← Truth in the Barrel
Truth in the Barrel
This Week Unfiltered | 09.11.25
00:53:39
Today we’re taking an UNFILTERED look at the murder of political commentator and Internet sophist, Charlie Kirk before we examine the legacy of 9/11 and how the tragic events of that day changed us. Then Russia invades Poland, the GOP continues to...
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- [00:01]
Mayra Ameth
A Mochi moment from Sadie who writes I'm not crying, you're crying. This is what I said during my first appointment with my physician at Mochi because I didn't have to convince him I needed a GLP one. He understood and I felt supported, not judged. I came for the weight loss and stayed for the empathy. Thanks, Sadie. I'm Mayra Ameth, founder of Mochi Health. To find your mochi moment, visit joinmochi.com.
- [00:27]
Amy
Sadie is a Mochi member, compensated for.
- [00:29]
Commercial Announcer
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- [00:58]
Amy
T Mo welcome everyone. Today we're taking an unfiltered look at the legacy of 911 and how the tragic events of that day changed us. We're also going to be talking about Russia sending drones into Poland. Republicans in Congress continue to block the release of the Epstein files, Israel attacks Hamas in the Middle east and in Doha, plus a lot more coming up. This is Truth in the Barrel.
- [01:33]
Denver
You know what a week, Amy. And I gotta tell you, people want to keep listening to us are going to have to subscribe, right? You got to go to YouTube, you got to go to our social media channels. Make sure, right? You go to the new substack for Truth in the Barrel. But following us on X, filing us on True Social even is what people need to be doing if they want to hear all this. Because if you look at the topics you just talked about, Amy, it's going to be an incredible conversation. I don't even know, you know, with everything that happened yesterday with 911 today, with what you're seeing in our environment, Amy, I think we're in for a very dangerous and unique time over the next year going into midterms. And I think with all what you said about our foreign policy issues also, it's hard for me not to think that there hasn't been a more chaotic moment in the US since 9 11, you know.
- [02:22]
Amy
Yeah, well today is 9 11, the day that we're recording this and it's a very somber day and one that's very personal to both you and me. And we're going to get to that. But before we do, I think it's important to talk about what happened just yesterday in Utah with the killing, the assassination of a man by the name of Charlie Kirk, who was a right wing young influencer and sort of. He was the head and started. Founded a group called Turning Point usa, which is a right wing, young sort of collegiate group that pushed a lot of conservative views. And he was shot yesterday at a campus in Utah. So there's a lot going on there, and I just want to start with that.
- [03:31]
Denver
Yeah, I mean, both of us have been in a political arena. And Amy, I know you've had death threats. I've certainly had death threats. And one attempt, as we've discussed on me, you know, and I think it's. You have to abhor political violence because that will break down the fabric of our society quicker than anything. And, you know, I can go into tpusa. You know, I don't. I don't know if you know this, Amy, but you know that Charlie had a founding partner named Bill Montgomery. Bill recruited him when he was 18 years old. Told Charlie not to go to college, but to start TP usa. Bill Montgomery was an older gentleman, had been a business consultant, things of that nature, but they wanted to push conservative values, and he thought that Charlie would be the one to do it at 18 years old. So literally took him in and groomed him for this position. So what's interesting about Bill Montgomery is, I don't know turning point USA when you're going back to 2020. Charlie Kirk was pretty virulent about the anti Covid stance that he had, as was all of TPUSA when you're getting into 2020, as Covid got worse. What I don't think they realize is Bill Montgomery was almost 80 years old. So Bill Montgomery ends up dying of COVID TPUSA had to go back and discreetly start scrubbing tweets and things like that when they were talking about not wearing masks with Charlie Kirk, pushing bizarre things like hydroxychloroquine. He was deeply embedded in the conspiracy theories there. And I was looking at what happened yesterday, the tragedy of it. It's interesting that two of the things that really they concentrated on, which was their anti Covid stance with one of the founders killed there and another founder who said that, really to summarize that there had to be some deaths to continue with the Second Amendment in the United States. It is something, Amy, that the two founders of Turning Point USA sadly died on hills that were absolutely dangerous to actually go on to. And I think it's pretty interesting to me and tragic how Bill Montgomery died, but also how Charlie Kirk died yesterday.
- [05:49]
Amy
It was absolutely tragic. Denver and I didn't know any of that. I don't follow him maybe the way that some others do. What struck me about yesterday, and I think we all kind of need to take a step back and just make sure that we are condemning violence against all members of any political faction in America. We have to condemn this type of violence, you know, no matter what. No matter if they're like wearing a red jersey or a blue jersey, it is wrong. We should not act like this. We cannot be a nation that has any leaders that fuel these types, the flames of this. We are all threatened by this culture of violence against people who we disagree with. I'm sure that there's very little that I agreed with this man, Charlie Kirk on, but I. It saddens me so much that. That he was killed yesterday. I mean, we are all humans. We're all humans.
- [07:19]
Denver
Yeah. And, you know, the ripple effect, Amy, is that what political figure is safe if everybody's on the table when it comes to violence? And that's what concerns me. And if me or you, to ever enter the arena again, it's something we have to be even more acutely aware of. Right. As we're going forward, because you see this back and forth of politically motivated killings. It's pretty. It's pretty devastating. I have to say this, though. I absolutely abhor political violence. What happened yesterday can never happen in this country. The thing that people need to be careful about is that there is no way that I am going to pay tribute to somebody who was part of that environment. You can separate those things, and I am going to separate them. And if people don't like it, I don't care. Because there's a brutality to facts. Facts are brutal, facts are specific. And if you look at a list of what Charlie Kirk advocated for over his life, it's pretty brutal. And nobody should be part of violence. If you think about his family, it's absolutely egregious. I don't even have the right correct word. Traumatic, disastrous, know, hideous, disgusting. But you have to be careful about being part of an environment that foments dehumanization, disinformation and hatred across wide swathes of the U.S. population. And you're seeing it right now on social media, where for some reason, the far Right. And Russian bots and foreign disinformation. Propaganda specialists and groups are pushing that the Democrats are evil and that there needs to be a war while decrying violence at the same time. This is one of the most dangerous moments in the United States, I can see, because we have sort of this mouth breathing propaganda that's baselining things that shouldn't be baselined. For instance, you can't go out and say we decry political violence, but the Democrats are evil and they're the ones who did this. That's ludicrous. Not only is it ludicrous, it borders on the dehumanization and propaganda lines of so many evil people in the past. And that's, I think there has to be some bravery and courage. I'm not quite sure why, if people don't have something nice to say, don't say it, Amy, But I'm not quite sure and I. And why Democrats would go out or other people while they're being totally obliterated as evil and globalists and Satanists.
- [10:01]
Amy
Right.
- [10:02]
Denver
They're going out and saying that Charlie Kirk was a positive force towards any type of political rhetoric. That's simply false. So don't seed the ground of facts. You can be compassionate, you can do all these things, but never cede the ground of facts because there's a brutality to it. And if you do, you start going down that same slope. And I think that's what worries me on both sides of this equation.
- [10:24]
Amy
Well, what worries me is, and I know there's, there's right wing influencers and Russian bots and propagandists doing these heinous things right now and trying to put, put gas on the flames. What worries me, Denver, is when our elected leaders do that because they, in my opinion, have a responsibility to condemn all political violence, you know, as, as hurtful to Americans and hurtful to our democracy right now. Law enforcement has not found to, to this taping. Law enforcement has not found the person who did this. It's easy to jump ahead with assumptions about this person's politics or motives. But the, the matter, the fact of the matter is we don't know. And the fact that we have members of Congress and sadly the President of the United States making in my mind very irresponsible statements about who caused this. Somehow saying that Democrats caused this, it's irresponsible and it feeds into that culture of violence. It comes back to a word that I keep coming back to over and over again right now, which is decency. Decency. Let's have the basic decency to say enough is enough. This is wrong. It doesn't matter what side of the aisle you're on. It's wrong. And you cannot be irresponsibly blaming this on the other side and then dehumanizing the other side by saying they're evil when we don't have a clue. Right now, what if it was a.
- [12:22]
Denver
Democrat or somebody on the far left who did it? It's still you. You can't have a tit for tat numbers game where, well, Luigi Mangione killed, you know, CEO of UnitedHealthcare. Well, there was a fire set to Josh Shapiro. He was a Democrat. Well, there was two Democrats killed by a far right maga. Well, now we have Donald Trump had an assassination, by the way. That was an accelerationist. That was not any far left ridiculousness. And then, you know, you have all these things happening where it's this tit for tat that it's somebody else, right? But what Trump did last night on his speech was dehumanized people based on no proof. And he's fomenting dehumanization which can lead to violence. The very thing he was saying we shouldn't do, he was doing. It was gaslighting. It shows his lack of a soul. It shows that he has real issues mentally. This is a man, right, that's doing things that are. It's creating this environment and then going out and saying it's only one side that he wants to blame because they are really hemorrhaging right now. And the only way they think they can get into the 20, 26 midterms, and it's always about midterms, is to play on this and use Charlie Kirk as a martyr. And it's horrific what happened to him, but it's horrific how they're using this. It's horrific what's going on with far right influencers. It's horrific what's going on with Fox News. And it's horrific with people who don't see this as a politically motivated assassination. The other thing that I've had an issue with is when I put out there, I use the word assassination had people in the far left saying we don't know if this is political. And my mind almost exploded. And I'm to a point that I'm almost thinking that the fringes are much bigger than we ever thought. We thought it was a 10 and 10. I think it's 30 and 30. I think they're not fringe anymore. I think hate, I think dehumanization has become normalized in our political system. And I think it's going to get worse before it gets worse, and especially in the midterms. And I'm really worried going into 28, I am absolutely concerned on a level I've never been concerned before, that as we go into 26, into 28 in the midterms and going into the presidential election in 28, we're going to see things we didn't think were possible possible in the United States of America. And it's based on this leadership in this country. And that is what is happening. And there is a brutality to this. And if people aren't paying attention, they're afraid to put words to it in a way that's respectful. But there's another time where you have to get confrontational. And I think that's where we're at. We can't have political violence, but you can't say we can't have political violence. Why? Fomenting dehumanization, at least to political violence.
- [14:52]
Amy
There wasn't the same outrage from our leader, you know, our president. And on the murder, which was politically motivated murder of the state legislator in Minnesota and her husband, the attempted murder of the other state legislator in, in Minnesota and his wife, they were targets of political violence. And our president said nothing. You know, he, it, you're, you're taking the flag down to half mass today for Charlie Kirk. You're not taking it down for the victims of 9, 11, you didn't take it down for the, for the, you know, victims of the politically motivated murder in Minnesota. I just, it's an irresponsibility of leaders. It's one thing when, you know, far right influencers do it, or far left, as you point out, you know that there's fringes out there. It's another thing when leaders who are supposed to be leaders, they're supposed to be calm, they're supposed to be the leaders of our country are completely irresponsible. And the second point I'd like to make is that historically, some of these murders have these political violent acts. The people that do them, they're not always, you cannot always put them in a box, meaning you cannot always say, well, they're far left or they're far right. They have many times confusing ideologies and many times they're motivated for reasons that don't match our partisan divides. And the thing about that is if, if. And those of you who are listening, I really learned a lot when I interviewed Bruce Hoffman and Jacob Ware, who are Experts in domestic terrorism. We interviewed them on this show Truth in the Barrel, on the Devil's Cut, just a. Just a month or so. And go back and listen to that. Because what they taught me was that a lot of these things you can't put into a box. A lot of the people that perpetrate these, they're sort of all over the map. Many of them, not all of them, but many of them more than you think. And I just think that's super important.
- [17:07]
Denver
It is super important. I think people should go listen to that. And also right now, if you look at it, what do they. They've only found a footprint and a bolt action rifle that was discarded, which is. Listen for a criminal to do that and not to keep the weapon. My guess is the weapon is somehow modified where you don't know exactly where it came from. If they found it, I wonder what has happened. That rifle, if the serial numbers are available, what they've done to it. But there is no suspect. And your point is so dead on, is that until you know the facts of something, it's very important as a leader to ensure that you're giving just the facts of what's happening to that point and not to point fingers. But even if it is somebody from the other side of the aisle, like Melissa Hortman who was killed by a freak show wearing a mask deliberately because she was a Democrat and he was a Christian nationalist maga, there's a brutality to facts. You know, for me, I mean, we're to a point right now since we don't know who this individual is. You can't go out there and scream that it's the left or even if it's somebody from the left, you can't do that. Either you're still fomenting violence. I'm. It is such a lack of leadership. But it also means that we have an administration that can only flame throw. And I think it goes back to the desperation starting from the Epstein files. I think they're seeing this as an opportunity. You should see what's going on here in Virginia, Amy, with the Republicans, even people that I've known that were moderate Republicans. And this is the fear, right, Amy, they're saying online the Democrats want to kill us. I. Are you. It's insane. It literally is insane. I think a lot of this has to do with their belief that this is a spiritual war and that it could become a kinetic war because of that. And I just can't believe that there's people that are saying that it's Hard for me to get my arms around it.
- [19:01]
Amy
Well, the point is that political violence is never, ever, ever acceptable. And you have to call it out. You have to call it out. If it's perpetrated by people with views that don't align or don't align with your own, or you have to call it out with. When it's perpetrated by people with views that do align with your own, it is unacceptable. I worry that this is going to get worse before it gets better. But I think you and I and everybody listening, we have a responsibility, if we care about this country to make sure that we say it is unacceptable. Okay. All right. So a lot of other news happened this week that we need to talk about though, because it's really important. There was a, an attack on Poland by Russia and Russian drones. I sort of, I'm afraid to use the word attack, but Russian drones did go into Polish airspace and into Poland. So Denver, what is going on here?
- [20:04]
Denver
They're tickling the network. What they're looking at is how air defense systems will react to when they penetrate airspace. So if you look at Zhesiaf, if you look around, why they closed down the Zheshv airport. I've flown in there multiple times now. There's Patriot batteries that surround Ichev. Right. So you're looking at Poland as a NATO country has access to armaments. Right. And they have a hell of an army. So what you're looking at, when you're looking at an incursion and you say, look, you're looking at double digit number of drones going significantly over the border. What they're looking at is how fast that air defense reaction system is. It's an intelligence gathering mission. And I, and I have to tell you, I had an attorney contact me. I'd given a speech on Ukraine about. Oh, God, Amy. Six, seven months ago after my first trip to Ukraine. And I said, poland's next and you got to watch out for the Baltics. And I remember leaving and there was about 50 to 70 people. They're like, Denver, there's no way, there's no way that Russia's even going to do anything about Poland. They would be so afraid of Article 5. I said, okay. I said, like we're supporting them now. I said, guys, I'm telling you right now, sociopaths only feel pain. That's it. That they only feel pain. And when you have such a weak administration right now after the Alaska debacle, Putin's feeling pretty emboldened right now, but he's Also desperate. There's two things happening. He's desperate and emboldened. That's why you see him hitting Kyiv so much. But this Poland incursion was simply intelligence gathering to take tickle the network dependent on how they can get through the Ukraine. They see America is on fire, we're in chaos. We have no specific foreign policy experience to deal with this. We have people like Lutnick and things like that that are trying to navigate this insanity. That's what's happening. That's it. That's what happened. And we should be. Absolutely. This is the most important story of the week is what's happening there.
- [21:51]
Amy
Yeah. For all the people that said that, oh, Russia would never have attacked Ukraine if Donald Trump was in office, you have to take a step back and recognize that Russia just, you know, maybe it wasn't an attack, but it's certainly a probe in on a NATO country using armed drones, an offensive deployment of drones into Poland, that hasn't happened in 70 years.
- [22:22]
Denver
Yep.
- [22:22]
Amy
And so, you know, that happened under this current administration and there's probably not going to be any pushback from our current administration. I mean, that should be shocking to people. And also a lot of what's come up, at least on my, my side is people asking me about, well, how come they should be shooting these things down. And I think what many people maybe not fully understand is there's a lot of drones. They're very cheap, they fly fairly low. And when you launch an F35, which is what I understand Poland did you know, a bunch of F35s, they're very expensive fighter jets. You're shooting down potentially a $5,000 drone. Right. Maybe $5,000 drone with an AIM9X, which is what the F35s carry. What is the name 9X? It's a, it's a, it stands for Air Intercept Missile 9 and it's a heat seeking missile. It's very expensive. It costs a couple million dollars, at least a million dollars, maybe probably closer to $2 million per missile. So you're shooting down a $5,000 drone with a $2 million missile. And they're not really optimized to shoot down drones. I mean, fighter jets are optimized to shoot down other fighter jets. And so we're in a new world. And your analysis of, hey, the Russians are probing here is very scary.
- [23:59]
Denver
Yeah. I find it interesting drone warfare has been advanced by the Ukrainians where they shoot down drones with drones. Right. I mean, if you're looking at. Or they go after frontline units with things like the Baba Yaga drone, also called the vampire drones. The thing about FPVs, right, first person view drones is that they can be built rather cheaply, as you said. But there's the shaheds, right? My guess is going that deep into Poland, you're looking at shaheds.
- [24:27]
Amy
Now, Those are Iranian, right?
- [24:28]
Denver
Yep. They were originally sourced from Iran. I was looking at some of the shaheds that were shot down and captured, and they actually had French and Chinese wiring. So what you're seeing now are the Russians are actually, and even FPV drones, they're personally building them on close to frontline areas in Russia, close to the Ukrainian border, and just shipping them over. So some are cobbling them together, but they're making millions of these, Right? So you have these massive warehouses that are continually making FPV drones, and they're cheaper and cheaper, right? They're getting better and better at doing this. So it's not just a lot of people like, oh, these are a bunch of Chinese DJI drones. No, they're cobbling together different types or they're building their own components now. So it's really interesting, right, A Ukraine drone is more expensive to build if you cobble it together instead of going out in buying those, you know, say, from the Chinese or other areas. On the other hand, though, they have the parts there where they can build them in Ukraine. So it's really interesting dynamic. Four million drones, I think Ukraine built last year. I think double that for Russia. It's somewhere in there. It might be that this year, but that's what we're going through, Amy, is that we have a new type of warfare here. And, and if we're going to use F35s to shoot down drones, we lose that material battle pretty fast. So we better get better at drone warfare like the Ukrainians and learn from them, because right now we are not as capable, capable.
- [25:49]
Amy
And also, you know, I, I, I criticize the current administration quite a bit, particularly on foreign policy. People that know me know that. But the criticism is really real. I mean, we are right now pulling out of exercises and support for our Eastern European allies. The United States is pulling out our Department of Defense, now called the Department of War, whatever, is now pulling out of these very important not only shows of force, but training to be a deterrent to Putin. We're sort of, we've taken our eye off the ball here. We have a Secretary of Defense that's more concerned about the placard outside of his office and what it says in the Pentagon than he is about these types of things going on in Europe right now. We rolled out the red carpet. We had our, our military roll out the red carpet for, for Vladimir Putin and now he's probing into NATO. I mean, I just, this needs to.
- [26:58]
Denver
Be front page news, right, every second. I mean, what happened was such an abysmal failure. But what we're going to have, right, is this downstream domestic issue that's going to dominate the headlines because the far right will force it that way. And I think a lot of mainstream outlets are going to fall into that right now. The Ukraine, Poland thing, you're right. Eastern European aid being withdrawn as far as financial aid and materiel and obviously the other things that are happening, which I know you want to get to internationally as far as bombings that have been absolutely brutal and here we are screaming performatively in some hate dehumanizing way about the others. It's incredible to me how we have failed as a country over these last eight to nine months.
- [27:45]
Amy
We're not being led by strong people right now.
- [27:49]
Denver
They believe in interdimensional beings.
- [27:54]
Amy
Israel attacked Hamas militants in Doha just a few days ago. And that country, Qatar is the home to the United States largest military base in the region. It's one of the most important allies in the Middle East. Israel did this attack using fighter jets. And I think what's significant that, that I need to remind people about is that Hamas is terrible. There's no doubt they were sending a negotiating team to Doha. And this was part of what Donald Trump wanted. He said that he had tried to arrange for a negotiating team so he could try to mediate, which. Good on you. I mean we, we need that, we need an end to this, to this war. But it's a pattern, right? I mean he did, he did this, the Israelis did this. Just a few months ago when it came to Iran, Donald Trump tried to set up an a negotiating meeting. And Israel just gives Donald Trump the big middle finger.
- [29:09]
Denver
They did.
- [29:09]
Amy
And, and strikes the negotiating team from Iran. And now they strike the negotiating team in Doha and then tell the United States afterwards. I mean that to me, just the pol, the geopolitics of that shows how weak our president really is.
- [29:35]
Denver
Yeah, I mean, you know, we talk about the Epstein files. Distractions. This is the BB indictment distractions. And the fact that he would bomb a country that houses United States military base. Amy. And we're sitting here just sort of okay. Oh, that's awful. I, I, I've never, it's hard to Define the weakness of this administration to. If, if we go back 30 years, nobody could have in any way predicted that we wouldn't have pushed Russia out of Ukraine, that we would allow Poland to be actually probed by drones by tickling the networks to. For an intelligence operation plan. What they're building, we would never think. Right. That we would allow Doha to be. I was just in Doha four months ago, by the way, coming back from the uae, right. So I, I'm just, I'm, my. I don't know how to actually get my arms around this. But it comes back to lack of talent and sycophanc. It comes back to a conspiratorial mindset and fantasy creating policy. And, Amy, they're not making any decision based on facts on the ground or data. They're making decisions based on bizarre belief systems. And the cascading effect of stupid is terminal. It's terminal. And I told people when this started, I thought it would take a couple years. Amy, I honestly, we're only in September. And what is. It's hard for. I know. For you, Amy, as somebody who thinks logically, had an incredible military career, teaches, have done things other people can't imagine, has gone through the political system. And I know, I have this background myself, and when you look at it, there's no way you can get your arms around what's happening internationally right now with us sort of sitting on our hands.
- [31:23]
Amy
And there's still hostages in Gaza.
- [31:27]
Denver
They said they're not going to be released now because of the bombing in Doha. Did you see that?
- [31:30]
Amy
You know, Netanyahu thinks, I think he thinks that there's going to be a military end to this war and you don't need to negotiate. I mean, obviously if you're bombing the negotiating team, you don't want to negotiate.
- [31:47]
Denver
It's an indicator.
- [31:49]
Amy
I just, yeah, there's just 2 million Palestinian civilians with, you know, no leader. And who do you negotiate with if you keep killing them all? I mean, I just, It's a great.
- [32:01]
Denver
Question, like, we gotta have sanity back in the office. Maybe have a. Maybe actually have an American Congress that looks at what's happening at the top of their party and say, this is insane. Instead of jumping on here and saying we should all celebrate Jesus like Charlie, what is happening. Political violence is what's happening. But we're also, we're ignoring. If we can't walk and chew gum at the same time internationally, we're in deep, deep trouble. Anyway, I know I'm kicking this horse.
- [32:34]
Amy
Well, I mean, look Israel attacks Doha. The Russians violate Poland's airspace. But, you know, don't worry, it's okay because we have a Department of War, renamed it. We've sent Pete Hegseth out to an aircraft carrier, put that, put the helmet on and look cool and talk about how important it is. I mean, I just, I'm, I'm speechless.
- [33:04]
Denver
We've gone from the DOD to the do.
- [33:07]
Amy
Do. We're the do.
- [33:10]
Denver
It's just incredible. I feel like it's the Homer Simpson DOD now. It's just incredible. Gosh.
- [33:18]
Amy
Okay, let's get to quick shots. All right. Because there's a, there's a lot more going on and there is actually some fun stuff coming coming up that I'm, I've heard, I've heard, but there's a, there's a Supreme Court ruling this past week, and it had to do with racial profiling for ice for the immigration stuff that's going on, these raids that are going on. And basically what happened was the Supreme Court lifted a hold that was put in place by a lower court judge that stopped ice. Okay. From stopping and searching people on what appears to be only their race, which was. The Supreme Court said, that's a. Okay. And I, I just wanted to know what your thoughts are on that. I mean, to me, I'm kind of like, oh, well, so it's okay to racially profile on immigration, but certainly not in higher ed. Now, from the Supreme Court, like, where are we at here?
- [34:18]
Denver
I don't know if that's that subtle of a ruling, Amy. I, I've, I'm having a tough time with how do you paint something that's so unsubtle that. Yeah, it's okay. You know what? They look brown now. It. Now listen, when it comes to law enforcement, you know, profiling is something that you have to do at certain times. It's just the way it is. Right. I mean, if you're in an all black urban area, that criminal is most likely going to be black. Right. If you're in an all white rural area and there's pedophilia happening, that's going to. Look, there's going to be a white male. So, you know, so, you know, that's just the way. That's just. This is. However, when it comes to the melting pot of America, you know, you're not just going to go up to a black person, just you think they did a crime here or to a white person because they were in a rural area here and there was a crime committed. You're not just going to check their computer because they're white and there's porn on their child. Porn. You're not going to just go to a black person and check their computer because there's been robberies or check their house. It's insane. And so what you're seeing right now is you're seeing an absolute sort of capitulation to ICE and DHS through the Supreme Court. Because I just can't believe that you're going to stop somebody who's possibly a US Citizen just because of the way they look to deport them. The. You, you do get to a point where you cross the Rubicon and you wonder what's happening. We know what's happening to our country. I'm going to stop saying I wonder what's happening to our country. Right.
- [35:54]
Amy
I do want to get to some good, fun things because we have, we have to talk about 911 that was so important for, for our lives and for America. But before we do there, there are some fun things that happen. Happened this past week and there are a couple of really cool stories and that I'd love to give cheers to. First of all, there's a special election in Virginia 11, which is near you. And I think voters are fed up a little bit with what's going on right now in our country. And they elected a Democrat in a pretty red area, James walkinshaw, I think one in Virginia 11. Do you, do you know those. That area good?
- [36:38]
Denver
Yeah, I mean, I know the area very well, but yeah, that he was going to win. That. It was. I think he was. Oh, goodness. The guy's name just escaped me. Is it Spencer, the Republican running against him? Not an awful person at all, the Republican, to be honest, a very moderate guy. But there was no way a Republican was going to win that district. So.
- [37:00]
Amy
It was. It was.
- [37:01]
Denver
Yeah, Yeah. I think that was Gerry Connolly's old district.
- [37:04]
Amy
Oh, very good.
- [37:04]
Denver
Okay. Yeah. So, yeah, so that's, that's what happened there.
- [37:08]
Amy
Well, that's good. All right. So also in New Mexico. New Mexico is now the first state to make child care free. Starting in November, the state will have child care reimbursement or offer child care to families, every family in the state. I just think that's worthy of a cheer. I'm somebody who is a big proponent of childcare being affordable. So cheers to New Mexico. Okay. And then finally, and this is, this is my favorite one in Kentucky here in my state, there is a nurse in eastern Kentucky who gave CPR to a raccoon. And the story is pretty amazing. And this, I think, just shows you how wonderful healthcare providers are in my state and in our country. This woman, her name is Misty Combs, she lives in Whitesburg, which is in eastern Kentucky, it's in Letcher County. And she found these raccoons in a dumpster. And that a couple of them ran away, apparently, but one was stuck in the bottom of a dumpster, drunk. And it was drunk on moonshine. And she saw it and said, it's probably gonna die. She pulled it out by its tail. It was soaking wet, and she could smell, you know, the alcohol. And she performed cpr, stomach compressions on this raccoon. And it came. You know, she saved it. And the, the, the, the piece in there that I think is funny for this show a little bit is that it was a. It was outside of a distillery that was making infused peach moonshine. And so the raccoons were eating the, I guess, fermented peaches. And that's how they got into this, shall we call it, predicament. But this nurse, Ms. Combs and her colleagues named, they brought the raccoon, they brought it to a veterinarian and everything, put it in a cage. And then I guess after it was finally all better, they released it back into the wild. And they called it. They called it. They named the raccoon Otis Campbell, based on the fictional town drunk in the 1960s program Andy Griffith.
- [39:41]
Denver
Griffith. I'm with you. I thought they were going to name him Pete Hegseth.
- [39:47]
Amy
Here I am, trying to be serious, and you bring that in. Anyway, cheers to the NER nurses, though, to her. I just think it's an amazing story. I'm somebody that loves animals, and I just think that's fantastic.
- [40:00]
Denver
I want to just tell everybody here what a hero. And there is no way on earth I'm going to actually give mouth to mouth to a raccoon.
- [40:08]
Amy
It wasn't mouth to mouth. It was cpr.
- [40:11]
Denver
Okay. I would just like to say, and say for the record, there's no way on earth I would give CPR to a raccoon. And here's the other thing that really bothers me. Maybe the raccoon just didn't want to go on. Maybe the raccoon was like, I'm done, right? I want to drink myself to death. I'm 21 years old. I've had 732 babies. I'm ready to go, right? And so I think maybe we got to look at for the. I don't even know what I'M saying right now, I don't even want to keep going with this because it's going to get more ridiculous. So I apologize to everybody. But, you know, we got to worry about how raccoons think too, you know.
- [40:43]
Amy
Well, I just. It's my favorite story of the week, I have to say. There's a lot of bad things going on. This was fun. That made me laugh and, and everybody should know about it.
- [40:53]
Denver
Now. I was gonna. I'm gonna say something that Doug's gonna cut and I think.
- [40:58]
Amy
Today, Denver is the anniversary of 9 11.
- [41:01]
Denver
Yes.
- [41:02]
Amy
And I'd like to ask you where you were on 9 11. What. What were you at that. That morning?
- [41:12]
Denver
Mountain Home air Force Base. 4458B Vance Drive was my house on Mountain Home. And it was mountain time. So literally was putting my uniform on when the first plane hit the towers. Mm. Yeah. Where were you, Amy?
- [41:30]
Amy
I was actually. I was in San Diego, California. I was stationed in Miramar Marine Corps Air Station. Three hour time difference in California, the planes hit the towers at about 6 o' clock in the morning or 6:30 in the morning, California time. And so I was still in my apartment and was. I got a call from my sister who said, watch the news. Turn on the news. And I was like, still groggy. I'm like, what? What? You know, I turned the news on and right as the second plane is hitting. Oh, second tower.
- [42:09]
Denver
Yes.
- [42:10]
Amy
And. And then I get another call from the operations officer in my fighter squadron. I was. I had literally just checked into my fighter squad. I was only there for maybe three or four months. Very junior. Okay. And. But I was in an operational squadron, and that means that I'm no longer in training. I'm in a squadron that, you know, is ready to go. And so the operations officers called. Everybody said, get in here. I lived Denver very close to the base. Okay. And so I was one of the first members of my squadron, of my fighter squadron to get onto base that morning. There was a lot of confusion on the base and they shut the gates down.
- [43:00]
Denver
That's true.
- [43:00]
Amy
So a lot of the pilots who are more senior to me, aviators and weapons officers who were more senior to me, could not get onto the base because the gates were shut. Being living close, I was one of the first ones on. So I was already on the base and I remember being in the ready room and they needed air crew immediately to go over to the Kayla. Kayla is the combined arms loading area. It's on the other side of the airfield. It's where you put live ammunition and live ordinance on board the aircraft. You do it on the other side, away from people if there's anything goes wrong. And my operations officer said, we need you to go to the Kayla immediately. We need air crews out there. We have.
- [43:46]
Denver
Wow.
- [43:47]
Amy
You need to hop in and defend Southern California. And I'm like a very junior aviator and that I'm sure the operations officer and the commanding officer were looking around trying to find somebody other than me because I was so junior. And they erased the names on the whiteboard that were the seat more senior because they weren't there. And they put my name up there. And I suited up, I went over to the Kayla on the other side. And I remember clearly walking to the jet that was over there. They had towed the jets over there already and had already loaded up. Aim nines, sidewinders, aim 120s. And I walked to that jet with live missiles loaded up and boy, my heart just, you know, and I. We were being briefed on the way, on the way to the jet in the Jeep, like, this is your. Your mission is to defend Los Angeles. You're gonna, you know, defend Los Angeles and, and San Diego and Southern California. And if there is an airliner or any. Anything coming in that is a threat, we're going to launch you and you're going to intercept it and do what's necessary. And boy, I gotta tell you, I sat in that jet for three hours that morning with one engine on and one engine off.
- [45:20]
Denver
Yep.
- [45:22]
Amy
To start to save fuel, you know, you could kick the other engine back on at any moment and run down that Runway. And in my mind it was just like, oh my gosh, what's going on and what am I going to have to do if my country asked me to do it? And so that was my 9, 11. And I remember being relieved, probably about 11am Pacific Time. So relieved, meaning somebody else came in to hop in the jet and take over. Because it was so. Just emotional, psychological. Psychologically emotional sitting in that jet.
- [46:05]
Denver
Yeah, I remember the first one hit. The second one hit. My wife yelled the first one. My first actual quote. When I saw the first jet, when I came out and saw the replay, I came downstairs so it was about 6:30 mountain time, a.m. local. And I said, that's not a small plane, you know, and being Air Force, right. And doing mission planning and having to learn F15s, F16s, B1s. Right. Fifteen E's and C's and things like that. I looked at my wife, I said, there's no way. A small. That's not a small plane. How would a large plane impact that building? You know, 31. 30, you know, 31.
- [46:40]
Amy
Yeah.
- [46:41]
Denver
And so I said, well, that's. I said, I don't know if that's a mistake. That's really interesting. My phone had not rung when the second plane hit my director of operations, Bull Valley. My phone rings and my wife yells, I come back into the room because I was just about to go to the squadron building, which was literally a half mile away. As you know, we lived on base. And Bull Valley goes, chunk, get your ass in here. Right? So I roll in there and it's chaos. Because, Amy, we were the Air Expeditionary Wing. We were on 90 day, 24 hour call, immediate notice for any worldwide conflagration. US and Seymour Johnson would go back and forth on 90 day RO. And obviously we had an Air Expeditionary wing. We had F15Es and Cs, F16CJs, B1s and KC135s. So, you know, so I'm like, oh, my goodness. So they're like, denver, what happened? Go find out. And you know how much was on the intelligence channels on 9 11, Amy? Nothing, right?
- [47:39]
Amy
Yeah.
- [47:39]
Denver
So, like, you need to brief the air crews. So I run an air. I'm like, hey, I took everything unclassified I had. I thought I did okay. I'm pretty good at it. But the commander came after me, goes, if you don't find out more stuff, we gotta know now because we're already. We're gonna get the call. I said, God. He go, but Denver, I know. Now our base was shut down like yours. We only had half the air crew. We didn't have any. Right? And our maintainers weren't on base and our supply guys weren't on base, right? And we're like, what is happening? And he goes, denver, man. He goes, I know. Here, the intelligence officer, will you go look at the Conexes to make sure they're squared away? I said to pack them. He goes, yeah. So I went up and I cut off the bands. You know what I'm talking about? Open all the Connexes. They hadn't been used since like 1947. It seemed like, like, so, you know, so we clean out the Conexes. I was packing those conexes six days later. I left on a C5 on September 21, 2011, to Diego to start our bombing runs. With the first mission planning bombing run being started on October 6. That was one of the most interesting days at that time. CNN came onto Base. And they made me the spokesperson as literally a first lieutenant for intelligence, just like I was in Romania in 99. And then they did a profile, the local news did a profile of my wife while I was gone. Because I was. Because my commander's like, Denver, just go tell them something. Just don't tell them where we're going. Don't tell me to say. We're just responding to what's happening. So I did that. And in the news while I was gone, I didn't know this, they would visit my wife every week to see how she was doing. They did a profile on my family while I was deployed for 9 11. So yeah, it was a life changing event.
- [49:22]
Amy
It was for both of us. I was deployed a few months later to Manas. First Marine Corps fighter Squadron, first American fighter squadron to ever land in former Soviet Union republic. And we basically built that, that in Kyrgyzstan, built that base back up. And we did missions into Afghanistan from that base.
- [49:52]
Denver
And Kyrgyzstan is a lot closer than Diego and Oman.
- [49:57]
Amy
Yeah, I mean, and that was, that was early on and in a few months after 9 11. And you know, it was such a different time. But today you just, you just look back and all of the victims of that tragedy, their families, our hearts go out to them. And the first responders who were so courageous in, in, at the Pentagon and also in New York City, the amazing Americans who, who took over the plane or tried to take over the plane so that it wouldn't be used as a, as a weapon and went down in Pennsylvania, they were, you know, heroes and our hearts just go out to them. This is such a, such an important, somber day. It affected so many of us for the rest of our lives and in our country, you know, you and I both deployed after that. It affected our families. But I just. Crazy times, you know, it's. It's a day where we reflect about our country and about the freedoms that we have and a recommitment to what our country stands for, the values that we have, that there are people here who, or who are not here anymore and we owe them our courage. For those of us who are still living and inheriting this country of ours, we owe them that courage.
- [51:33]
Denver
In my mind, I couldn't put it any better. I mean, that's wonderful. I mean, the way that you put it, I think what's amazing is how we came together as a country. But I feel like this country, every time there is an external, there is not an external threat. I feel like when we don't have that outside threat coming at us. We seem to want to turn on ourselves and look at the other as a internal threat, regardless if it's true or not. And I think that's what you're seeing now. It's amazing, right? When you look at the strife in the U.S. i mean, our entire history, it feels like we come together at times when we really need to, but it seems like we're always identifying with one tribe or another internally, and that becomes violent inside if we don't have an outside enemy. And the only way to fix that is through facts and empathy and tolerance. But I think we're on a track where we're in fantasy intolerance and I would say a lack of empathy on every level. And I don't know, you know, 911 was horrific, but there were those few years where the country seemed to bind together, and now it looks like this country's so fragmented, I don't know what brings it back together so.
- [52:53]
Amy
Well, I know we can talk about these things, but we're not giving up. And 911 is, is a, is a day where we take a look back and, and remember. But also we have the resolve to go forward, speak the truth and stand for what is right, both you and, and I and, and folks who are listening out there today. So we're, we're going to end our show on that. But I just, you know, I feel like this is an important day. It's an important show. We're going to do our best going forward to live the values of our country.
- [53:35]
Denver
We are. And that means condemning political violence, speaking facts when they're uncomfortable. I think it also coming to this with the topics like we did today with sobriety and empathy. And I think that's what we're really good at, Amy. And I'm not trying to brag, but I think we do. But if people want to get this kind of incredible insight, I think they certainly have to subscribe. They have to make sure that they go into our YouTube and watch, you know, they can comment, make sure that you join us for our live programs, which I think are the best. Make sure that you sign up for all of our social media accounts. Right x TrueSocial, BlueSky down the line and our new substack. So I hope that everybody subscribes and listens. And Amy, thank you for doing the show with me. It was fantastic. You're the greatest. Thanks for getting us together today.
- [54:28]
Amy
Well, thanks for everyone for listening. We'll see you next time on Truth in the Barrel.
- [54:37]
Dan Harris
Hey, this is Dan Harris. Host of the 10% Happier podcast. I'm here to tell you about a new series we're running this September on 10% happier. The goal is to help you do your life better. The series is called Reset. It's all about hitting the reset button in many of the most crucial areas of your life. Each week we'll tackle a topic like how to reset your nervous system, how to reset your relationships, how to reset your career. We're going to bring on top notch scientists and world class meditation teachers to give you deep insights and actionable advice. It's all delivered with our trademark blend of skepticism, humor, credibility and practicality. 10% happier is self help for smart people. Come join the party.