engage in this,
especially as we're engaging as exercising our civic duty to vote, exercising our civic
duty, you know, to make decisions and to model a kind of leadership we want in our country.
So Tim, you know, I love what you're contributing L.A. Tom, I know you're listening, love what
you're contributing.
Listeners, if you want to give us a call 855-752-4842, join us.
I know we got some texts, we're going to jump back into it when we come back.
But we'll need miracles to topple from the sky, to park the seas around us, to water
into light, because we are the miracles, we have been all the time, we're not scared
of what surrounds us, we're not waiting for a sign, we are the miracles, we are the miracles,
we are the miracles.
And we are back.
We let it education talk.
Dr. Tim Slecker back in the saddle.
This is Johnny here with Jess, our sound engineer who said that she's been in training,
but I'd say the training wheels are off, he's a hired gun, highly knowledgeable and regulated.
Balance for us on this show, appreciate your Jess, Neil and Nancy texting in, saying hello,
hello to Neil and Nancy, special listeners out there, fans of Jess, I'm sure.
We also got a text in right before the break from Chris Casper, Chris Casper said, the
man has never been told no or had to be held accountable for anything his entire life.
Now that he has, he's lost his damn mind over it, it's quite the thing to witness, it's
like watching a toddler throwing a tantrum when they're told no, completely bonkers that
any of this is even real, I agree with you Chris.
That's also why I'm like, hey, we're going to talk about it because it is unprecedented
and we're going to get to why, especially as educators, we have to be teaching about it,
but also sad day that we have grown folks throwing up and calling mantrums and they're more common
sadly than we'd realize.
But the theme of the show for the last couple of shows, especially for the last week and
a half has been kept with your feels and we've talked about why mantrums kind of happen.
So I love that comment, we're getting into it, but we got a caller on the line, we got
Stephen from Green Bay, can we get Stephen on Jess?
Stephen, what's happening?
That's all you're doing.
All right.
It's been a long time since I've talked to you, I'm going to say you're not in bed yet,
Stephen.
I am not, I've actually changed jobs, that's what you guys have not heard from me.
Oh, six o'clock Steve is no longer six o'clock Steve.
Nice, so you're going to be a regular caller now, what you're saying?
Hopefully, yes.
But I wanted to call in about what you guys were talking about, Trump and him getting
charged with 34 felony yesterday, and I've heard a lot of, you know, mixed reactions.
Some people say that, you know, the judge had it out from her from the beginning.
Some people say, you know, it's the best day on earth.
Me personally, I'm a little sad and I'm not sad that he got charged with 34 felony counts.
Anyone with two eyes in a brain that can do, you know, can do simple reasoning would
know that he was going to get conducted with those charges.
I mean, it was pretty black and white, but he at one point was the leader of this country.
And we have to remember that we're supposed to be the leader for the rest of the world.
And if I'm China or Japan or another third world country, and I'm looking at U.S., who
has a president now that is a felon, I'm laughing a little bit.
I mean, we always looked down on dictatorships and, you know, kind of looked on our nose
is like, oh, we're America, we're better than that.
But are we really better than that now?
It's a sad day.
Thank you for education.
You know, the big thing when I was in school was learning about the Holocaust and things
like that.
The next generation is going to have to learn how there was a president who got convicted
of 34 felonies and it's a felon, that's something that's going to be in the history books.
And that's a sad day for this country.
Steven, man, thanks for dropping all of that truth.
I really appreciate it.
I'm glad you got a new job.
You sound happy about that, calling in from Green Bay, but, you know, Johnny, yeah, the
education implications here, you know, we just hinted last night at the civics lessons
that come out of this and now, you know, Steven putting out the whole idea too, just that,
you know, this is an unprecedented, and we're going to have to talk about this as history.
And we got some more phone calls, though, we got Neil from Glendale on the line.
I think this might be the Neil and Nancy who called in Neil.
What's happening, our friend?
Well, yeah, that's a good guess.
Yes, I'm calling.
I'm calling from Glendale.
I had to listen to the show because I heard you have this great new producer.
It's, I know something, something tells us, yeah, I wonder who that is and something
tells us that you might, you may have had a hand in that great producer.
So not in the particular job, but in that, but also commenting regarding the topics on the show,
especially the comments about maybe Biden should have just pardoned him to avoid him firing
up his base.
And I think that would be absolutely the worst thing that would have happened.
Absolutely, the worst because all that would have done is that Trump would be going around.
The, I told you the case was no case at all.
And once, once they got to the firing line, they had to put down their guns.
The worst thing, the worst thing they could have done was to back down.
They did absolutely the right thing.
And this verdict proved that there is a bit of justice left in the nation.
I was certain he was going to be, he was going to be exonerated in the case.
And I was, I was jumping for joy when all 34 came in guilty.
Neil, thank you.
Thanks for that call.
And thanks for disagreeing with me.
And again, I'm not exactly sure what I'm advocating for here.
The record for the record.
Neil doesn't just disagree with you.
He agree.
Johnny agrees with Neil.
Oh, come on.
This one.
But I see the, I see your point like the way that these events give attention.
Yeah.
I think I like how Neil broke it down.
Because like he said, I think that would be the worst thing is to back down.
We have a process.
Let's go with the process.
Let's let it fall through.
You broke the law.
You deal with the consequences.
It doesn't matter who you are.
It shouldn't matter.
If you were a former president of the United States, or you are a person, you know, who's every day kind of just grinding it out out there.
If you break the law, there are consequences for your actions.
And so to, if we were to get there, it would be completely validating.
Like I think Neil said it well, we'd be showing up and they say, see, they really didn't have a case.
They really didn't have anything.
And, and they're actually is so, this is what I got back to.
There's so much more than just this.
It's just a touch money case.
Oh, right.
More.
And so that's why I'm like, this is a starting point.
And also coming back to Steven, like this is also a sad day.
Because how this is when people were like, oh, you know, it's just that it's just the president of the United States.
It's not a big deal.
He has political responsibilities.
His personal kind of problems he has in his life aren't going to affect how he does the job.
Ladies and gentlemen, if you were in that camp, this is where we are at post presidency.
We are going to have three running for president again.
We are still dealing with the actions of this man's behavior for decades.
And we will be for decades.
It is actually a sad day for US history because future generations of children and people and teachers now and into the future.
We'll be having to teach about this.
And no matter how you spin it, it's not a good look.
So we got caller on the line.
We'll get back to you after the break.
This is a call during the conversation busted pencils when we come back.
The end of the road.
This is a breakdown.
But we've got nowhere else to go.
Welcome to the breakdown.
Welcome to the end of the road.
This is a breakdown.
But we've got nowhere else to go.
It's not hard for business home.
And us now.
Wow, wow, wow.
Yeah.
How many walls can you put up?
Question I'm always asking.
How many walls?
How many guns?
How many felons can run for president?
Well, I don't know.
We're about to maybe find out.
Well, actually, we did.
We're going to find out.
Man, great calls.
Again, Steven from, you know, getting Steven back on from Green Bay.
Yeah.
Great to hear that.
Neil, calling in.
And Neil, thank you for this wonderful producer that we have here.
And Mark.
Mark from the sack.
Mark, you're there.
Mark, what's happened in our friend?
Yeah, thank you.
And it should be remembered that the founders actually anticipated moments like this.
They actually said Hamilton pointed out in federal of 69 that a president would be a
manable, meaning subject to punishment and disgrace.
He further pointed out in 75 using the words like, there might be a man elected to cheap
magistrate, you know, being avarices or an ambitious man, you know, seeking his own
selfing and granddiasment with the help of eight of foreign powers.
I mean, committing crimes, you know, long, you know, that and that it is not, you know,
they anticipated this.
So it's nothing that we should, we should look on upon with caution that this is a cautionary
care of, of Hoyman, who is, in my opinion, truly evil that has, you know,
that yes, he's charming and all this.
But I mean, according to the popular literature, the same can be said of Satan.
I mean, that in all the fiction about him is that he, you know, that is of
glib tongue and charming and all that.
And it just is not surprising that he's able to seduce a number of people,
including people of faith to say that he's, you know, that he's, he's their man.
I mean, but it is just, it's just sad.
I mean, it's both heartened and heartbroken by the situation that we are in right now,
because it should have been, this information should have come out before the election,
so people could have, you know, analyzed it, you know, that made a further
judgment of Trump's character back then.
But if you'd actually been following the man through the decades, you would recognize the man,
you know, really has no character other than, you know, that for himself.
I mean, the number of business people he cheated in his career, I mean,
what's particularly, you know, kind of be amusing to me is the number of people
that, you know, do the kind of contract and work that Trump cheated hundreds of
not thousands of men out of their, out of the money that they agreed to,
they agreed to do their work for and get paid for.
And then it didn't pay them the full amount.
Yeah. No, it didn't.
Mark, you know, thank you.
First of all, thank you for your call.
Call us from Priority Sack.
Really appreciate when you're able to do that for, for the show.
It is, it's sad, you know, and again, we're talking about the feelings and Jess and Johnny,
you know, a whole week of talking about our feelings.
The idea though, I think when Mark talks about that, there, there is a sadness and
going to read to put my, you know, pardoning thing out there.
It's not, it's the sadness that we're dealing with the situation.
And man, I'm, I just get confused and think, you know, how do we, how do we make it go away?
And I'm positive the pardon wouldn't make it go away either.
But you know, here we are though, Johnny.
And we hinted at this though, too yesterday that, okay, and as Steven points out,
this is going to be a historic moment that will be taught as, as American history.
But I think which is one of the interesting things to go is because you're starting to now here.
And I, and I know this when I was a fifth grade teacher, I would always hear my
fifth graders, they always ask these kind of questions.
You know, they would come running in if I was still teaching fifth grade right now.
It's like, the Donald Trump just got convicted.
Can he run for president though?
Because we were learning about like, if you're a senator, you have to be this many years old,
and you have to be born in the president.
And, and we were looking at it with my mom and dad last night.
And it doesn't say anything about being a felon, except that we found that felons aren't allowed to vote.
But we're having an argument at home, Mr. Sagar.
Can somebody be the president and a felon?
Johnny Lupinacci, what do you do with that question, my friend?
Well, you just kind of threw that one right out at me.
You know, nothing like going off script Tim.
It's great.
You know, so I, I mean, honestly, I'm, here's the thing.
It's not going to be popular.
I mean, I think it's, I think it's great.
I don't really care whether or not someone has been convicted of a felony or not,
whether they should be allowed to or not allowed to.
I'm not into this much of this many rules.
I mean, I think it should be more based on the moral fiber and the actions that you show as trustworthy and consistent in your community and in your work.
And I like that, you know, our caller called in and said, you know, the, the whole piece about like,
this is someone who's ripped off people.
This is someone who is advocated for hate.
This is someone in every way.
If this person was somebody we worked with on a day to day basis or had to live within our community, you would stand up to you.
Do not back down from a bully and this person is a bully was bullied his way and been been lifted up for being a bully.
And so, you know, these are the things, whether he gets convicted or not, doesn't matter to me.
So like, that's kind of also where I'm on your side too.
I guess like I get that there's these like requirements to being the president, like they seem kind of absolutely random to me.
And I know some historians are going to call in and say, no, they're not because 35 years old is important because of X Y and Z.
Right. And then the whole other piece coming through on that, you know, I, I'm kind of frustrated with liberals right now.
I usually am, but I'm not that doesn't mean I'm a conservative.
I probably land more on the radical side, but I'm frustrated with my peers in the sense of the same people who are so critical of the prison industrial complex are cheering and saying lock him up.
It's like two years, two, three, four years ago, we were infuriated that a political party or the people running for office would would be chanting or encouraging to lock anybody up.
This is sad moment. So to behave the same way, this seems, this seems like we got to, we got to check ourselves.
So I'm a little bit frustrated with people who are like they, they're, they're critical or they, they want to critique the criminal injustice system and the prison industrial complex and then they want to use it.
The minute it's someone they don't agree with or that I totally agree needs to be held accountable for his actions.
So I'm just like, I don't think that's my go to so I also, I'm a big fan that you should.
I know people who are convicted felons who were, you know, maybe used for non violent crimes.
Right, right, right, right.
He worked well, I'll tell you what, they probably will be better presidents than either the candidates we have to vote for right now.
That's when you, you kind of threw that curve ball like, oh boy, I'm not sure that like we scripted out Johnny.
Well, it was, it was a curve ball, though, too. And I recognize that to see this is that, see, to me, that's classic civics lesson.
And Jess, you've been really kind of working through this here.
Give us a sense to throw it back in there, put it back. I know I got a little bit carried away gone.
But man, when I taught fifth grade civics quality, qualifications for office was just part of the rule.
And I could just see my kids right now having a field day with this.
Well, Tim, you did jump a little ahead. I mean, come on, man, we had a plan.
I'm so sorry. It's all right. We'll get there.
That's a Tim. That's a Tim bomb. That's what we call them Tim bomb.
Well, see, we're going to get there. And what's amazing is that the two of you are educators.
First and foremost, you are educators.
There has been in every talk radio show today.
People talking about this news through one lens or another.
Primarily, we've had people who are professional talk radio hosts.
And we've had a lot of lawyers, but we haven't had our educators.
So my questions for you are based around how is this decision?
How is this momentous occasion going to impact education, specifically civic education?
We are civic radio network. We are civic media.
This is a civics question.
So can you tell me a little bit already from the history of Trump's presidency?
Did his time in office change at all? How you taught civics?
Man, that's a question. You talk about it. I wouldn't say it's a curve ball as much as what a hard hitting question.
I changed. I tell you, thinking about this, I'm going to do a little bit of a dodge on this.
And go, the effect, though, for me, has been seeing this is on education and as an educator,
this is my biggest fear. So the pardon comment and all that comes from the fact that I actually see another Trump presidency as the end of public education in America.
I really, I do. I see it that way. People like you mean like, yeah, yeah, I'm telling you, it'll be a national voucher.
He's going to put somebody like a Betsy DeVos back in charge again.
They're going to take that momentum and they're going to run with it.
That doesn't mean public schools aren't going to exist, but public schools with the commitment to democracy for all children.
This is what's at play here. I mean, we're talking about the end of public education in America.
And that's an end to democracy because public education is the vehicle by which we engage citizens in that civic duty,
that civic mission to bring people into a democracy to, and I thought about this trying to indoctrinate people into democracy.
And Trump has done everything to actually throw that out, get rid of it.
And he has made absolutely nothing more than saying that public education is on his radar is on his shopping block to do away with it.
That's where I'm, I'm just, you know, again, a little bit, that's where the pardon comes from because anything to keep him out of office.
I hate to say that I'm saying anything, but man, public education is on the ballot in the fall.
And this to me is, you know, along with everything we've known to anybody is what do you think he's going to do?
What do you think he's going to do? Come on.
He did away with the woman's right to choose the idea of doing away with public education.
If that will make his supporters happy, he's going to do it because he doesn't care.
He has no moral connection.
He has no sense of civic duty, no sense of public anything.
So the idea of destroying public education, that will be something he will celebrate when he is if he gets reelected.
And that's my fear of Donald Trump.
That is such a powerful response to him.
Yeah, go on, Johnny.
Whoa, Jess, take us there.
Okay.
Tim, I'm hearing a lot of emotion in what you're saying.
I'm hearing a lot of feelings.
I'm hearing a lot of fear, a lot of anxiety.
And that's real.
That's really real, man.
I applaud you for letting some of that show.
And for working through some of your feelings on air, that's a brave thing to do.
Yeah, give yourself a hug, man.
I'm giving a self hug.
Yeah, I know he's watching out there.
Yes, what's the thing that you called it when we say we have conversations for the gods or something.
Conversations for the heavens.
What?
Locate.
Bishem Shamayim.
Argument for the sake of heaven.
Yeah.
So we're learning to engage in that a little bit here that we can disagree and we can all come out of it better.
That's right.
And have our fields and effort, our fields and Tim shared his 10 man.
I, I want to say, I, I, I hear where you're coming from and I, and, and I don't think it's possible to eliminate public education.
I think, you know, like saying it's dead, it's going to end.
It's going to be, be gone.
I think that's preemptive.
And I think it's an early surrender.
I know that you're not surrendering, but even the source of it is like, say, come on, we're going to lose all of this.
We're going to lose all of this.
I'm telling you, I've taught places where public schools barely exist anymore.
And they still exist in strong ways.
The concept of public education is impossible to, to, to get rid of.
It's, it's, they're trying to privatize it.
And Trump is going to smoke screen things and make a mess to the point where it's really hard to fund.
But I'm going to come up with another thing to tell you, how do you handle a bully?
And this might not be popular again.
Tim sharing his feelings.
I'm sharing my feelings.
You punch him right in the mouth.
And so I'm tired of the whining and the whole like, well, we've got to tell people more that this isn't fair.
That this isn't going to work.
You fight fire with fire within reason, right?
And I'm not advocating for unjust violence.
But I'm also saying anybody who tells you if someone's coming into your house to do harm to you or to do harm to your family and physically threaten you.
And you're not going to respond with the appropriate violence to stop them.
Then you're, then you're lying to me.
Or then you like, we really have to protect you.
So we're going to come back.
When we come back, we're going to jump back in on this because I do hear you, Tim.
But I disagree.
I think this is a moment of organizing.
I think this is a moment where we collectively punched a bully in the mouth.
Take it to Friday night football.
That's all I'm saying.
Yeah!
And how many lives have been wasted?
How many bodies have laid to us?
Sick of the lies?
The same old story?
Forever and ever and ever and ever and ever.
Forever and ever and ever.
Yeah, there it is.
Busted pencils fully-led.
Education talk, educated educators talking education.
Johnny, it is TGIFBP.
Thank goodness.
It's Friday busted pencils.
Man, what a great show.
Collars, textures, everybody there.
Okay, John.
I, you were saying that my passionate worry,
my anxiety, my fear, my just absolute sense to public education is on the ballot with Trump.
And that if Trump gets reelected, it would be, you know, destroyed in this country.
And you're saying, well, I don't know.
I don't think so.
It's going to exist in places.
I agree with you.
But the concept, the attack, the symbolism of taking out public education and privatizing it.
I think you're right.
That's what it'll happen.
He's going to throw a massive national voucher across and it's going to be out there.
And that begins the beginning.
It's just the, the attack on democracy that I fear here.
And that's what I want people to realize.
If you're listening to civic media, you're listening to busted pencils here.
You're like, well, they have a talk show about education.
It's like, yeah, we do.
We have a show because it's about democracy.
It's recognizing that public education is the vehicle for democracy for the citizens of this country.
Public education is that vehicle that allows people to become democratic citizens.
That's my fear.
I agree that there will be something left.
I'm just worried that the civic mission of democracy will go away.
Well, and let's not forget the education is a state right.
And that's where I'm coming back with, how do you deal with a bully?
You punch me in the mouth.
And I'm not saying like you actually like physically do thought, but you can't just say, oh, no, or this guy.
You know, we'll figure out you can't pardon it.
You can't do all these kinds of passive ways of working around the fact that someone is telling you dead face.
I'm going to do this to you.
I'm going to do this to your community.
I'm going to cause harm.
I'm going to directly threaten him like you're passionate about and believe in it.
And I grew to a public education.
Here's the other thing.
That's not how it works, buddy.
That's just flat out.
Not how it works.
And that's how bullies get their power is they they push what they push their way through.
And they ignore the way it works.
The way it works is education is a state right.
So every single one of us and whatever state we're in in this country civics less than 101 right.
Education is a state right.
Your state can say, you can't tell us what to do with our public schools.
And in fact, Idaho does a great job at that, right?
Yeah.
You've got as a great job at that.
So I'm not advocating that that's necessarily in those states a positive thing right now.
But certainly every single person out there who's like worrying and I get the worry.
I'm not belittling it.
But like they're like, what happens if Trump gets elected?
Newsflash, if he runs, there's a strong chance the man gets elected.
So start preparing for what to do.
And what we do in a case of public education is we assert the state right to have control and jurisdiction over education.
So federal government, sorry, but we're not doing what you want.
If we don't agree with it, we just won't do it.
And I do believe really strongly that people have the ability to stand up to a bully.
That's what this is about.
Like do not you can't we already know the logic part out the window.
We had a great text in from Mark, I believe, who said, you know, remember,
one of the things about being pardoned is you the party pardon has to accept an admit guilt.
Right.
I actually think Donald Trump would say, okay, great.
Yeah, I did this.
I don't care.
I'm going to keep pushing.
Yeah.
So, you know, by big thing about it.
So when you talk about the worry of public education, that's where I come back with.
Well, you know what?
I'm going to fight my fight where it can respond to whatever happens in November.
And that's at the state level.
And that's where man, it's right there.
And I'm telling you, Johnny, yeah, mobilize the forces right now.
States rights and do this.
But I'm telling you to, though, and I saw this.
The internal chat here I put down there, my worry though, Johnny, that a lot of public school advocates.
I'm, man, I've just, you know, the to be able to step up.
And maybe this is a criticism of the left and liberals, too, as much as, you know,
because, man, when it comes to fighting a bully, the whole idea that you're going to step up and do what's necessary, what's required.
I just haven't seen it, man.
And, you know, because when I talk about public education, I know there are advocates out there.
But then there are times when I'm talking to some of my advocate friends.
And they're like, well, we can't do that.
We couldn't organize around something like that.
We couldn't push that envelope.
Yes, she could.
Yes, she could.
And in fact, you know, where you could do that really well, Johnny.
Minnocle.
Minnocle, man.
Do it with us.
Minnocle brewing.
You know why?
Yeah, I gotcha, man.
So, bust a pencil sponsored by Minnocle Brewing Company, who sued the state of Wisconsin to end its parasitic voucher system that hurts public schools.
Minnocle Brewing Company is making Wisconsin great one beer at a time.
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So, we're fired up here.
You know, we're going, I'm saying punch the bully in a mouth.
I'm ready to go.
I'm saying states assert your right to have say over how education is done in your state.
And I'm not worried that there's going to be an end to public education.
I'm saying they're a bigger fish to fry.
And you'll rarely hear me say this because I like public education a whole lot.
But I know it's going to live.
I know it's going to survive.
I know it's going to be there on the other side.
We need to put the bully out of the way.
This man cannot become president of this United States or we're in for a bigger, more trouble kind of arrow than we really want to.
So public education is part of that.
But I'm saying like, here we go.
Let's go.
We're completely dysregulated.
Go ahead.
One way to end the show or wrap up our week, right?
TGIFBP.
But Jess, you do you have a gift for bringing this back.
And I think maybe it might be a good moment to invite in some of that reminder that you've brought to the show for the last week and a half as our producer.
How can you bring us back, Jess?
We need some regulation.
We're going to regulate for a moment.
So in my household, we use shape breathing a lot.
We're just going to teach a very simple shape breathing here at the triangle.
You're going to breathe in for three to four seconds.
You're going to hold your breath for five to six seconds.
And then you're going to exhale for six to seven seconds.
Now the numbers don't matter as much as the fact that you're breathing in holding and then releasing.
And this is bringing oxygen back to your brain.
Remember, teacher.
Halley told us about how we need that oxygen to flip our lid back.
So please remember to breathe everyone.
Take a few moments.
Really, it only takes a minute.
Re-regulate yourselves, my friends.
Man, with that.
Thank you, Jess.
Busted pencils, man.
Next week, looking forward to it.
See y'all have a great weekend.
Thank you.