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Jacob Goldstein
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Ryan Graduski
Welcome back to A Numbers Game with Ryan Graduski. Thank you guys for being here. Happy new year everyone. First episode of the new year. Happy 2026. I'm excited to be here and it's actually the one year anniversary of this podcast. We started this podcast January 6th, 2025 and here we are a full year later. I didn't really know if this podcast would work or if there was an audience who want to hear about nerdy number stuff with, you know, a nasally guy from Queens. I guess Ray Romano's not the only one who can pull an audience off sounding like this, but I, I'm just kidding. So I, I I'm happy that this show has grown and that you stay with me for this entire year. And I hope that I' providing you with some interesting insight about politics and the economy and the world at large that you're not getting from anywhere else. So thank you guys for being here. I really appreciate it. Now, I rang in the New Year the old fashioned way. This year in 2026, I had the flu, which is why we didn't have an episode for New Year's Day. I was just honestly too sick. So I have a little psa, a piece of advice for my audience. If you are sick and not feeling well, or your child is sick and not feeling well, do not bring them to a crowded party full of people. Even if it's Christmas, which is apparently what some people in my own family don't know. Influenza should not be your gift to everybody. So that's my little piece of advice going into the rest of the year. If you're not feeling well, stay home, take a nap, have a have some me time, maybe listen this podcast or some episodes you have missed, but don't go out with with large groups of people. So that's why we didn't have a New Year's episode again. But this, you know, this new year, this new podcast is going to be now three days a week. We're doing every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. So please like and subscribe wherever you're listening this podcast to make sure you don't miss an episode. I'm going to try to make sure we do like a Canada episode every Friday maybe, or Wednesday whenever I can get a candidate on to talk about specifically one race. Because it's a big year with the midterms this year we have a lot of important races, not only for the House and the Senate, but also for governorship and state legislatures too. So I think that's really important to spend some time to actually dig deep into these individual races and what's really making parts of our country tick. I'm very excited about it. And if you're really feeling generous and liking this, make sure please to like and subscribe and give me a five star review if you have a chance. It's pretty easy, takes a few minutes. All right, let's start off this podcast with some breaking news, and that is that Venezuelan dictator Nicholas Maduro was arrested over the weekend by special Forces and he's awaiting trial in the Southern District of New York. He is my new neighbor. There goes the neighborhood. Now, I was welcome to a few friends who are Venezuelan and Cuban and they couldn't be happier. It's a big day for them And I'm happy for them, but it is feels like liberation for them. Right? They have finally, the dictator has been overthrown. But before I go any further, I want to remind my audience of something very important that has been lost in this conversation, that Maduro is being arrested. Because we're talking about, you know, maybe if it's constitutional or if it was overreach or, you know, what, what the ramifications are, is important to remember. Maduro, who is the successor of Hugo Chavez, the other Venezuelan dictator, was elected by the people. The people voted for communism. And the way that communism works is you can vote for it, but you can never vote away from it. You can never get out of it. You can't vote your way out of communism, only your way in. And that's a very important thing to be aware of in this conversation. This would not have happened had the Venezuelan people not voted for communism. Hugo Chavez, Maduro's predecessor in 1998, Campaign on the themes of tackling inequality, redistributive economic policies and for a new constitution. But also in the midst of this left wing economic populism, he also covered racial identity throughout his entire campaign. It's less talked about than just the social economic policies because that's the way the left always works. Like to sit there and talk about racialism on the left. But Chavez would often talk about how the fact that he was ethnically mixed, he was probably part European, probably part native, probably part black, whatever. And because he was, he would note how his hair was curly, how his nose looked different, how his eyes were squintier. He would talk about how the elites were white and talk about the whiteness of the elites, the fact that they were the descendants of Europeans. There's a lot of colorism in South America. His mixed racial identity was infused with left wing economic populism. You could not separate them. Now, who does that sound like in America today? Remember, Mandani was there right after the election saying, we're going to turn New York into Denmark and Sweden, but for brown people. We've talked and we've heard a number of times from prominent left wing politicians about race and identity. The left employs the same type of tactics that we saw the right rise of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela back in 1998. In America today, the lesson for Americans from this whole experience that we're seeing right now shouldn't just be the future of Venezuela, but also the past. You only vote into socialism and into communism. You never vote your way out. So how do voters feel about Trump and Venezuela, how does he feel about the ousting of Maduro? There have been two polls. First, an Atlas intel poll. They really got the 2025 election incorrectly, but they found voters were overwhelmingly in favor of how he was removed. Right. It was only six hours. It wasn't like this long, ongoing war. There were a number of polls ahead of time asking about a military conflict. And when people hear the words military conflict, they're thinking of Iraq, they're thinking of Afghanistan, they're thinking of long occupations and nation building. So it's very difficult when you're talking about this type of engagement to get a pulse check ahead of time because no one's processing and saying a military engagement. That means six hours where no Americans die. There was also a YouGov poll that found that they asked in afterwards, they said, okay, seeing how this was, do you approve or disapprove how, how Trump conducted this raid. 34% approved, 41% disapproved. This was taken in the immediate aftermath. So it was like only a 900 sample size. I don't know if everyone even had all the information, all the data. I'm going to have a grain of salt when it comes to this poll, but it's the only one I have going into this podcast. That's why I'm going to bring it up first. I think one important piece of this poll, though that is seems very obvious and very true is 25% of respondents didn't know how they felt. Foreign policy is not a big deal to most voters. I think that you can't overemphasize that, even if you're like, in America, heck yeah. Like, this is great. We kicked ass and took names and beat up a commie. Even if you're feeling that kind of excitement and enthusiasm, for most voters, foreign policy just isn't a top priority right now. They really care what's going on in this country. When asked if they think military intervention will make things better or worse in Venezuela, 34% said better, 35% said worse, 31% said they don't know. It looked like this poll very much came down to partisanship about how you feel about Trump. Right. Over and over again, they asked, and basically if you liked Trump, you said the thing was great. If you didn't like Trump, you didn't feel it was good. And then a whole slew of people really had no clue. There were a clear divine on three issues. The first was 51% said, America will take over Venezuela's oil industry. That seems like it's a big goal of the Trump administration. 41% said Maduro should be found guilty of at least one charge brought against him. There's Maduro is not a very well liked figure. I think it's a broad level of support across the board is that, you know, there's no love for Maduro except I guess of the hard left communist type that loves starvation. And then lastly by a 19 point margin 46 to 27Americans want their country to be a good neighbor and avoid interfering in other countries domestic affairs instead of trying to set the right of other nations wrongdoings. We are still a very war weary country, right. We are still a country that has grappled with the effects of Iraq and Afghanistan. And anytime you talk and it is processed as a long military engagement, Americans are not really there. Now 71% of Democrats, 44% of independents and 24% of Republicans out there and said we're really, we just want to be good neighbors. We don't want to sit there and try to right the wrongs of every country. 50% of Republicans said the opposite. But I think it's important to realize that 50% of Republicans were either I don't know or we should just be good neighbors. That's the President's base, that should be where his numbers are strongest and they're not that strong even there. Americans really do want more me time as a country and I think Iraq and Afghanistan just lar, you know, they loom large in our conscious and in our head. Especially when you consider how military service is so heavily represented in just very few parts of this country. Right? The south, the Midwest and the Inland Empire like California, Arizona, Nevada, that whole area. That is the overwhelming number of people who serve in our military. It's not the country as a whole. You know, we don't force enlistment everywhere and there's, you know, we live in a country where kids in blue states wave foreign flags and kids in red states get American flags draped over their coffins from these wars. And I just think there's a lot of apprehension towards military intervention because of that. As for what happens next in Venezuela, I have been trying to read any tea leaves and it is no clear answer. They very well could hand power the Vice President for some time. It doesn't look like the Nobel Peace Prize winner woman who is the opposition woman is going to take over, but who knows, maybe she will. My best bet is that the Trump administration is going to provide certain types of demands for whomever the next possible leader is. And Whoever that is will probably go along with quite a few of them. One will obviously be about oil. But the second one that no one's really talking about is that Trump revoked temporary protective status of 700,000. Well, it's 500,000 Venezuelans. And then there's a secondary Biden humanitarian category that he offered. That would be another almost 200,000. So almost 700,000 Venezuelans living in America really are going to be without legal protections to be here. So part of that conversation with whomever the next leader is about who can repatriate 700,000 Venezuelans, not to mention the millions of Venezuelans living in South America who probably want to go home at some point. I think one thing's really for certain, though, is that Trump cannot take his eye off the ball when it comes to domestic policy. Americans want a president focused more on domestic agenda, especially on the economy and affordability and not just making a legacy with foreign policy wins, which the President has done a very good job of so far from, you know, the Middle east to what he's trying to do in Ukraine to Venezuela. That's fantastic for your presidential library, but Americans at home need to know you're caring about the homeland. And there's a lot to celebrate going into this new year. Right. I was looking and digging at some data, and I think it's lost very easily because you focus on bad news more than good. But I wanted to spend a second just thinking about all the good news that we have going this year. There's a positive sign at the beginning of 2026 that we've really turned a corner on the rise of bad BLM induced violence, Black Lives Matter induced violence that swept over our country for the. For the last decade. From 2015 to 2023, really 2024, we're at the lowest levels of mass shootings since 2006, the lowest levels of homicide since the 1950s. In part because our medical equipment is so good, we managed to avoid deaths from homicides, but nonetheless, lowest since 1950s. Teenage pregnancy is at a record low. Suicides are lowest since 2020. Road fatalities, lowest since 2019. Drug overdose deaths, lowest since 2019. Alcohol consumption is at our lowest in recorded history. Inflation is at the most stable since 2020. There's a lot to celebrate. Americans need to be reminded of that. Like we are. Nothing's perfect, but we're not headed in a bad direction right now. Things could be better, but things are not. The world is not ending. Things are not catastrophic. And any, you know, person who is sitting there and saying this is just a a bad, there's no worse time in the world to live in is really kind of missing. Missing the. Missing the moment. Because it's a pretty good time to live in this country right now. And there's a lot of good things happening. Not perfect. A lot more could be improved upon. But things have been heading in a positive step and you should just know that and chew on that as you start this new year. There is a lot of great things happening for America. So for this episode, I wanted to catch up on all the Ask me any things that I missed from last year. We're going to go into that next.
Jacob Goldstein
This is Jacob Goldstein from what's yous Problem? When you buy business software from lots of vendors, the costs add up and it gets complicated and confusing. Odoo solves this. It's a single company that sells a suite of enterprise apps that handles everything from accounting to inventory to sales. Odoo is all connected on a single platform in a simple and affordable way. You can save money without missing out on the features you need. Check out Odoo at O D O O.com that's O D O O.com Pro.
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Ryan Graduski
Of the flu, I'm behind of ask me anything and I wanted to make sure that I answered all my 2025 questions really start off 2026 fresh. All new ask Me Anything starting at the beginning of the year. If you want to be part of the Ask Me Anything segment, email me. Ryan numbers game podcast.com that's ryan@Numberspluralgame podcast.com it's such become such a great part of the show. I feel like I'm actually having a dialogue with so many different people from across the country. I really love this. It adds a lot to the show. So please, by all means, I am completely free. I've answered all the questions as of this episode. So shoot me an email on literally anything and I will try to get you the data and the information and my perspective whenever I can. This first question comes from Mary. She says, I think there is something you are missing from what has caused normal people to be squeezed. And I think the message Republicans need to focus solutions. The area of the economy that are way out of line even with today's inflation rates are where government has socialized some of the industry. That is true. Health insurance, not just the aca, but Medicaid and Medicare are driving up costs for everyone. So yes, health care costs are up. The Kaiser Family foundation founds that private health insurance in the last five years up 24%, way past, you know, people's earning rates. But I don't believe that it's Medicare or Medicaid that are responsible. I was trying to figure out how you meant that and I was drawing a blank. I don't think it's involved in raising premium rates unless you're talking about the cost of equipment and whatnot, because the government's paying for part of that. Maybe that's what you meant. MARY I was trying to figure out, I really couldn't, I couldn't do it. It's not directly related, though, Medicare and Medicaid. Secondly, housing, local, locally zoning and rent controls, national immigration policy, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Immigration obviously matters a lot towards housing. It's not just supply, it is demand. You have a lot more people come in the country, a lot more housing is needed. And then there's that's obvious with zoning. Here's the thing. I don't hate zoning laws. I know that it is the biggest, biggest thing that everyone's jumping on. It's like, let's end zoning laws. And zoning laws are the problem. There is an apartment building near where I grew up in Queens and it's not, it's not built yet. There's two coming up. There's going to have 850 apartment units, no parking. They're not building any parking for 850 units. It is not near a subway, it is not near public transportation. And the roads are singular single street roads. Do you understand what a calamity you're building for that local neighborhood? It is certain zoning laws are built to make communities function. And I think people just need to realize that a lot of what our housing issue is is because one, mass immigration, bringing in all these new people and to the hollowing out of so many regions of our country, especially like rural regions where these people are moved, there's more people living in more concentrated areas, right? So you have all these people wanting to live in the same 35, 40 metropolitan areas. They have to try to accommodate millions upon millions of Americans plus foreigners. And the government is responsible for the infrastructure. But these private corporations are profiting off of building as much as quickly as they possibly can. And in many cases, cases the infrastructure has not met up with the rising population and it causes an overall decline in people's quality of life. And I just wish that that was a perspective that people had when they talked about, you know, the, when they talked about growth. I think that they should really evaluate them perspective of let's grow but let's do it in a smart way where everyone's lives are miserable because traffic is too large, because there's not enough schools, there's not enough police, there's not enough civil service. Things like drive me crazy. I'm not anti zoning laws. Like it's, it's, it is one of the things that I very much disagree with my party overall on. But immigration, I'm 100% with you. And lastly, education. You say student loans have driven up the cost of education. That's 100% true. Student loans are the reason that colleges keep going up and up and up and more you guarantee student loans, the more the colleges will increase their numbers. If you bring down student loan guarantees or limit them, you will have whole areas where the numbers will decline. I will say with education, with the population change, especially less children, a trend you will start seeing in the next decade is school, schools being consolidated and closing, especially primary school. Something, something to look out for. Next question comes from Michael from California says I'm looking forward to your upcoming episodes on campaigns and getting started on politics. I'm so excited. I listen and watch on YouTube. Thank you so much, Michael. I'm, I'm very, very honored that you listen to me. My ask me anything question is what path would you suggest for a person who's Interested in career change from education to politics. I'm a teacher from public and private high schools with 30 years of classroom experience. I teach advanced placement US government politics in my spare time. For entertainment, I consume with national and California political news. I know I'm sick, but I love this and I'm fairly wonky. My point is, as I transition away from education and the classroom, I love to redirect my time and passion in politics. I'm not the type to run for office. I can see myself working on campaigns or for an elected official or somewhere in the media covering political issues. Okay, so first of all, if you want, those are all very different careers. Michael. Right. Working in the media is not working on a campaign. Working on a campaign is not working in an office. Right. So you have to kind of pick a lane and I would say as. As you're still working in education to start kind of dipping your toes in different things to see if you like them. This is 2026. We have a big election coming up in California. The governorship you have, you have the state legislative elections going on there. Volunteer, be an activ. Member of a campaign and see what that is like being really part of a campaign. It is thrilling. It is like a drug. I've done it for so long, I don't know if I can even get out of it because it's like a drug. But see if you like that, it's not for everybody. So I would say try that. Just try that in this year while you're still there. If you. And you volunteer or host a fundraiser or if you want to, you can even try to organize people to sit there and make sure they get a vote. Figure out, you know, which, which want to tap into. This is a super string year in California because there's two main Republicans running for governor. And California is then called a jungle primary. So basically everybody, Republican, independent, Green Party, everybody runs together in one election and then the top two run in November. Well, a couple years ago there was one congressional district, District 31, right in LA where the two Republicans came in first and second and locked all the Democrats out of a Democratic district. This year Republicans have two candidates that are right polling in first and second. In the last open election when there was not a. Was not an incumbent. So not Gavin Newsom was 2018. And the Republicans got a combined 36% of the vote. If they can get 37, 38, 39% this time there are nine main Democrats running. There is a possibility. I'll buy a small possibility, but a possibility for Republicans, if they organize and if they turn up in big numbers in this primary and Democrats stay splintered, that they could lock the Democrats out of the November election and pick up the California governorship. It is worth spending your interest and your time volunteering for that kind of campaign. If you don't want to do campaign work, you want to work for an office. I don't know how close you are to Sacramento, but there's obviously all these local offices you could sit there and apply for a job for figuring out it's not as sexy, not as glamorous, a lot of constituent service stuff. A lot of people arguing over trees or, or things overgrown. If that's what you like, God love you. There's. It's a very important service they do. And media is an entirely different aspect and there's a million different kind of jobs. Media is a tough industry, but there's like, the LA Post is coming up there to cover California politics. There's a lot of stuff that's going on that's happening right now in California. So there's, there's spots, but they're very different careers. So I would say try one of the other and see what you like best. Don't. If you don't have to do a career because you sound like you've worked in education for 30 years, do something you really, really are passionate about and just figure out the lane is my first piece of advice. Okay, Brian Fox writes to me, ponder me this. What the European continent would look like had World War II not taken an entire generation of men and women. How might both political economic conditions be. Have been impacted? And do you believe this would change the attitudes towards economic migration today? Oh, my gosh, Brian, this is a great question because I think about this often. Can I tell you, the other day, I'm sitting there and I'm all quiet and a family member of mine looks over me, goes, what are you thinking about? I was like, I'm thinking about the Reign of Terror from the French Revolution. What are you thinking about? Like, of course I'm thinking about this. I think about things like this all the time. So I, I've been thinking like, so, yeah, if the World war, World War II or World War I, World One and World War II had not happened, there would be. If both world wars had not happened, which I know you said about World War II, but both had not happened, there would be 190 million more Europeans al, today than there are. Right. There'll be 40 million plus more Germans and Russians. 38 million more polls, there be 15 to 25 million more Brits, Italian and French combined. It would just. There be tens of millions of more people, Right? That means more gdp, more economic prosperity, more people, but also the functionality. What World War I and World War II did was they broke colonialism, right? The British Empire fundamentally died because all their men died fighting Germany, the German Empire, all the great empires of the west, except for the United States, ended because of those two wars, because they killed everybody. The Russian Empire, Austro, Hungarian, Ottoman, all those empires are just gone because of that. So those empires would have lasted. Colonialism would have lasted for decades afterwards. Who knows what the conditions would have been in the Third World, what they could have done. Because, remember, I mean, I know colonialism is bad, bad, bad, but the colonial colonization built most of the infrastructure that many of these places enjoyed to get their first, you know, irrigation to get plumbing to get, you know, anything. If you look at like a place like Somalia, almost all that was built by the Italians back in, like the 1910s and 20s. So maybe had that continued for several decades, the impoverishment wouldn't have been so severe on the part of the Third World, and possibly the independent movements would been a little bit less haphazardly done. They were pretty much carved up 17 different ways because of. Because of, of just people breaking up. Also, I mean, there. We know Israel. Think about that. If there was no. There was no World War II and no World War I, especially if we're no World War I, the British would have never taken the region and no World War II, and it's likely that they would have not gotten nationhood. So. So it would just be a different world. It's fascinating to think about, but it's so hard to answer. Okay, last question. This one, and I've received this from multiple people, this question is, what do you do when you're not on board with Vivek Ramaswamy for governor? This is the question, given the current lay of the land in Ohio, where is the primary is effective, effectively the election? What's the best strategic play for conservatives who aren't fully on board with Vivek Ramaswamy should be looking for a viable primary challenger supporting a strong independent conservative with values. Or is it better to stay unified even if the candidate isn't ideal, just to avoid fragmentation? Okay, I really don't like the background of Swami. I don't know if I made that clear in that one episode. And by the way, to the honest member who said I was a little too hot under the collar, I apologize, I am Italian, I do get too passionate. But I will sit there and say this. You're. I think everyone who's going to be in the field is in the field, right? So if you don't like the back, there's other Republicans running. They have a very small chance of getting winning. But hey, throw them your support. That's who you want to do. You have the right conscience to sit there and do it if you really can't, even if that happens, right? There hasn't been a Democrat elected to the governorship of Ohio since Ted Strickland, which was like I guess maybe 16 years ago and he was a one term Democrat. If you sit there and say Vivek's our nominee, I don't want to vote for him and we live in a red enough state already, what should I do? I say this. Support whoever you want in the primary and then spend your time and energy voting for the Republicans for the state legislature. Remember, the Republican Ohio State Senate is 73% Republican. The State Senate of Ohio is 73% Republican and the State House is 66% Republican. Even if you don't like Vivek and even if Vivek, Vivek somehow loses because he is an extraordinarily unlikable candidate and the Democrat wins, it is not the end of the world. Because the Ohio state legislature is super majority Republican, the Democratic governor will be able to get very, very, very little done with how Republican the state legislature is. So I say focus your time and energy on a race, on a local race that matters. Vote for whoever you want on top of ticket. Don't vote at all. You know, vote your conscience. I don't believe that in the, in the case of where you really don't like somebody, okay, I'll say this. I did not vote for mitt Romney in 2012. I really, really. And this is in 2012, this is before it became popular. Says I really didn't like Paul Ryan. I thought he was full of, full of it. I mean, I just thought he was full of it. I thought he was a liar. I thought they were propping him up as leader of the party. I didn't buy into his plans for the budget. I just thought that he was awful. I didn't hate Mitt Romney, really did not like Paul Ryan with every fiber of my body and I didn't vote for him. And in the end of the day my vote didn't make a difference, but I didn't have to vote for him. And that's kind of my logic behind things. If you really don't like somebody, like really have a very difficult time voting for them. Yeah, skip it. Skip it. Vote independent. Vote for whoever you want. Don't vote for the Democrat. I wouldn't vote for the Democrat. But vote for somebody else who you believe in. And if they lose, it doesn't matter because that one vote didn't change the entire election. And as long as there's a Republican state legislature, Ohio is going to be fine, right? Super majority of the state legislature doesn't matter who's governor. They're going to run the show. That's my episode. Happy New Year's guys. I am so happy to be back. I am so happy to be able to talk again and I am so happy with you guys. I'll be here every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. So please like and subscribe. And I will be seeing you guys on Wednesday.
Jacob Goldstein
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Guaranteed human.
Episode: It's a Numbers Game: Maduro Arrested & What It Means for U.S. Foreign Policy
Host: Ryan Graduski
Date: January 5, 2026
In this episode, Ryan Graduski celebrates the podcast’s one-year anniversary while diving into the breaking news of Venezuelan dictator Nicolas Maduro's arrest and discussing its political and foreign policy implications for the United States. Graduski combines in-depth polling analysis, U.S.-Venezuela relations, and broader takeaways for American politics, before transitioning to his “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) segment, responding to listener questions about economics, housing, education, and career advice in the political sphere.
The main theme revolves around the fallout from the military arrest of Nicolás Maduro, implications for U.S. foreign policy, voter sentiment about interventionism, and what lessons Americans should draw from Venezuela’s recent history. The episode also provides a snapshot of positive social indicators in America as 2026 begins, emphasizing optimism amid commonly negative headlines.
(Timestamp: 06:02–09:45)
"Maduro, who is the successor of Hugo Chavez, the other Venezuelan dictator, was elected by the people. The people voted for communism. And the way that communism works is you can vote for it, but you can never vote away from it. You can never get out of it." – Ryan Graduski (07:00)
(Timestamp: 07:45–09:00)
"You only vote into socialism and into communism. You never vote your way out." – (08:27)
(Timestamp: 09:00–13:30)
“Foreign policy is not a big deal to most voters… even if you’re like, in America, heck yeah. Like, this is great. We kicked ass and took names and beat up a commie… for most voters, foreign policy just isn’t a top priority right now.” – (10:53)
“We are still a very war weary country…” – (12:27)
(Timestamp: 13:35–15:10)
Power may temporarily pass to the Venezuelan vice president; U.S. likely to lay out demands for new leadership.
Trump’s revocation of Temporary Protected Status threatens legal status for nearly 700,000 Venezuelans in the U.S.—repatriation likely a key discussion.
Domestic Priorities Matter:
“Trump cannot take his eye off the ball when it comes to domestic policy. Americans want a president focused more on domestic agenda, especially on the economy and affordability, and not just making a legacy with foreign policy wins.” – (14:25)
(Timestamp: 14:55–16:00)
“Americans need to be reminded of that. Like we are. Nothing’s perfect, but we’re not headed in a bad direction right now… there is a lot of great things happening for America.” – (15:25)
(Timestamp: 17:44–31:58)
Ryan addresses listener-submitted questions, providing data-driven perspectives and career advice.
(Mary’s Question, 18:20–20:50)
“Certain zoning laws are built to make communities function.” – (20:10)
(Michael from California, 21:00–24:40)
“Working in media is not working on a campaign. Working on a campaign is not working in an office. So you have to kind of pick a lane…” – (22:15)
(Brian Fox, 24:45–27:55)
“Colonialism built most of the infrastructure that many of these places enjoyed to get their first, you know, irrigation, to get plumbing… maybe had that continued for several decades, the impoverishment wouldn’t have been so severe.” – (26:30)
(27:55–31:59)
“If you really don’t like somebody, like really have a very difficult time voting for them. Yeah, skip it. Skip it… And as long as there’s a Republican state legislature, Ohio is going to be fine, right? Supermajority of the state legislature.” – (31:05)
"You can vote for [communism], but you can never vote away from it. You can never get out of it. You can't vote your way out of communism, only your way in." (Ryan Graduski, 07:10)
“Foreign policy is not a big deal to most voters… for most voters, foreign policy just isn’t a top priority right now.” (10:53)
“We are still a very war weary country, right. We are still a country that has grappled with the effects of Iraq and Afghanistan.” (12:27)
“There is a lot of great things happening for America.” (15:25)
“Do something you really, really are passionate about and just figure out the lane is my first piece of advice.” (24:32)
“If you really don’t like somebody… skip it, skip it, vote independent, vote for whoever you want… as long as there’s a Republican state legislature, Ohio is going to be fine.” (31:05)
Ryan Graduski maintains an affable, conversational, and often humorous tone, mixing data analysis with personal anecdotes, direct listener engagement, and an emphasis on pragmatic, real-world considerations—especially when advising on political careers or voting strategies.
Summary by Section:
Overall Takeaway:
Graduski argues that while foreign policy successes like Maduro’s arrest may seem significant, the American electorate primarily cares about domestic issues—especially after decades of military interventions. He encourages contextual optimism for Americans, underscores the importance of thoughtful engagement in political life, and stresses individual conscience and realistic expectations in both voting and career choices.