The National Crawford Roundtable tackles a complex issue this week: looking at Donald Trump’s new tariffs from all angles. Are they a power move towards a more balanced trade system or a risky venture with potential repercussions for the American economy? This episode navigates through various opinions, analyzing the potential benefits and drawbacks of such economic policies, and how they relate to existing global trade practices.
SPEAKER 02 :
Welcome to the National Crawford Roundtable podcast, a view of culture, current events, and politics through a biblical lens brought to you by Preborn, saving babies and souls. Join us in the fight to save babies from abortion. Your gift provides a free ultrasound for a mother in need. 80% of the time she will choose life. Visit CrawfordMediaGroup.net and click on the Preborn logo to donate to save babies now. and buy SunPower LED light therapy devices. Bring light to your pain. Visit CrawfordMediaGroup.net and click on the SunPower LED logo to get out of pain and improve your overall wellness. And now, here are your hosts, Neil Boron, Bob Duco, and John Rush.
SPEAKER 04 :
Back with another week of the National Crawford Roundtable podcast with the guys, Neil Boron, Neil Boron Live out of Buffalo, New York, John Rush, Rush to Reason out of Denver, Colorado, myself, Bob Duco, out of Detroit. Hey, guys, how are you? Good morning. Thank you. Yeah, it’s always good talking to you. By the way, do you know, we record this on Wednesday mornings, okay? Guys, here it is. It’s Wednesday morning. It’s April 2nd. And here in Detroit, I look out the window. It’s snowing, just so you know, okay? It’s April. It’s spring. It’s snowing. And I don’t know. But both you guys, Denver, Colorado, Buffalo, New York, you know. You guys are not above getting snow at this time of year.
SPEAKER 01 :
No, I have some coming this weekend, so we’re like you.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, that’s okay. That’s okay. Okay, we’ve got a few things to talk about. Today, April 2nd, is what Donald Trump is calling Liberation Day. This is when his reciprocal tariffs on other countries kick in. And he got the 25% tariffs on imported cars as well and imported car parts. And what might that mean? Is this smart? Is this not smart? It’s a good thing, bad thing, whatever. So we’ll dive into that. A few other things as well. The Trump effect, we’ll discuss that. Are more liberal establishment organizations sliding to the center because of Trump? And maybe we’ll get in a little bit of Bill Maher meeting with Donald Trump at the White House as well. So a lot of things. But let’s start with the tariffs issue. Today is today. April 2nd, that Trump’s reciprocal tariffs are set to kick in. And this is where he’s telling not just our enemies, but our friends and our allies around the world, especially European nations, that, hey, whatever you tariff us, we are going to tariff you. It’s that simple, not just on products, but things like automobiles. And this is what people need to understand, at least from my perspective on this. So Look, I would love it if we didn’t have to charge tariffs to anybody. But the fact is, when you hear Donald Trump saying that other countries around the world are ripping us off, the world’s ripping us off, he hasn’t just been saying that in the last few years. He said that decades ago in the private sector. OK, the way that we’re getting, quote unquote, ripped off by other countries, take European nations, for example, that are friends of ours. OK. If you go over to Germany or to the U.K. or, for that matter, just about any of the European nations, and you drive down the street, you’ve got to drive pretty far to find the occasional U.S. auto dealer because there’s not that many of them over there. Same thing if you go to a store. And you look for widgets somewhere. Look on the shelves. The overwhelming majority of them are their own country’s products. And you’ve got to look far and wide to find the occasional made in the USA. And that’s because these countries are very stingy. They say, U.S. products coming into our country, we’re going to limit them. and just allow a small amount of them to come in. And we’re also going to charge tariffs on them so that they cost more. What that does is it hurts the US automaker and the US widget manufacturer because they don’t get to tap into the full European market. However, Here in America, let’s face it, you can drive down any street, any road, oh, hey, there’s the US car dealership, but there’s the Hyundai, there’s the Kia dealership, there’s an Audi dealership. I mean, you see these dealerships all over the place because we open our doors wide and allow other countries to completely tap into our markets, but they don’t allow our companies to tap into their markets the same way. And all Trump is saying is enough is enough. The gravy train is over. You need to treat us just as fairly as we’ve been treating you. Trump’s not looking for an advantage. He’s not looking to get a trade imbalance over top of them. He just wants to narrow the trade imbalance under them. But to do that, it’s going to cause disruption. The alternative is we have no disruption, no chaos, and we just keep on allowing the U.S. auto industry and the U.S. manufacturing industry to weaken and weaken and weaken while other nations get rich off of our consumers. So there’s got to come a point where somebody has to step up and say enough is enough. And that’s why I think the thing to do is let’s rip the Band-Aid off and let’s take some change. Let’s not expect… this whole thing to turn like a jet ski, it’s probably going to turn like an ocean liner. But let’s allow the process to begin. That’s how I tend to look at it. And so let’s have this discussion. Let’s go around the table a little bit. And Neil, let me start with you if we could, okay? First of all, What are your thoughts on this? Because I know that you are not as pro-tariff as I am, and I know not as pro-tariff as John is. But I get from you, it’s not that you’re hostile to tariffs, but you really question whether they’re the wise thing to do right now. What’s your take on all of this, this Liberation Day?
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, who knows what he’s going to say, because it’s apparent that even some of his key economic advisors don’t know what he’s going to come out with. So I can’t really comment on that. I think it’s going to be interesting to see how it all plays out later today. By and large, I don’t think… You know, messing around with tariffs right now are the best thing to do. I don’t think he’s adequately explained it to the American people. I’m not even 100% sure. And you can argue with me if you want, but I’m not 100% sure. He knows exactly what he wants to do about it. I think he’s been a bully in some ways, the way he talks about it. And you can say, oh, well, you know, grow up. He’s just, you know, a little blustery guy. So what? But I mean… one of the things that got him elected was the idea that he was going to be addressing the economy immediately right we’re going to make america affordable again give me first day in office prices are coming down ladies and gentlemen well maybe in some ways there’s been certain things that have happened like i think gas prices are a little bit lower kind of like that right now but you know there’s still a lot of things that are really expensive and the average young person has no chance of buying a home right now so when When there’s conversation about like, hey, look, this is going to the prices on foreign cars are going to go up. He says, I couldn’t care less. Well, if you own a foreign car or you wanted to buy one, maybe that matters to you. I’m just saying like attitudes matter. And given that that he’s got so many other things that he’s done that are so clearly positive. I mean, they got the Doge thing going on that I think the vast majority of people are like in shock about. They’re finding billions of dollars of waste and fraud. And yeah, give us our money back. We’re taxpayers. We don’t want to be paying for that kind of stuff. Trim the size of government. Go for it. You got the border situation. There’s virtually no illegals. There’s just a few, you know, making it here or there across the border. We’re shipping out the criminals. These are huge issues. The wokeness thing, which we might actually talk about a little bit later. You know, we’re going to call a male a male and a female a female. I think the vast majority of Americans, even some independents or maybe even Democrats who crossed the line and said, I can’t do this Biden thing anymore and I’m certainly not voting for Kamala. I’m going to give Trump a shot that they’re kind of impressed in this area by what they’re seeing. But I don’t think tariffs works the same way. And so I don’t mean to go on and on. I’m just saying I think it’s a really risky thing. I think he’s fumbling it. I don’t think he’s mishandled it per se. Time will tell. But to just say, hey, look at short-term pain, long-term gain, he hasn’t explained it adequately, even to his own economic advisors, apparently. And I just think it’s not going to bode well. And if he doesn’t prove himself on the economy in the next 12 months, and of course, stock markets come down, the whole thing. If he doesn’t prove himself on the economy in the next 12 months, he’s going to lose the house. Therefore, he’ll never get the… All these things, all these executive orders are going to be reversed eventually by the next administration. He’ll never get all this stuff codified into law because he’s not going to have Congress to do it. I just think it’s really dangerous. I’m not a fan of what’s happening with tariffs.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay, let’s do this because, you know, John, I want to get your take on this in just a moment. But before we do, I want to remind everybody that this podcast is sponsored. We appreciate our sponsors supporting this podcast, okay, certainly like Preborn and certainly like SunPowerLED. And, Neil, I know you’re very knowledgeable on SunPowerLED and the tremendous work that they do helping people get out of pain naturally.
SPEAKER 1 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, well, it actually saved my life. There’s no question in my mind. You know, I was struggling with COVID, couldn’t breathe. My blood oxygen content was extremely low. And the light that God himself created, I believe, healed my lungs. It was a SunPower LED that… and red light therapy that helped reduce the pain and swelling in my chest, and I was all of a sudden able to breathe again. In a matter of just a few days, all of that turned around. I was on my way to the hospital otherwise, and I’d end up on a ventilator. So some pretty shocking stuff, and I think it’s important that we realize that sound waves have power. A sonic boom can knock somebody out of bed in the middle of the night. Light waves have power as well, and essentially what we’re talking about is certain wavelengths of red or near-infrared light that penetrate the human body, reduce pain and swelling. They help deal with things like arthritis and back and neck pain, knee pain. People have problems healing, vision problems, migraines. amazing stuff. And SunPowerLED is definitely worth looking into. So just go to CrawfordMediaGroup.net, click on SunPowerLED, watch the videos, participate in the free webinar, find out how the light God himself created can help heal your body. And thank God for SunPowerLED and our friends over there at Preborn. Bob, they’re also a major sponsor of ours.
SPEAKER 04 :
They are. And they do such great work saving babies’ lives all over the country. But you know how they do this? They do it by showing ultrasound images of unborn babies to expectant moms in pro-life centers across the country. Problem is that the demand is higher than the supply. Not all pro-life centers have ultrasound machines in them. And the ones that do, it costs money to show ultrasound images. And so sometimes they don’t have the money to do this. And this is why we ask everybody in our audience right now, will you pay for the ultrasound images? Because when you do, you’re saving babies’ lives. You see, when a mom sees a picture of her baby, statistically, she doesn’t go across the street to Planned Parenthood. She lets her baby live. And so when you pay for ultrasound images, you actually really are stopping abortions. So there’s two ways you can do this, everybody. Option A, buy an ultrasound machine to be placed in a pro-life center. They’re 15 grand a piece. It’s a nice tax write-off for you. And your forever legacy is you’re stopping thousands and thousands of abortions year after year. Now, for the rest of you, if you can’t buy an ultrasound machine, pay for an individual number of ultrasound images. $28 is the average ultrasound expense to stop one abortion, to save one baby’s life. So how many babies’ lives will you save? Take $28 times, fill in the blank. And whatever that number is, that’s your forever legacy of the number of abortions that you stopped. Maybe you’ve given to pre-born already, but you haven’t for 2025. Would you do that right now, everybody? There’s two ways to give, online or on the phone. Online, go to CrawfordMediaGroup.net and click on Preborn. CrawfordMediaGroup.net, click on Preborn. And if you want to give over the phone, you can call right now, 833-850-BABY. The answer to the phone is 24-7, 833-850-BABY. Just mention National Crawford Roundtable when you call. And don’t forget, 100% of what you give goes to the ultrasounds, not a penny for overhead. That’s all covered by private donations. So 833-850-BABY. We appreciate you folks doing that. As we talk about the tariffs and what President Trump is calling Liberation Day today, this is when the reciprocal tariffs start kicking in, the tariffs on foreign automobiles coming into this country. And so, John, let me go to you. What’s your take on this? We both heard what Neil said about this, about Donald Trump and the tariffs and not really making it clear to the American people. Philosophically, I do believe that this is something that is necessary. It does cause short-term pain. But I don’t think the short-term pain is going to be as severe as people assume it is. But the long-term benefit of this is really strong. But what do we do about the fact that Neil did point out he said prices are going to come down day one and this will slow them coming down. So what’s your take on all of this?
SPEAKER 01 :
It will in some cases, and it will not in others. And fortunately, automobiles are something that, since that’s kind of what we’re talking about with Terrace, automobiles aren’t something everybody buys every day. And there are lots of choices when it comes to automobiles. And yes, I understand that there are people that like to buy foreign automobiles, even German-made automobiles. That one, I can’t ever figure out why, because they’re definitely not as good and reliable of a car as some of the other brands that are out there. And I’m a car guy, so that one I can defend completely. all day long, but people love their German cars. I’ll just say it. I’ll just say it straight up. And the reality though, is that what people don’t understand is Germany has been tariffing our cars going in there. So our us made cars going in there at about 20%. And yet we’ve only been tariffing their cars coming here. at about two and a half percent. That’s not a level playing field. So the way I look at tariffs is long term. This is a way to level the playing field. Yes, I know everybody don’t don’t send me any messages on the fact that, yes, it’s a tax that’s passed on. I get all of that. I understand how tariffs work. But I also know that we’ve got to get the field leveled at some point. The other thing that I would caution everybody on and Neil, this is for you as well. The majority of people that are against terrorists are globalists. A lot of the articles that you will see written about terrorists and how bad they are. These are globalists. These are one world order people that that hate anything at all that disrupts what happens on a worldwide basis. This is a huge disruptor when it comes to worldwide things. And I would encourage every single Christian out there even those that maybe don’t like our stance on tariffs and what’s happening in certain countries and so on. Everything I just said is very true because tariffs and what’s being used right now goes against the globalist plan. And that’s why you see all sorts of negative things written about it, because globalists hate tariffs.
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, I couldn’t agree with you more on that. I really do. But, Neil, what do we do with the – look, I get what you’re saying, Neil, about, well, this slows down the reduction in prices. And so what about the economy part of this? What do we do with the fact that the alternative is let’s just leave the trade imbalance in place? And if Trump’s not going to do this now, when? OK, and so does he just let that go? You know, no future president is actually going to take on
SPEAKER 01 :
other nations around the world it’s like that skin cancer that you’ve got that you keep putting off putting off putting off pretty soon it grows to the point where now it becomes a big huge deal why not just burn that off early on when it’s when it’s a lot less painful my feeling on these things is the longer we wait the more painful it gets as well
SPEAKER 04 :
Actually, that is a good point, too, I would argue. But I don’t know. What is the alternative? Would you rather then we just leave it alone, don’t touch it? Because there’s no way that Trump’s going to try to do this three years into his four-year last term. So if he’s going to do it, it seems like right now is the time to rip the Band-Aid off and maybe set a new precedent. If anything, Neil, we get at least some other countries – that say, all right, we will lower the tariffs on U.S. products and cars coming into our country. And then at least it does generate some more strength for our own manufacturing industry here in America.
SPEAKER 01 :
And I want to add one more thing to that, Bob, before, Neil, you respond, because I see all sorts of of car people even responding to these tariffs and how this really won’t have any positive impact upon manufacturing in the United States and so on. Now, I agree there’s a lot of robotics and automation and things like that. And building a plant here doesn’t put the amount of people to work. that it once did but the thing that these people are also forgetting is all of the ancillary jobs that come from having a plant put in a brand new plant not only the construction of the maintenance of afterwards the maintenance of even the robotics i mean there’s still so many jobs that come out of having a manufacturing facility here that we wouldn’t otherwise have that the byproducts are still huge and that’s what donald trump is looking at
SPEAKER 04 :
Think about Sean Fain, the president of the UAW. He hates Donald Trump with a passion. But he just said this week that I don’t agree with Donald Trump on anything except these tariffs. This is the right thing to do for the auto industry. This is a UAW head. But anyway, Neil, your take.
SPEAKER 03 :
Again, and I said on a previous podcast that if you were to ask me to speak on tariffs at a public event, it would take longer to introduce me than for me to explain everything I know about tariffs and or the long-term impact. And I think to some degree, even people who think they understand tariffs aren’t exactly sure how it all plays out in the end and which countries we’re going to be able to continue having friendly trade relations with, et cetera. I mean, It all has to sift out in the end, and it takes time, which is why he’s talking about short-term pain, long-term gain. Okay, so long-term, maybe this helps. And if that’s what he’s doing, sort of as a sacrificial lamb, putting himself on the altar and saying, look, I’m not concerned about my future. I’m concerned about the well-being of America. I want to do this for the benefit of America long-term. I think the problem is that people have short term memories. They care about what’s happening to them today. And I’ve often been frustrated in past presidential elections when there’d be some huge issue hanging in there in the air, like abortion when Hillary Clinton was running, etc. It was a huge issue. People would look right past it and just say, yeah, but the economy and, you know, she takes care of the little guy and she really cares about people that are hurting. No, the Democrat Party does not care about little people that are hurting. And I think they began to wake up, which is why Donald Trump gained so many votes in minority communities, et cetera. All I’m saying is that attitudes matter. And I think if people don’t feel in their own pocketbook that things are turning around economically and they’re being told, hey, things may cost more. And, you know, so what if prices of automobiles go up? I could care less. They’re hearing that. They’re listening with their own ears, and I think it’s going to cost him long term. Could he pull a rabbit out of a hat? Yes. Donald Trump is famous for, you know, all odds stacked against him, and somehow he comes out looking like the golden boy. Maybe in a year, all of a sudden, the economy just revives. I mean, by the way, it shrunk from January to March. We’ll know more when the March numbers come out. Like, it’s a very crucial, tentative time right now, and economically speaking, people want change. If they don’t see it, I think he loses the House, and then he’s neutered. Then he’s got no ability to do anything in the last two years.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah. John, I got to tell you, though, to me, there’s a way to simplify this. Either we do something, either we end, we begin the end of the trade war against the United States from our friends around the world, or we just stick with the status quo.
SPEAKER 01 :
We have to end it. We really have to decide which one it’s going to be. It’s been so unfair for so long. And that’s the other thing, too, that I think most people don’t ever look at. Most people don’t realize because you hear about other countries and what they do and so on. And I don’t think most people look at the actual GDP numbers. For example, U.S. is this is as of I think this is going back to 2023. So 2023, we were pretty close to $28 trillion as a country. China is the second closest at only $17.7 trillion. The next one after that is Germany at $4.5 trillion. And i’m not saying that to make it sound like you know we’re the big big bad guys on the block and it really doesn’t matter what other countries are doing but i think bob you have to put this into relation with one another and i think this is what donald trump knows these other countries need us far more than we need them and i think it’s something that people don’t like hearing because that sounds very egotistical But that’s the brass tacks, Bob. That’s the bottom line. They need us more than we need them. And the bottom line is we have been far too fair with a lot of these people that, by the way, are not very fair back to us when it comes to the trade that we have going back and forth as countries. And it’s high time it stopped.
SPEAKER 03 :
Let me throw another with you more. Let me throw another thought into the mix It’s just off the beaten path, but it was kind of rolling around in my brain got plenty of room to do that by the way I just America is arguably the richest country on the planet. I mean, there might be some country somewhere with a median average median income, whatever is higher. Who knows? But we’re extremely wealthy country. If you own a home in the United States of America and make like whatever it is, 60,000 a year. I don’t know what the number is anymore. You’re one of the wealthiest 90 something percent of people on the planet. so okay that’s how wealthy america is and on top of it we’ve been blowing all this waste out you know just so much money that’s going to fraudulent things we’re cutting back we’re trying to reduce the size of government trying to reign all of this in hopefully to the tune of not just billions but in the end maybe a trillion or more dollars uh taking back all this money that was just leaking out so that’s going to have an impact on the economy but You know, Trump, during some of his speeches about tariffs, said, you know, we’re going to make America great again. We’re going to make it so wealthy. We’re going to be richer than ever. We’re going to be the richest country. To some degree, at what point do we say, look, we’re doing pretty good. This tariff thing can wait a little bit. We want to balance this down the road, but this isn’t our priority right now. We’ve got other priorities. I just don’t see… overall that america is hurting so bad cut back on the waste will be much better off there and then explain to the american people why this has to happen don’t rush into it his own economic advisors aren’t entirely sure which way he’s going to go on this what he’s going to do or what the impact is going to be and we’re also just supposed to buy that this is a great thing for america i think it’s really dangerous
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, if we wait a little bit, how long are we supposed to wait? 50, 60 years isn’t long enough to wait.
SPEAKER 01 :
We’re $36.5 trillion in debt. We don’t have any choice. We’ve got to do it now.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah, exactly. You’re absolutely right. $37 trillion in debt. And if Trump doesn’t do this now… It’s never going to go. What future president, what future Republican president would do this, let alone Democrat president? He’s trying to stop the globalist collectivism mentality that exists. Maybe one of the reasons why the United States is so wealthy is because the United States has had a free market attitude and a we the people attitude for so long. But that doesn’t mean that we deserve to then have the rest of the world take advantage of us and pick our pockets and say, you know, we want to tap into the U.S. market, but you’re not allowed to tap into our markets.
SPEAKER 03 :
Does anybody know how much foreign aid? I mean, I don’t know the number. How much foreign aid do we send to other countries? I think that we probably send every country on the planet money.
SPEAKER 04 :
Nobody sends us any, right? We’re massive in foreign aid, outside of just the U.S. aid. Massive, right.
SPEAKER 01 :
So who knows the number? That’s roughly $70 billion.
SPEAKER 03 :
Okay. Yeah, that’s a lot of money. If we don’t care for ourselves, I mean, the Word of God itself says if you don’t care for your own family, you’re worse than an infidel. At some point, do we really need – can we assess that? Would that be another place we could start? So we’re cutting back on the waste and the fraud?
SPEAKER 04 :
Well, USAID is one of the areas that Doge is scaling back on, but that was so mismanaged. We should still help people around the country, around the world, I mean, but not through something like USAID. That doesn’t change the fact that these tariffs are a way to say, let’s take care of our own house first. Let’s take care of our own family first. And I think that that’s the right thing to do. But anyway, look, we’re coming up on the bottom of the hour, and we do want to remind you folks, we’re going to be talking about a lot of other things in the second half of this podcast, but we want you to support our advertisers, our sponsors to this podcast, like Preborn, like SunPowerLED, Neal.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, and it’s been incredible the results people are getting with red light therapy. And by the way, photobiomodulation, which is the technical term, has been around for quite a while. It’s not exactly new, but it is being refined. And Kerber USA, the makers of SunPower LED, which oddly enough is based in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. So you’ve got Kerber USA sells their product here, also in our Canadian markets. And they’ve been able to reduce the cost of individual light units from SunPower LED that allow people to be able to focus on their health in an affordable kind of way. And light therapy is being used to reduce pain and swelling in the human body and promote healing. And the applications are incredible. I mean, yes, joint and knee pain, back pain, et cetera, tinnitus, migraine, headaches, arthritis, pain, uh vision problems spinal stenosis plantar fasciitis it’s unbelievable what light therapy can accomplish and i suggest you look into it it’s simply using the very light god himself created to heal the body no pharmaceuticals no surgical intervention just light that god created check it out by looking at sunpower led and click on that button at crawfordmediagroup.net
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SPEAKER 04 :
Continuing the second half of the National Crawford Roundtable podcast with John Rush, Rush to Reason out of Denver, Colorado. Neil Boron, Neil Boron Live out of Buffalo, New York. Myself, Bob Duco, The Bob Duco Show out of Detroit. So the first half, guys, we talked about Trump’s tariffs and April 2nd being Liberation Day, the reciprocal tariffs. There’s some other things, though, that I want to talk with you guys about. First of all, one of them is what happened in the White House, the meeting with Bill Maher. I’m curious to get you guys’ take on this because Bill Maher – look, I’m not a fan of Bill Maher at all. He’s a liberal left-wing guy. Okay, fine. He’s a Trump basher. No real surprise. It’s an HBO show. But there’s one thing that I do give Bill Maher credit for. He is somebody who’s willing to call out his own side if he sees his own side going off the rails. And he’s done that in some various occasions. He said that the Democrat Party needs to get more moderate. They’re going to radical left wing and the transgender stuff and some other issues. So he says, knock it off. Well, anyway, Bill Maher and Donald Trump have a mutual friend, Kid Rock. Now, Kid Rock, the singer, Kid Rock is more conservative, but he’s friends with both of them. And so Kid Rock called President Trump. How cool is that to just say, let me call my friend Donald Trump and say, you know what, would you be willing for me to broker a meeting between you and Bill Maher and me bring him with me to the White House? Trump said yes. To Bill Maher’s credit, Bill Maher said, sure, I’ll be happy to meet with him. To Trump’s credit, Trump said, sure, I’ll be happy to meet with him. And they went out there. They had a meeting. They had dinner with Dana White as well as wrestling. And according to Kid Rock, this is the first time that Bill Maher had ever been there. Trump didn’t know that. And he said that Trump was very gracious with him and friendly and gave him a personal tour of the White House, including his own private residence, and was sitting down and asking Bill Maher his opinions about things, even foreign policy questions. Well, what do you think about this? What do you think about that? What are your opinions on our policies? And genuinely wanted to know what he thought. And and to Bill Maher’s credit, he was pretty cordial with the president, too. So but it’s interesting that some conservatives, not all, but some are griping that Trump is being so friendly with Bill Maher. Bill Maher’s got a lot of liberals that have been giving him grief. And Maher’s attitude, he said last week on his HBO show, he said, to those of you on the left that are criticizing me for being willing to meet with Donald Trump, he said, blank you. There’s nothing wrong with talking with people you disagree with. You know, we want that in America. Isn’t that supposed to be healthy? I think Bill Maher is absolutely right. And I say kudos to both of them for being willing to shake hands and have a cordial discussion with each other. So that’s my take on this. But I’m kind of curious to go around the table. John, what do you think?
SPEAKER 01 :
I think it’s absolutely fabulous and everything you just said, Bob, on both sides of the aisle. I mean, yes, there are conservatives that don’t like it. There’s Democrats that don’t like it. The reality is I think it’s a good thing. I think it shows that, you know, two people that, you know, really oppose one another. And like you, I am no fan of Bill Maher, although I’ll give the guy credit. He does call his own party out at times. I know he does. that they do and he does very well at that and then you have to wonder when he goes and he meets with donald trump and he realizes that wait a minute this guy that i’ve been making fun of with you know all of this time and i’ve been calling him this that and the other i mean basically everything under the sun hum he’s really not the way that i anticipated him being i mean to me these are things that build bridges and and there’s nothing bad that can come out of this at all in my opinion
SPEAKER 04 :
You know, I’ll tell you, Neil, I really see a tremendous amount of maturity from both of them. For all the people who say Donald Trump is so petty and childish, really? Here’s a guy who told Mika Brzezinski and Joe Scarborough, sure, I’ll be happy to meet with you. I’ll invite you to my personal residence at Mar-a-Lago, and I’ll be happy to talk with you. So I say kudos to both of them. I think that they both deserve a decent amount of credit. But let’s face it, the Trump haters are never going to give Donald Trump credit for anything. If he cured cancer, they’d criticize him for putting oncologists out of business. But I don’t know. What’s your take on this whole meeting? Well, I really like it.
SPEAKER 03 :
I like the idea that it happened. And for, I don’t know, maybe different reasons than others, but James 1.19 says, Therefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. It goes on from there. But, you know, it’s the old phrase that God gave us, two ears and one mouth. Like, there is something to be learned from one another. And teachability matters. I think all of us should be teachable, including the President of the United States. In other words, maybe Bill Maher learned some things about Donald Trump, but I also think Donald Trump learned some things about Bill Maher. Maybe it’s just how to better communicate with people that are political opponents or whatever. But there’s something to be gained in those kind of situations. I have a friend, a good friend, who’s taught me a lot of life lessons. He’s an older man and really is, in many ways, a godly mentor in my life. But he taught me a long time ago, if you have an enemy, move towards them. and why because because number one we’re supposed to love all people including our enemies we need to demonstrate that but that there’s something to be learned and and sometimes people who look like their enemies at first later become allies and you know so you’ve got i mean even Donald Trump himself at one point was a Democrat. Today he’s a conservative Republican if you think about the transformation in his life. So I applaud it and I’m grateful. And it also boggles my mind. Joe Biden seemed to have so little time for anything. He didn’t do any press conferences. where was he he was never around he wasn’t out in public he definitely wasn’t speaking Donald Trump seems to be everywhere all the time and seems to have time to sit down with people like Bill Maher by the way I know at least two people that have met Donald Trump and I know quite a few people who know someone who met Donald Trump and in every case people said that the private behind the scenes behind closed doors Donald Trump is a warm-hearted kind you know loving human being that’s engaging and funny and you know fun to be around which is kind of hard to believe i’m sure for some people listening to me say that but if that’s true then that’s exactly what bill maher experienced and i bet bill maher is a different person as a result we may see some of that come out in future conversation on air
SPEAKER 04 :
We may. And by the way, the thing that you’re saying, Neil, I’ve heard that anecdotally from a lot of people, even the enemies of conservatives and Republicans, that Donald Trump, when you get behind the scenes with him and the cameras are off, he’s so much of a regular guy, not a billionaire type guy at all. He’s so much of a regular guy, fun, great sense of humor, affable guy. very generous, very gracious, and this is gonna sound crazy, who uses the word humble to apply to Donald Trump? But a lot of people say he actually has a sense of humility about him when the cameras are off that is way different than the persona that you expect to see. Even though he is a strong, confident person still, But that sense of, hey, you know what? What do you think about these? Give me your opinion about this. Let’s shake hands. We can still work together. So give them a lot of credit for that. John, before we throw it back over to you, Neil, one of the things that we’ve been talking about on the show, obviously, every time we do a podcast, we want our listeners to know that we appreciate our sponsors supporting this podcast. We’ve got a couple of great sponsors. We’ve got SunPowerLED. We’ve got Preborn. And I know a lot of you out there have given a Preborn already. Some of you maybe haven’t, or if you have, maybe it’s been a while since you have. I’m asking you right now if you would give to preborn today. What you’re doing is you’re paying for ultrasound images so that babies can be saved in their mother’s wombs. You see, in pro-life centers all across the country, preborn partners with them. And they show these ultrasound images. And when a mom sees a picture of her baby, she chooses life. She doesn’t go across the street to Planned Parenthood. No, she lets her baby live. Do you know that last year, 2024 alone, pre-born literally stopped 67,000 abortions from happening? 67,000 babies’ lives were saved last year. And that’s thanks in large part to you folks in this audience because you’re paying for ultrasound images. And by the way… thousands and thousands of those moms accepting Jesus Christ along the way. So here’s how you give. Either pay for an individual number of ultrasound images or buy an ultrasound machine. If you buy an ultrasound machine, it’s 15 grand, it’s a nice tax write-off for you, But you get to go to bed every night knowing you are stopping thousands and thousands of abortions year after year. For the rest of you, maybe you can pay for an individual number of ultrasound images. They’re $28 a piece to stop one abortion. $28 stops one abortion. How many abortions will you stop? Pray about a number. Take $28 times fill in the blank. And that number is your gift to Preborn. And 100% of what you give to Preborn goes to the ultrasounds, not a penny for overhead. So what do you say? Here’s how you give. Go online right now to CrawfordMediaGroup.net and click on Preborn. CrawfordMediaGroup.net, click on Preborn. Or just call them, 833-850-BABY, and they answer 24-7. So call 833-850-BABY. Mention National Crawford Roundtable when you call. We appreciate you folks supporting our sponsors like Preborn. like SunPower LED. And Neil, I got to tell you, the photobiomodulation technology that SunPower LED has, it’s so natural. It’s God-created. It really is. It’s a God-created natural way of healing.
SPEAKER 03 :
Well, it’s God-created because God said, let there be light, and there was. Light was clearly God’s creation, and photobiomodulation just takes certain wavelengths of that light and uh uses them to penetrate the human body get to the individual cells excite the mitochondria wake up the cell and cause the cell to do what it was designed to do and that’s to provide life and healing and you know the results have been incredible i think i told the story about a guy named uh mark who had knee surgery and was having you know trouble afterwards started using photobiomodulation sun power led palm device and he’s running again uh there was a young man named caleb I had a horrible pickaxe accident, can’t even imagine, but severed his ankle tendon in the process. Doctors said it was going to be six to eight months before he could walk again. He was walking in just four weeks, didn’t need any pain medication, by the way. And, you know, I had horrible plantar fasciitis about a year ago. SunPower LED helped take that away, and I was walking normally again in just about a week. It’s unbelievable how it works. You can check it out for yourself. You can watch videos, learn more about it by clicking on SunPowerLED at CrawfordMediaGroup.net. Yeah, no drugs, no pharmaceuticals, no surgical intervention. This is as natural as it gets. It’s just using the light that God created to heal our human bodies. Again, click on SunPowerLED at CrawfordMediaGroup.net.
SPEAKER 04 :
Absolutely. We appreciate you folks doing that. So, John, let me ask you about the Bill Maher meeting with Donald Trump. I’m not a Bill Maher fan. I don’t watch his Friday night HBO show. But, of course, we see what happens in the news. And I am curious, though, how he’s going to navigate. the rock and the hard place that he’s in, because I do believe he probably came out of there at least saying to his people that are with him, boy, I got to admit, Donald Trump is a lot more likable of a guy than I thought. And he’s a lot smarter than I thought. And he’s a lot more tolerant and welcoming than I thought. But he can’t really go on his show and slobber about how great Donald Trump is, or he’s going to destroy his base and his audience too. And so I am kind Kind of curious. If there was ever a time I was interested to see him do his Friday show and his commentary, it might be this Friday because I’m curious how he navigates that with his audience.
SPEAKER 01 :
And what’s interesting is Kid Rock came out there and said that Bill Maher’s mind was blown after meeting with Donald Trump, which that says a lot. So yeah, how does he recover from that coming back to his own audience? And how do you couch all of that, Bob, in a way where he knows he’s got an audience, he knows he’s got people to sort of pacify, if you would, because he knows his market. On the same token, you got to be honest. I mean, what is he going to say on Friday? Great question.
SPEAKER 03 :
Can I just jump in for a second? I think Bill Maher needs to tell the truth, the bottom line. Tell the truth. Tell what he learned, what he was surprised by, what he was blessed by, or what he didn’t like. But either way, truth matters in the end. And what I’m really getting at here, look at what happened in the last election when people came to realize that they’ve been lied to about Joe Biden. when people saw things like cbs editing the audio of kamala harris editing the interview to make her look like she had some clue what she was talking about and when people realize they’ve been duped um it doesn’t go well you know truth prevails in the end and i think you know it might cost him a couple of viewers but he might gain some as well by taking a more you know reasoned approach to say look at i didn’t know what i was going to expect i kind of like the guy Let me tell you what I saw, and then let the chips fall where they may, but I think he’s going to benefit in the end if he tells the truth as opposed to trying to act like he had some influence on Trump and he didn’t learn anything in the process.
SPEAKER 04 :
You know, John, to switch gears a little bit, with Trump, before the three of us went on the air to start recording, Neil was talking about the Trump effect. And there is an effect that Trump has, not just one-on-one with people, like people like Bill Maher and others that walk away from him going, you know, he left me a little bit changed. Donald Trump does appear to be a rudder on a large ship that can, in fact, cause that ship to slightly turn. And one of the things that we are seeing is a scaling back, a rolling back of wokeness. It’s not just Donald Trump issuing executive orders saying we’re ending DEI in the public sector. The private sector is saying – Yeah, the winds of change are here. And so you’re even seeing places like Disney starting to roll back a little bit now and saying let’s – maybe we shouldn’t be quite so liberal, left-wing, hardcore. Look, you got people in the media, some of them. I mean some of them are still being stiff-necked like AP. But a lot of the rest of them are saying – the White House Correspondents Association dinner. We’re canceling the anti-Trump comedian. We’re going to go non-comedy this time. There is a certain sense of people going where we recognize that Trump is slowly turning the tide against liberal leftist Marxist wokeism. And many people are going along with that, at least temporarily.
SPEAKER 01 :
Yeah, and to your point about Trump being a rudder, and this is one of the things that even I’ve had to learn about Trump, and you guys know, I mean, I call everything the way I see it. If I don’t like something, I’ll say it. I think that’s the one thing about the three of us is we don’t mince any words along those lines. But to your point, Bob, about him being a rudder, one of the things that I’ve had to even at times catch myself saying, okay, you know what? I won’t criticize. Let’s see how this plays out a little bit because I’ve realized in the past with Donald Trump that not always, but typically. I bet the guy’s got a 9 out of a 10 ratio for wins versus losses when it comes to what he sees going on, the wins that are out there, which way we should actually be sailing, and so on. And the reality, Bob and Neil both are, I’m learning to trust him a little more. Not that he’s the Messiah. You guys know my feeling on all that. I’m not following him in that way. But as far as a leader and as president and looking from things differently than we can, because he’s on the inside of all of that and he hears and sees things and none of the rest of us can. I’m learning to trust him a little more than I probably did at one time, just because at the end of the day, he’s not often wrong. Right, right.
SPEAKER 04 :
Neil, what do you think? You’re the one that brought this up when we were off air before we started. Your thoughts on the Trump effect and the incredible influence that he has to move an entire culture, if you will, when it comes to things like wokeness and leftism and such.
SPEAKER 03 :
yeah now you know what I had mentioned about the New York Times over the weekend they they you know published a column written by the editorial board basically saying look at if Democrats ever want to succeed again you better move away from the ledge that you’re on right now it’s not going to work and so they they said Democrats are in denial about 2024 that was actually the headline of the editorial And and then they went ahead and made some suggestions, basically just saying, look, we made a lot of mistakes. And Democrats, if if they want to regain voters trust or some things they need to look at, they should admit that their party mishandled Biden’s age. Leading Democrats insisted, of course, that he had mental acuity for a second term. Many voters believe that Democrats refuse to admit uncomfortable truths on some subjects, including crime, illegal immigration, inflation and covid lockdowns. Mr. Biden’s age became a glaring example of all of that, of course, but that that they should recognize that they move too far to the left on social issues, particularly after Obama left office. And then you got Kamala Harris in the last election. you know rejoicing over decriminalizing the border and government-funded gender transition surgery for prisoners it was way too far even today they said the party remains too focused on personal identity and on americans differences by race gender sexuality and religion rather than on shared values etc but point is the new york times and then you got the la times following suit beginning to come back from the radical edge going hey guys like they’re waking up this ain’t working but then there was also a huge article if you guys saw this harvard’s nine billion dollar scramble to avoid becoming the next columbia the ivy league school’s president alan garber made a flurry of moves before trump opened federal uh federal before he opens a federal funding review And so obviously we all saw Trump pull funds from Ivy League schools that are anti-Semitic and all of that stuff. Well, this is really having an impact. And apparently Harvard is really nervous about losing federal funds. So they started shifting people around, taking people off boards, looking at the programming they’re offering. that’s directly related to this administration. That’s directly related to what we’re seeing coming out of Washington, DC. And I just say, praise God for that. These things need to be looked at. They need to be reviewed and they need to be changed. So yeah, it’s good stuff.
SPEAKER 04 :
No, that’s, that’s good. All right. Now there’s one thing I got to bring up here is we’re kind of winding down our time together. And John, this is kind of related to you. Uh, I invoked you on my, uh, my show here in Detroit, uh, Yesterday, I was talking about something that I was actually criticizing Donald Trump for because I don’t agree with everything that he does. And when he does stuff that I disagree with, I call it out the way that it is. One of the things that I disagreed with him on is this executive order that he’s signing to go after secondary ticket sales markets, the scalping thing, if you will, because you do have – You do have individuals and companies that they will block purchase several rows and several tickets of a venue when the ticket sales first come out. And then they’ll turn around and they’ll mark them up a lot to whatever level the market demand will allow. And if you buy some tickets, in essence, wholesale for $100 and you got people willing to pay $5,000 for those tickets – That’s what the free market is about. Exactly. You sell them for what the market will allow. And this idea that Trump is going to step in and have the federal government and the Federal Trade Commission, the Department of Justice, try to regulate that philosophically. I’m sorry. I don’t see a lot of difference between that and Kamala Harris saying she wanted to control how much of a gallon of milk could be sold for. Now, I can understand if there’s a hurricane and people are taking necessities like water and they’re gouging for those purposes. That’s one thing. But somebody can decide if it’s worth it for themselves to pay X amount of money to go see a concert. They can make that decision themselves. I don’t think the government has any business involved. But I told my audience, I’m like, oh, no, I’m turning into John Rush. I guess I’m a libertarian now. But I’d love to get your take on that because I totally disagree with Trump on that.
SPEAKER 01 :
You end up with a situation where somebody can come in and buy all the water that guy has at the same price. It’s regulated by government. They then just go back out on the black market and sell it at a much higher price. And at the end of the day, the guy that actually thought far enough in advance to have that water on the shelf loses out. The guy that comes in and buys all of it in one shot gains. At the end of the day, you’re not fixing anything, nor would this, by the way, fix anything in regards to ticket prices, because those people could do nothing more than what the ticket resellers are doing at the end of the day and go out and resell as well. You’re not going to fix anything by doing this. All right.
SPEAKER 04 :
Neil, what do you think? Do you have a problem if somebody goes out and buys 500 tickets to a concert that has a 20,000 ticket sale thing, buys 500 tickets for $100 a piece, and then says, I’m going to turn around and sell these things for $500 a piece, $1,000 a piece, $2,000, whatever the market will demand? I got no problem with that. Call it gouging. Call it whatever you want to. It’s what the market will pay. Why is a diamond worth so much more than a piece of coal? Because that’s what the public will pay for it. Why does a shot of alcohol, why does it have a 500% markup over top of the wholesale? Because that’s what people are willing to pay for it. That’s what a free market system does. Your thoughts?
SPEAKER 03 :
My wife went to the movies the other day with a friend, and it was $37 for two tickets. They didn’t even buy any popcorn. But they went. They paid it. I don’t know. No, I don’t have a problem with – I hate that it happens. I’ve been in the situation before where I wanted to go to some kind of a sporting event or whatever and realized the only tickets were ridiculous. They’re $1,500 or something as opposed to $150.
SPEAKER 01 :
I’m quicker. Let’s back up a little bit, guys. The answer to this is if you’re somebody that really wants that concert, then you know what? You figure out how to be that person that either buys the 500 tickets or the 50 tickets or the 10 tickets or the whatever. I mean, the reality is nobody’s saying you can’t do that, but a lot of people are late to the game. And then, yes, they’re going to pay that higher price because that’s what it demands at that point in time.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yeah, I agree. And I think too bad if you miss out and you end up having to pay the higher prices or just stay home and don’t pay the higher prices.
SPEAKER 01 :
Or just don’t go to the concert.
SPEAKER 03 :
Because that’ll bring the price down. That’ll ultimately bring the price down. You can have a role in that.
SPEAKER 01 :
But by the way… Yeah, the other option is nobody buys those 500 tickets and that person, that company, whatever it is, is now out that cash because they don’t get all of their tickets sold. Which, by the way, is a risk that they have depending upon… The concert and how things go and so on, they very well may not make all of that back. It depends on how popular that concert becomes. Typically, those guys do well because they know the ones that are going to be successful. But let’s say that there’s a situation where all of a sudden a singer makes a big stumble and something happens and all of a sudden the popularity just plummets. Well, now that guy’s sitting on 500 tickets he can’t get rid of.
SPEAKER 04 :
True, very true, very true. Boy, where in the world does the time go? Listen, folks, we want you to support our sponsors of this podcast. Please support SunPowerLED. Please support Preborn. If you haven’t given to Preborn yet or maybe in a while, do it now. Go to CrawfordMediaGroup.net, click on Preborn, and you can give right there. Remember, you’re paying for ultrasound images so that babies’ lives can be saved. Moms choose life when they see a picture of their baby. We’ve got to show them the pictures of those babies, though, so… $28 is the average ultrasound expense to stop one abortion, to save one baby’s life. How many babies’ lives will you save? Take $28 times, fill in the blank. And that’s your legacy of the amount of abortions that you stopped. And if you can buy an ultrasound machine, do that. They’re 15 grand a piece. You have a nice tax write-off for yourself. But then you get to go to bed every night thinking about the thousands and thousands of abortions that you’re stopping with that ultrasound machine. Either way, anything you give to Preborn, 100% goes to the ultrasounds, not a penny for overhead. That’s all covered by private donors. So here’s how you give. Go to CrawfordMediaGroup.net. Click on Preborn. And if you want to give over the phone, call 833-850-BABY. They answer the phones 24-7, 833-850-BABY. Just mention National Crawford Roundtable when you call. And support Preborn. Support SunPowerLED, especially when you think about what they can do to help you. I mean, Neil, they do help a lot of people.
SPEAKER 03 :
A lot of people. And the number’s growing. And by the way, there are videos that you can watch if you go to SunPowerLED. CrawfordMediaGroup.net, then click on the SunPowerLED button. There’s all kinds of information there about how this works. And every Tuesday night, they do a free webinar. that you can participate in from anywhere you can get on the internet and ask any questions you want about how light therapy and photobiomodulation work but i actually watched a video just yesterday of a young man a young adult who is struggling with severe autism and he looked to be somewhat non-verbal and the implication was in looking at this video that he struggles with social you know involvement and awareness uh but he sat underneath the um the head unit that uh that you know covers the head And he went through a light therapy session and he began to get much more relaxed, much more willing to address the people around him, to have a human connection with other people. It was fascinating to watch. Now, I don’t know where all that’s going, but I mean, they’ve seen positive results on things like epilepsy and seizures. tinnitus, back pain, neck pain, all kinds of things that are being treated, and I suggest you check it out. Go to CrawfordMediaGroup.net, click on Sun Power LED, and see how the very light God himself created can be used to reduce pain and swelling and promote healing in the human body. Last thing, John, were you able to get those Taylor Swift tickets, or were they too expensive?
SPEAKER 01 :
Yeah, actually it was, yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
Great concert.
SPEAKER 04 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 03 :
Excellent. That’s very good.
SPEAKER 04 :
And it was worth every penny of the $7,000 per ticket you paid, right?
SPEAKER 01 :
That’s right.
SPEAKER 04 :
Hey, look, I would have offered you a cheaper price, but I had other people offering to pay me the same thing. So, John, I don’t know what to tell you. There we go. All right. We appreciate you, folks. We appreciate your five-star reviews wherever you listen to the National Crawford Roundtable podcast. Thank you so much. And John Rush, Rush to Reason out of Denver, Colorado. Neil Boron, Neil Boron Live. Or as Neil feels like sometimes a podcast should be called, Boron and the Morons. So I know we don’t always agree with you, Neil.
SPEAKER 01 :
Exactly.
SPEAKER 04 :
What can we say? Myself, Bob Moronduko out of Detroit. Guys, great talking with you and catching up. Looking forward to next week. Have a great week. Likewise. You bet. You too. We’ll see everybody. Thanks for listening. God bless.
SPEAKER 02 :
You’ve been listening to the National Crawford Roundtable Podcast. A view of today’s culture through a biblical lens. Brought to you by Preborn, saving babies and souls. Join us in the fight to save babies from abortion. Your gift provides a free ultrasound for a mother in need. 80% of the time she will choose life. Visit CrawfordMediaGroup.net and click on their logo to donate. And by SunPower LED light therapy devices. Bring light to your pain. Visit CrawfordMediaGroup.net and click on the SunPower LED logo to get out of pain and improve your overall wellness. You can download this podcast from Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, and more from your local Crawford Media Group stations website or at CrawfordMediaGroup.net. And please give this podcast a five-star rating on your Apple app. Look for the notification on your app for when the next weekly edition of the National Crawford Roundtable Podcast is ready for you to download. This is a Crawford Media Group production.
