Shownotes
We are diving into the hot topic of whether the Ohio government should pay people for their land, tying it into bigger issues like reparations and historical injustices. They’ll look at how we use taxpayer money and the tricky business of trying to right past wrongs.
We’ll also dig into the nitty-gritty of the ATF and a big Supreme Court decision on bump stocks that’s got everyone talking. What does this all mean for gun control? Why is it being tied to Second Amendment rights?
Plus, ever wondered if those "close door" buttons in elevators work? Spoiler: They might not, thanks to the Americans with Disabilities Act.
As always, we’re brought to you by our fantastic sponsor, **Harper Plus Accounting**—the pros you need for all your tax and business structuring needs. Harper CPA Plus
Common Sense Takeaways
- The challenge in solving historical and current land issues using taxpayer money and the legal precedents this might set.
- The Randolph freed people promised land faced resistance from white residents, illustrating Ohio's complex history as a free state with racist practices.
- Examination of the ATF's authority, particularly in redefining what constitutes a machine gun, and the implications of the Supreme Court's ruling against their reclassification of bump stocks.
- The scope and limitations of government intervention and regulatory power, illustrated through the ATF's actions and broader governmental issues.
- Importance of understanding specific terminology in the gun control debate, particularly the implications around terms like "bump stocks."
Common Sense Moments
08:17 Discussing World War 2 progress and decisions.
11:05 Rifle operation and bump stock explained briefly.
12:49 New interpretation of the rule regarding bump stocks.
23:34 Government power impacts different perspectives and consequences.
29:06 Support for outlawing bump stocks lacks consensus.
32:21 Ridiculous to think power can solve everything.
36:06 Ohio state rep plans resolution for freed people.
41:02 Debate about reparations for descendants of slaves.
Stephen Palmer is the Managing Partner for the law firm, Palmer Legal Defense. He has specialized almost exclusively in criminal defense for over 26 years. Steve is also a partner in Criminal Defense Consultants, a firm focused wholly on helping criminal defense attorneys design winning strategies for their clients.
Norm Murdock is an automobile racing driver and owner of a high-performance and restoration car parts company. He earned undergraduate degrees in literature and journalism and graduated with a Juris Doctor from the University of Cincinnati College of Law in 1985. He worked in the IT industry for two years before launching a career in government relations in Columbus, Ohio. Norm has assisted clients in the Transportation, Education, Healthcare, and Public Infrastructure sectors.
Brett Johnson is an award-winning podcast consultant and small business owner for nearly 10 years, leaving a long career in radio. He is passionate about helping small businesses tell their story through podcasts, and he believes podcasting is a great opportunity for different voices to speak and be heard.
Recorded at the 511 Studios, in the Brewery District in downtown Columbus, OH.
info@commonsenseohioshow.com
Copyright 2024 Common Sense Ohio
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
Transcripts
Alright. Here we are. It is, Common Sense Ohio time again. It is that time again to come at you right from the middle, June 21, 2024. Common Sense Ohio, where you can check us out at commonsense ohio show dot com. Why do I say that? Because, you know, that's the convenient easy place to go look up all the backlog of episodes. I, I highly encourage it. Then you can like, you can share, if you have any difficulty subscribe I was gonna say prescribe subscribing to
Brett Johnson [:Well, some of it could be a prescription if, it could be. Your ills are that way.
Steve Palmer [:Be a prescription for your lack of common sense.
Brett Johnson [:There you go.
Steve Palmer [:Right. Yeah. So if there is a drug for that, you can find it right at commonsenseohioshow.com. Maybe I'll start making that. I'm start no. That'll be a slogan here.
Brett Johnson [:Prescription. Your prescription for common sense. Oh.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. There you go. Hey, we
Brett Johnson [:got another subtitle going on there. I like it.
Steve Palmer [:We'll get there. So, also there, you can, you can figure out a way to subscribe to your podcast. You can check us out on Facebook. It looks like the followers are increasing exponentially. It's sort of like, Yeah. You know, it's like when you invest money and, it grows with compounding interest. Mhmm. So subscribers are are racking up at an alarming rate, so people are interested in common sense, and you should be too.
Steve Palmer [:We are brought to you every week, each or was it I was gonna say every week, and I was gonna say week in and week out. I'll say it both. By Harper Plus Accounting, Glenn Harper, running the show over there, but he's got lots of folks who are, equipped to handle all your accounting needs. And what's interesting about that practice is that your needs could be vast. And by you, I mean, everybody, all of us. Some of us only have a simple tax return. Some of us have a more complicated business structure. I run a small business.
Steve Palmer [:Brett, you run a small business.
Brett Johnson [:I was just in there this week and I knew exactly what I had to pay this quarter.
Steve Palmer [:And then that make you feel warm and fuzzy knowing you gotta pay it. I mean, it's it's I don't wanna pay
Brett Johnson [:it, but It's such a I know I know exactly what it is though.
Steve Palmer [:It's such a, a dubious feeling. Mhmm. Because at least you know
Brett Johnson [:Mhmm.
Steve Palmer [:And at least you know. So you know you know you gotta pay, but at least you know you gotta pay. So but the idea look, we all know we have to pay taxes, and I would I would posit this for all Ohioans as well as those across the country. If you folks are not working a small business job where you have an LLC or you own your own show or you're a 10.99, maybe a a driver, truck driver, something for a living,
Brett Johnson [:or or whoever w 2. W 2.
Steve Palmer [:Or if you're if you're just w
Brett Johnson [:2 Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:You have no idea how much you pay in tax. And you think you know, but you really don't know. Because in order to have an employee, your employer has taxes to pay that you don't even know about or at least expenses to pay that you don't even know about. Maybe a certain 15%, 7a half 15%, something like that. But anyway, it it adds up fast. And the idea of having somebody on your side to help you sort it all out, to help you get to a point where not only you know what you have to pay, you feel good about what you have to pay, not because you pay it, but you feel good that you have the money. So if I know what I'm gonna pay in advance, then I can plan for it in advance. I can put money aside, and I'm doing this.
Steve Palmer [:I have a savings account in my business where x dollars goes in regularly, because I am worried that, I'm gonna owe money to the government. And it's not just, like, random amounts. I know what I need to save. And, you know, the idea is if you're getting a big tax return those of you who think you're getting a big tax return in April and it's like free money, it's your money. You loaned it
Brett Johnson [:to the government interest free.
Steve Palmer [:Interest free, and now they're giving it back to you, maybe. Maybe. Right. Right.
Brett Johnson [:Exactly. Yeah. It's it's, it's it is eye opening when you go through that process. I know we probably we're laboring it a little bit, but it's that but those are the pains of being a small business owner, entrepreneur. Yeah. You've gotta go through this stuff. You you have to and if you don't capture the moment and understand how to to wrangle with it, you're gonna come to the every time paying taxes, and you're gonna go, where's the money gonna come from?
Steve Palmer [:Well and I've seen it time and time again. Right? And and to finish I'm gonna follow-up on that, but to finish the point, it's like, if everybody knew how much they really had to pay in tax, it would be a tax revolt. Mhmm. There'd be a revolt. And this is maybe relevant for the bigger picture in the country and the state of Ohio, and it will tie into a topic here in a minute about, what Ohio wants to do with some money up in Mercer County. But, you know, government so often run this deficit, and our federal government is so far behind. I mean, we we have this it's not even deficits, it's debt. And it it's like, people we don't just print money, folks.
Steve Palmer [:And when you print money, it creates inflation. And it it's like we have this problem. And at the same time, you've got the politicians banging the table saying, well, the rich people aren't paying their fair share. But in our country, the rich people pay something like 80% of the tax. I mean, the, in order to live a socialist lifestyle like these folks seem to want, like the Scandinavian countries or the European countries. You have to start heavily taxing the middle class, you know, the guys the the the families making 50 to $80,000. You gotta really start gouging them for their tax money because, it just just not enough money. And we're you can't just print money and keep spending forever just to get your, your cause through the through the ringer.
Steve Palmer [:So anyway Yeah. And, you know, I forget where you're going with the other with the other topic you brought up. But
Brett Johnson [:Just the knowing where it's gonna you got to pay it. So you got to be in control of your business. Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:You gotta be in
Brett Johnson [:control of your business. Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:You gotta be in control.
Brett Johnson [:And and Harper Harper CPA.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. Yeah. We're back to Harper.
Brett Johnson [:This is serious to do. Yeah. They are.
Steve Palmer [:But if you only have a tax return, they can do that too.
Brett Johnson [:Oh, yeah. For sure.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. They can do that too. And they can compete with the guys with the signs on the side
Brett Johnson [:of the room.
Steve Palmer [:So that's harbor plus. You know, I've always if anybody hasn't figured it out yet, we are we are missing Norm's voice from the table. Norm is a believe it or not, Norm's a race car driver, which is, like, anybody who know like, you wouldn't think that just by talking to him.
Brett Johnson [:I know. Because you have this mindset of who and what a race car driver is, and he doesn't fit it.
Steve Palmer [:It doesn't seem like Norm.
Brett Johnson [:He doesn't really.
Steve Palmer [:And I can see Norm Norm's just like he he cuts this big, broad figure. I can see him cramming his body into a small little race car cockpit. And I guess we're not allowed to say that anymore, cockpit. They
Brett Johnson [:got it.
Steve Palmer [:There's some one of the airlines is now saying that they can't use that words to
Brett Johnson [:Get out of here. Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:I forget which one it was, but Oh my god. They're like warning pilots. They're they're trying to get a more diverse pilot structure or pilot I don't know, employee base. And, they wanna stop using the word cockpit. I I don't even know the origin of the word cockpit.
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. We're we're
Steve Palmer [:doing Let's figure this out.
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. That is cock
Steve Palmer [:But I can see while you're doing that, I can see Norm sort of cramming himself into the cockpit of a race car with, like, a little tiny helmet. Oh.
Brett Johnson [:Oh, okay.
Steve Palmer [:So So, what's the origin of cock?
Brett Johnson [:Well, this is Okay. It comes from cock which is an old, you know, term for small boat and swain which is a servant. So, simply put a Coxswain is a boat servant. Over time, the title led to the steering compartment of smaller boats Coxswain but I mean it would it would lead to the airplane.
Steve Palmer [:What's what's on woke about that? I I I don't know. I I mean the coxswain is the guy at the front of like the rowing.
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. So yeah. You know, when you do a Google search, this is kind of a heads up. When you do an a Google search, don't be looking at the AI overview because I mean, it may tell you where the AI the AI overview tells you.
Steve Palmer [:I've never even read it. I always skip
Brett Johnson [:the idea. Exactly. The term cockpit has multiple origins in origins. Excuse me. Including a pit for cock fights, a space for steering boats and ships, and a metaphor for combat. Again, I'm not gonna trust that. I'm gonna go kinda go I mean, you remember the days when we used to never trust Wikipedia? Now we trust Wikipedia over to AI interview.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. I know, but they're changing that too. That's what's so crazy.
Brett Johnson [:But but, yeah, it's an old English term for a small boat in swain which is the servant. So So the servants,
Steve Palmer [:there's no there's look, the word servant doesn't bother me at all.
Brett Johnson [:No. And it well, I'm sure it's based on the cock piece of it probably too.
Steve Palmer [:I guess I mean, I I don't know. But anyway
Brett Johnson [:Anyway
Steve Palmer [:the, Interesting. I can just see Norm, taking laps up at Mid Ohio right now at the in his, crammed into his cockpit. Yeah. Saying it out loud for
Brett Johnson [:the train. No AC.
Steve Palmer [:No AC.
Brett Johnson [:Sweating it like a Sweating it. Mad man.
Steve Palmer [:Right. With the with the like, I can see him, like, the white tight old fashioned sixties helmet.
Brett Johnson [:Oh, yeah. Yeah. He's he's probably
Steve Palmer [:but I think he's pretty good. He's a good driver from what I understand. But, anyway, Norm is up racing around the track, and, we're racing around the round table here without him. So that means we're not gonna use the normal format. We're not gonna just plow through the stories because guess what? I don't have the stack of papers that Norm has. He's good at that stuff. That's his that's his thing. We do have some stories we're gonna kick around.
Steve Palmer [:I know, I've been doing a World War 2 fact of the day. I think, we finally in 1941 on June 21 and I'm just gonna say the fact that we're gonna move on, because Norm usually helps me guide the discussion on it. But, there's a bigger discussion to have here too, is that, we finally, took Okinawa, I believe. So our Pacific quest was, we're we're moving. Right? So in, you know, we're preparing to invade, what, 1941? Hold on. Couldn't have been. Anyway, we are preparing to invade the mainland, which ultimately resulted in the study about whether we should do the bomb, we should not do the bomb. So anyway, there there's there's lots to talk about there.
Steve Palmer [:But, skipping right along, there is, there was a decision in court. And without Norm here, I thought I would do what I do best, which is to break down some
Brett Johnson [:legal stuff. Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:Do it. Yeah. There was a decision in the United States Supreme Court about bump stocks. And if anybody knows the history of this, so bump stocks are are these devices you put on, what would normally be a semiautomatic weapon. And here's what here's what's so frustrating about this debate, is that the people who say the the anti gun folks are often uneducated about guns. I mean, not only uneducated, but, like, grossly and foolishly uneducated. They will call a semiotic mantic gun a machine gun. They will call a machine gun a gun.
Steve Palmer [:I mean, they they have no idea. And look, I'm not it's it's a different argument to me, whether you should have gun control. But if you're gonna if you're gonna wade into those waters, at least understand the terminology. Because then what you do on the other
Brett Johnson [:side It's important.
Steve Palmer [:It's important.
Brett Johnson [:It is.
Steve Palmer [:For sure. On the other side, you lose credibility. When you when you get up there saying I think it was Biden or somebody saying, I'm gonna have a get a 12 gig shotgun, And, you know, I'll defend my like, give that to your a 120 pound, spouse, wife, and say, shoot a 12 gauge shotgun with slugs in it and see how, and see how you feel about that. It's not it just it's stupid. And then I hear people say, there's no reason to ever have, semiautomatic guns. They should all be outlawed. And I ask people what a semiautomatic gun is. They have no idea.
Steve Palmer [:They don't even know. So but this this case sort of digs into it, under the by analyzing the bump stock issue. So let's go let's go back in time. Everybody remembers the Vegas shooting. I think there's even a Netflix or something about it, but, the Vegas shooting where that that shooter was using a bump stock. So he basically took a normal rifle, semi automatic rifle, which requires you to pull the trigger each time to shoot the gun. You just don't have to cock it each time. So it will you can pull it each time.
Steve Palmer [:And the the recoil or gas or whatever mechanism in the rifle will cause the slide to go back and chamber a new round, then you can pull the trigger again. It's different than say, a bolt action rifle. Like, think Oswald Mhmm. Where they have to pull a bolt back and put it forward. You don't have to pull the bolt back on a on a semi automatic rifle. It is semi automatic. It requires a pull of the trigger with your finger each time to you wanna expel a projectile. An automatic what rifle, you just pull the trigger once and keep it pulled, and it just goes So with the bump stock, I've never used 1 or shot 1 or I don't know if I've ever seen a gun that has one on it other than pictures, you attach this device and the it bumps and recoils off your body and it lets you if you get if you time it correctly, you can sort of make it fire almost as fast or maybe just as fast as a machine gun.
Brett Johnson [:And you're attaching that to which style again you're talking about?
Steve Palmer [:To semi automatic.
Brett Johnson [:To semi automatic. Okay.
Steve Palmer [:And and it makes it fire a lot like a machine gun k. But not quite. And, you know, before the Vegas shootings, the ATF interpreted the law to say that bump stocks are not machine guns. K. Alright? After Vegas, under Trump, who said, I'm gonna get rid of these bump stocks, if everybody remembers, the ATF all of a sudden reversed its course midstream and said, well, wait a minute. We think these are machine guns. We're gonna interpret this this law as machine guns. So they they basically outlawed bump stocks, which essentially created criminals out of everybody who had one.
Steve Palmer [:And under the new interpretation of the rule, if you're in possession of 1, you had you had to go hand it in, get rid of it, and they couldn't sell anymore. Now, here's the the case the the US Supreme Court case was interesting because it went into the case somebody eventually said, I I'll tell you who it was. So a guy named Cargill eventually says, look, I'm gonna give you my my bump stocks under protest. I'm gonna go sue you bastards because I don't think this is constitutional. And, the issue here is more interesting to me than the than the or maybe the analysis is more interesting to me than the actual bump stock issue. So what you had in 1934 is the is the National Firearms Act, and that basically defined a machine gun in a certain way. It has to operate automatically and it has operate without interact I forgot how it says, but yet, like, the user, doesn't have to pull the trigger each time. And that makes it a machine gun.
Steve Palmer [:Now, this is the big picture that I find fascinating that is not really discussed in this case. A little bit, a tiny little bit they hit it. Because what the Supreme Court does is they eventually say, look, bump stocks the the ATF rule is unconstitutional, and bump stocks do not violate the Federal Firearms Act of 1934. Alright. What's what's interesting to me is that you have, on this hand, a law. And by law, I mean, Congress actually convened in 1934 the way they're supposed to, and they had this debate on the floor of the of the Congress, and they said that here's what a machine gun is, and they signed it. And this is a statute. This is a law.
Steve Palmer [:It's in the United States code. And then, on the other hand, what I have people for me rail about now for forever is we have what what I call the administrative state, who has something like who promulgate some what we call rules. So the administrative state ATF, they sit under the hat of the executive branch, the president. The law is written by Congress. So you got rules, and you got the law. And anybody back to taxes, anybody who's done any taxes, you have the United States code that says you so let's say, you shall pay taxes, and then you've got the IRS regulations that are like this, the piles and piles and piles of crap Mhmm. That interpret the tax rules or the tax law. It's the same here.
Steve Palmer [:You've got the Federal Firearms Act says machine gun is x y z, and then you've got the ATF saying, well, we think bump stocks before Vegas were not machine guns by this definition. Now we think that they are. And as a criminal defense lawyer, what I have are people getting charged with crimes based on the administrative interpretation of a law. And it gets really, really weird. Right? So it's Right. What what statute am I violating? Well, this is now a machine gun, but before it wasn't. Alright. So to me, the fascinating issue is what's the authority of ATF to actually interpret the law this way, and how do we sort it all out? If I had it my way, and ultimately, the US Supreme Court sort of agreed, and and Alito even wrote a very short descent that said, Congress go fix it if you want.
Steve Palmer [:And all you have to do in Congress is say, this is this is illegal. Bump stocks are against the law. But they're not gonna touch that.
Brett Johnson [:They're not gonna touch that.
Steve Palmer [:There's several bills have tried to, they've they've tried to get several bills passed. They haven't been able to. They don't have the votes. So this is this is the interesting political debate. So it everybody has sort of reduced this to gun control versus, versus, the NRA, but that's not really like, to me, it's more of a it's a deeper issue. We there is nothing wrong in I I think I read the decision. I didn't see anything mentioned about second amendment. It's not a second amendment decision.
Steve Palmer [:It is a the question that that what is interesting about the Supreme Court is they dig into the actual definition of machine gun and what it takes
Brett Johnson [:to operate a machine
Steve Palmer [:gun under the definition machine gun and what it takes to operate a machine gun under the definition in 1934 versus what a bump stock does. And in a rare sort of factual analysis, the US Supreme Court says, look, you ATF can't do this. They've exceeded their authority. They've essentially changed the law with a rule, and they can't do that. They've gone too far. So this is, like, if you believe in the cause of gun control, you think it's absurd. If you believe in the cause if you're, in favor of guns, you think it's awesome. I happen to believe in I I I favor guns, and I hate government control in any form.
Steve Palmer [:But this this this is one of those that works both ways. You gotta be careful what you wish for, because sooner or later, this thing reverses on itself, and it's gonna be an issue that you don't agree with. So you can't engineer an outcome and let, let an administrative body redefine the law just because you like what they said. So here, even if you agree that bump stocks should be illegal, the case does not say that bump stock it's unconstitutional to ban bump stocks. It just says that the law here or the rule making power here of the ATF can't do it. They can't define this as a machine gun. It doesn't fit the definition, and it doesn't. I read the logic.
Steve Palmer [:They even put trigger diagrams of triggers and how they work in the in the case itself. So it doesn't it it doesn't fit. So you're gonna get people up and up and down that screw this up. And you heard it here first on Common Sense, Ohio. The the real issue here is whether ATF had the authority to change the definition of machine gun by cramming in, this bump stock to fit, and it doesn't fit. It's a square peg in a round hole. It doesn't fit. And nothing in this decision says that Congress can't go pass a law banning bump stocks.
Steve Palmer [:Now if they did that, the US Supreme Court might eventually rule on whether that violates the second amendment, but that's a different question. Right.
Brett Johnson [:Right. So what is the ATF? When it was established, What was it supposed to do? Obviously, it is morphed. Sure.
Steve Palmer [:It's morphed just like IRS.
Brett Johnson [:It's gotten more powerful, more powerful, more powerful. What it was with the original intent for the ATF? Do you do you recall
Steve Palmer [:I don't even know what the original intent I mean, look, they have a
Brett Johnson [:Because it because it's not whatever it was at the beginning is not now what it is.
Steve Palmer [:They have different branches for sure. So now they have, like, investigative branches. So I'll deal with ATF and gun cases and criminal in criminal courts all the time. Then they have something called a tech branch where they go decide stuff like this. They have their technical people look at something and then determine whether it's a gun or not. Right. What they've done is promulgated a bunch of rules that are designed to fit into the cracks of the statutory scheme.
Brett Johnson [:Okay.
Steve Palmer [:And we have we have sort of looked in our lives, we have come to rely on these types of administrative bodies as gospel. You know, we they they promulgate the rules, and that's that. The problem is is this is what gives the executive branch so much power these days. This is what gives, you know, Trump said, well, these I wanna ban these. So a t they try to do it in congress, they cancel, ATF just does it. And, Biden is doing this with things like student loans, he's doing the like, whatever with immigration, they do this kind of crap, they being the executive branch. And all they do is just say rewrite the rules down there, give me some rules that, that fit. That this sort of reached an apex, this being the administrative power grab during COVID, where we had, CDC, the Center For Disease Control, basically promulgating law.
Steve Palmer [:And, it it it it this is a I think with the current composition of our US Supreme Court, they're gonna put a stop to this, slowly but surely, incrementally. Like, this this is really a slap down of what the administrative power is. So you can't ATF or any other agency can't just rewrite the law by promulgating rules. And, ultimately, people heard me talk about Chevron Chevron deference, and that's a different discussion, but, ultimately, I think, if we're gonna get back any semblance of what our country was intended to be, it is when we start to gut the administrative form of government. And this goes all the way back to, like, I guess, Woodrow Wilson, who said, you know, we just need we're all smart. We're all kings, or we're all, like, the educated elite. We have the ability to decide what's best. This governmental structure just gets in the way.
Steve Palmer [:You know, this balance of powers gets in the way. We don't need it. But our court is very tuned into this, and I think everybody should be because if you're worried about if everybody's worried about this power swing, so, you know, Biden's president, he gets out his pen and starts issuing executive orders using the administrative government to do it, then the next president comes in and issues executive orders swinging it back the other way. You know, eventually, that just becomes impossible. And
Brett Johnson [:Well, and just your example here with Trump. It's not a party thing. It's anybody in power now knows that they can do this. Yeah. Trump. So it it's it's party it's party blind. It it's that whoever's in the in in the White House knows they have that power now. Yeah.
Brett Johnson [:Or they or at least they know they can make the phone call, and something probably will happen.
Steve Palmer [:But you also make a good point. It's like, what was ATF when it started? Maybe it was just supposed to be a law enforcement, supporting legislation. Supporting yep. Write some rules.
Brett Johnson [:Of law.
Steve Palmer [:Tell us what a gun is. You know, give us some stuff. Yeah. But then it becomes this all powerful entity.
Brett Johnson [:Power creep into it. Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:And if you do that so, like, how many I forget what the numbers were. This is where we need norm. Like, how many IRS agents were added in under Biden? And there were, you know, 100 and 100. And I just saw another story today, specifically regarding IRS under the employee retention credits. So there anybody who had back to small business, if you file a small business and you you file an ERC claim because you brought back employees or you did something during COVID, you you're entitled to a tax credit. Entitled is such a wrong word, but it's like you you're eligible, maybe I should say, for a tax credit. And, but there's been so much fraud that, now they're gonna deny a bunch of claims, and those in the pipeline aren't getting their tax credit that others got. But IRS essentially wrote rules to give your to give employ businesses tax credits, And now it's a mess.
Steve Palmer [:And how many people do they have to employ to fix this? So it's just this blob that keeps growing and growing and growing and growing. We keep adding more administrative, governmental employees where pretty soon that is fascism, folks. That's what fascism is when the government takes over business and then, you know, that like, now there's more I don't have many more government employees we have, but it's,
Brett Johnson [:Well, it continues to grow. It continues to grow. You know, it doesn't really go. And and again, it's party blind. It is party blind. Every party brings in and it it doesn't it doesn't necessarily and maybe it slows down the growth with certain parties, but it still grows.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. And and the problem and and the problem is it it gets a pass, because if you're on one side of that issue, you like it. But if you're on the other side, you don't. You're but you're not fighting the power lever that the government is using to reach the decision either way. And this is what I always try to do, and then this is where Norman and I butt heads all the time. He's not here to defend himself, so I'll take him on. It's like, I I would say, well, Norm, what's the structure of power that the government is using in order to effectuate what you want to happen? Because if you once the government takes that power to do this, it's going to be wielded against you sooner or later than the next regime is gonna have it the other way. Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:And that's that's the danger of it. So here, look, the outcome, I I don't frankly I never really thought through whether I care about bump stocks or not. You know, it's a device that somebody sells that you can treat a semiautomatic weapon like bump stocks. And I guess I would say this, let's say Congress happens to pass a law that says bump stocks are now illegal. And let's just say that the US Supreme Court then decides that that law passes second amendment muster. It's okay. So now, we have a an official law on the books made declaring unlawful the use and possession sale of bump stocks. Does anybody really think that that is gonna stop somebody like the Vegas shooter from fashioning something like a bump stock to use it to kill people? No.
Steve Palmer [:It's absurd.
Brett Johnson [:No. If if you're if you're dead set, excuse the pun, on doing something you're going to do it. You're
Steve Palmer [:gonna do it. Right. So maybe you could argue that, like, some school shooters not gonna be able to have his easy access to it. But look, an Internet search will give him whatever whatever specs he needs to or she needs to make a bump stock and go use it. So it's like, you can't legislate away, bad people. You know, it's like, you you can only pile on the same different crimes to the same conduct over and over again until it just becomes ridiculously futile. And we're sort of there. It's, like, you could pass a law that says you're not allowed to use bump stocks to kill people.
Steve Palmer [:Is there any difference? It's, like, is there any difference? Like, there already is that law.
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. Yeah. So And it might stop a few people from and they may think twice about it, but probably not. They're already in the mindset. They're they're they're mentally ill to that already. But yeah. Yeah. I guess what I found, yeah.
Brett Johnson [:The ATF was actually under the IRS. And in 70 Really? And in 72, ATF was established as a separate bureau within the Treasury Department when the Treasury Department order 221 effective July 1, 1972 transferred responsibilities of the ATF division of the IRS to the new bureau of alcohol, tobacco, and firearms. Mhmm. So, it's been that recent. If you wanna put it that way, I mean, we're going on 50 50 years.
Steve Palmer [:50 years. But, you know, that's not Interesting. It is interesting. Yeah. So, anyway, anybody who cares about the case, it was, Garland, attorney general, Et Allen. When you ever see Et Allen in a case, it means, others and others, versus Cargill, c a r g I l l. So worthy of a worthy of a read. And, again, sort of, interesting in that they took on some factual nuances of how triggers work and whether a trigger pull with a bump stock matches what the definition of machine gun is in the act.
Steve Palmer [:But ultimately, it comes down to this. The ATF doesn't have the power to redefine or to cram a bump stock into the definition of machine gun because Congress passed a law that define machine gun. Now, nothing in this decision says Congress can't pass another law to include bump stocks in their definition of machine gun. It happens all the time. Happens all the time in state court legislation, all the time. So there's a new device that comes out, they pass a law, and, now we have a congressional action that outlaws bump stocks, and it can be tested against the 2nd amendment as it should be, but this is a separate issue.
Brett Johnson [:And I think, to your point, any news coverage that's to the to anything like this. Really dig deep in regards to seeing if the wording of second amendment comes in play. Like you said, there's nothing about second amendment in this. We have to start to parse out these news articles. Yep. And this coverage
Steve Palmer [:Because they're gonna make it a gun control versus anti gun control.
Brett Johnson [:Start sliding in these terms of the day, and they think it's a second amendment thing in it, but it's not. They're just, again, whether it's the journalist doesn't have enough time to really know what they're writing about or they have an agenda.
Steve Palmer [:There's an agenda. One of
Brett Johnson [:the whatever.
Steve Palmer [:Or both. Or both. Ignorance. You know?
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. Both. Because I wouldn't have known a lot about the artillery you're talking about up until right now either. Yep. Automatic, semiautomatic, and such. I learned today.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. I have a plethora of semiautomatic firearms, and, I have a plethora of bolt action firearms or single firearms and even double action firearms, like a revolver. I mean, there there's all sorts of difference. So at least get the definitions right. But what's Right. What's interesting to me is that the bigger picture I think we're talking about, these government officials claim to be able to solve problems if only they had the authority to do it. Our founding fathers created a governmental structure that limited their authority to do just that. So we operate with this certain inefficiency on purpose, because what we don't want is 1 leader, 1 group, 1 one person, one cause to to reign supreme over everybody.
Steve Palmer [:So look, there's a reason why you can't get this passed in Congress, And those who say we should outlaw bump stocks are unwilling to say, well, look, there half the country or more doesn't agree with you. Right? At least not through the representatives at Congress. Mhmm. So if you can't get it passed, then, yeah, I get it. You don't think that we should have bump stocks, but other people do. In this and even if you think you had the majority, we are not a majority rule government. We're a republic where we elect people to go vote on our behalf in Congress, and every state has 2 senators. And I've heard Obama say this, I think, in an interview on a podcast, maybe even with I forget who it was.
Steve Palmer [:But I heard Obama say something, talking about disbanding the senate, because they don't like it. Because the senate limits power. Because you have a state like, pick one that's not densely populated. Idaho. Idaho has 2 senators. New York has 2 senators. And people that want power to do what they wanna do don't like that. So we have this country, where we have different people that sort of span the entire continent.
Steve Palmer [:So those living in the coast believe differently than those living in Idaho.
Brett Johnson [:Certainly do.
Steve Palmer [:And, you know, heretofore, it's worked because the people living on the coast don't get to get crammed down policy on those living in Idaho. And this is what federalism is all about. I've I've told this story before, but I've debated people and they my the debater or debatee I was talking to basically said, well, we should just we should just create a we're just gonna end up in we're gonna have different parts of the country where people just go live and live under their rules, and then, I can go live under my rules. And I said, yeah, we had that. Yeah. Wow. It was called states and federalism. And and you guys you guys screwed it up.
Steve Palmer [:You don't want that. You wanna cram down your views on on everybody else. And I don't care what side of the political aisle on, you can't do that. You can't do it.
Brett Johnson [:Well, and it's it's I forget who said this today looking at back, you know, in history about, you know, looking at our woes of today politically. You know, that sort of thing. He says, we've always had this. Mhmm. You go back to 19 seventies. You go back to 19 thirties. I mean, we're talking about automatic you know, a machine gun act in 1934. Mhmm.
Brett Johnson [:So obviously there was a discussion about this type of artillery in our country. And congress That needed to be legislated. And congress
Steve Palmer [:And congress passed a law. Change it if you don't like it.
Brett Johnson [:Right. But but they were talking about it nearly a 100 years ago. Mhmm. So nothing's new under the sun here that we're talking about. Other than yes. Culture, there's some some things that they were addressing differently than than was back then, but we have the same problems.
Steve Palmer [:One of the scariest things I've I've read, and it was going back a few years. It was a one of the Ivy League law professors either wrote it or was getting interviewed. Can't remember who it was even. But the he was making some comment like this. If only we had the power, or let me let me rephrase. He says, we need to get this power, so we can do things like solve global warming, solve racism, create equity in in income throughout the country. He had a he had this laundry list. And, but, you know, we can't do it, because, the courts keep striking down our legislation.
Steve Palmer [:And I'm thinking to myself, yeah, exactly, you jackass. I mean, the first, the premise is that you think that if what they what he's really saying is only if you gave me plenary power to do whatever my whim is, I would wield it perfectly, and I could solve all these problems. Now it's absurd on its face to think that that Congress in the United States would have the power to solve global warming, even to the extent you believe it exists or don't believe it exists. Like, you think that you're gonna that you can solve it? You think you can solve racism only if you had more power? Do you think you could solve economic inequality only if you had more power? Yeah. I mean, that's like, you can just you can it's like the the animal farm at the end when the pigs turn into farmers. You know? It's like that you're you're gonna give them all the power. What do you think they're gonna do with it? So
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. And and and you kinda wonder where this this this comment comes from. Is it just out of pure frustration or just like I'm I wanna end this conversation. I would just wanna be done with it. Let's stop talking about this. Yeah. What is it? What what what what leads them to that to that end that they know the best way? Because I wanna end this. It's done.
Steve Palmer [:And what's interesting is the founders understood and protected against that. Mhmm. They protected against that because they came from a place where there was a king, and they protected against it because that inevitably leads to corruption Right. And and and authoritarian. They didn't want the elite class, the, quote, educated elite, to have plenary power to, enact whatever they wanted to enact at their whim. They didn't want it. So they created this prop they created this 3 branch government that is loaded with checks and balances. And I think I think it was Ketanji, Jackson in the US Supreme Court argument recently on a first amendment issue where she's like, well, this first amendment is getting in the way of our ability to solve problems.
Steve Palmer [:Like, you're damn right it is. Right?
Brett Johnson [:It's not supposed to be easy. Right.
Steve Palmer [:Oh, gosh. You you Oh my god. Like, we have a check on powers and, you know, the spit the court's now the end all be. I heard, AOC in an interview. It's like the court is now this end all be. Why should they have so much power? Well, they don't have all the power. They don't get to write law. And the funny thing is is that the left was forcing or the left was encouraging it, and, they agree with it when the court when the US Supreme Court is legislating Wade or when it when it fits their bill.
Steve Palmer [:But when it doesn't, they think it's, unfair. It's like, look, you can't have it both ways. The court's job is to look at law, compare it against the constitution, and figure it out. Make bigger picture legal calls, not right law, not right legislation. And the executive branch of government's job is not to write legislation in the form of defining bump stocks as machine guns. Their job is merely to create rules, of enforcement. And when they've when what they did here is they went too far. They said, no, you can't.
Steve Palmer [:You don't have the authority to basically rewrite a law. And I think that it what's interesting in that decision, they actually quoted, I think I think, Clarence Thomas wrote the decision, but he actually quoted, Feinstein, who said on, I think, on Congress floor somewhere, look, be careful. You can't do this. The ATF doesn't have authority to do this, and you're just gonna get struck down. You know, we need to go about this a different way.
Brett Johnson [:He he saw it already. Yeah. It could happen.
Steve Palmer [:And she was right. You know, it's like they she can't do it. But, anyway Wow. The bigger picture here is, folks, always be weary of the of any government official who says they can solve the problem only if they had more power. Because usually, what that means is disbanding the protections that our government inherently has. So
Brett Johnson [:Right. Exactly. Yeah. Well, one other, item that we talked about preshow just to give you, like you said, normally has the stack of papers to go through. So, we had to pick at least 2
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. To talk about. Through on our own.
Brett Johnson [:But, you know, going back to Ohio Focus. So, I I think most of us have heard that, you know, with with the celebration of Juneteenth, there was some new talk of, from Ohio the state rep, Dontavious Jearls, from Columbus announced plans for a resolution acknowledging the story of the Randolph freed people. I think most of us don't even know that story. Now, what hit home for me is I'm from Mercer County, so that it affects actually the Mercer County area. So, it really caught my attention going, woah, woah, woah, what's going on? And, you know, the end result of this, I'll I'll I'll play it backwards, but I'm hearing these acknowledgments of like, okay, these freed people were not, they they were land was taken away from them going, well, wait a minute. My family owns a, you know, a 40 acre farm. It's a century farm back from 18/92. It's been held in our family for since since 18/92.
Brett Johnson [:It's like, okay. Who is involved with this? Is it resolution that land's gonna be given to them, taken away from farmers? But luckily my family was not involved in this. We're not in southern Mercer County, but that's why it rang true. Anyway, so the back story of this if you have not heard in 18 46, a group of nearly 400 recently freed black people were halted by a white mob in New Bremen. When Randolph freed people were freed, their former owners set aside money to buy them land.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. Randolph being the guy. Randolph was the former owner. He lived down in Virginia and had slaves. And after he died, he said, buy him land.
Brett Johnson [:I feel guilty.
Steve Palmer [:Send him up to Ohio.
Brett Johnson [:Send him up to Ohio. The the the the will was contested, but I think it was settled in court. Yes. The land was his and it was his to give. His executors settled on Mercer County because there was a thriving black settlement there called Carthagena. But white residents recoiled from the prospect of 100 of new black neighbors. In fact, when when they came up in in 18/40 7, I believe it was 1846, excuse me. They were stopped.
Brett Johnson [:I mean, guns, rocks, whatever. The pitchforks saying, you're not coming in. You're not coming in. You're not coming in. Said they were forced back down. They they actually resettled and settled in the the pick what area from what in in a Rossville, I believe that's where a thing. Some Quakers brought them in, gave a you know, so they they they they didn't have to go back down south. They stayed in Ohio.
Brett Johnson [:Yep. From the most part, from what we read, they did okay. Of course, they weren't given the land they were supposed to be given to, given. So, this has been addressed a few times. So it's it's now back being cited that we need to make some restitution to these groups to this group of people because they were given the land out. So I was playing this out in my head. I was telling you this before we started recording it's like okay. So this group of 400 freed slaves come up up the Miami Erie Canal and I drive by that.
Brett Johnson [:Well, that spot they stopped. I drive by that every time we go back to to the farm and so they're they're forced back. So that land is still sitting there. That 2,000 acres is still sitting there waiting for them.
Steve Palmer [:Mhmm.
Brett Johnson [:What happened after that moment then? Who how did the ownership of that land turn? Did the farmers buy the estate buy the plan from the estate? Or they just plop their butts on the on the 2,000 acres and cut it up?
Steve Palmer [:I I
Brett Johnson [:I don't know. Yeah. Exactly.
Steve Palmer [:So it's an interesting there's so, basically, Randolph sends these folks up, and they're met with a mob. And already in place in Ohio, it's interesting because Ohio was a free state.
Brett Johnson [:Right.
Steve Palmer [:Right? So in theory
Brett Johnson [:And this is free state. And think about it.
Steve Palmer [:This is a It wasn't a non racist state.
Brett Johnson [:Right. And and and prior to the Emancipation Proclamation
Steve Palmer [:as well.
Brett Johnson [:This is prior to the end of everything.
Steve Palmer [:Yes. And Ohio was not even a it was prior to the civil war. Right. Right. Ohio was not even it was not a it was not a race racist free state. You know, it's like, we didn't have slavery, but you still had racism. And the landowners up in Mercer said, nuh-uh. And Ohio already had on the books, these bond a bond requirement or something that we would call now black laws, which were designed to keep black folks out.
Steve Palmer [:You know, it was designed to prevent this from happening. Now, by and large, I hear or I read that these black laws were not enforced. The one that's at play here was whoever was gonna go get this land had to post a bond of $500, which is more than what the I mean, that was an absurd amount back then. There's no way they would have been able to do it. Right. Randolph's, executor was assured that they wouldn't have that wouldn't get enforced. But even after they when when Ohio heard they were coming, they tried to pass laws that ban black immigrants. I mean, they tried to do everything they could to prevent this, and then, when all else fails, they meet them with pitchforks and shotguns.
Steve Palmer [:You know, it's like
Brett Johnson [:Yeah.
Steve Palmer [:And say go go away. They went away and they ended up down near Troy, Ohio and, Piqua. And, and I guess one of them, a descendant, is now the the mayor of Yeah. Of, the particular one. They've they've
Brett Johnson [:they've traced quite a few descendants in regards to what they have done in the community. And they've done some really good stuff. I mean, they they made do with the home the 2nd home they said they were gonna have to have.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. So now the question is, what do you do about it? You know, we've talked about reparations before and, you know, reparations as a general topic is is a tough one because what are you gonna do? It's like, who's who's entitled to it? Who has to pay? And how does it all work? And what are you gonna do? This is a little closer though because you can actually track trace this back maybe a little closer to say, alright. I was one of the my great grandfather was one of the black folks or the descendants here who was, entitled to get his 40 acres of land, and I didn't get it. I want it now. In the meantime, like you said, somebody else has purchased that land probably 10 times over. Probably. It's probably occupied by a generation of families. It's all mostly farmland up there anyway.
Steve Palmer [:Mhmm. And, it's being used. So now you've got this this this has become sort of like a political theater a little bit, because it's really an impossible ask to say the government is gonna take land from these one family who has now had it, who had nothing at all to do with any of this, the person sitting on that land right now. We're gonna take it from that person and give it to another family. And then to expect that to somehow fix anything is absurd. I mean, it doesn't those are those are non sequiturs. And then it's you know, on the other hand, you could say, well, why not? You know?
Brett Johnson [:You could. You could. You could. It could it could be asked for. I I think other options that are on the table from what I'm seeing are obviously, one is that, they, the state sets up some scholarship fund for the the descendants. Okay. Now, another option is, well, we to to give them state land.
Steve Palmer [:Yep. But give them some other land. Give them a consolation prize. Right? Well So here's the problem.
Brett Johnson [:That that that reeks with, okay, what state land is Ohio? What state land
Steve Palmer [:is Ohio? I don't know.
Brett Johnson [:And where are you taking it from? It's probably parkland. Right. I mean, what what our or, mineral rights land. I mean, what what does what what does the state of Ohio own?
Steve Palmer [:And understand, like Well, give me Ohio State University,
Brett Johnson [:I guess.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. Give yeah. Well, they're not gonna give them good land. And whatever they give them, it's not gonna be that.
Brett Johnson [:That. So yeah.
Steve Palmer [:So the question is and then you have to ask, is it the is it Ohio's job to solve this problem? You know? It it is it? And it's like this guy, this this congressman, or this general assembly member would say, yes. It is. You know, we have to do something. But Probably based
Brett Johnson [:on the black laws and such that that were put in play, probably. I could see the line. But It's
Steve Palmer [:him saying, yes. It's our problem. But, you know, couldn't the court solve it? I don't know. I don't think there is here's the bottom line. There is no good solution to this problem There's no because slavery sucked. Racism sucks, and this kind of crap sucks. And It does. And it just it it it's a it's a it's just an awful part of our history that we have to contend with.
Steve Palmer [:That's the bad news. The good news is, look, these folks all found a place. They most of them stuck around. Most of them had lives. They might not have been easy lives. Maybe they would have been easier lives. Maybe they would have been harder lives had they got the land. Who knows?
Brett Johnson [:We don't know. We don't know. Who knows? Right. And that's not a justification that they should not have gotten it. It's not. Either way. But we don't know that. Yes.
Brett Johnson [:Correct.
Steve Palmer [:You're we're we're making a we're drawing a conclusion here that I don't think is that I don't think necessarily follows. Had they've gotten the land, they would have been better off. I I don't know.
Brett Johnson [:Don't know.
Steve Palmer [:We don't know. We don't know. And if you play it out,
Brett Johnson [:they would have they would have been in a county that they were not welcome. Ever ever welcome daily.
Steve Palmer [:Could have been miserable.
Brett Johnson [:It could have been.
Steve Palmer [:They might they might have been hanged by the recent bastards who were there who didn't like them.
Brett Johnson [:Or they could have changed the scope of where Mercer County is gone.
Steve Palmer [:Maybe they could have changed it completely. Either way. No. Like, we're we don't have the flex capacitor or the flex capacitor. We can't get in the DeLorean and go back in time and fix this. We cannot do it. So in law, typically speaking, we solve such problems with money. And those problems are solved with money through the courts, not the government.
Steve Palmer [:And this is the problem, is that when we're asking the Ohio government to solve this problem, that's where it gets dicey, because they're doing it with taxpayer money, they're doing it with everybody else, or they're gonna do it with an individual's land who now they have to take. And is Ohio gonna compensate them for it? They could say, no. We don't have to because you shouldn't have had it in the place. And the guy sitting there thinking, oh, I've lived here for my whole life, and I was gonna give it to my kids because I've worked it my whole life, and I put this house on it, and I did whatever. So it's not the compensation for that guy.
Brett Johnson [:And do I pay for the sins of my forefathers?
Steve Palmer [:Right.
Brett Johnson [:Or maybe and not may not even be a Century Farm. They could have very well been that well, that's not even my relations. I bought it from that family. Our family's, they died out.
Steve Palmer [:They died out. Or what if it's a subdivision now? Yeah. Now what do you do? Like, you can't fix these problems after the fact.
Brett Johnson [:So
Steve Palmer [:it's always money that has to fix these problems in law. So if I, you know, look, if if I am negligent or if I do something bad, and I hurt you or kill you, I can't you can't fix it by saying, I'm gonna resurrect the dead. You have to fix it with money. Or even if I if if you lose your leg in a car accident and somebody else is at fault, it's like you can't you can't do anything. We just gotta pay. And so money is the money is really the only equation that can fix this. And then the question is, who has to order the money being paid, and where is it coming from? And, that's where it just becomes this impossible onion that you have to peel off, and there is no end to it. So this is this is politics.
Steve Palmer [:It's gonna go nowhere. I don't think anything like this will ever pass. It sucks for the people who came up here with the American hope of having 40 acres of land to farm as their own. Mhmm. It absolutely sucks.
Brett Johnson [:And I think it's, to me, I love history. And when these gems come up to find out who we were, I think it's great.
Steve Palmer [:It's it's let's see.
Brett Johnson [:Study it. It's lessons learned. How do we not repeat this crap?
Steve Palmer [:But banging the table rhetorically to say, now we have to fix it. Yeah. It's like, well, how are we gonna fix it? And, you know, this argument is, well, we we the government compensated the intern the Japanese who were interned. It's like, yeah, yeah. Alright. But that's not quite the same thing.
Brett Johnson [:No. Not no. It it's it's not real time. Yeah. Right. It did.
Steve Palmer [:Or at least closer to real time.
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. It it's it's a difficult situation all the way around because, yes, you feel for these these descendants. You do. Right. Of course. And
Steve Palmer [:I'm And to think you can fix the the mistakes, the sins of the past, you cannot. Which is a very fundamental Western idea. Right? We can't fix this. Right? We can't. You know, we can we can atone in different ways. We can say, alright. Now we're gonna resolve to learn from this and make sure this crap doesn't happen again. Right.
Steve Palmer [:Make sure that the people, the 600,000 men who died, one on, including both sides in the civil war is not in vain. And we're gonna Mhmm. We we deal with it. But I don't think there's an easy way to fix this. And I find it somewhat, this is like a rhetorical table pounding debate, designed to get attention.
Brett Johnson [:Yes. Yeah. For sure. For sure. Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. So I I I I I think it's interesting, and we have brought up reparations, stories in the past, and it didn't affect Ohio directly.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. But this does.
Brett Johnson [:And this does. And I thought this wow. It's not
Steve Palmer [:quite reparations because there's there's a it's grounded in some some factual legal
Brett Johnson [:specific to a group of people that have that have that have generations still here you can follow. Yeah. So there there's some meat to the bone on this one.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. It's it's it's it's not just this, nebulous ether of preparations.
Brett Johnson [:Group of people that
Steve Palmer [:if you Paying everybody $1,000,000. Yeah.
Brett Johnson [:Right. Right. Right. Right. Exactly.
Steve Palmer [:But, at the same time, there's still no solution that works. No. There's still no solution that works. So say, for instance, if I fire you wrongfully, you have a duty to mitigate. So you have to go get another job, and then you have to still you can't just give up and say, now you owe me everything I would have made on this job. And I hate to I'm not comparing this horribleness to getting your job. But the the point is these people had lives, and and they had lives despite this horribleness. And how do you account for that? Or you might even say, like, 2 generations away, if you would have asked one of the grandsons, hey, look.
Steve Palmer [:You wanna give up everything you have here and go back to Mercer County and have your 40 acres? He'd probably said, no. Yeah. He probably would have said, no. Or maybe somebody else says, yes. But, you know, it's like we're dealing with, like, the the closer you get to this kind of reality, the more you get into those kind of thoughts. It's like you still had a life.
Brett Johnson [:Right. Right. And and if they do follow what the will stated, each it would be divided up into 10 acres. You'd be getting 10 acres.
Steve Palmer [:I thought they're each getting 40, but maybe it was
Brett Johnson [:I think I was throwing 40 around just for the sake of 40 40 acres and a mule.
Steve Palmer [:Yeah. 40
Brett Johnson [:acres. But but I just saw I did because I was kinda curious, like, okay. How did they divide that up? It's like, oh, 10 acres of plot.
Steve Palmer [:So you get 10 acres. But look, 10 acres in today's dollars is huge money.
Brett Johnson [:For sure. Yeah. I'm not I'm not implying that at all, but 10, you're not gonna become a farmer.
Steve Palmer [:You're gonna have a house. You have a homestead.
Brett Johnson [:You have a homestead.
Steve Palmer [:Yep. The You have a homestead.
Brett Johnson [:And a good thing if if you didn't have it before and you don't have
Steve Palmer [:it now. So So maybe the government takes 2,000 acres, allocates it to somebody, and pays the current farmers. Maybe they try to make a deal. I I don't know. But I guess the point is is that it's far more complex than what this this guy that's the point of all this. So people are gonna like, I can see people taking clips of what I said and saying, you're blah. But the point is is that this is a far more complex problem It is.
Brett Johnson [:It is.
Steve Palmer [:Than just pounding the table saying fix it because it can't be fixed.
Brett Johnson [:Well, and you're also dealing with, okay, the reparations or what do we wanna call it to these descendants. What do they want? Yeah. What do you want? What does each individual family want? Maybe they're very very happy and pick one. They just like, we're good. Yep. So they're not like, I can out of 400 descendants or, you know, 400 families or whatever and all these descendants, there cannot be a unity in what they want.
Steve Palmer [:Oh, they're all split.
Brett Johnson [:Yet. Right.
Steve Palmer [:Now they're all split. So you're deciding what they want. That's another now the government has to decide what's best for them.
Brett Johnson [:Right. And it's them
Steve Palmer [:any input.
Brett Johnson [:You'll have So to extremists.
Steve Palmer [:You have an extreme failure.
Brett Johnson [:Yeah. It's tough.
Steve Palmer [:This is a failure ab initio from the outset as we say in law, ab initio. Failure from the beginning. This was an abject evil failure of of our country's policies of slavery, of racism, of the this is, like, effectively Jim Crow laws back in the 1840s. Yeah. This was a failure on every level. And the problem is, it is also a failure that has no real recourse.
Brett Johnson [:I know. Tough. Tough. So Well, I want to I think we cover our stories, but we'll end on a on a Oh, I didn't know that story. I just found this this morning. So the truth about the closed door elevator button. We all see it. Yeah.
Brett Johnson [:We get we get we get.
Steve Palmer [:How many times do you push it?
Brett Johnson [:We get anxious that sort of thing. So, you might be surprised to learn that pushing an elevators closed door button does nothing and has been doing that since 19 nineties. Through the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, elevators had to open to be open for at least 3 seconds to allow someone with a disability enough time to get inside the elevator. Any elevators built after that act in 1990 were built either with an ineffective or dummy closed door button or the button was not wired to the control panel.
Steve Palmer [:So we've I've been pushing it. That doesn't do crap. That's awesome. Alright. I guess yeah. Regulatory nonsense. And you
Brett Johnson [:at least it makes you feel like you're doing something, but it's not doing anything.
Steve Palmer [:Push it.
Brett Johnson [:It does, though.
Steve Palmer [:Now they're gonna tell us the crosswalk button doesn't do anything either. Oh. Yeah. I'll have to look into that. Yeah. I think it probably does. But yeah. Alright.
Steve Palmer [:Well, look. We we we made it without Norm. We got some guests coming next week, and Norm wanted us to tout them. So I I I've I've just done that. So next week, they're a guest. It's gonna be a pretty cool discussion. Tune in. I'm not gonna tell you who, what, when, or why, because Norm wanted me to.
Brett Johnson [:Make you tune in.
Steve Palmer [:Right. Make you tune in. So, this is Common Sense IO brought to you by Harbor Plus Accounting coming to you right from the middle, at least until now.
