Peter and Laura Dissect NC Teacher Protests and Taxes

Peter Pappas: And everyone welcome and good evening. Welcome to the Carolina cabinet. I'm your host, Peter Pappas in studio with Mrs. Laura Musler. Hello. Hello. The lovely Mrs. Laura Musler. ⁓ thank you. As usual. Yeah. I the lovely. Yeah. I know. can't, you know, I knew you were going to call me out on that. So I hear the cabinet. know this is the smartest hour of radio and our job is to give a voice to the conservatives of Fayetteville, Cumberland County and beyond. Even if my best friend isn't listening. said, what show? ⁓ he's totally going to get it. So, ⁓ anyway, so we've had a interesting. week or so diving right in. Any, any big news your way? know you have a big event coming up this weekend. Yes, we sure do. The Red Roses. for the roses. Yes. Oh my goodness. I forgot to call the chamber of commerce today. Well, they'll be open tomorrow. They have a networking event tomorrow. I know I'm going to be there in the morning. So we got to wake up early. I gotta be up at 730 AM. Fayetteville tech on Fort Bragg Road brag roadside. That's what is that? Continuing ed building. What do they call that building? It's the one that faces barbecue hut, whatever. just know where to go. The chamber of commerce will have their business networking breakfast first Tuesday of every month. ⁓ gotta be there seven 30 if you want to eat, cause, they got some good, good, good food and always just have pork though. Well, then don't be a North Carolinian. Okay. I don't know. I'm not a North Carolina. I guess I am now. are real. mean, from California originally right right so you're not really a Yankee southerner. You're just kind of here. I'm nothing. Thank you I appreciate that what gosh what are you neither one great partner? you just So yeah the networking event tomorrow, hopefully you can give away a couple of tickets Yep, so we have a lot of people signed up already. It's gonna be an exciting event You're gonna be doing it at anchor alleys. Yes, but it's like fancy like I didn't even understand the The food towns Not exotic, but I've definitely never heard of some of the food on anchor Ali's menu. Right. It's down. It's, it's like, imagine to debt on Saturday of this week coming up that you are going to the Kentucky Derby. Now I realize the Kentucky Derby is over, but we're in the middle. It was just Saturday. Yes. You're kind of like the dogwood festival. Like you have the festival. No, I'm just saying, imagine that you're going there because we still have the Belmont stakes and the Preakness. So we're in the middle of the circle. there's still horse related stuff. That's correct. It's also the eve of mother's day. Okay. So if you don't want to wait for hours on mother's day, this is a wall of red roses, a red carpet leading you in. This is like high class, high society stuff at a discount price. I mean, come on for the very cheap price of two or no. Is it a hundred dollars? Okay. So the ticket price is, ⁓ a hundred dollars, but I'm running as a midnight special between now and tomorrow at midnight. Two tickets. you do members pricing, I'm going to doing members pricing, two tickets for $100 only until midnight, night, tomorrow night. Cause it's for the members of the chamber of commerce and the members of our club. Two tickets for $100 is that as a steal considering I already put a check on your desk for 250 for Fort Bragg Road tickets. Actually. No, you didn't. You put it on for, um, 300, that's a Whatever you, yeah. Anyway. Yeah. I got you for an extra hundred bucks. There you go. See, I mean, it includes food. It includes drink. We're going to have a band. You get one, not you get one alcoholic drink and or unlimited non-alcoholic drinks. pretty fancy too. mean, I might have to turn the pinky up when I drink some of that stuff. have a parasol and I have a skirt that looks just like roses. It's, I'm, I'm, and to wear fancy floppy hats. Yes. Where you're fascinated. A fascinators, which I never heard until this event. Yes. And when you, I always was aware of girls in big, big hats and big sunglasses. That was always kind of a caution for me. Okay. Well, this is for the event. This isn't just, yes, they're hiding the bald spot on back of their head, but yeah. Well, ⁓ it's a reason to get dressed up and not have to go out and fight the crowds for Mother's Day. I mean, there are not a lot of events that are upscale for the just regular prep. I mean, they do their upscale things at the country clubs and they do their upscale. I'm a normal person. don't belong to a country club. That's exactly right. For, like I said, for a hundred bucks, where can you get an entire meal, have entertainment and fun and you can't not for two. can't. So. I'll be, I had to wear seersucker or can I just, I don't have any of that. Well then why did you offer? I'm not offering. was asking, okay. Well, I want the men to wear, like what you would bring to the Kentucky Derby, pair of like, know, the last time I went to one of those things, I was, uh, my friends were in grad school and it was nothing but a big old lots of coolers of beer and we didn't really care what we were. Okay, well that's some direction on me. It says garden party attire. So feel free to go online and look at it. to Google it garden party. I helped you Google somebody's dress. Yes, you You did. You did. Yeah, not for me. Yeah, you're not my companion. That's Okay. ⁓ well I'm excited. It's going to be a good weekend. We get to be among friends and I have, I have three people and there's no speech. This isn't like a, cause Fayetteville Republican women's club is hosting it dry. Right. But this is no speeches. No elected officials. This is just let's come together and have a beautiful event and have a great time together. There's so much negativity around politics. This is let's just have some fun and laugh and joke. And if you're a Democrat, come on. If you're an independent, come on. If you're a Republican, come on. If you're a whatever, no commies. I'm just joking. Especially if you're a Democrat, come on and see why we're a better choice. You know, like we know how to change anybody's mind. I just want to have fun. I can't, I can't fix them. You know, they should. see a better way to do stuff. So, uh, I'd be almost remiss. So, uh, may the fourth be with you, Laura. Oh, thank you. You have also with you. don't know. Like it sounds like church, man. You know, for once it's a holiday. There's no legislative study committee. There's no budget. This is just nerds with Cal. We have a deadly day tomorrow. Do we? Yeah. Cinco de Mayo and taco Tuesday all on the same day when you almost died No, i'm just saying taco Tuesday and Cinco de Mayo. Holy smokes That's like two like major things coming together on the same day. Okay. Yeah, it's like yeah All the stars are aligned. Look i'm a star trek guy So never really got the star wars thing but for one day a year I guess I can let the star wars guys have it um, but uh, Yeah, they can go be annoying somewhere. Yeah, exactly. I don't know. What is it? Um cosplaying and How do they do? What is it? ⁓ that's the Vulcan. Yeah. See, it's that. Yeah. No, that's Star Trek. Live long and prosper. That's not, yeah, that's, I think it turns out to be incestuous. Like the Darth Vader or somebody's brother. No, it's Luke. I am your father. Yes. I actually, ⁓ well, ⁓ smart one. are. Someone gave me a, a gag gift. One year it was a condom that says I will not be your father. Nice. Okay. Hey, you know, guys and gag gifts were pretty good at stuff like that. So let's talk about the North Carolina legislature. ⁓ they were in short session last week. ⁓ of course they didn't do a whole hell of a lot, but well, cause it's a short session. a short session. Well, and I say that because we're still in a budget deficit here. We're a budget desert. I should say we just don't have one. Right. ⁓ now the one major thing was that. It was house bill 696, which means nothing to anyone became session law 2026 dash one. So I guess that means it was the first governor Stein did sign it on April 30th. The bill was about Medicaid and other critical needs. ⁓ Apparently it protects coverage. So doesn't give new coverage, but a protected coverage for 725,000 of our citizens. many of that is for how much of that is fraud though? I don't know. So the big thing with Medicaid is the federal government said, look, we're not going to, we're just not going to fund it. So the state now has, uh, pretty much taken the responsibility of backstopping Medicaid. that's kind of a big deal. That's more money that we weren't, what do you call it? Unfunded mandate is what that is. Um, but 725,000 people in North Carolina would have lost it if our legislature didn't pass this bill. So it looks like. Republicans and Democrats, all right, getting along. Governor Stein signed the bill. So, or maybe it was just stripped down enough that he could. ⁓ I dunno, who knows? I never know. I never, there's gotta be something. I'm, we have to work together. I understand that. Okay. But, ⁓ I'm never surprised anymore about the things that the Republicans will give away to get along. As opposed to having some backbone and standing behind what our core beliefs are. Well, I, in an exchange with our state Senator over the weekend and you know, it's always friendly with Senator Applewhite and me, but you know, I brought up, there was a post about bashing the Republican party or something. I said, look, why don't you just say something you love about the democratic party instead of worrying about what you hate about the So, you know, people are anti-Republican. call fascists and all this other good stuff that they don't know the damn definition of those words to begin with. But my point was just very basic, like, look, all right, cool. You hate us. Fine. What do you like about your own people? And when you turn, when you turn it inward on folks, they're first of all surprised. And second of all, they're like, ⁓ crap, the mirror's on me. I don't know what I like about myself because that's their problem. Democrats for the most part that are, that are. And this goes for hateful Republicans too, but the hateful Democrats that just post that kind of stuff and the Senator didn't post the original post. She just responded to me. ⁓ you know, it's just like, well, just instead of bashing us, tell me what you like about your own house. Right. And usually they can't say anything. And then the Senator and I went back and forth about, ⁓ she said, well, the Republicans blocked every bill that the Democrats put up in the state legislature. And my point was, well, maybe it didn't have. the right ideology that wasn't progressive. know, progressive gets misused in the political realm. Sounds good, doesn't it? We want to progress. Right. Who doesn't want to do that? No, but that's not- progressive means something very, very different than the textbook. And in the context of politics, it means what you would consider woke, what you would consider the super liberal blue hair crazy stuff. Wow. And we've defined blue hair crazy on the show before. We know we love everybody, but we have the crazy red hats and we have the crazy blue hairs. Yes, we do. We each have our own crazies. of us in the middle get tired of being lumped in with the crazy khaki wearing torch burning righties. And I'm sure that the regular Republicans. ⁓ yeah. Okay. Just clarifying. I'm not crazy, but I have khaki style today. And then I'm sure the moderate Democrats don't want to be with the purple haired lefty loons. I share that view. Now, ⁓ in my travels this weekend, I listened to the Ruthless podcast, which is those Fort Bragg Road ⁓ lobbyists types up DC ⁓ and they are just of the mind. There are no good Democrats. Well, that's not true. are. ⁓ for, ⁓ I will say this. I, ⁓ on Sunday, I went to a Christian like talking about laws and things like that. and the separation between church and state and how it's actually, people have it backwards and you can't have, know, whatever. If you're voting, if you go to church and you're a Christian, how can you vote for killing babies? If you go to church and you're a Christian, how can you vote for some of the leftist policies that are anti-, oh, well, you got to separate church and state. No, you're either a Christian or you're not. You're either Christian with convictions and you do what your conviction tells you. understand that. And I think I've even brought that up on the show before, ⁓ with other guests. the thing is thinking back in retrospect, is that oversimplifying just because like a Venn diagram that if Democrat must kill baby or if Republican must not want to like must be pro life and if Democrat must be pro choice. Is it that song? Okay. I don't necessarily believe that all Democrats believe that it's okay to murder a baby, but they're voting and putting those people in that are an acting and standing up for those behaviors. They're voting people in saying, we believe in women's rights, unless you're a guy and you want to be a woman, then you can go ahead and compete and beat up on our girls. Yeah. No, we can. category where you know trans people can compete against trans people that's cool whatever but you can't be one is that our main problem with Democrats because there's I will I will hand it to the Democrats that we do beat them up on the girls and sports and the whole yeah but they're trying to be empathetic more empathetic instead of logical in my opinion they're looking out for the best interest of the in getting reelected well I think I think it's more that than it is that they really believe this crap. Really? I don't think, I don't believe everybody up there that's got a D by their name just believes everything hook line is sinker. Like, Sanders, mr. Lib, mr. Lib tard, ⁓ he is endorsing. There's a candidate up there in Maine. The guy's got a Nazi tattoo on himself. Right. It's a Bernie's fighting for Nazis bad, unless you're on our team. Yeah. you're a good Nazi. mean, it's, you mean really the heart of hearts, Bernie Sanders, who I'm assuming, is he a Jewish guy? I mean, it sounds like it. you know, good old Bernie, you know, he's endorsing some guy that has very outspokenly, but he apologized for it. that may go away. ⁓ but see when ⁓ a Democrat, a Republican does it, you can be held liable for forever. But if you're a Democrat, you apologize. ⁓ he's sorry for him. okay. Yeah. I bet he's sorry being caught. He ain't sorry for it. Right. So, Hey Mario, how you doing? It's been a long time, sir. It's good to see you, Mr. Independent. ⁓ You know We we see you and appreciate you joining. Yeah, you need to come join us Saturday night. Yeah, yeah would be one of the best dressed men and we wouldn't even ask him to DJ for free Like I could have been a gig, you know, we should have asked him to come out. We have a band. We have a band Yes, we're the band. Yes. Okay, who's the band? You'll see. All right. I'll see. Okay, great. It's a good one. Actually, there's better not be you and a jug No jug band. No thing. What you saying about my judge? don't know Lord ⁓ to everybody watching, thanks for tuning in. ⁓ let's talk about something that doesn't make me turn red on air. ⁓ let's see. talk about the walkout. Yes. The teachers. Okay. So this is the first time Laura, I'm going to share with you. ⁓ let's see what I want to do first. I'm going to share. Okay. Just so everybody knows, I've not seen these videos. Please don't judge me by my face. I haven't had the opportunity to view this in order to temper my, Okay. here we go. ⁓ I'm gonna just now PD Pablo showed up at the North Carolina association of educators protests. I'm going to call it right now, but I hear, here we go. Let's see here. So let's get it come up. Okay. And We're going to watch the whole thing, so strap in. Was it a concert? No. So far I'm seeing some people that could use the steps. But who doesn't like Petey Pablo, man? But you're missing school for this. Hold on. Okay. So I mean, first of all, who doesn't love Petey Pablo? Okay. like the native son. I mean, come on. Isn't he from Rocco? think it's from Robeson County. I don't know. Petey Pablo. I will say I like the song, like the music. Yeah. But that's a concert that's not a protest. Stay tuned. I got more now. So the rest I have are just pictures that I stole from Facebook. ⁓ I'll just go ahead and admit that right now, but, ⁓ you know what? I'm probably gonna mess this up. Hang on a second. Yeah. You know, I'm not tech support over here. You're more techie than I am. Or Trekkie. Trekkie. Yes, I'm more Trekkie. Yes, I'm way more Trekkie than that. So, okay. Here we go. All right. I'm going to share and we're just going to, let's just comment on these as we go through them. So there's Petey Pablo again. ⁓ You know, well, there's a couple of skinny folks in the back. Hey, hey, hey. I'm just saying they're probably not my number one customer right there. So, you know. They need a little steak and cheese in their life. Okay. So, uh, again, there you go again. Like it looks like a lot of, a lot of younger teachers there. Uh, good, good mix of representation of North Carolina there. This though. Okay. that's now hold on. on. We're gonna go back. All Now let's talk about this BS for a moment. Okay. Refuse fascism.org. What in God's green earth does Donald Trump have to do with your Education Dollar. You want to look that up? You want to give them a hit? Refuse fascism.org. Yes. Okay. So, you know, I saw the Petey Pablo thing. I think I have a couple more here. So here's another one. Make America pay reparations. No Kings. And then let's see if I have anything else. Proud to be woke progressive Democrats. Okay. So they're making it a partisan issue. what about the Republican teachers that are there? There you go. Socialism is a future and look at her Hamas leaning head scarf. So let's think about it like this. okay. First of all, if Trump was a fascist, you wouldn't be able to have signs like that. You would be taken out by the government. So let's start there. Number one, simply. I mean, let's just start with basic one on one. You would this website refuse fascism.org. ⁓ This they would hunt you down and they would make you ⁓ Pay and yeah, no no work. No school. No business as usual a demand a day to demand Trump must go now So, all right. Let me let me say this clearly. All right good teachers. They deserve respect good teachers deserve support They also should be able to make a living without working two or three jobs so I We had lunch today and you met the teacher that I helped out from Uh, Alger Wilkins, the, uh, high school on us on the bypass, you know, she works at least one other side job to make ends meet that I know of. Um, but this May 1st thing, it wasn't a teacher pay rally. It was not, it was, you got 700,000 students miss school. mean, there were whole school districts and they had to close down. Right. So if the teachers wanted to piss people off, I think they made it clear last Friday. mean, school's almost out for the year and they, they could have gone and protested on June 1st when schools out, right? No, we've got to make a statement and include our children and get our children. now the children are political pawns. It's funny. I just saw something by Ben Shapiro today. I got a story. Go ahead. Well, look, I just think that you can advocate for the teachers without using the students as leverage. There is a way to get better pay for the teachers. This kind of and to me this infiltration of this crazy this anti-fascist anti what the hell You're an educator, right? And then an educator and you're saying that Trump is a fascist then you need to go back to school yourself and become educated Yeah, because that's incorrect and for that fake news and misinformation what it said all of no, no, no, no and no If he was a fascist, he wouldn't return power back to the state, right? You wouldn't be able to protest and have a day off. And oh, by the way, if you're a teacher and you want to protest, I respect your right to protest. Dr. Pay. And you shouldn't, yeah, you shouldn't be able to be on the clock and take PTO. mean, look, they already get paid. We already screw them enough with their pay. So, you know, I did a protest on your own time near on my tax dollars. I pay for it you. Just like the. Police I pay for your salary When you get pulled over I found that is not a good strategy No with the policeman to say I pay your salary and I don't mean that in another way I paid your salary or whatever But those are our tax dollars at work and if you want to protest I respect your right to protest ⁓ Yeah, feel free to protest on your own time. I don't go to work. I don't get paid. Absolutely You don't go to work and you don't let's remember who the NCAE is See North Carolina prevents unions ⁓ for teachers here in North Carolina. So it's against the law to unionize, but the NCAE is a education association who wields a lot of power. They take a lot of ⁓ money from the teachers out of their paycheck. I want to, I want a union for the students. teachers don't need unions. The students do. Let's start looking after. It's like we got to get a lawyer for the students to defend. So. ⁓ We do I did reach out to the conservative teachers alliance. I want to have them back on the show They've been on with me twice since I've been hosting ⁓ yeah, well, I and I reposted Mario's there, you know, the political parties have become the new hate groups I think it's some of the extremes. You're right Mario. I think ⁓ Not that I feel sorry for the Chuck Schumers of the world, but he's not, he doesn't have a backbone. what has no backbone, but he has actually a primary problem from AOC because she is so woke and this and that, and she's everybody's darling. She needs to go back to serving drinks and the Democrats love these liberal lunatics because they raise money quickly and it's about the money. They, know, It was, it used to be okay just to be a little liberal. fine. know, now it's how liberal are you and who can be the best at how who's going to win the most trophies? Where do you, I'm a victim scale. So let me see here. I had, I did have a few videos. I'll see if we can get through the NCA. So look, my thing with the NCA is they are an over-powered Overpowered overpaid organization and they are they are weaponizing themselves against the students. Yep Now, how do we move forward with teacher pay because we are smack dab in the middle in the country? in the middle with performance too. We're 22nd for performance How about make it a merit-based system where you the better yours? You have a bit every teacher has a base salary and based on your students your individual students how they test on grade levels and things like that and how they, and we need to get back to reading, writing and arithmetic. You get bonuses based on how your students. and that's one thing. So do want to mention, ⁓ have to the Pidea back to Pidea way of educating. What the hell's that? Yeah. Hmm. Okay. So, so I have invited, ⁓ Mr. Tom Hatch. He is a former education, lifelong educator. He's been a Cumberland County schools principal. ⁓ He has spent decades in the school system. He is coming on May 13th, which is next Wednesday. I think yeah Because basically I reached out to Tom I said hey He ran for school board. He didn't make it this time around but I know he knows what the hell he's talking about I you he knows what the Pideia education system sure he does smarty. So ⁓ you just you're gonna make me Google something I'm gonna let you one up me right now, but ⁓ Mr. Hatch so There's been talk of Leandro and we've heard Leandro, Leandro, Leandro. So because Leandro is such an old, ongoing court case, I mean, it's so old that the kid who was the plaintiff is named Leandro was in Hoke County. Now he's an attorney. He's been through school, graduated everything law school. Now he's fighting for the actual law named after him. So this thing's been around for a long time and I wanted Mr. Hash to kind of help me cut through some of the noise. He sent me plenty of primers. So I have plenty to read before next Wednesday, but, ⁓ I want to talk to him about how we can pay teachers more because one thing we did discuss was the biggest screw up that we Republicans made the no child left behind act. And that is when our school system decided, let's start teaching for the test and not teaching this to think because we were trying to find a metric. We were trying to find some measurable way to be fair. to give teachers raises and to incur, but well intended, horrible execution is the way I would put that. anyway, so we're going to have Mr. Hatch here. That should be fun. He's going to be a good guest. ⁓ you know, he, he's very active still in the community. He is not going anywhere. So, ⁓ what do got next? You want to pay some property taxes? ⁓ no, I want to move to Florida and not have to. Why? because frat bronda sanders is has ⁓ introduced a bill he's not only done away with that income tax but now he wants to do away with property taxes with ⁓ if you have your own single-family dwelling where you live your primary residence is in and with you so far okay in florida they're going to try and make a law where you do not have to pay property taxes you will own your property and not have to continue to lease it from the state for the rest of your life. Well, let's clarify that. So, you you buy your house, you pay your mortgage every month. Usually inside your mortgage is principal and interest taxes and insure the PITI. So basically if you sign the mortgage, then you will not have the T. You'll still have insurance, but you won't have taxes to be paid because essentially No matter if we own a property outright or we're paying on it, we're on a perpetual land lease. Right. From the government. That's right. You never own your home. And when the government decides it's coming for your home, they will out price you out of your home. Be a retired person on a. Okay. This is my argument with that though. Okay. Okay. You, you've, said that several times. It was a very busy lunch ⁓ and you know, we've talked about it today, but the government didn't price you out. the market priced you out of your that is where I own my home. understand. I own my home. Your home is worth whatever those valuations say. Okay. When I get to sell it, then okay. Now, I don't want to lose it from the government. I agree with that. It is unrealized gain. So maybe there's a middle ground here to, ⁓ block the appreciation or like you only pay taxes on that original value. No, I think once you own your if you are purchasing your primary residence where you live You should be able to own it now when you sell it or you move or whatever if it's a rental property or whatever Then you pay taxes on it But if it's your primary resident, you should have the option of one day government give you one You should have at least one freebie. That's exactly right It's not the government giving you anything right you owning something that you've worked for all of your life because literally there are people right now that are on fixed income, they've retired and our taxes have gone up exponentially in some areas and they're like, Holy smokes, I don't know if I can afford my home anymore. Again, I have to, I gotta say the tax rates did not, the evaluations went up, which is the market. And that's what a lot of people, but I'm not selling. So, so it's, realize, right. So why should I be paying for something that I haven't sold? This is why I even give a damn. Okay. This is my whole, my beginning to end. how the hell are we going to pay for school buildings, for police, fire, roads, because that right now is how we pay. It's through property taxes now. I have an idea. As soon as, if we can study how much impact that would have and how we can either replace it or cut it out of our budget, then I think we can proceed and I won't have a problem. that's. where I'm at right now. want a usage tax. The more money you spend, the more money you pay because those of us that live on tight budgets, we are a lot of, you know, we're buying, you know, um, loaf of bread and milk and things like that. And that's our budget. Okay. So we have to pay a little bit more for that. That's fine. But then the people that are out buying cars and homes and, luxury items, you pay more. okay. So think about, think about the dollar stores for a moment. We know the dollar stores it's been proven, take advantage of the, lower income bracket folks because they, the perception is a value. can only buy one roll of toilet paper or one of this, of that you're paying more. So with that logic, they're paying more for that roll of toilet paper. It means they're going to pay more tax. it would disproportionately affect the poorest. if I have a dollar 50 and it's going to come, well, you go to the dollar store, the dollar store, it's not the dollar store. It's a dollar 20 or something. like that. Yeah. But then you can start budgeting for items. I know that there's going to be a 20 % tax on anything I purchase. If I'm purchasing a dollar item, I pay a dollar 20. If I'm purchasing a hundred dollar item, I'm paying $120 more taxes. The more you spend, the more you pay. So you want to tax the rich, you're taxing the rich. Here, I got to play devil's advocate for the poor. If they're renting, they're going to the dollar store, they're paying rent. they're renting a place that is not my primary residence. have now purchased an investment property to rent to them. I'm paying now higher taxes on that. I'm going to pass those taxes onto my renter. So now they, the $1,500 a month goes to 1800 a month. Well, know what? market will take care of itself. And that's my issue right now. We're so early stage. I don't think it's a bad idea to let me live in my house tax free. mean, I, we worked hard enough. But how are we going to, you're talking about changing an entire system that we grew up in and maybe it's comfortable and I'm afraid to change. That's exactly right. There's nothing, anybody that works in being comfortable all the time, nothing great ever comes of it. But if you want to make great changes, there's going to be great uncomfortable. periods of time, you got to learn and adjust and okay, well that didn't work. Well, let's fix it or whatever. There are times of being uncomfortable in order for Iran not to have a nuclear weapon and blow us all to high hell. have to be uncomfortable and pay more for gas right now. Not as much as when Biden was office, but we have to be uncomfortable for a moment. that, but we forget, see that that's the problem with Americans, you know, damn well, we have a short attention span. we don't. the, the, um, I'm saying we don't. said we don't. mean, we remember. No, I've been told that I don't remember anything, but the media pounds at home. Yeah. And then you start to feel something that you should not be feeling. Be logical. Sit down. Would you rather have, would you rather let's play the game? Would you rather ⁓ have Iran have a nuclear weapon and What do they say? Death to Israel? No, not death to Israel. There's another one. Death to what's that country? Brazil. No, not Brazil. America. America. Yeah, that's America. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And screw those guys. Yeah. So would you rather have them come and bomb us with nuclear weapons or would you rather pay $5 a gallon for three months, Fort Bragg Road months, five It's a little pinch right now. And think ⁓ six months from now, everybody's going to forget it. That's exactly right. And the other thing I tell people is when they complain for gas, like, well, Can you do without it? No. All right. Just this week you're going to pay a little more. Uh, I don't like that. I'd like gas to be 50 cents a gallon, but that's not the reality we live in. then we say that we, and the whole thing is that we're, pumping, we're energy independent. We're pumping more gas, but the because our infrastructure has not been updated since the seventies, we have not built a new refinery since the seventies. It's now 2026. That's 50 years. of old stuff. Do that. Are you driving a 50 year old car? Is your TV 50 years old? But our infrastructure is 50 years old. that argument before that we have that for resource, but we have a broken permitting system. have a broken like federal government, the EPA and all that stuff, which was meant to help keep our environment safe. You know, it takes a lot of energy to get the energy here. If we have to import foreign oil, we have to import foreign oil because all of our infrastructure only processes the thick, nasty, disgusting oil, not the beautiful, fine, thin oil that we have. If we upgrade our infrastructure, which people won't do, because why? Because the next administration that comes in might say, ⁓ yeah, no, nevermind. And then you're talking about billions of dollars and it takes you 30 years to recover your money. Why would you want to invest in something that may be the next? So not only do they want to kill all Americans, but their oil sucks too. way too soon. but that's what our infrastructure works. Well, let's go back to property taxes. Now what's going on in North Carolina? ⁓ there is representative Erin Paray. ⁓ she's one of the primary sponsors of house bill 10 89. is now this is cool. It is a proposed constitutional amendment that would require the legislature to enact a property tax levy limit. And it was referred to house finance on April 30th. Now define, okay, so I can only raise your taxes X amount of dollars, but your valuation, can inflate again. No valuation. See that's, that's the unfair part. Okay. The valuation is based on sales in the marketplace. Okay. Yes. It's unrealized gain. If you have not, are not preparing to sell your house, but that's what the market says your house is worth. We got boned this last valuation because we included the COVID years. That's right. And people in COVID were crazy. They were being paid to sit home and do nothing. And people had, don't want to say disposable income, but they had more on hand. had fraud. they got, they had plenty of fraud. Yeah. ⁓ there was some leering centers and we're to get to that in a minute. have some more I didn't tell you about. got to show you. so people were paying if their house is a hundred grand, they were paying 120. Right. So they were paying 20 % above list price just to have a damn place to live. So that's what drove up our valuation. And I think this is the most egregious and the most harmful valuation we've had in Cumberland County, probably in 50 years. know, people forget the two valuations ago. So let's see, was it 25 and then it was 18 and then it would have been 2011, 2010, 2011. Our values went down. because we included the recession of seven eight, oh seven and oh eight. So we're unforgiven, we're unforgiving when it goes up, but when it goes down, it's just like a whimper. It's like, eh, not, that I need to my government. Our tax rates went up in 2010. And before our tax rates are screwed with, I think they, they need to not only publish the revenue neutral rate, which says with these new valuations, here's the rate for me not to get another dollar, me being the county government. not only publish it, which they do, adopt it, make them live on that for the first year. And then after that, they have to make a damn good case on why they need to ask for an increase outside of the regular ⁓ cost of living adjustments and things for county staff. we shouldn't put a strangle on the people that work for us. Actually the county employees and the government employees are some of the high in Cumberland County anyways, they're paid above the average rate in the county that they live in. That's not right either. Our government employees are getting paid better than the people here in Cumberland County. Well, that's whole other argument in rabbit hole because in my opinion, you have to compete with the private sector and do you want the dumbest or do you want the best and brightest? And you're going to have to pay for it. Okay. We already have the dumbest. We have some. I how you think electives are hires? I can go. When you go to the end they once they get put in some humdingers in office, mean come on We do put some money really And that's nice. I can say that by the way, everybody joining us. It's nice to see y'all You can say hello if you like feel free, know, I won't call you out too bad. But so We needed we need to work through property tax. We're not there yet My concern is we already have enough trouble funding building like right now, Cumberland County schools, there's like $300 million in deferred maintenance and that all falls on the County. That's not a state issue. That's us. learned something today. So what did you learn? I learned that the schools asked for X amount of dollars and they ended up getting more money than they asked for, which means in the future they automatically get that money. It automatically went up. There was, it wasn't like a So that's a big disagreement for me. of why they were funded fully to begin with, not only that what you learned about them going over that they were given to Cumberland County Schools, I disagreed with the first part and I definitely disagree with the second part. They don't need a tip on top of it because to my knowledge, they've already asked for an additional few more million dollars. They asked for extra money thinking that they're going to negotiate down and they asked for extra money and then they got extra money and then some. now when it's time to pass that next budget, you know what they get? Plus plus so they get to go up think about this and I've said it before So my disapproval of funding the school system fully is not that I hate schools It's that we don't have as many children in the county school. We're missing how many people we're missing six Thousand students Wow, that's bigger than I thought. Yes like 1400. No, it said okay six thousand less students now than we had but we have a bigger budget that means like I We did the math. So the money from the county pays for buildings, pays for the capital stuff, the buildings and supplements the teacher pay. doesn't, the pay actually, they're state employees, but we supplement and I have it on good source that it was a tangible supplement this time around. Okay. Well, what I would like to see is administrator costs and we start limiting some of the administrators can only earn a percentage above what the teachers earn. Agreed because right now that administrators are earning three and Fort Bragg times ⁓ what the teachers earning ⁓ Well, we get on ⁓ wall street ceos that make you know multiples of their that's in the private sector No, no, know i'm saying using the same rationale, you know, we get on wall street ceos for making I mean in that case like 10 000 times more than some harista but ⁓ Why can't we apply some know ⁓ god forbid that you know, the real world out here has some pretty good lessons that maybe we can bring back. ⁓ Maybe we need to limit and make it so that my thinking of the administration and how we do things is that we're top heavy and bloated and that we can definitely afford to transom tree. ⁓ Again, that's another, we're going to have to have some more questions for Mr. Hatch when he comes here. ⁓ He actually, one thing he pointed out was that elementary schools are fully, like fully employed, like there's, they're full. But when you get to middle school, the attendance drops because people pull their kids out, go to private school, whatever. And then for high school, the, the enrollment goes back up. So there's a, there's a tangible dip in if you follow a kid from K through 12, he's there K through five, then six, seven, eight, he disappears. And then nine through 12, they reappear. ⁓ he has experience as being the principal at Ann Chestnut back in the nineties and early two thousands. ⁓ there were some programs that he was behind that he, uh, it was professional development for the middle school teachers to make a better quality. He, he, he understands the kids as, don't want to say a product, but he understands that they are, they are the results. I'm not trying, I don't want to make them sound like widgets. It's just, um, there are a future. are the future. And yes, but he understands that there is a role that the school and the teacher of that classroom plays. And he broke it down for me, like down to the classroom level. Like this is what needs to happen in every classroom, not at the school, every classroom. So I'm looking forward to that. before we wrap up here about the pie day away teaching. right. All right. All right. Well, yeah. I did put in here a note, you know, cause property taxes, they suck all the way around. And, ⁓ you know, sometimes it's like, what gives you the right? What gives you the right to tax me? And so North Carolina, ⁓ the right. for the legislature and local municipalities attacks us is called the Machinery Act. Okay. Sounds like a factory thing, but it tells us what property can be taxed. says who values the property. It says that if the county can change your value between appraisals, they can, but it's a little tough to do that. And who collects the tax. So the Machinery Act is the actual machinery that our government uses against us to take our money. Right. Okay. Right now it matters because it is in conflict. It's being like basically rewritten by this committee on property tax reduction and reform that Aaron Pare is one of the co-chairs. So that's where they are focusing their effort ⁓ to try to repeal some of this stuff. ⁓ So ⁓ let's see. If they were more studious with our money, then I wouldn't, I don't, I'm not opposed to taxes. think some taxes are good fire stations, police. roads, schools, things like that, but they're just so wasteful. So the thing is, it's like, look, I can't be like F the government. They don't deserve. Look, you are part of a society. I was thinking about it the other day. You and I disagree on the, um, SB 50 carry whatever. And I'm thinking, you know, as part of living in a society where I know my head is not getting chopped off next week, I'm willing to play the game. I'm willing to get the permit. I'm will because because why I want to be I want quiet enjoyment I want to be left alone. Okay, so go ahead So are you being left alone because let's pretend for a moment that we're living in the 60s where all the vehicles didn't have What are they called seat belts in them and people were driving around mining their own business? And imagine if one day out of the blue the government said in the 60s Everybody, want you to put a strap across your waist and across your face. And we're going to start videotaping you while you drive. They would be in the streets. What happens is the government takes a little bit, little bit of time at a time until you are no longer able to have a free society because they have nibbled away at your freedoms. So every freedom that they're going to take needs to be, they need to clutch it from my dying hands because I want a free society. Okay. I'm willing to play the game. Okay. I'm not. Well, I play the game, but they're going to fight me for it. Yes. Okay. So, uh, let's switch to now. I have other things that you have not seen yet. And I, I, uh, I actually meant to bring these up last week. Um, but let's watch what I got here. Okay. Yeah. So this guy, oh, Lee Zeldin, and crazy this now this is a crazy purple hair if I have ever seen one so let's watch ⁓ my god this is hilarious I actually saw this he schools her he handled it very well I thought mm-hmm can't hear what'd you say I'm lawmaker, I don't know. Okay. So first reaction, love it. I this guy. mean, you know who, who was angry in that exchange? not Lee's Eldon. Right. So because it's, it's, it's great to, I watch a lot of these videos where people are like, okay, like a woman that we was at that we can do, they go around and interview. Okay. What is it about this that makes it that way? When you question people, they get mad at you, they hit you, they walk away or they yell and they scream. So he's got facts, which is what's right in front of them. Right. Yeah. Here are the facts. Now, can you explain it? I'm not just telling you, no, no, no. Tell me the fact here are the facts respond. Let's talk about the context. So what he's saying is, and what Mr. Zeldin was trying to get across to her was that She, he's not calling climate change a hoax. He's not saying it doesn't exist. What he's saying is in the, in the Lope or bright in the legislation and the rules for the EPA climate change doesn't exist as a, as a concept. Right. That doesn't mean the EPA is not for clean air, clean water. It's just that whole climate change idea is not really ensconced in our rules. That's all. That's it. It's just not in there. Right. And. She's going crazy. She said she accuses him of running a hoax. Of who's running the hoax. That Mr. Zeldin and the EPA and as she, at some point she says you and your boss. So I hate to remind you, but he's your president too, lady. So that's, that's goes back to what we said earlier. It's the, okay. I believe, I believe in climate change and all of that stuff. So I'm going to take my private plane with just me in it and go and make But if I pay money though, that takes care of my carbon footprint, yeah. Let's go to the next one here, I got. ⁓ you like this. Is it the Learing Center? Yes, it is. Hmm, imagine that. they change the sign. Okay, you know, let's I don't watch Fox so this is totally news to me so they said it became viral in December. Uh-huh. Is that correct and ⁓ It's so now it is now mate so that video came out on I had it ready for the April 29th So so for Wednesday last week and it came out a couple days before that so we got a good Fort Bragg Road month lag right between whistleblowing and our government doing things. So can we call that a knee jerk reaction or is that maybe a planned and calculated action by our government? That seems like somebody maybe is going to secure an indictment from that. That seems pretty knee jerk to me. Four months for our government. It usually takes like years. ⁓ yeah. Well, I'm liking this attitude from the department of justice. Get on it. I agree. Get them. And I hope they end up in jail. Every one of them. And I hope they drop the soap and never recover. Yeah, buddy. But they might like it. All right. Let's go to the next. think I have one more here. Let's see what I got. Well, the same one. ⁓ Okay, I know I have another one, so hang on a second. Let me go to the folder and do Senator. ⁓ this one. OK. Crazy bald lady. All right. Crazy bald. Yeah. You know, love her. I can hear something I can't see. Okay. Yeah. She's a, think this is, you, you'll know who this is when I, when I share it. She seems like a regular on the crazy circuit. All right, here we go. Now who be that? what's her name? Presley? Yep. Okay. So Ms. Presley, let me make sure I turn this up here. It's all the way up. All right. P Mr. Higgins. Congressman Higgins from Louisiana, I believe. Yes, sir. Amen. So Mr. Higgins, I'm, he, he was a very popular, let me see if I can pull it. Well, he was a very popular sheriff. Okay. Let me see here. I should have just representative Clay Higgins is his name. Okay. And I want to see if I can find, he was a very, you know, that guy, Grady Judd in Florida. Like Clay Higgins was like the, the, maybe the first version of him. Okay. think, ⁓ he was very outspoken. He was very law and order. ⁓ let's see. Sheriff. Let's see. I like law and order. Yeah. It's a good show. No, I mean, I like law and order and I don't watch law and order on the show, the show, yeah, TV. Let's see. He is here. is. All right. Yeah. We're not going to watch the whole thing is it's two minutes, but Okay, I'll share this. Yeah, vaccines for kids. Yeah, there we go. Here we go. All right, here we go. So let me, oops. That's the same guy. Yep. Great names. You've never seen this never. Is this him running for office or is this just him being a sheriff? Why can we not have a sheriff like that? That's right. Is that a real gang, gremlins? Yeah, that's me not going along to get along. I love that guy. After I get some chills, know, like, you know, that guy, anyway, that came out several years before he ran for Congress and he's been in Congress a couple of terms now, I think. But anyway, so I thought I'd just play that. So your impression is we need a sheriff like him. Yeah. Okay. Every county does. I would like a sheriff. You know, I have some wish lists for sheriff, whether it's Mr. Winham or Mr. McDuffie, cause those are the two. that are going to be on the ballot in the fall. ⁓ I want a visible sheriff. I want somebody that's not afraid to stand up and say, law and order, you're safe in your homes. We're going to pursue criminals and we're going to support ICE. I'd like to hear that too. Which means they just got to read the computer when they, what do call it? When they book somebody. So I do have ⁓ a Hope Mills mayor. ⁓ Jesse Bell Flowers, he was scheduled to be with us this evening, but he was unable to attend. They did have a closed session on Thursday in regards to the state auditor's report. And then we have another meeting this evening. I think that's why we're missing Bambi. We haven't seen her tonight. But he will be coming here. We're going to have a serious conversation about the state auditor's report. you know, I do want to point out though, the auditor's report is not a criminal conviction. Okay. And not every allegation in the report was substantiated. I think that was the biggest takeaway I took from reading it was that the salaries, the salad. So there are a couple of what I would consider smoking guns. And honestly, I think we need to remember the style of government we have is rep it's representative. They are elected as a board, the town board, the mayor, all those people, but they then hire the county manager. I'm sorry, the town manager in that case. So I think the town manager has to answer for, ⁓ there was a letter written. wasn't that what that woman, Elise, wasn't she upset with the town manager for breaking different rules and things like that? it's, is this finding that the, is those things weren't substantiated. ⁓ They weren't even mentioned in the report, but, the things that were, the way I read that whole auditor's report is there's maybe like one thing. That could be the fault of the elected body. ⁓ The rest of what I read was a failure of administration, failure of process. For instance, there was a, ⁓ they have HR records that are paper and electronic. one and just keep them all together. know, so there's stuff like that. And I think that to me sounds like growing pains of the sleepy little town of Hope Mills to now. They're an actual town. Well, I have lots of paper records and I'm actually putting all on digital because paper is a pain in the butt. It is. But when you're dealing with people's pay and their HR records, I think that should be easily accessible. And I think it should be, ⁓ uniformly, yeah, uniformly where it belongs. So, all right. So we are coming up. We just broke an hour, just me and you. Well, Monica, I'm sorry. We, we went live. We went late today. ⁓ so Breach of fiduciary duty fraud theft breach of authority. That is some pretty powerful Accusations so and Monica is helping me to gather Questions from the Hope Mills residents. Are we gonna have the town manager on so I've wanted to have the town manager on I don't know if he's gonna be the town manager after tonight's meeting I Would think not if he's messed up that bad. I look No, let's quantify the messed up that bad They're gonna screw up in their jobs with ever 100 % Yeah, but this my understanding is was egregious. I Mess up. I don't want to I don't want to color with the adjectives that it's egregious or it's hard. Just okay. Well, I to talk about what you want I have the egregious red crayon. What color crayon do you my hungry for crayon tonight? ⁓ so I don't know I I don't want to be CNN or like star news and like, know, egregious and whatever. ⁓ let's let the people decide what they want to call it. And I just want to put the facts forward and, aren't I of the people? mean, yeah, you're one of, you don't live in a whole mill. I don't care what you think. ⁓ I read my 62 page auditors report or 52, whatever. So I looked at a few and it was so boring. fell asleep three times trying to it. It's not exactly a, I'm like, don't even know what they're talking about. I don't care to be 100 % honest. Well, I read it. have some notes, Monica, please stick with us and we're going to ask, we're going to summarize those questions, I did. She coward. You coward. guess. Yeah, it's fine. I different hat, different day. I did respond to somebody. ⁓ and this is where we got to figure out how the questions need to be formulated. There was one question that was offered in one of the groups that said, you know, ask the mayor about. why the police department is open 24 hours, how many people they've helped, whatever. And I responded, I mean, I wasn't mad at the question. It was just like, well, that sounds more like a police chief problem, like a police chief question. He should be able to tell us how many calls for service overnight. Apparently there police stations now staff 24 hours a day, which I mean, Hope Mills used to have like five officers. Now they have a lot more. Right. And if, ⁓ okay. So not to get too into it, but my son was killed. at nighttime in Hope Mills. I'm glad that the staff, their staff there because it took them longer to get out there because it happened. and that's a perspective. I think it's kind of like, let's let it be staffed because if you need them, you want them to be there. That's exactly right. So don't let it be not staffed and you be the one that need them. You'll appreciate it when you need them. Now I did smart off to somebody about the flock cameras. ⁓ somebody said they don't like the flock cameras tracking their every move. And I said, yeah, until somebody murders you. And those flock cameras are ideal for reading your license plate and finding who did it. It's also, there is no expectation of privacy in the public. Your license plate is not privileged information. Okay. You know, I mean, how many times have I been contacted from my restaurant downtown from the police to get the video to find out where their suspect went? I too have been contacted by the police because I have videos on, on, on light poles outside of my house. I understand. but there's a lot of. The flock cameras are not all ⁓ they're not what are they called encrypted right? Anybody can get on there and see it anytime. I think I have the app someplace for stalkers or whatever That's a little unsettling just like property taxes every thread you pull is gonna unravel something else. So Let's not do too knee-joking and ⁓ Monica. Yes. I know you're not talking about me ⁓ And we will stick to the report just the facts ma'am just like drag net so ⁓ We'll be back on Wednesday. We're gonna hope you guys enjoyed watching today a little bit different with the clips I'm trying to turn myself in the top point. ⁓ I guess I do want to talk about on Monday that North Carolina found some fraud ⁓ you want to talk about today or next week either way because I did some numbers Okay, well, let's dig in before we guys get ready to head out of here. So average benefits Okay, so we're talking about snap benefits. so North Carolina state found out that there are almost 500,000 people getting snap benefits that are getting it from another state. Also, they're double dipping. this is a nationwide survey. There's a half a million people that are getting snap benefits from two places. No, in North Carolina, North Carolina, a million here. Yes. That are getting them from somewhere else. Dead people. There are. ⁓ over 200, they said anywhere between 180 and 250 dead people on the rolls. So I did some math. took the lower number 450,000 people getting snap benefits. That's 157,900, wait, 157 million, $950,000 of waste. take 210,000 dead people, that's $73,710. That's a lot of money. Total, In fraud in North Carolina is $231,660,000. Now that is a number that I cannot comprehend, but the way I like to do numbers when they're this big is it would take you counting to 231,660,000. If you counted one every second, $1 a second, $1 a second, it would take you seven years. Fort Bragg Road months, two days, and 14 minutes. If that was your only job. Or 15 minutes. No bathroom breaks. No, and that was all you had to do. dollar a second. It would take you seven years to count. That's how much money in just in North Carolina that the government is wasting. people. not using it anymore, so who cares? Somebody's using it. That's my point. We don't need it So when we start talking about cutting taxes and things like that what we'll right there 231 million six hundred and sixty dollars that we can cut from our taxes. So how about that? Well, how about them apples? Yeah. All right Well, it is time to get out of here. Yeah, and I want to thank everyone for joining us today on the live I appreciated your feedback and we will see you on Wednesday at 2 p.m. ⁓ a good evening everybody. See you later Yeah