Now this is the FCB Podcast Network. A Brandon Lowe Masoda Day that we won't said, and we won't say all we got it? Does no one get tattowa is gonna be Okay? Day that we won't say and we won't say all we got it? Does no one get tattowa is don't be okay? Hey, everybody, welcome back to another episode of Just Listen to Yourself. We're doing another throwback episode this week. I'm still pulling myself together from the crazy month of May. Thank you for everyone for your patience and your support. I asked Arvio to pull out the Ben Carson episode this time. I feel like it didn't get enough love that first time. He was a wonderful interview. We had such a great talk. He was so gracious, and so I thought, in the spirit of primary season, jinting back up and we're seeing all of the nastiness that comes with primary season. In honor of primary season, I thought, well, let's pull out this interview with a former presidential candidate who did go through primary season, but who did so with a lot more grace than we see people typically go through it. It was a wonderful conversation doctor Carson is so generous with his time and his wisdom, and I think someone can. I think there's something for everyone in this one. I really do. He's a truly inspiring man and I thank him so much. First time. I think you for your time. If you've already heard this episode, well please consider sharing this with somebody. Share it on your social media, share it to a family Facebook page or something. There's a lot of good stuff in here. It's really not that political, so if you're in the sharing mood, go ahead and give us a shared. Don't forget to like and subscribe to the podcast, of course. Enjoy me on substackj Cura Davis dot substack dot com. I'll be back next week with the new episode. Until then, enjoy doctor Ben Carson. Doctor Carson, thank you for talking with us today. It's my pleasure to be here with you. Thank you for inviting me. Well, I wanted to start out with so I asked my husband the other day, I'm interviewing doctor Carson. Is there anything that you would like to ask him? And since he is not involved in politics at all, usually like at election time, he just is like, who are we voting for? Just give me the list and then I'm going to the batotbox to do that. But so I just wanted to know what he would ask you. And he wanted to ask you if you ever do any fly fishing because he's becoming obsessed with it. I certainly have seen a lot of people who do it, and we've seen their obsession at we had a bet. He was like, I don't think doctor Carson is a fly fishing kind of guy. He was right, Okay, although I would probably enjoy it if I if I ever got around it. Well, are you the kind of guy who's always doing something like fly fishing requires you to I think this is why he likes it, requires you to slow down, be present, be in that one place. I mean, if you're the kind of person that's like, oh, I'm always thinking, I'm always moving from one thing to the next, maybe thinking you like things like what pool? Oh pool you shoot pool? Where you sit there and calculate the angles and things. I love that that makes sense to me coming from a neuro sartain. That's fantastic. Well, I am really happy to interview you today and I have some questions. I was I was pulling my audience as to what they wanted to hear from you, and a lot of them had curiosities about what it was like to rump office. And I this week announced my own run for school board here in my district in southern California. Thank you. It's been an experience so far. It's only been a week, and it's been insane. And I'm starting to realize that talking about politics and getting involved in politics are two different things, and you are not. I'm not a politician either. I talk about politics, but I'm not a politician, and neither are you. That was what was surprising about you getting in the presidential race. Originally, it's like, well, this guy, he's a surgeon, he has a career, he has a history, he doesn't need any of this stress. Why on earth would he get into this race? So what was it that prompted you to get into presidential politics in the first place. Well, I was very concerned about the direction of our country, and I really thought that we were on the precipice and that we might fall off and go in the wrong direction. And I felt very strongly that it wouldn't be that hard to turn things around, you know, with some intelligent policies, getting rid of a lot of the regulations that are on the books but are completely useless and just impede progress, because we want to create an environment that encourages innovation and entrepreneurship. And also we were moving away from our values, and I just didn't see anybody out there who was advocating these things appropriately. I was also very concerned about kids and what we're doing through their future with the accumulation of depth, how that can affect their quality of life. So that's part of the story. The other part of the story is when I was asked to speak at the twenty thirteen National Prayer breakers I thought that was pretty strange because I had spoken at the nineteen ninety seven Prayer Breakfast and I didn't know that anyone ever did it twice. Some research demonstrated that there was one person who did it twice, and that was Billy Graham. I said, I said, that's a pretty good company. So I accepted the invitation. And after that speech, it was just crazy. Everybody's saying you got to run for president. And I said, if I ignored these people to go away, but it didn't. Every place I went there were people with black carts run Then run and I had over five hundred thousand petitions in my office, and I finally just said, Lord, you know, it's not something I particularly want to do, but if you want me to do it, then you have to give me all the stuff that someone who runs the president has, a roll index with all the important names, a big more chest of money and organization. And the next thing I knew all those things were in place in our organization was raising more money than the RNC each and it was crazy. And what was the one thing, not the one thing, but something that surprised you when you got into presidential politics, when you got in the race, what was something that you were totally shocked by? Well, you know, I had an inkling of how dishonest the press was, but boy did I see at the big time, you know, particularly when I reached front understands they were just coming out with lies every day. Unbelievable. They're very creative. I will give them credit for that. Yeah, yes, it seems to be a requirement for being a journalism these days, is being creative. But I know I can tell you, I can tell listeners that even just from my limited experience, just in this very small school board race in this very small district that the liberty that some opposing parties will take with your reputation with who you are, it is disconcerting. I mean, you've always had a good reputation in your practice and from what I know about you in your community, I mean, people have held you in high steam, which is why so many people wanted you to run for president. So was it didn't it feel sort of hurtful that all of this stuff was going around about you and you knew it wasn't true And you can't defend every accusation individually, Like did not worry you or concern you? Well, you know, I kind of look at the big picture and I realized that the Good Lord is in charge, and he plays the long game. You know, we tend to play the short game. And you know, it all worked out fine because I did end up as the Secretary of had got a chance to do a lot of things that affected a lot of people's lives, and that in turn led me to American Cornerstone Institute, where we're able to really focus people on faith, liberty, community, and life. Our little Patriots program, all of these things are just mushrooming right now and you know, I want to have a place that American people can come and find out the real truth about a whole host of things, and we don't have that to a large degree, and we need to make sure that we do because the future of our country depends on it. I agree wholeheartedly as a specifically, particularly as a parent who has been I mean, this is today, so to your anniversary of fifteen days to slow the spread, and it's been grueling and it's really nice to see people like you stepping up. Well, let's talk about a little bit about HUD and American Cornerstone Institute. You and I do have a tansigentle connection. By the way, I used to write for a magazine that you were supporting called American Currency, and I used to That's kind of where I started out doing a lot of paid contracting, and so I knew how passionate you were even from just knowing that you were involved in that. But what does the American Cornerstone Institute do? I know they have some scholarship programs. Are you guys involved in making educational programs as well? Well? Education is obviously a huge part of what we do. That's through the Little Patriots program, and it's just what it sounds like. You know, we concentrate on the kids at the young impressionable age. You know, the Bible says in Proverbs twenty two six, train up a child and the way he should go, and when he's only I'm not depart from it. Well, even our enemies understood that. And you know Vladimir len And said, giving your children to teach for four years and the seed that I plan will never be uprooted. So taking advantage of that, you know, we have presented an online educational program right now is K through five. We're expanding it which gives our kids, for instance, the true history of our country, warts and all, so that they come away with a love and an admiration for our country, not hatred for each other. And we have to be aggressive on this because those who want to fundamentally change our nation, they are very aggressive on it. And if you're running for the schoolboard, you I'm sure know how they're trying to indoctrinate our kids. And obviously that's a winning formula for them if we don't counter them. So the Little Patriots program free of charge, by the way, Little Patriots Learning dot Com because We've gotten underwriters across the nation to underwrite it because they understand how important is. We also have a book that came out in November called Why America Matters. It's for elementary age and preschoolers. And we have a whole series of books that will be coming out. The next one will be coming out is Why I Stand, and it talks about the American flag and what it actually represents. Doesn't tact people who want to kneel, but it tells you why we stand and why we have that respect. And then we're doing one on occupations different jobs, because all jobs are essential. There should be nobody sitting in an ivory tower saying your job essential and your job is, and how important it is for us all to be able to work together. And we have a little icon which is a little ego and all the appearances on every page who is the guide And we emphasize the fact that the eagle has a right wing and a left wing, and he can't fly with two right wings and he can't fly with two left wings, but when they work together, he flats quite well. I love that. I love it. Well, what is you know? We're both we're both black, Americans, and we both and we're both conservative Black Americans as well, and um so we get a lot of flack for our views and maybe not fitting into the boxes that people think we're supposed to fit in. And I, as a parent, I don't want to be I don't want to be unrealistic about what the journey of America has been. But why do people like you and I, doctor Carson have reason to feel pride in being American and in our country's history. Well, first of all, you know, we should recognize that if you go back and you look at American history, American history, it's black history and black history's American history. You know, the bear for person killed in the Revolutionary War, Christmas addicts who was a black person. You look at some of the heroic things that happened with some of the Buffalo soldiers and black troops throughout all of our world wars. You look at the red tails. I mean, it just goes on and on, and you look at the contribution that black Americans have made. You know, you just walk down the street and you can start with your shoes. It was Jan montzlig Or, a black man, who invented the automated shoe lasting machine revolutionized the shoot her in the street throughout the world. And you step on that clean street Charles Brooks, the guy who came up with the street cleaners, the street sweepers, and down that street comes a big refrigerated track and trailer truck Frederick Jones the refrigeration system for trucks, later adopted for airplanes, trains, and boats. And it comes to stop at the traffic sitting on Garrett Morgan, a black man, and you can talk about how we also have been at the gas man say lots of lives during the war and then war you can say, well, how about Henry de Brandberry, black woman who bent it down the water cannon that made it possible to launch torpedoes from Subbury. And you just go on and on and on all the way to the railroad tracks. And Elijah McCoy in the automatically location system for local mother vengeance, and he has so many great inventions. When something would come out, people would say, is that a McCoy, Is that the real McCoy? You got racist people like David Duke talked about real McCoy. I don't even know he's paying Homas too, And that's amazing. We have a lot of stuff to be proud of. Believe me, I agree. I agree, And I always say to my children everything good that I have in my life right now is because of God and because I've been blessed to be to be a member of this country and to absolutely yeah. And you know, my mother absolutely if anybody was a victim, it was her. You know, grew up in a huge rural family, got married at age, their team trying to escape desperate poverty. Years later found out that her husband was a bigger mess, had only a third great education, had to raise her two boys in the inner city by herself. But she never became a victim. And she always said, we got this, we got this under control with the help of the Good Lord. And she would never let us make excuses for anything. If we made an excuse out of her mouth, the next thing that came out was a point, caught yourself to blame. And you know, it made a big difference. And you know, her philosophy was, you know, if you walk into an auditorium full of big, racist white people, you don't have a problem. They have a problem, because see they're gonna all cringe and wonder if you're going to sit next to them, where you can go sit anyway you want. And that was the kind of household that I grew up in, So it made a difference for me. It made a difference for my brother. You know. I became a brain surgeon. He became the rocket scientist, you know. And she got a lot of criticism, but I think she had the last last. Oh yeah, I would say so. I mean, having a rocket scientists and a brain surge and who also was a presidential candidate. That's a win for mom. She's kind of making me feel like an underachiever. I have a freshman in high school who thinks she wants to be an actress, and I have a college freshman who is pretty sure he wants to be a filmmaker. They're lovely and intelligent kids. But yeah, definitely no brain surges in the family yet. But who knows. You never know. Maybe I can just make films about great brain surgeons or Yeah. But the other good thing is I've noticed an increasing number of black people moving toward conservatism. Yeah, and they starting to think for themselves, actually looking at the data, seeing who has done something for them and who hasn't and what works what doesn't, rather than just listening to so called leaders. Well, that's a great transition. You're good at this. Hey, y'all, this is Alie Michelle. I'm a conservative social media influencer that has been censored by big tech. So I broke away from the restrictions and started a podcast called pillow Talk with Alie Michelle. My show is a space to have real conversations about the issues that impact our everyday lives without the fear of being canceled by the big tech tyrants. Subscribe to pillow Talk with Allie Michelle and FCB podcast on Apple, Spotify, iHeart, or wherever you getch podcasts. That's Ali a l II. Come check on my show. I'll see you there. That's a great transition because that's one of the questions that I got for you and that I get a lot, which is we're seeing black Americans kind of move out of this default democrat attitude a largely due to what's been going on in the last two years, but I think we both can admit that this has been bubbling for quite some time, and so they're looking for ways to move out. As I speak, on my race for the school board. It's so funny because the general sentiment among parents is that they're really ticked off about mandates and that's what's getting them into these races. But when I talk to black parents, the thing that they say got them into this whole school board thing is crt. I mean that is almost to a person with black parents. So I'm seeing even black parents are saying, look, I'm not that political. Yeah, maybe I go to the ballot box and I don't put a lot of thought into it. But when this showed up in my school, I was like, wait a minute, this has nothing to do with how I raise my kids, and this goes against everything I know about parentine. I mean, have you've been seeing that too? Obviously I've been staying it in droves, and you know, I think a lot people recognize that if you take a black kid and you convince them that the system is stacked against him, that he can't possibly be successful and that he's a victim, and then he starts to believe that he's a victim, then he is a victim. It's a self fulfilling prophecy, and that's really child abuse. As far as Appinston and it's just as abusive, quite frankly, to take the white kids and try to make them feel guilty. You know, I have a white friend. His granddaughter came home crying because she was saying, Am I evil because I'm white? You know? I mean, this is just ridiculous stuff that we're doing to these kids. And then if that's not enough, they may not be a girl or a boy. I mean, how can we put all this stuff on our kids? This is just so unfair, It's terrible. I mean, as a parent, it's terrifying. I find it terrifying. And again it goes against everything I know and everything I've learned. I mean, my parents and grandparents raised me to, you know, believe that segregation was bad and segregation is evil, and my ancestors marched to and gave their lives, their blood, their livelihood to fight segregation. And now we're in this era era where we're we're now putting a rubber stamp on it and we're calling it equality. It's it's so bizarre. How did we get here? How did we get here? It's so illogical. And you know, as a brain surgeon, I can tell you, you know, when you open the scalp and take the bone flap off. You're operating on the thing that makes that person who they are. Their skin color doesn't make them who they are. The shape of their nose or the texture of their hair doesn't make them who they are. It's the brain that makes them who they are. And you know, when you're a little more sophisticated than an animal, you can figure that out. Because animals are designed and their brain is designed with a large midbrain. Midbrain helps them to react quickly. That's animals react so fast cat like reflexes. But people are the ones who have the big frontal lodes. Those are used for rational thought processing, so you can extract information from the past and the present integrated into a plan for the future. You can actually analyze a person. You can actually determine what the content of their character is. You don't have to act like an animal and just look at the color of their skin. Whoo, I didn't know we were going to church today, Donard. Here we are, yes, amen to that, and we just we're up against so much as parents these days. It's nice to know that we have people like you in our corner. I'm wondering, though, what you say to parents who say, well, we just we need more equity in our schools and we're not teaching enough black history, and that's all CRT is. It's just it's just black history. We just need more black history in the schools. I would say to them, you need to go and read about CRT and see what it really is. It's not just about black history. Now, I agree that we need to make an effort to make sure all those things that I was just talking about walking down the sheet, those things need to be in the books. Everybody needs to know because I think whites need to understand that blacks have played a very important role in the development of our country and our kids need to understand that too, and I think that creates mutual respect. But I think people also should know that, you know, I could take a walk down the street and point out a lot of things that Hispanics have made, a lot of things that people of Swedish descent having. You know, our diversity is not a problem, it's a strength, and that we just need to emphasize the right thing and that requires strong leadership, not leadership that continues to drive this mistakes into our society. Um when you look at your career from neurosurgeon to HUD secretary. Well, when I look at it, I think, m how how does this guy get here? And I think a lot of people would like to know what was it about the HUD position that you that you that attracted you to it and why did you agree to take that position? Because having grown up in dire poverty, I realized that there are a lot of people in our society who have been convinced that they're victims, who are treated like victims, who are not given the kinds of opportunities that they need, and I wanted to try to do something about that. And you know, and I still have a very deep concern for poor people in our society because I strongly believe that the majority of them don't have to be poor. And you know, we talk about, for instance, the wealth gap which is quite significant between American blacks and American lights. However, is it really a racial issue, Because when you look at Nigerians who came to this country, Ghanaians who came to this country, some others with black skin who came to this country, there's no wealth gap. And if you if you go among those families, go to a Nigerian family. First thing you'll discover is that a best degree is a baseline. That's the very baseline, and there's a lot of emphasis on family. And I think if you find American Black families where they have those same kind of emphasis, you don't see that wealth gap either. This is so interesting I was talking to somebody about I was talking to an Asian friend of mine once about wealth gap and she said, well, in my experience in my family and community. She happened to be of Chinese descent, but she was speaking generally. In my family and community, we finances are always on the table, like we're always discussing it. We're always having financial discussions. It's something that we talk about around the dinner dinner table. And it was the first time I had ever heard somebody say that. In my family. When I was growing up, the baseline like that was not the baseline. You didn't talk about, you know, money at the dinner table. That was distasteful. You didn't talk about these issues like how much does this person make or how do I get to be this rich or how do I get to this wealth status? We found it distasteful. But when she said that, I was like, Oh, that's setting like a normalcy right for the family. And I was thinking maybe that's something that we all need to be discussing, particularly in the black community as well. Making not a priority, not something that's sort of oh, I don't want to talk about what kind of money people make. Well, no, you're gonna need money to survive and you're going to need money to support your community. So we do need to be more engaged in these conversations around the dinner table. What a difference it makes when you understand how to save, how to invest, you know, what kind of associations to make, makes all the difference in the world. And you know, I look at I look at my children. We used to have those discussions and they're doing very well. Yeah. One thing that we emphasize in my house for our kids is working, you know. I mean it's like, as soon as you can get to work, you should if you want things, you know, if you have desires. My daughter likes to go to concerts. She loves music, and for a while my husband was, because she's a daddy's girl, was just indulging her. But after a while he said, well, you're going to have to find ways to earn what you want. Unfortunately, my son was a twenty twenty graduate. He lost that school year, that year of high school to the to the pandemic and the closures. But the first thing he did when we closed school is he went got a job. And I think you're right, doctor Carson, that a lot of this has to do with the nuclear family. And if I feel like that's a bad term these days, like I feel like to say nuclear family, people are like, oh well, what about I understand I'm the daughter of a single mom. I understand you're the son of a single mom. I understand that that not being in a nuclear family is not an immediate condemnation of your future. But let's be realistic here. Every every measurement we have, everything we have in across time, every study, every research piece tells us that the that the nuclear family is one of the most basic indicators for how well you'll do in life, no question about it. And you know those two factors, the nuclear family and understanding finance are big factors and success. And it was the same when I went to HUT. When I went to HUT, the place was in financial shambles. They had not had an audit for several years. Even though every federal agency is required to have an annual audit, they could not do an audit because there were so many material defects. And so one of the first things we did was worked very hard to get someone who was a financial expert, and we managed to get one of the senior partners from Ernst and Young and just twisted his arm until he finally agreed to come. And you don't seem like an arm twisting kind of guy, doctor Carson. We just pestered them until I guess I'd better go do this. And what an incredible job he did. Herb Dennis. He's actually written a book about transforming a federal agency. I think HUD is probably the best run federal agency now. But getting those things under control made it possible to do all the other programs that we were subsequently able to do, and we had a lot more on the docket had we had a second time. Well, what were maybe a couple of examples of things that you were able to accomplish there you feel very proud of. Besides the audit obviously, Yeah, Well, one of the things was the FYI program Foster used to independence about twenty thousand foster used age out of foster care h year with a high degree of homelessness, and some of them actually came to HUD and told us their story and we were so impressed. Within four months we had a program together where we were granting housing assistance and raparound services because just giving them a place to live is not enough. You know, you can imagine if you were eighteen years old and you didn't have a support system, just get your place to live wouldn't be enough. And that has made a big difference. The Envisioned Centers where we take federal, state and local programs along with nonprofits, faith groups, put them all together under the same roof and coordinate the services so that you give people a ladder from which to climb out of poverty into opportunity, you know, rearranging things at FAHA and Jenny May and modernizing them so that you could reduce the risk and give more people housing assistance. I mean, the list is much longer than your arm. Of things that we were able to accomplish. They don't generally the media doesn't like to talk about because they were good things, things that were great for people. If it had been something bad, they'd be all over it. And you know that was another thing. You notice a lot of the secretary areas left and because they attacked all of us severe attacks, and you know, you have to take money on your own pocket to higher lawyers. You know, some of us, you know, have the resources to do that and some didn't. And it really is something that needs to be looked at because I think it's very inappropriate, and so many good people on both sides will not go in the government, and they could do us a lot of good from a really smart people, but they don't want to put themselves with their families to it. And that's on purpose rights to scare us. Oh I mean, I'm again in my little modest school board race, I'm already seeing that. And even I who report on all of this ridiculousness, have had days where I'm like, I don't know if this is worth it. But that's the point, right You drive good people out who are imperfect but who have good ideas and intentions, You drive them out and then you just leave the positions to the vultures. But I find it really encouraging that you're saying that actually government can be changed, because I have to admit that some days I look and I'm like, this is hopeless. I don't know, just burn it all to the ground, Like I don't know how we fix this. Everything's so entrenched. But you're saying, no, I did see positive results when I went into HUD and those results are available out there if we have the right representatives in those offices. And the people have to understand that elections have consequences and that what they do is important. They need to inform themselves and a lot of people when they go to vote, they're just looking for a name that looks familiar. They don't know anything about it. They could be satan, they say, I know that in many cases it is. Oh man, well, I don't want to take up too much of your time. I've been so it's been wonderful to talk to you. But I do have one more question that one of my colleagues over at I write for a red state dot com. By the way, I don't think I introduced myself as the deputy managing editor of red State at the top, but I also write over there, and I'm a I'm an editor over there. So one of my colleagues over there said, yeah, and I've been working to make to sort of bring on more black conservative writers because I think we need more of that perspective, and you have to be intentional about finding those people. It's not that my colleagues are racist for not going to find them. They don't think from that perspective. So I want to bring in all perspectives. So one of my black colleagues said, yes, ask doctor Carson if he has noticed, which you have already kind of answered, that that Black Americans are kind of shifting right and what the GOP needs to do moving forward to help those people kind of move from this default Democrat setting to a more thoughtful political position. Now I don't want to say to the Republican Party, but at least getting them to vote on issues that line up with their conservative values, which Black Americans really do have conservative values for the most part. Absolutely, And that's the reason that you know, my wife and I wrote another book which will be coming out in May call Created Equal The Painful Past, Confusing Present, and Hopeful Future of Race in America, putting everything in perspective, including critical race theory and including our history. And I want black people, white people, I want everybody to understand, you know, the function of a society and the different components of that society, and we have a choice. We can build our future on our past failures, but we can build our future on our great successes. And we get to the men. Well, I yeah, Well, one more question. Do you think you'll ever run for president again? I have no plans of doing that. I will always do what the Lord leads me to do. But I hope that's not what it is. Fair enough, but fair enough. Well, before we go, please tell everyone again about American Cornerstone Institute and where they can go to support you and your wife's great work over there and what they can do. Well, thank you American Cornerstone dot org. And you'll find on their all kinds of information, conversation series with a lot of national leaders, a ton of television interviews that I've done, all kinds of resources for you, and also a link to Little Patriots. And we also have a more Perfect Union program starting now which will give people insiders few of the federal government how to get involved, because we're trying to encourage people and we don't want them to be scared away because if all the good people are gone, what's left, Well, there's no better note to end on. Thank you so much for your time. God bless you and all your endeavors. And you know anything that we can do for you here at FCB Radio or me over at Red State or here at just listen to yourself, you guys, just reach out to me and let me know because I'm fully on board for that mission. Thank you so much. Thank you for being a paycheck. Thank you, doctor Carson. Goodbye my soda day. That we won't stay, and we won't stay. All we gotta does, no want to get to setto and you is gonna be okay that we won't stay and we won't stay. All we got it does. No one can take that away. This has been a presentation of the FCB podcast Network, where real talk lifts. Visit us online at FCB Podcasts dot com.
