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Richard Helppie
Welcome to The Common Bridge. I'm your host, Richard Helppie. Today we have a return one of our more popular guests, Mr. Adam Coleman. Adam, it's good to see you. Welcome to The Common Bridge.
Adam Coleman
Thank you for having me again.
Richard Helppie
Adam has a very interesting backstory. He's had an interesting career in technology and his views on the social aspects of the United States and around the world are quite interesting. He has become a prolific columnist, he's become an opinion maker; you're going to find his work more and more prevalent. And of course, his book is something that I believe is a must read. So, Adam, welcome to The Common Bridge. We have a chance to chat about just about anything. How are you by the way?
Adam Coleman
I'm doing well. I'm getting over a little something, so if I cough that's why, but in general, I'm doing okay.
Richard Helppie
That's good to hear. Well, we're sitting here today waiting for Snowmageddon and the Christmas season; one we're looking at with fear and one hopefully with joy. This podcast probably will air a few weeks from today. Adam, one of the things that you write about so eloquently is about some of the press coverage. One of your columns was titled - I don't know if you're the one that gets to write the titles, but I like it - it's called "The Mainstream Media Lied to You About Conservatives." What made you write this column?
Adam Coleman
Actually, it was something that sparked from a conversation I had on a different podcast. We were just talking and when you have these different interviews, it sparks different ideas. And it made me want to actually just write openly about part of my - I don't want to say transformation - but part of my awakening about certain aspects about the media, and the lies and exaggeration about certain things that were happening around me. So that's kind of what initially sparked it.
Richard Helppie
You write eloquently about how Republicans in particular, and conservatives in general, have been labeled racist as a way to basically obviate anything they might say. So I guess two parts to that question; are they racist and it does that mean we should ignore them?
Adam Coleman
So I always try to say that there's no political side that has a monopoly on racists. But the other part is that the more I've learned about conservatism, there's nothing within conservatism that encourages racism. Someone who calls himself a conservative who is a racist - to me - isn't a principled conservative. So can someone be a "conservative" if you're racist? Absolutely. But I will say that my encounters with conservatives who like me, who don't like me, who disagree with me, have overwhelmingly been cordial, not something that I would consider highly racial, or anything of that nature. Actually, I find that to be the opposite, I find that conservatives feel very restrained about talking about race; they're unable to because of that stigma. I think if we want to have a healthy conversation about race - and lots of people on the left say we need to talk about this, we need to address it - then people should feel comfortable asking odd questions, uncomfortable questions. Oftentimes, what ends up happening is...and it's not something that I'm shaming people for or anything like that, but I wrote a book about race so it sparks the conversation. So they feel like, I'm sorry for asking this, like, can I ask you this question? Because they're not able to, and then I respond by giving them an answer, or at least my opinion of an answer. But for them it's a relief to actually be able to talk to someone who is black. They've had certain questions where they've had an opinion, they've wanted to express something, but they don't want to be taken as, I'm not saying this because I'm racist. They don't want all these qualifiers, they just want a good faith conversation with someone. And oftentimes in person, it turns into a little bit of like a therapy session, so to speak, because they finally get it off their chest; they feel a little bit better that they can talk to someone about it and not have to hide.
Richard Helppie
One of the things, I think that you're very consistent about it is, let's have conversation, and let's deal with our experiences. I know one of the things that I like to do, somebody's going off about, well, this group of people, they all think this way, and they act that way, and so forth. And I'll stop them. I'll say, well, how many people do you personally know that act like that or talk like that? And most of the time it's well, I don't know anybody. Okay, so let's stop them there. Well, how do you know they exist? Well, I saw it on XY channel. I said, okay, do you trust the reporting and the editing? That's when we start to have a real conversation, like, what you're being presented, how real is it? You write about going to a conservative convention called Turning Point. And I believe you had some of that same experience if I'm understanding your writing.
Adam Coleman
It's actually called America Fest. It's thrown by Turning Points organization. I went last year as a guest. Someone part of the organization got me tickets, and my wife and I went, and it was a cordial event basically. It's to me...I laugh, because it was exactly what you would expect, conservatives talking about conservative stuff. [Laughter.] Like, race barely was a thing of any sort of topic that they even would bring up. Most of the stuff was exactly what you would expect. If the idea is that - and this is the perspective coming from certain people who are on the left - if the idea is that race and racism is of a central concern for conservatives, then how come they don't ever talk about it? There must be some sort of way if it's so central to their identity, to their being, yet they have no organizational way of ever discussing it. They don't do it publicly. So what, there's some sort of secret conservative meeting where they're getting together to be racist? As someone who talks to people all the time, I'm around people who are on the right a lot more today, it's just kind of like, no, it's not a thing. It really isn't. If you come across some racist conservative, that's one guy. But it's not a central matter for the right wing, to be honest with you.
Richard Helppie
Well, we went through a period on the news reporting, where we had commentators, talking heads, on the left, saying, well, this is a dog whistle to all the racists. I remember some of the extrapolations that they made and it didn't make any sense to me. Then when I kept looking for the dog whistles, it was all the people that were critical of the right and critical of conservatives, they were the only ones that could hear the dog whistle, nobody else could hear it. Now that narrative has ran its course, and I think it's moved on from this point. But I agree with you that racism can come from any place in the political spectrum. As a person that tends to look at outcomes, like yourself, I get enraged when I look at young minds that might be predominantly people of color in an urban city, that they're not getting a good education. They're locked in there by teachers unions - I don't want to bash any particular city - that to me is racist when you don't give a kid a chance because you don't want to give them a voucher, you don't want to let them have access to private education that could really lift them up. That to me is a racist act. That tends to be coming more from the left than the right. I don't know if you agree, or if I'm actually making any sense here or not.
Adam Coleman
You're definitely making sense. I will say that it's difficult when it comes to policies and actions that we want to call racist. Because I go back and forth between is it racist if it's accidental or only when it's malicious? So that's always a tough one for me. It could also be racist if just no one cares and no one cares specifically because of the demographic. Sure, that could definitely be racist. I find more of the malicious type these days when it comes to negative outcomes - not even necessarily negative outcomes; condescending - the creation of certain outcomes because of condescending mindsets. When you get rid of certain educational standards because you don't believe that black people can catch up to it; like to me, giving them a fake B on a test score just so they can pass their way through, you're not helping them. It's a very condescending act. It's a racist act, because you believe because of their skin color, because of their racial identity, that they cannot achieve a B like anybody else. You have to make one up for them, you have to just pass them along, move them along. And I think that's that's a major problem. That's what we're seeing a lot more today, under the guise of progressivism.
Richard Helppie
I had some interesting guests on my show, talking about various agendas. And I haven't researched this but one of the comments on my Substack page was a person that represented - both he and his wife worked in public school system on the West Coast - they said part of it's funding. That if they put initiatives in place that raised the performance of certain schools, now, they're not at risk, and they get less money. So it's almost like a money machine to keep kids from learning. Of course, if they can't learn, they can't get the jobs that we have today. Therefore, that continues that cycle of despair and dependency. That's clearly a fixable problem, and one that doesn't need to exist.
Adam Coleman
Right, and that goes to the shortsightedness of government. Actually, it's kind of the shortsightedness of how we fix American issues; you just throw money at it. We like to say, oh, well, these failing schools, they just don't have enough money, just keep giving them money. This actually goes to one of my pet peeves when it comes to the far left, who tries to say the reason that, let's say, a poor black, urban area has failing schools with stuff that doesn't work and and doesn't have the resources like other school districts, is because there's just not enough money. And the reason there's not enough money is because the property taxes, because not enough people own. They always overlook that and for many of these places, they get state money, they get federal money. They don't just get money from property taxes, houses. And they do that purposefully. They don't want people to see that a lot of the school districts are just wastelands of money. It's just public corruption. They don't want people to focus on that. They think if we just keep doing the same thing over and over, just give them more and more money, that eventually it will work itself out. But no corrupt system works itself out by giving it more of what created it to be corrupt in the first place; more money. Some of the poorest areas have so much wealth in the form of government subsidies, government money that's been thrown at it on a consistent basis.
Richard Helppie
So I don't have an objection to the public sector doing things, I don't have an objection to them stepping in to educate kids, provide health care, pave roads, have public safety and the like, but it's value for money. One of the things that I look at is the ratio of people delivering the service versus the overhead required to manage it. My personal experience with some of the philanthropic issues that we're engaged with, it's not the people on the front lines, it's not the teachers not caring, or it's the teachers doing the best they can with the resources they got in the system that they're in. And it's not that the kids don't want to learn - they do want to learn, but they don't know how to learn. And yet, that money never makes it into that classroom, nor is there any expected performance from it. That, to me, is the crux of - to your point - public corruption. It's great, take the tax dollars, do something, give me some value for it. Churn out kids that are ready to enter the workforce, enter college and become the engineers and the scientists and the health care providers and the welders and the carpenters that we need. That's what the education system needs to do. (Adam Coleman: I agree.) That's probably a conservative principle but it's hard to argue with. Can't we churn out kids that actually have some life skills and some marketable skills?
Adam Coleman
No, I agree with you. I think that we can definitely do these things. The problem is that there are too many obstacles, especially when it comes to local government, to try to overtake these particular obstacles, especially if you're talking about in Democrat strong-hold urban areas. Which, if you're talking about predominantly black areas, they're likely in a Democrat stronghold area. Getting them to change politically is a major feat because there's just not enough push-back. You're basically hoping that somebody within the same party is going to be willing to take on - I would imagine - a huge obstacle in whatever city it's happening in. I always think of Detroit, because Detroit is just like the most glaring public failure when it comes to a school system that is just on repeat seemingly decade after decade.
Richard Helppie
Well Detroit was actually, I think, on the upswing. I haven't been inside the public schools. I know some of the top performing schools in Detroit can compete with anybody. Also we've had a number of private initiatives that have rewarded the students in Detroit. So I think Detroit is starting to move, but it's places...I mean, Chicago, Los Angeles, I believe, are definitely failing the kids. But Adam, one thing - and you write about this a lot - one thing we think about, what does the public sector do? But a lot of times you talk about what about in the home? And particularly where are fathers and how do fathers play into the nurturing and the rearing of children so that they do become responsible adults? Is this part and parcel of the same type of institutional failure? Or is it something that's separate?
Adam Coleman
I think it's separate. I think that the issue of fatherlessness is an American issue. The United States is number one in the world when it comes to single parent homes. (Rich Helppie: I did not know that.) Yes, the United Kingdom is number two but we're number one when it comes to that. As much as we look at the disparity, when it comes to black households with a single parent, the reality is that there are more white Americans who are growing up in that situation, than black. And this is a growing, growing problem. Why it's happening? I think a lot of it has to do with feminism, modern feminism. So it's not to say women can't go to work or anything of that nature. That's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is the idea that women can do no wrong. Whatever decision she wants to make, it's her decision. All the family planning, it's up to the woman, it's a very misandrist take on the world; that men are optional, fathers are not necessarily important. I think it's that kind of strong feminist mentality that exists within our society. Does it exist in every home? No, but it's enough where it's becoming normal. It doesn't seem uncommon anymore. We all know somebody, multiple people, who grew up without their father in the house, who grew up with an antagonizing mom who kicked the dad out. We all have some sort of story; my mother didn't want to get married and she had children with a married man. That's the reality. So as much as my father is at fault, it's my mom's fault too for making this decision and putting us in a circumstance. But I'm not the only one. I know there are lots of people who are in similar situations, and it's okay, right? It's, we don't shame this stuff anymore. It's so normal, why would you shame it. So basically, the adults get to do whatever they want and especially the moms get to do whatever they want, without any sort of harsh scrutiny when it comes to it. But then in the end, the children suffer. I think that's what I'm trying to highlight for people. I'm not trying to attack women, I'm trying to bring a balance of criticism, because we can say deadbeat dad every day of the week. But do we say deadbeat mom? Do we say, hey, mom, that wasn't a good choice. We can't just criticize one side and not the other. You can't just criticize Democrats and not criticize Republicans if you want to have a balanced view in politics. You can't just criticize the dads and not criticize the moms because there's two that created the children. And so we have to figure out how do we bring some sort of balance of criticism.
Richard Helppie
I understand what you're saying. It really comes back to that preparation for adulthood and that marriage is hard, maintaining relationships is hard, raising children is hard, and doing it on your own is even more difficult. I don't criticize or condemn somebody that may find themselves in a situation where they're a single parent because we don't know what their circumstances are that got them there. But if it's a lack of maturity, a lack of commitment, you've said it perfectly; it's the child that becomes injured and the child that loses the benefit of having that father or having that mother in the home, of feeling like they're maybe not as nurtured. I think that when I look at successful people, generally, and you listen to them, who are your influences, many times, it's, my father told me this, and my mother counter-balanced it with this. My mother always said this, and my dad counter-balanced it. When we come to some of the conservative voices and the way they're treated in the media, I think men like Thomas Sowell, I'm thinking about Larry Elder from south central LA, his father was a janitor and raised him with moral principles and enthusiasm for creating something of himself. And yet the left called him a white supremacist during a political campaign. That to me is like, okay, how could people actually read that and believe it, that's what I'm not understanding. Then more broadly when we talk about how conservatives are treated in the media, in recent days we've had the Twitter files released and I'm horrified. I'm horrified by the fact that we know for sure that the FBI and other agents of our federal government were going to Facebook, Twitter and other social media and saying, we want you to run this, don't run this, we think you need to tweak this, don't tweak that. And those companies were doing it so I am outraged about that. And then I am baffled by the dead silence, because well, this might help conservatives - who were the ones predominantly being stifled. That, to me, is like your point about if you're going to criticize one side, you've got to criticize the other. I think people lose their credibility when they don't criticize what their own team's doing.
Adam Coleman
I think the Twitter files basically just made conservatives feel like, alright, I wasn't crazy. (Rich Helppie: Yeah.) Because for a while I remember we had the hearings; are you censoring conservatives? No, no, we're not doing that. I remember Tulsi Gabbard, I believe she had some sort of lawsuit saying that Google is censoring her. And she's not conservative, but she's somewhat anti-establishment and everyone was like, no, you're paranoid, oh, it's happening to everybody or something of that nature. Even when the first Twitter files were being dropped, I remember someone saying, oh, you know, so what if the campaign...the campaign's not the government, they were just [cross talk] to minimize what is actually happening here. Then we're all like, this is Twitter Files One, obviously there's more to this. And we make it to, I think we're up to eight, but I believe seven highlights that there's a portal where they're sending requests, and they say, you need to get rid of this person, some rando account that made a joke, you need to get rid of this person, you need to do this. And I will say this, Twitter did have some hesitancy about some of the things that they were doing. I will say that, but they did it anyways. I think ultimately when you have that much power as a social media platform, the deep state will come and start knocking on your door and saying, you either need to play ball with us or need to give us access, you need to do something because this is a lot of power and this can be very beneficial for us.
Richard Helppie
Indeed. I feel for the position that the Twitter executives were in, it's the federal government making suggestions. Then I listened to the trial balloons about why it was okay and the one that I literally burst out laughing was well, Joe Biden wasn't in the government. I mean, he hasn't done anything but be in the government, basically, his entire adult life, except for a brief period when he wasn't vice president and then before he became a candidate. I don't know how many months that was, but it wasn't very many. Then to say all of his contacts all throughout the government structure that he built up over a very long career in the Senate and as eight years as vice president and in the few months he was out, hey, he's just an average guy off the street so it doesn't count. I mean, the height of absurdity that there wasn't an undue influence. Some of these things, like what you said, hey, I'm not paranoid, it wasn't a conspiracy theory I was watching when Sam Harris said, yeah, we throttled the Hunter Biden story and now it's trying to be shaped as quote "the Hunter Biden porn picture story." That's not the story. The story is ìten percent for the big guyî which clearly refers to Joe Biden, and clearly some kind of deals with states that might be hostile actors; that's the story. Why isn't anyone looking into that? Unless you believe [what] Joe said, I've never talked to my son about business. Okay, you rode back with him on an airplane from China; all that time? We didn't talk about that. Okay, I mean, that's your story, right? How believable is that? But when I look at the power of what the media can do, and where it convinces people, there are always remnants people want to believe. In fact, I was just on Twitter before you and I signed on to do this podcast tonight and there are people that still believe conspiracy theories that have long since been debunked, in particular, while Trump was engaged with Russia. You don't hear that anymore but there are people that are still clinging to that. The shooting in Kenosha that with the young Rittenhouse, there are people that still think, oh, he's just a mass murderer that took an automatic weapon across the state line. The case was tried in court and adjudicated, he was ruled not guilty but they're hanging on to that. There's lots of examples about that. What I don't understand is why do people keep consuming this stuff? And by the way, it happens on the right too, where they get a hold of something, and you can't dislodge them. Is Donald Trump playing for you or is Donald Trump playing for Donald Trump? I mean, you just have to look at what he does and the evidence kind of points in a direction other than he's here to help us. He might be a better choice in some people's mind than the other alternative but clearly the guy is really focused on himself and his brand. My humble opinion.
Adam Coleman
I tend to agree with you on that assessment. But to go to your original point, I think what ends up happening is people are unwilling to want to admit when they're wrong. There's a high level of hubris when it comes to people in politics, or even just people who are very involved in following politics. It's a team sport. I'm a Knicks fan and it's like, you'll take that guy who's last on the bench and you're like, well, he played all right - we just lie to ourselves - there's a reason he's the last on the bench. Or the rookie player that we just picked up as a tenth pick and he played so-so and we're just like, I think he has real promise, he might be an all-star one day. No, no he won't.
Richard Helppie
Anybody that's rooted for the Detroit Lions as long as I have, okay, you can't complain about the Knicks. [Laughter.] Alright.
Adam Coleman
Right...
Richard Helppie
But I feel your pain. Okay. So I can follow you with that.
Adam Coleman
It's the same thing within politics, it becomes a team sport. And for me, this is why I left the Democrat team and have become a free agent so I can look at the market and make critiques of everything that's going on around me because I don't like the team sports. When I was playing the team sport I got fed BS propaganda from my own team. I got made to believe certain things that I shouldn't believe. I followed along a two year investigation about Trump and Russia. And I'll tell you this, this one of those red pill moments - a small red pill - when they did the two year investigation. Robert Mueller...and I remember watching The View and Bill Maher, they said, Robert Mueller is a Boy Scout, he's going to save the day, he's going to show how corrupt and how Russia got involved in our elections, that Donald Trump was in the middle of it. And then Robert Muller comes and gives this long explanation, essentially saying nothing. There was nothing there. It was [sic] never anything there. I remember turning on The View and listen to Joy Behar say, well Robert Mueller is a Republican anyways (Rich Helppie: Yeah, right. Exactly right.) He just moved on. And I said, that was weird, that was one of those weird moments. I didn't leave my team then but I still remember that was like, wow, she was just like, alright, so anyways...
Richard Helppie
[Laughter] Yeah, right, exactly. And then again it's cooking that next narrative. I brought up Kenosha and Kyle Rittenhouse earlier because it was a case that I followed rather closely. And the man was convicted in the media; he was a bloodthirsty guy that went across the state line with an automatic weapon in places he wasn't invited, where he didn't belong, and he brutally shot three people. That's the story right? What comes out at trial; what was he doing in Kenosha? He worked as a lifeguard for the Kenosha pool. That's where his dad lives, across state lines, he basically lived on the border, so people cross all the time to do that. But the question I would ask people, particularly my friends on the left, I said look, if you live ten miles from downtown in your town, and you hear that there are people there that are destroying buildings, lighting businesses on fire, and the police are standing down and saying, you know what, we're going to do nothing to stop them. Would you want a young man like Rittenhouse on the street. Well, no, never, let the buildings burn. Okay. Now that same group of people come to the corner store in your neighborhood and they attack the store and they set the store on fire they light it, not two blocks away. Police won't respond. Would you like a guy like young Mr. Rittenhouse there? Okay. Then what if now they're at your neighbor's house right next door to you and they're turning your neighbor's house on fire. Do you want the guy there if the police won't come? Now what about on your own land. To watch people adamantly refuse to believe that there was an uncontrolled civil disobedience, that the young fella was invited by the people that owned the car dealership, that the act that precipitated it was a fire in a dumpster that was going to set some gas tanks on fire, and that he went to stop that and there was a guy that had threatened him before [who] came at him. That's what went down. And then the next two guys were armed. Again, it's I think it's an American tragedy that any of it happened. But when you condone the riot and you tell the police to stand down, and the police stand down and it continues to escalate, bad things are going to happen and this was a bad thing that happened. But it wasn't about some vigilante.
Adam Coleman
No, I agree with you there. I've heard from other people who talk about how the Rittenhouse trial was a little bit of a red pill for them too about the media. There are people who literally thought that Kyle Rittenhouse killed black people. (Rich Helppie: Oh yeah, forgot about that one.) And I'm just like, what? What are you talking about? The Rittenhouse case is one of those kind of litmus tests where I know if someone is just playing team sports or not. Or I'll give them a caveat; they just did not watch the trial. Because anybody who watched any, not even the whole trial, just watched a portion of the trial with significant moments - let's say when when they go after certain witnesses - they would say, hold on a second, this doesn't sound right at all. I'll say how about this, don't even watch the trial. Did you watch the footage? I knew that this was self-defense when I saw the footage. I was like, oh, this is this is easy self-defense. I was actually shocked that it went as far as it did. You could tell the prosecutors just wanted to get some big win but this was the easiest self-defense situation that I had seen. Because most of the time, there is no film of it - they had drone footage, they had every angle to see that this boy was being chased. They even did it frame by frame where he didn't shoot when the guy backed up. Then when he reached for the gun, then he shot him. So not only was he an under threat, he had trigger discipline and he was precise with his shots - maybe he got lucky - under such a tense situation. But I'm just like, there is no other situation that I've seen involving self-defense where they have multiple angles showing it and they still went through with this. Anyways, I'm just thinking to myself that the people who still believe this stuff just refuse to actually look into it.
Richard Helppie
You and I agree with that, it's part of the same narrative. We could have pulled any one of these narratives out. I mean, we can go all the way back to Jussie Smollett, and we can fast forward to our Supreme Court justice being asked, what is a woman, and she had to pretend not to know. This is the point of absurdity we've gotten to, and the linkage with the media establishment and the federal government is in a very bad place today. That's why I really applaud what you're doing, coming and speaking out. That's why I went over to Substack and I think we can add our voices to this. Now, after this conversation, nobody's going to hear any of the nuance about that neither of us are in the tank for Trump. We're not trying to join the Republicans, we're trying to say that there's a problem with the political system - aided and abetted by the media system - that's robbing us of the ability to get to policy solutions. If you want to think about things, go back 22 years and we have a bunch of Saudi Arabians trained in Afghanistan that attack us in New York and Washington DC with airliners, so therefore, we invade Iraq - like what? I look at this where we have mentally unstable people obtain firearms and create evil with it. So let's go after all the people that aren't doing anything illegal with their firearms and basically prosecute them. What? Why don't we like fix the problem where the problem is. As you and I talked about, we have kids that are coming out of K through 12 education unprepared with fundamentals for either the workforce or higher education. Again, we're split. Instead of look, can we all agree, let's let's educate the kids. Because if we spend a year arguing about it, that's a year that a kid lost in school, they're never getting ninth grade back again, or kindergarten, or third grade, or whatever it is. That's, to me, where we need to strip away the labels, strip away the insults, and start focusing on problems and getting them fixed. But I wonder if that can happen in this media environment, what do you think?
Adam Coleman
I agree, there are definitely issues that we need to start looking past hard-line party politics. I think there are things that both parties could come together on. The problem is that for the people who can make a lot of changes within politics, they have no incentive to. When you fix problems, then there becomes less issues to run on and no one wants to be that effective. I think ultimately...I don't mean to be like black pill, but I think ultimately, this is just going to be a continuous problem. There's just too much money in politics on either side, there's too much private industry influence, too much lobbying efforts - lobbying for corporations, not lobbying for people. And the things that we can solve are going to be even tougher to solve, because we don't have a special interest group for us. That's what...the politicians are actually supposed to be our special interests, our special interest group, but they're not because they always have to run for re-election. They need millions upon millions of dollars and, at some point, they have to take money from people that are actually against our interests as citizens. So it's a crazy system that we're hoping for change from, and there may be some change, it may be slow, and then we may go backwards. It's a crazy thing, but I think ultimately, people should focus politically more in local politics. People should hold their party more accountable, because I think a lot of what happens, it ends up you vote D all the way down, you vote R all the way down and you cross your fingers and you hope things work out. But then you vote for the same corrupt people wondering how come we don't get any sort of change. And that's why. Just because they have an R next to their name doesn't mean that they're in support of what you actually want. You need to hold them accountable and that means you have to be able to criticize them. Just because you criticize someone who's on the right, someone who is a Republican, doesn't mean that you're a Rhino - everybody's just throwing around Rhino everywhere - or a deep state actor or controlled opposition, whatever term they want to use. You can be a regular American citizen who just wants some accountability from your politicians who are actually supposed to serve you. I think too many people on both sides act as if they're supposed to support the politician; the politicians are supposed to support us, we're not supposed to be their fans. This is part of the issue that I have when it comes to some of the Trump fandom. I have no problem with Trump, if Trump is the candidate when it comes down to 2024, he's a better option than what the Democrats put forward. But I'm not going to ignore the level of fandom that exists in our environment that prevents people from saying, hey, maybe Trump shouldn't do this; hey, maybe Trump is the guy, but could he not do this. We should be able to criticize people that we like. So I think that's my thing that I've been trying to do. Criticizing Republicans doesn't get you on Fox News. I fully understand that but I think it's something that needs to happen. If we're going to have a healthy political environment, we have to be able to criticize our own side - even though I'm not a Republican, but I'm on the right - we have to be able to criticize people who are on the right. And maybe you do it slightly different than on the left, but you've got to be able to criticize them.
Richard Helppie
I think you landed in a great spot when you said that we need them to be our advocacy group. They need to be our special interest and deliver solutions for us. There are things that make such good sense: child tax credit, that makes a lot of sense, people want to do that; energy independence, that makes a lot of sense, people want to do that; clean environment, people want to do that; making sure that all of our kids are educated, people want to do that. The answer can't be well, we can't do it the right way, or we can't do it the left way. We've got to do it for the people that actually need those services. Adam, you're such an articulate guy and have such a command of the nuances of politics and in media, I enjoy having you on my show. I really appreciate you putting the time in. As we wrap up today is there anything that we didn't cover that you'd like to chat about?
Adam Coleman
I think that this kind of goes back to what we were just saying about criticizing people on the right, we need to do more of that and I know it's not a popular thing to do. When I was a Democrat, it wasn't popular to criticize other Democrats either. I know it's not a popular thing to do but man, it's a healthy thing to do in a political climate. When I see people who are saying, oh, man, I don't want the primaries to turn into...no, you do want the primaries to turn into that. You want to see where the flaws are. That's how you get better. You can't pretend that any politician is perfect, you can't pretend that. You have to be able to see what actually is this person going to do for you. No politician is going to be perfect, but at least you want to know where their flaws are. You want to have good expectation as to how they're going to serve you in public office. Also, I just want to add, I think there needs to be better commentary when it comes to the political right. I see way too much rah, rah, red meat, I see way too much paranoia preaching. We just talked about the FBI being involved with Twitter; that is a real thing. But I see way too much of the abstract; the deep state, we need to stop the deep state, how do we stop the deep state, we need to disband the FBI - good luck with that happening. Why are you talking about these things? It's too much. It's too much this dogma about being the underdog.
Richard Helppie
That's very true. I love the way you're putting that; let's talk about specifics versus generalities. Adam, any any closing comments as we wrap up here?
Adam Coleman
Other than that, take care of your home. Raise your kids, engage in healthy relationships with people and have good faith conversations.
Richard Helppie
I enjoy the good faith conversation with you tonight. So with author and editorialist, columnist, Adam Coleman, author of "Black Victim to Black Victor," founder of Wrong Speak Publishing, you can find Adam on lots of outlets. Find The Common Bridge at Substack and elsewhere, on YouTube and your favorite podcast outlet. And so with our guest, Adam Coleman, this is your host, Rich Helppie, signing off on The Common Bridge.
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