Matt Connarton Unleashed 7-13-23

Hey everybody, welcome, here we go. It is that time again,

Matt Connerton Unleashed and we are live from the studios of w m n H

five point three FM and Glorious Downtown Manchester, New Hampshire, also on cong

Pass ninety seven if you're in Manchester, and hello to all of our online

listeners across an Asia and around the globe. You can go to my website

Matt Connerton dot com for all of your live streaming options, social media links,

contact infolk show archives, etc. Etc. Today is Thursday July thirteen,

twenty twenty three, so nice to have you all with me. By

the way, played a couple couple songs there to open the show today.

We started with bleed Lines, the single from our friends in the band sepsis.

Part of why I played that is they've got a brand new video and

in fact, if you happen to be in Facebook in the chat room,

Jenny shared the link they've just released. Actually it went up last night on

YouTube. The brand new video from sepsis for the song bleed Lines. It's

really cool features the brand new lineup of the band, so I recommend checking

that out. And I really like that song A lot, so I figured

i'd play that today and it's a good excuse to let everybody know about the

new video. And of course I also played don't Cha, a little bit

of garage rock from our friend grim Rock, who joined us yesterday on the

show for the world radio premiere of his new single Don't Cha. He is

from the great state of Pennsylvania and he's by the way, he's been doing

a lot. If he's listening, thank you. He's been doing a lot

for a lot to really kind of promote the show and his appearance on the

show yesterday, and he's got a lot of people talking about it on Twitter,

which is really cool. So we appreciate that very very much. Tomorrow

on the show, we've got a busy show. Tomorrow we have, of

course Eric Pilch's classic film review and this week the subject is National Lampoon's Vacation,

very appropriate of course for the summertime. And then at five pm tomorrow

we're going to be joined by Dave Wally And this is kind of a special

one for me because Dave and I went to high school together and I've always

had a tremendous respect for him. Not only is he a great guy,

but a very talented musician, and so he's got this band, Satellite Union,

really really good. So he's going to be skyping in from Chicago.

That's where Dave is and that's where the band is based. I spent a

lot of time in Chicago as a kid because when I was when I was

a wee lad, a young urchin. Uh, you know, when my

parents split up, my mom ended up moving back to Chicago, where she

where she was from originally, so every summer I would get to spend spend

the summers out there with her. So I know that city pretty well myself.

But oh, I haven't been there in a while, I'll admit,

but it'll be it'll be really cool to talk to day of tomorrow and catch

up with him. So that will be tomorrow on the show. In fact,

I might even, uh, at the top of the hour today,

I might give a little sneak preview of a Satellite Union song. Not one

of the ones that Dave sent me. I'm going to save those for tomorrow.

But there's another Satellite Union song. I found online a video of a

performance from twenty twenty two, and I said, oh, I really like

this, So Melanie says, were you a crip or a blood No,

no, not in not in Chicago, Melanie. You're thinking of back when

I when I was in Compton, you know, Seetown, I was actually

a member of both the Crips and the Bloods. But uh, you know

I was pretty thug. That was a different time, though. Boy.

I'll tell you what if if you knew me back then, you'd be you'd

be afraid. You'd be afraid of me anyway. Uh, six zo three

two five O six ZO seven as a studio line six zo three two five

O six Z seven. I'm never quite sure how to go with that.

That's an old joke. I'm never quite sure how far to go with it.

I don't go as far with it as I used to. Um,

it's different, different times. Six zo three two five six Z seven.

You can also text me at six one seven nine one seven four four seven

six. I'm on social media at Matt Connerton. You can email me Matt

at Matt Connerton dot com. And of course you can interact endo Pine in

the Facebook live chat. But the melody's making me laugh in the chat room.

But the best thing to do so that we can hear and enjoy your

dulcet tones is to give us a call at six zoo three two five zero

six zero seven. Speaking of dulcet tones, we have a little bit of

a mystery um. Usually on Thursday afternoons, we are joined via phone by

our friend EASYG for his entertainment report. However, I realized today that I

haven't heard from him. And usually I hear from him in advance of his

entertainment report because he typically has a song request that he would like me to

play at the end of his entertainment report. It's usually something by either Amanda

McCarthy, Katie Dobbins or April Cushman, one of those three, because those

are the three entertainers he speaks about during his entertainment report. It's really the

it's really more of an Amanda McCarthy, Katie Dobbins, April Cushman report,

to be very precise about it. But I realized today, and I was

saying to Jenny earlier, you know, I haven't heard from I haven't heard

from EASYG. So we'll see if he calls at four fifteen, but I

don't know, and I don't see him in the chat room either, So

hopefully everything's okay. If we don't hear from him, he'd does have I

was. I ran into Kyle Heavy earlier. Of course, Kyle part of

the W M and H family. He ows his own show called Off the

Mark Sports on Sundays from I believe it's ten am to noon. But Kyle

and I were talking earlier, just stob briefly, and I said that Jenny's

saying Eric Agnet, Yes, easyg Eric Agnet. I was saying, you

know, Easy has a He has a little bit of a history of disappearing

for for months at a time. So I don't know. I don't know,

So we'll see, we'll see if we hear from him. But we'll

go ahead and say a load everybody on the Facebook live chat, and we

do have some something to get into. There's a particular a news item that

I think is being somewhat underreported. Shall we say that we're gonna get into

today, But yes, I did mention. Melanie is in the chat room.

And by the way, Melanie, I hope everything is good where you

are. Also, Jay Fed joins us in the chat as well and says,

good afternoon everyone, Good afternoon, j Fed. My thoughts are with

the two of you. Of course you are in Vermont and Vermont areas of

Vermont, I mean the pictures. I'd seen something Melanie had posted on Facebook,

and it's been in the news, of course that the terrible torrential downpours

of rain that left that area flooded. And to see the flooding in mont

Pelier is. I saw one news report that said it's actually worse than when

Hurricane Irene had hit. So it's pretty bad there. So I hope every

hope everything's okay. I hope you're both all right. It sounds like you

are, but boy, hopefully that that water recedes soon. And I did

even hear something about another storm system is moving in, so our thoughts are

with you there and everyone in the great state of Vermont. Jenny of course

is in the chatroom and says shalom peeps, and she did. She did

share a link, like I said, to the new video from Sepsis for

the track bleed Lines, really great great song. Eric Street joins us in

the chat and says, I thought Kyle could be the new entertainment reporter since

he sat at the desk the other day. Ah. Yes, Kyle Clayton

of the morning show. It was great to see him. He hadn't been

on the show in quite some time, but he came in the other day

because we had the try Combs here and he's really close friends with Ian from

the try Combs. And it turns out they had been in a band together

back in the day, which I meant to look up online. I wanted

to find that band, and I there might not be anything available anyway online,

but I am super curious. But DJ Steve is in the Facebook live

chat. Hello. DJ Steve of course joins us Friday Nights for Retro Spectrum

Radio with Paul c every Friday night from eight to eleven pm here on WMNH.

I have the honor and privilege of being one of Paul's co hosts on

that show, along with DJ Steve and of course Mike from Queen City Cabinetry.

Melanie says, Yep, governor is encouraging no one is on the roads

after four pm today risk of flooding and extreme wins. It just saysn't stop,

does it. I'm sorry to hear that. Melanie and Saturn, who

is from of course Greensboro, North Carolina, says, we say good afternoon,

hashtag Matt yesterday hashtag Matt Connerton. We say that new force of the

spark just comment to you yesterday. Alrighty, we are watching you from Greensboro,

North Carolina. I suspect it as much, I have to say.

I did kind of assume that that might be where you are watching us from.

Oh I do see sepsis as is in the Facebook live chat. Hello,

let me give the number again and then we're gonna get into something.

It's obviously EASYG is not called, so I guess he's probably disappeared once again.

Oh, Melanie says, I think a virgin or two should be thrown

into a volcano. You never know. It could work. Um, yes,

um, it could, but we don't know. Is there an active

volcano available to do that? Is? That would be my first question,

just, you know, because we have to approach these things, uh from

a pragmatic and practical standpoint. Oh my god, I just thought of something.

What if something happened with e ZG And Bruce. Maybe that's why I

haven't heard from him. So let me give the studio line again and then

we'll we'll get into uh. Oh, Rondo Favero joins us in the Facebook

lift had all the way from California, She says Callie in the house.

Uh six three two five six z seven is a number six H three two

five six zero seven. That is the studio line. Um, what I

wanted to get into today. And uh I this is one of those things

that it's not that the media is ignoring it. Sometimes when people talk about

things that aren't getting what they feel is a significant amount of attention in the

mainstream media, they'll say, oh, the mainstream media is ignoring this story.

You hear that a lot, and it's like, well, no,

the mainstream media is not ignoring it. I knew about that, and the

reason I knew about it is from the mainstream media. But this is a

particular item that I think is being not covered enough, and I'm a bit

alarmed by by what is happening. And it involves foreign policy. Obviously,

in the times that we live in, when we talk about foreign policy,

the first thing that people think about and discuss is of course Russia and the

invasion of Ukraine and NATO, and it's been a pretty big week on that

front. Of course, the announcement being made at the G seven that Ukraine

will be joining NATO in the future, not until after the current war is

over, you know. So we talk about that, and we talk about

the the decision by the Biden administration to give Ukraine cluster bombs to use,

which is very controversial. They're taking a lot of criticism from that, to

a large degree, from his own party, Biden's own party, the Democrats.

A lot of Democrats are criticizing him for it. I actually agree with

the decision. I think it's necessary to do, but I understand it's,

as we say, it's something upon which reasonable people can disagree. So there's

been a lot of news lately, but there's something that is connected with all

of this that is not getting talked about that much. So again, it

is being reported on. For example, if you go onto the Google and

you type in Cuba, Russia, China, you will in fact find search

results on mainstream media outlets. Oh hello to Dylan Reynolds who joins us in

the Facebook live chat. It's been a great musicians. So you will find

stories. The mainstream media is covering this. But again, you know,

at any given time, there's only so much oxygen. Yeah, because there's

only so much time you have in a newscast and on these shows. And

but you'll notice again I mentioned Russia, China, and Cuba. So we

talk a lot about Russia these days. Obviously when we talk a lot about

China, we're always talking a lot about China. We don't talk much about

Cuba. Now, why is that? Well, just not much to say

about Cuba, right, Well, here's the problem. Actually there is,

and this is the part that I think is being not discussed enough. What's

happening right now with Cuba. And I'm pretty bothered and I'm upset that this

is happening. And I'm going to explain you in some detail in a moment,

but it's these current conditions were avoidable, and there's a significant amount of

blame to go around, and the blame that I will be assigning today for

the current situation, as I see it, will be bipartisan in nature.

I can assure you of that. But the problem is, and if you

saw my post on social media earlier, you might have an idea of where

I'm going with this and why I'm thinking about Cuba. Two things. So,

China has been really cozying up to Cuba, and they seem to be

developing quite a relationship, and China seems to be using Cuba to spy on

the United States, or that seems to be their intention. At least Cuba

not too far. I don't remember offhand how many miles it is off off

of the coast of Florida, but you know, Cuba's not far, not

far at all. Uh. Strategically, if you are an enemy of the

United States, and we have seen this in history, if you are an

enemy of the United States, if you can somehow get yourself set up in

Cuba where you can do things like spy on the United States because of the

close proximity of Cuba where you can spy on the United States, well you're

you're you're in a pretty good position there. That's a that's a good thing

for you to have, right Or if you're in an if you're an enemy

of the United States and you would like to well it's been a long time

since we've used a phrase like this, but if you're an enemy of the

United States and you would like to potentially be able to launch a first strike

in a nuclear standoff on the United States, boy, having some having some

missiles in Cuba would sure media or advantage wouldn't it. Kruschev certainly thought so,

and Kruschev is long gone. But well, we'll get to that.

By the way, though, before I go any further, I want to

alarm anybody. There's no I'm not saying that they're actively putting, once again,

putting nuclear weapons in Cuba to hit the United States. I'm not saying

that. No, no, no, Just to be clear, no,

no one is reporting that, nothing like that. But I'm concerned because so

not only is Cuba getting very cozy with China, but we seem to have

a rekindling of an of an old relationships, shall we say, with Cuba

and Russia, and in fact a navy Russia just sent one of their navy

ships to Cuba, and Russia is helping them out with their oil situation.

Apparently Cuba needs oil, and so we seem to be we seem to be

seeing a great strengthening of that relationship, a restrengthening of that relationship. That's

a big problem. We'll get into more details, but just looking at it

in a broad sense, we don't need our two greatest adversaries in the world,

China and Russia, to be having a strategic relationship with Cuba, the

island that is not far from the coast of Florida. This is a problem.

And again, this is something that I think is going largely unnoticed.

It's not that it's not being reported. Obviously, how did I know about

it if it's not being reported. It is, but I think it's a

bigger problem. I think it's a bigger danger than people might realize. And

I'm a little bit frustrated that it's not getting more attention because I would like

to know what the Biden administration is doing about this, and I'm not getting

any particular impression that they're doing much now in terms of blame, I said,

the blame is bipartisan. Well, here it is. And we'll again

we'll get into some more details about it, but just speaking about it broadly.

So the Obama administration, and we'll go through the timeline in a moment,

but just just broad strokes to start. So, the Obama administration really

tried to sort of normalize relations and really sort of an outreach program with Cuba,

involving, in fact, not without a lot of controversy and criticism,

but President Obama at the time actually going and visiting Cuba. When was that

in twenties, toward the end of his presidency. We'll look at the timeline,

but actually, some really cool pictures that came out of that. Actually,

it was pretty amazing to see President Obama on the streets of Havana or

Havannah, depending on how you say it. How does Urge Overkill say it.

In that song they say sister Havana, I think they say Havanah.

And I supported that. Again, I understood some of the criticism, but

I supported it because I felt that strategically, again, we want to doesn't

mean we have to like them and buy them. I mean, I don't

mean anything against the Cuban people, not at all, not whatsoever. But

it doesn't mean we have to like Castro. Of course, Fidel Castro is

dead and he was replaced by Raoul Castro. And you know, people get

people got very uneasy about images of Obama hanging out with Castro at a baseball

game, and you know, these are things that really bothered some people.

But I felt at the time, from a practical and a pragmatic standpoint,

it made sense and it was probably long overdue, to be honest with you,

and I thought so because the Cuban missile crisis, even though it happened

before I was even alive, which I'm really glad about. I would not

have wanted to live through that because well, we'll get to that, but

but I thought it made sense. Unfortunately, and here's where the blame starts.

After Obama, Trump administration comes in, predictably, they start trying to

undo much of what Obama did. And you know, historically, you see

that that's not that unusual, right when a new president comes in who's a

different party, of a different party than the previous president, they try to

undo a lot of things that the previous president did, so not surprising in

that sense. But one of the things that the Trump administration immediately undid was

most of the if not all, of the progress and goodwill and all of

it that this new relationship that Obama had established with Cuba. They Trump came

in and they basically undid it all. So back to square one there.

And then the Biden administration came in, and I remember at the time thinking,

you know, hopefully they can reset things with Cuba. That would be

wonderful because I thought that what the Obama administration did was very positive. Nope,

the Biden administration came in, and they did actually try to reinstate some

of the Obama era policy, but I'd say overall a pretty meek and meager

attempt at it. I understand coming in they had their hands full with the

pandemic and this and that. But you know, I would kind of think

that once Russia started indicating that they were about to because it wasn't a huge

shock when they invaded Ukraine. It was looking like it was going to happen

months before it did. You know, you would think it might occur to

somebody, Hey, Russia's really getting out of control here. Maybe we need

to make sure that things are stable with Cuba so that the Russians don't try

to try to rekindle that relationship with Cuba because it seems like we're about to

be at odds with Russia. But no, the Biden administration didn't do a

whole hell of a lot in terms of that. So there's plenty of blame

to go around. And some of you might think, Matt, is this

really a big deal. Why are you so concerned about Cuba. You're overreacting,

It's not really a priority. Well, you know, if you know

anything about the Cuban missile crisis. Some people thought that too back in during

the JFK administration, nobody cares about Cuba. What do we care about Cuba?

Yeah, nobody cared about Cuba until there were images aerial photography of the

Russians installing nuclear weapons on the island of Cuba, and all of a sudden,

everybody cared a whole hell of a lot about Cuba. Now, part

of why I might be a little extra sensitive to this is so I wasn't

alive when the Cuban missile crisis happened. And again I'm very glad for that,

because that would have been something frightening to live through. I especially probably

would not have handled it particularly well. Oh hello to Amiriam Banish in the

chat room. I would have been pretty freaked out because I grew up growing

up in the eighties, you know, I grew up with obsession is too

strong a word, but an unhealthy preoccupation, shall we say, with the

threat of nuclear war. I was very worried, and I did let it.

I expended a lot of mental energy on it. I'm worrying about it.

Some of that is human nature. We all tend to worry to varying

degrees about things that we can't control. That was my big thing growing up.

And my dad, who you know, he listens to the show.

I mean, he can attest to that. I remember having conversations with him

about it, with my mother about it, with my stepmother about it.

It was it was something that was on my mind a lot more than it

should have been. This may be part of why I was so um.

I've always been so fascinated by you know, obviously I love history, but

if you were to ask me, is there a particular aspect of history that

I'm you know, sort of that I find more interesting than any others?

You know, anything Cold War related is really interesting to me. I'm fascinated

by anything related to the Cold War. And if I were to pick a

particular point during the Cold War that I'm especially fascinated by, it's the Cuban

missile crisis. I'll read any book, watch any documentary, you know,

whatever it is about. The Cuban missile crisis just absolutely a fascinating moment in

history to me. And thank god JFK was there to get us through that,

and he had some really good people around him. He also had some

people who maybe didn't have the best judgment, but fortunately their voices were not

ultimately the ones that JFK chose to listen to. That's why you might have

heard me say it on the show. Whenever I hear somebody start talking about,

Oh, we need to be doing so much more, and we need

to get NATO right in there and confront Russia directly, and we need to

send in American troops and push rush out. You know, I hear people

say some things that I think sound completely irrational and insane and potentially self destructive

and armageddon inducing. I'll often refer to that as Curtis LeMay syndrome. And

if you know anything about the Cuban missile crisis, and you know who General

Curtis LeMay was, he was probably the number one guy who was in Kennedy

Zier telling him, Hey, look, let's let's just do this. Let's

just go and start bombing. We gotta bomb Cuba, we got to take

out those missiles. Let's just do it now. We're not gonna We shouldn't

be waiting for them to uh, you know, we shouldn't be doing all

this back channel negotiation and whatnot. We should just go in and let's let's

hit him. And Kennedy said, well, if we do that, how

are they going to respond? And by the way, Dean Atchison said at

the time, well, what they will probably do is they will probably confront

us in UH, in Germany and UM and then it just escalates from there,

the point being it would ultimately ask scalate in a nuclear exchange and that

would be it. None of us would be sitting here. So but yeah,

you know, General LeMay was you know, and I'm sure he was

a good man, but he was like, yeah, let's just because he

told Kennedy he doesn't think that they will respond, because if they respond,

then things will escalate and we know where it ends up. So but he

was just itching. LeMay was itching to go in, and thank god Kennedy

was, you know. And Bob McNamara too, who, of course is

takes an incredible criticism for his role in the Vietnam War, criticism that I

think is warranted. And if there's a great documentary about McNamara called Fog of

War where he's interviewed throughout the documentary and it's really good and really compelling.

You should see it. If you haven't. I highly recommend it. But

McNamara was one of the cooler heads again during the Cuban missile crisis who helped

get us through that. So McNamara deserves credit too for his role there,

not for his role in Vietnam however, in my view, that's my opinion.

But um, we obviously were caught off guard by what was happening in

Cuba and the fact that those missiles were being put in and you know,

JFK and his administration got us through that. But a lesson that obviously,

some people did learn from it because we've been warned about this over the decades.

We've been warned about this by some people who've said, you know,

we might want to do something about strengthening our relationship with Cuba, even though

Fidel Castro and again he died and then was replaced by Raoul Sroin, even

though Castro is a bad guy, and we don't ever want to look like

we're from a human rights perspective, we don't ever want to look like we're

approving of anything going on there. But you know, we have an embassy

there obviously, but we might want to be making a little extra effort to

keep things very copasetic with Cuba, because if we don't, someone else may

come in. The Russians may come back, or China might come in and

fill that void that we're not filling, and we're not showing any interests or

inclination to ever compromise. Not compromise, but but you know, in terms

of lifting some trade restrictions or whatever it may be, you know, maybe

some sort of an olive branch needs to be extended to keep history from repeating

itself as history often will. And I'm worried that that's where we're ending up

now. Chris Porrior was also known as Crispy, a comedian. He says,

we need to stop the posturing by Russia and China, and if Trump

was still in he just would have handed handed us over and still might if

Trump if Trump's are elected. Oh do you mean Ukraine handing Ukraine over?

Well? Trump has said that he could have that solved within twenty four hours,

but the problem is we all know what that means. Well, how

would you possibly just have that solved in twenty four hours. There's only one

way you could do it. You could tell putin you can have it,

and that's it. Trump was never a fan of NATO to begin with,

which means if he gets elected in twenty twenty four, he might then have

to deal with the reality that Ukraine is at that point now a part of

NATO. If if the war is even over by the which I'm actually skeptical

that it will be. I think it's going to drag on, potentially for

years. I really do. I don't see any evidence of the contrary,

but that's that's me. Melanie says, I have a preoccupation with the Dead

Rising since watching Night of the Living Dead in the third grade. Yes,

I can understand that. You know, what film I did see when I

was a kid was not in the third grade, certainly, but um,

I was pretty young actually the day after, and I remember a conversation my

dad probably will remember this too, a conversation with him and my stepmother about

whether or not to let me watch it. But I'd say it's a good

film. But it's weird to say it's a good film considering what the subject

matter is. I mean, it's frightening, but I don't think it.

I don't think it did any harm seeing it because I was already so preoccupied

with nuclear war. What you know, I don't think it made me any

more afraid. Certainly didn't make me any less afraid either. I think it

was a wash. And Saturn says, in the chat room, Trump Trump,

Trump, We say, Melanie says, true story. I've always mapped

out at least two escape routes to escape zombies everywhere I have ever lived.

Well, that's very m That's like a survivalism, except instead of planning to

go into an underground bunker, you plan to escape your You plan your escape

from zombies. And Saturn says, Trump just got something going on. We

say, we ain't going to like it. We said, all right,

Melanie says. My therapist says, I'm doing much better. I'm just kidding.

She doesn't say that. Roni Favero says, the day after gave me

nightmares. Yeah. See, in my case, I was already having those

nightmares. So I don't I don't think it much mattered. But so the

point is, the broad point is, and then we'll get into some some

of the details on what is happening right now with Cuba. This is being

overlooked to a large degree, and I'm very concerned. Let's well, let's

look at China first. We've got a couple of things on this. Oh

you know what this is from the Hill dot com. Now this is actually

this is an opinion piece written by Arturo mcfield's who writes for the He writes

a national security column, an opinion column for The Hill. Let's see what

he has to say about this. For the last sixty four years, the

Cuban dictatorship has been one of the main threats to democracy in Latin America into

the security of the US. Since the nineteen sixty two Cuban missile crisis,

following the Russian spy based establish in lords the Bejucal I'm sure I'm not saying

that correctly facility, and finally, with the twenty nineteen chapter involving Chinese espionage,

Havana's regime has continued to open its stores to America's most dangerous geopolitical enemies.

In nineteen sixty Cuba became the first country in Latin America to establish diplomatic

relations with Communist China. Since then, political, military, and economic exchanges

have been increasing, particularly since the fall of the Soviet Union. Last November,

China approved one hundred million dollars to rescue Cuba from itself inflicted economic collapse.

By the way, I didn't see. I didn't even realize that.

That totally got past me. I did not know that. I knew that

Cuba had a diplomatic relationship with China going back to the sixties. I did

not realize this though, about the one hundred million dollars rescue package that China

had approved for Cuba. That completely got past me. Oh, hello to

Greg Joseph in the Facebook live chat, he says, sending love and respect

for the work you are doing educating the people. Thanks a million, thank

you. Yes. Greg Joseph, of course from Clemento's another one of our

great sponsors here at WMH ninety five point three, and he's a frequent contributor

on the Morning Show as well. I love hearing Greg on the Morning Show.

He's got he's got kind of an understated sense of humor that I find

very funny. Says here last November. Okay, so we covered that.

Okay. So, although Havana and Beijing have maintained a spy base since twenty

nineteen, and by the way, I didn't know that either. I didn't

realize that either. I thought that that was a more recent development, but

it's not. Intelligence cooperation between the two countries has continued above and beyond that.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the two regimes are negotiating the establishment

of a joint military training base on the island, just one hundred miles away

from the Florida coast. Yeah, that's not good. That's really not good.

The US has also reported the activities of the Chinese cele communications giants Huawei

and Zte in the same area where the spy base is supposed to be located.

This century, the Castro dictatorship and its progeny have helped forge and maintain

the current dictatorships of Venezuela and Nicaragua, both politically and militarily. Cuban advisors

are present in these two countries to pull the strings, offering intelligence support and

training to their policies. I'm sorry to their police and armies. Cuba also

maintains a close political and ideological relationship with leftist presidents in Brazil, Colombia,

and Mexico. Brazil and Mexico have supported the Cuban medical brigades, considered a

model of modern slavery. According to the human rights organization Prisoners Defenders. The

regime keeps ninety four of the salaries received by fifty thousand doctors in different parts

of the world. Yeah, I've read. I've read some about that.

We have a Oh thought we had a call? Do we have a call?

Nope? Go Yeah, I've read some about that. And by the

way, it's things like that that I understand make it difficult, make it

difficult for us to extend that olive branch. I understand that. But I

just wish if I could turn back time to quote share that we could have

at least maintained that sort of normalization of a relationship that the Obama administration had

established, because I cannot help. But wonder had that not continued, even

if it didn't necessarily progress, but just continued, Maybe, just maybe in

the year of twenty twenty three, we wouldn't be sitting here talking about the

Chinese having a military base on an island one hundred miles off the coast of

Florida. Maybe it says here. Since the early days of the Cuban Revolution

and the Missile Crisis, Russia has been the main military partner of Cuba's regime.

Last week, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shogu met with his Cuban counterpart,

Alvero Lopez Miera. After the abort of rebellion by Wagner mercenaries in Russia,

Putin has reportedly looked to Cuba for more soldiers to continue his war of aggression

against Ukraine. According to prisoners defenders, Russia and Cuba have reached an agreement

that would send Cuban soldiers to Ukraine, paying each of them two thousand dollars

per month, but the island's dictatorship would naturally keep between seventy five percent to

ninety five of their income, since this is how dictatorship's work. While China

advances its commercial relationships in Latin America, seizing key industries such as lithium,

copper, and telecommunications, Cuba has an extensive political and ideological network throughout Latin

America and even in the US through the Salpolo Forum and the so called Solidarity

Networks. Senator Bob Menendez, Democrat of New Jersey and Congressman Michael McCall,

Republican of Texas are calling on the Biden administration to give a classified briefing regarding

the reported Chinese spy facility in Cuba. Okay, well thank you Senator Bob

Menendez and Congressman Michael McCall. I'm glad that somebody in the government is paying

attention, and I would support them in that. I would hope that the

Biden administration will give them that briefing. Giving the political, economic, and

security threat posed by Cuba and China, a comprehensive response is urgently needed.

Partnerships with other democratic nations in Latin America should be strengthened, both in the

field of security and in commercial matters. It would be a very big mistake

to neglect such hemispheric threats or underestimate the dangerous strategies of such regimes as Cuba,

China and Russia. So that's the opinion piece on the hill. And

let's also look at this. Let's continue on the China portion of this,

and we'll get to the Russian part, probably in the second hour. This

is a big topic, obviously, so we will continue. Actually, no,

I think change change of plans. All right, let's look at this.

We'll go ahead and get to the Russia part. Here. Um,

this is from the Havanah Times. This is from right out of Cuba,

right out of Cuba media. Here it's an article titled relaunching relations between Cuba

and Russia. Just that phrase gives me a chill. Um. Let's see

Cuba and Cuba and Russia have announced plans to strengthen their economic and trade relations,

but experts doubt that they can achieve a new bilateral golden age, and

they glimpse geopolitical interests in difficult times for both countries. This week, the

Cuban Prime Minister Manuel Marrero is in Russia for the Eurasian inter Governmental Council in

the International Economic Forum in Saint Petersburg, while the opposition warns of a new

Russification quote unquote. The visit, the last after those of several ministers and

President mcguel diaz Canal himself last November, comes shortly after Havana announced preferential treatment

for Russian investors from transfers of agricultural land for thirty years to tax exemptions.

These measures complete a flight of announcements, including the entry of three Russian ruble

banks on the island and the presentation of a package of reforms. This kind

of gets into the weeds a little more than I want to. You know

what, I never liked the Havana Times anyway, I'm kidding, I've never

had any opinion. I do want to look at the timeline though, and

then probably in the second hour, we'll get more into the Russia part of

this, with um, the Russians now supplying oil to Cuba. But there's

a great this is from CFI dot org Council on Foreign Relations dot org.

It's a timeline of US Cuba relations and it's pretty pretty informative. But where

I want to actually pick this up is twenty eleven to twenty thirteen, and

we'll go forward from there because I want to look at again, Um,

well, we could go back. We actually could go back to nineteen sixty

two. Now maybe we should actually, now you know what, we should

go back to nineteen Let's go back to nineteen sixty growing antagonism between the United

States and Russia. I mean, I'm sorry, the United States in Cuba.

Just just we'll kind of speed through part of this. But I want

to get to because ultimately where I want to end up is U when you

know, we had an opportunity to really kind of improve things long term and

then we didn't. But we have a call. Hi, Welcome to Matt

Connerton. Unleash. Who is this? Oh knee, how mom, Matt

oh Bosha? Ridley pancha bhaja? Uh? Is that Cantonese? What is

that? Oh? That's Mandarin. I just think I'm Ridley, but I'm

a beginner, Ridley. I I yes, I'm sorry, Dave Ridley.

You know I often, uh, this is a failing of mine. I

often get Cantonese and Mandarin confused. Yeah. I don't really know much of

anything about Cantonese. In fact, I don't really understand. You know,

whenever you search, like when I if you want to say so much,

well, what happens is when you try to figure out what you're speaking or

what you're listening to, it will tell you that you're speaking Chinese or you're

here you're listening to Chinese, and then it called it Chinese simplified in Chinese

traditional. I know that Chinese traditional as Mandarin, but I don't know what

the difference is between Cantonese and Chinese simplified. Do you uh? You know?

I actually I do know, but it's just too much to get into

here. Yeah. Well, anyway, I'm just gonna say I told Cold

War two, Cold War two point zero, I don't know how to say

that in Mandarin. I have no idea. Ah, yes, yes,

I go ahead, Dave, I am surious, serir thoughts. Well,

yeah, so this is really tough. You know. Look from a pro

freedom standpoint, if you look at the history of the First Cold War,

the United States was more of a pro freedom place than the Soviet Union was.

But in finding the Soviet Union, it eviscerated some of its own freedoms

and we haven't gotten those backs yet. In addition, obviously it committed a

lot of abuses in in beating the Soviet Union. Does that make sense?

Say it again, Dave, I just, I just I'm not sure I've

quite followed all of it. I definitely got part of it. But yeah,

say it again if you would. I guess what I'm trying I guess

what I'm trying to say is what's happened before is what will happen again.

The US will be more pro freedom than China, but it will lose some

of its freedoms in fighting China. Does that make sense? The US will

lose some of our freedoms in fighting China. Yeah, just the way we

lost some of our freedoms in fighting the Nazis and then fighting the Soviets and

we never get them back. Can you expand on that, because I'm actually

not sure exactly what you mean. Well, I hope I'm not starting to

drift off topic here. But just for example, the reason we have income

tax withholding is because they started withholding income taxes to paper World War two,

because its temporary wartime measures that's been in effect since I think nineteen forty two,

So we can expect that kind of thing to happen again in fighting this

actual legitimate threat from China. It's just it's gonna they're gonna use that as

an excuse to take our freedoms away here. But do you think that it's

Some people think it's inevitable. I actually don't call me an optimist. I

think there are a lot of reasons to believe that it's actually not inevitable war

with China. But do you think that it is because you sound like you're

pretty concerned. Well, yeah, I mean cold war is inevitable and we're

already in one. Yes, but there are solutions. They're all kinds of

solutions. It don't cost taxpayers a dime, and the government wants to cover

those up. They don't want anyone talking about it, and no one does

talk about it, it seems like, and that the obvious one is just

to let us defend ourselves. They've got the American people so twisted into not

over what guns they can even own, and and all the permissions they have

to get to own a gun or to carry a gun, and so for

some you know, that just all needs to go away, and then we

don't have to worry about having this expensive, federally funded centralized defense. So

you're not interested in So I assume you're not interested in defending Taiwan if it

comes to that, Well, anyone who wants to help defend Taiwan should have

the full moral support of the federal government. I think they shouldn't. They

should, you know, that should probably be encouraged. But people, there's

no it's not right to steal from taxpayers to send the money off to Taiwan.

It's just it's not right for the federal government to centralize the process of

defending Taiwan. It's something to be done by individuals, companies, organizations,

militias, that sort of thing. Yeah, well, I understand what you're

saying, but it's not that's never going to be the reality of how any

of this works, so well as not as long as the federal government is

monopolizing defense, right, which is what I mean by that's not ever going

to be the reality of how any of this works, because that's never going

to change. What's the reality of how it works in Switzerland. But this

ain't Switzerland, and it's never going to be. That's the whole point,

and that's why we have these problems. Right. Switzerland is not having these

problems with China. And by the way, either is Closta Rica, which

has no military at all and no and no allies. But when you say

are problems with China, what do you mean exactly? Because when I think

of problems with China, I think about things like them. See you know,

they seel our intellectual property, they spy on us. They Um,

I mean, what do you what do you mean by problems with China?

Well, I'm more concerned about their interference with free speech in America, which

it's not very intense yet, but there have definitely been some high profile cases

where they interfered with people's ability to speak against their government, even though they're

like Anglo Americans living in America or African Americans living in America. They have

nothing to do with China except opening and closing their mouths in criticism of its

government. Are you talking about those? Uh? Well, give me an

example. Well, it wasn't there an NBA guy who made some pro Taiwan

statement or made pro Hong Kong statement or something that he was forced to retract

it, right, right? I somewhat remember that, Yes, yeah,

And there was also I think, well there's an NBA official who was forced

to do that, or I think there was also a player, and you

know, we're there's there was also that example of the there was a student

in Australia who just led this really minor, like twelve person sign wave in

support of Hong Kong or something like that at university. And he was he

was such a small event and such an unimportant thing. I don't even think

he was on time to his own protests, right, It was just almost

a non event. And suddenly, out of the blue, these these goons

show up and start beating up the protesters, like the the you know,

the the twelve point five you know, twenty year olds holding a little sign.

And it turned out in the Beijing embassy got involved in the university ejected

the young man who organized up the sign wave instead of coming after the people

who beat him up for no particular reason. This is all videotaped. They

ejected the student because the university was bought by the bought and paid for essentially

by the Chinese government. And so that's just an example of how free speech

is interfered with closer to China, and they're they're expanding their interference with free

speech to the US. UM. I do remember you talking about that story

with the protester and getting beaten up, and uh, pretty wild. Um

well, I mean, you know, the reality is that there's a larger

reality and part of this is part of why I don't think war is inevitable.

Uh particularly but um, we are so economically interlocked with China. Um.

I think probably more than a lot of people realize. Um, So

there's no it's not like it's not like our relationship with Russia, for example,

where we can just say, well, you know, screw you,

we don't want your oil, you know, we being NATO, I guess,

um. But with China, it's it's very very complicated and and we're

very economically dependent on each other, and the Chinese are much more economically dependent

on the United States. And I think people realize too, some people I

heard. I heard one analyst saying that, you know, people think of

China as like, you know, like like the US is six feet tall

and China is like ten feet tall, and it's really the other way around.

But um so, I don't know what the solution is. They're always

They're always going to have influence here. Dave, Are you the one who

originally brought up the the Chinese police stations operating in the United States? Was

that you they're not well the ones I was talking about, or not police

station, you were talking about the Confucius Confucius Center. That's right, the

Confucius centers. Okay, it was my dad who brought up the police stations.

Yeah, that that really shocked me. But um so, what's what

what's the answer, Dave? If realistically, now I understand what you would

like to happen, but realistically, knowing that we are economically interdependent, and

knowing that, uh, you know that the situation is what it isn't terms

of the federal government controlling defense, what what do you think should happen?

Well? The realistic thing to hope for is that the United States government does

not make any new steps to limit gun rights. Right, so just make

sure making sure that Americans maintain at least what rights they still have in terms

of the ability to defend themselves. That would probably be the realistic thing to

hope for. Um. Well, that's the that's not going to change.

I mean, you know, we're not going to continue We're we're not going

to not have gun rights. Uh, certainly, even even if they are

somewhat more regulated. But um, but I don't think that has any effect

on our foreign policy with China. I mean it doesn't. Well it's it

should you know, the gun gun rights are a key element of any sort

of domestic defense. Oh, domestic. Yes, that this is the reason

why this is the reason why Ukraine was invaded was because they didn't There's a

key reason. I think it was a deciding factor was if there were not

enough guns in the hands of civilians. Seven seven guns civilians. Yeah,

in New Hampshire. It's in New Hampshire. It's one hundred and twenty guns

for hundred civilians. You can't imagine that that doesn't have a big impact on

the decision of anyone to invade. I understand, Dave. I think I

think we might have been talking about two different things because I'm not I'm not

talking about invasion. I'm talking about a war with China. But I'm not.

I'm not talking about China trying to invade the United States. I can't

imagine any circumstance under which that would happen. That would be uh. I

understand their long term planners. You know, they've got fifty year plans,

one hundred year plans and whatnot. But I don't think they're planning to invade

the US. I'm not. I'm not when I talk that's yeah, go

ahead. That's the reason. That's a reason why they're not planning on hitting

the United States. They would be able to do something like that in certain

there'd be certain circumstances where they could if United States people didn't have gun freedom.

Does that make sense? I disagree with you there. I mean,

I'm pros I'm pro two A and I support gun freedom. But um,

we've got quite the nuclear arsenal. So even if even if we were to

do something like what Australia did and confiscate guns, we've still got a whole

lot of nukes, So I don't think China would be I don't think anyone

would be interested in invading the United States. I think if if we were

to get into some sort of a war with China, it would be over

Taiwan. It wouldn't be the Chinese coming to American soil. Yeah, but

just just bear in mind how how much it frees up the US military for

individuals in the United States that we've kind of got their back here right Like

the United States military could they could send all the US military out of the

United States if they want wanted to. Every last soldier could be sent away

from the United States and it would still be able to defend itself because of

the gun freedom and the large number of firearms. Does that make sense?

That does no? I understand what you're saying logically. Mike from Queen City

Cabinetry points out in the chat room, they would be too tired to fight

from swimming all that way. That's a good point. I don't know how

many boats they have. I know they've got a huge army, because you

know, it's a lot of they don't have. I think India now has

the largest global population. If I'm not mistaken. I think China's second.

Is that correct? Do you know, Dave? Actually, I don't know

if India history pasted him yet. I think India has, but I could

be wrong. Okay, Now what about so what about Cuba? Any any

thoughts there? Well, I'm not sure exactly what you know should be done.

Just as long as it's not an act of aggression, go for it.

Anything it's not an active aggression, It's fine to do against this Chinese

base or against the government of Cuba or anyone else. The problem is if

the federal government is taking action against some base in Cuba using your tax dollars,

that's an active aggression against you. Yeah, well, I know you

and I see that differently, both in a broader sense, and I would

say, more specifically, if if something is being done using my tax dollars

and to protect to protect me, and you might say, well, how

is it the government's job to decide for me? What is it or is

not in the best interests in terms of my protection? I understand, But

but I guess what I'm thinking about and what I've been taught about today really

is I just wish that that this wasn't even on the table in terms of

China potentially having I mean, I guess it hasn't happened yet, but potentially

even having a base in Cuba, because I wish that we had continued the

Obama administration policy with Cuba where we were kind of trying to normalize relations and

get things to a more positive place where someone like China or Russia would not

come in and kind of fill that vacuum, you know what I mean.

Yeah, Well, but again, it's also important to keep things in perspective.

Look how many military bases? Well, I don't know what you tell

me, what is the number of military bases that the United States has within

one hundred miles of China. I'm not sure. I'm not sure what that

number is. I don't either, But the US has eight hundred military bases

overseas and constantly putting military bases right X two countries that it's hostile towards.

Right, there's that saying. You know, you know, obviously Iran is

the aggressor because look how close they put their country to our eight hundred military

bases. Right. I understand your point, Dave, I do um,

But again, I just I think back to um I don't know how much

of the show you heard earlier, but I talked a lot about the Cuban

the Cuban missile crisis earlier. And um, when you're talking about putting,

when we're talking about a Chinese base one hundred miles off the coast of Florida,

UM, I get very very concerned, and I just feel and that's

I mean, that's how that's how China looks at Taiwan. They said,

that's that's the American military base, you know, ninety I guess, about

ninety miles off the coast of mainland China. We don't have an actual base

on Taiwan, do we, Well, not a big one. I don't

think there's US troops there, but I don't think there's a de facto like

official US MILITI. There's not an official US military base on the island of

my knowledge. Yeah, I didn't think so that would be because I don't

I don't think the Chinese would tolerate that. UM. I think if we

tried to put an actual military base on Taiwan, UM, I do think

it would be uh, that would be akin to actually them putting a military

base on Cuba. UM. But I'm very worried about that. Well,

I'm sorry, oh I was saying, but I'm very worried about this go

ahead. Well again, that's the other solution is for the Taiwanese government to

stop taking its people's guns, and they have its situation as Taiwan is much

worse than than the one in Ukraine was before the invasion in terms of in

terms of guns freedom. You know, Ukrainians had seven guns per one hundred

civilians and Taiwan has officially zero guns in the hands of civilians per hundred civilians.

So their government has brought their their bad defense on itself, their lack

of defense on itself. I see, yeah, I didn't know that about

Taiwan. It doesn't surprise me, but I didn't know that what the policy

there was. And obviously the Thaiwan they do have a Taiwanese military, but

it's it would be no um, no match for for for China. Uh,

that's uh, that's for sure if they do ever decide to move on

Taiwan. Well, what do you think about that? Do you think that's

inevitable that the Chinese decide? I know Ji Jingping has said it will happen,

but he never says when, And again I remain cautiously optimistic that it

won't. But what do you think do you think it's inevitable? No,

I don't think it's inevitable. Uh. The Chinese revert they're sort of reverting

to the reverting to totalitarian, isn't now. So that's going to start damning

their economy and shutting down the progress that they made, So they will start

following. Probably eventually this move will catch up with them, and it'll start

affecting their technological lead wherever they have one, because you can't be totalitarian and

have a you know, decisive technological lead, you can't maintain that. I

think I think it's going to start a rooting. I'm not sure, but

that's what I hope will happen. Their economy, as pretty fragile as it

is, they've did a horrendous job, as we all know, managing COVID,

and uh, they're they're in a lot of they're in a lot of

economic trouble right now, by the way, and I hope you'll take this

as a compliment. Dave Rondo Ferverro in the chat room says, Uh,

the guy on the phone sounds exactly like the back in the day talk show

hosts Dick Cavett. And I never noticed it before until Ronda pointed it out.

But you do sound like Dick Cavett. Oh great, you're you know

Dick Cavett. Right, Well, I saw just a couple episodes that I'm

not very with him. My dad used to watch Dick cave It when I

was a kid. He would he would watch him every night. And um,

yeah, I like to have it. But you do sound like him.

You do have a very similar voice, You're you you speak a little

bit faster than he does. Dick cav It kind of um speaks a little

more slowly, but but your your actual voice is h is very very close.

Um, well, Dave, we're we're we're well past the top of

the hour, so we should we should let you go and we we've got

to get to a break. Did you have anything to add? No?

Thanks? Okay. Oh by the way, pork Fest that's already coming,

gone right, yeah, I could bosh you just call him separately about all

the Porkfest news. Well, now I'm curious did anything because when you had

called before, you said there was some controversy about involving a couple of the

speakers like RFKA didn't want any guns in the room, and some other guy

was threatening to cause a problem if there were trans people or something. Did

anything, Did anything happen the rf case thing went smoothly. Carla Garrick,

the president of the Foundation for New Hampshire Independence or the former president of it,

was able to heckle him a little bit or something, or she jumped

up and asked him a question about New Hampshire declaring independence and whether he would

whether he would fight us militarily if we did that, right, and he

answered kind of evasively, he said that he wants to bring people together.

And the other thing that happened with regard to the guy that was the guy

that was making threats against like he said, if there anyone tries to do

a drag Queen story hour, I'm going to come get him, you know,

or something. He didn't sound like he was going to physically do something

to them. Yeah, So this resulted in someone having like a transit story

hour or whatnot. Uh. The guy who was making the threats, like

this big speaker who was going to come in and like a paid speaker,

I guess he just never like he never showed up. And I think he

was like arrested them the week before the fork Fast or something like that,

really, and I think it was an unrelated arrest. He was in an

event or something like it. So I think he was in jail or something

when when fork Fast happened, or that's my understanding. So that's pretty dramatic,

and there's other stuff that happened. But I should just call it in

separately enlisted all. Yeah, I am. I am very curious to hear

about it, so please, yeah, call call back soon about that.

But do you do you know the identity of the person yet or or no?

I feel like it's something like I just I never can say it correctly,

but I'm just afraid I'll say the wrong name and implicate the wrong person.

Yeah, I have it, I have it in my head, but

I'm just afraid to say it. Is it a long name. It's not.

It's like a two syllable thing. Okay. I keep meaning to know

that before I call you, and keep forgetting to look it up. I'm

just super curious. I tried to find out myself. I just I looked

online and I couldn't. I couldn't figure it out. But I'm just very

I'm just very very curious. Well, all right, Dave, did you

want to plug anything Ridley Report or an NH exit or anything before you go?

All I've taken enough of your time, all right, Dave. Well,

I do enjoy talking with you, and I appreciate the call. Thanks,

Matt, all right, you got it? Bye bye? All right.

That is Dave Ridley from the Ridley Report and NH Exit. We will

let's do this because yes we are late for Oh actually we have another call.

Let's see. It looks like our friend Ron is on the line,

so we always have time for Ron. Hey, Ron, Hey, Matt.

I'll try to be brief. I've got kind of questions and thinks that

I can, you know, take answers off the year. I'm sure I

was misinterpreting what Dave was heading at with arming the civilians. Um, you

know, wars are just fought conventionally, not by you know, a handguns

and back guards. But that's I think that would only cause anything. I

think he knows it would only cause walm and good. Even if everybody,

every family had guns, it would just cause Woma good he does. What

I wanted to ask, so, is um with Cuba setting up, with

China setting up a base in that sort of up only one hundred miles from

my from from the US? What we would just talk about is that really

matter? Because the United States has more nuclear vessels than anybody else, and

like a large of quantities of nuclear vessels, So we kind of already have

a base at sea anywhere any time between the air, between the carriers and

the fighters and and all of the above. So I don't know, it's

just there's one hundred miles away be matter because well, you know what,

what does that matter? You could get a plane in the year I'll kind

of shoot down anything kind of rapidly from if they're only a hundred miles away.

I mean, I don't know. I'm just saying this. We don't

need to have a base that close because our basis are all over the seas

between the submarines and everything else, right, you know. So, And

the last thing I wanted to say was this wasn't even commented. I wanted

to ask Um, I hear all these countries you know where this one I

wrote that just wore, and this one and this one and this one.

But it is Japan falling all of us. I haven't heard much about Japan.

Yeah, I mean just this, Um, there was a dumb question.

No, No, not at all. There was something about Japan recently.

Actually, um, I forget what it was now, though I might

look that up during the break. There was something. I mean, we

don't hear a lot about Japan. You know, they don't go to war

with anybody. Um, they do have nuclear weapons, but um, we

don't hear a lot about Japan. But there was something recently foreign policy related

that was important regarding Japan. And I can't remember what it is, but

I will look it up. Ron. I'm glad you asked about that because

it was okay. And last pace, Yes, the sanctions that got imposed,

do they affect I'm not saying US Japan. Are any of the sanctions

that we have polls on these other places. Does that affect Japan's ability to

get products and manufacture and create? I mean, I don't know. The

sanctions would seem like they were doing good, but I don't hear anything about

it anymore. Sanctions on who um, Oh my god, I'm nervous,

and now you get me on this spot. Oh that's okay, I mean,

yeah, go ahead. No. Um, when Trump was in place,

UM, sanctions were put in place against I wasn't as a freshet,

I'd tell you, I don't know, just seem the next stanctions were pres

it pulls everywhere and it was affecting everybody. Um have we and we've been

listening the sanctions under Oh do you mean that? Do you mean the tariffs

that were imposed on China? Because Trump was very big on having a trade

war with China, and we thank you, thank you. Yeah, not

not sanctions, but but tariffs and um, some of those I think a

few of those have been rolled back under Biden, but most of those have

remained in place from what I understand, which actually surprises me a little bit.

I thought more of those what would have been rolled back, but maybe

because things are so tense with China, they're leaving them in place. But

but yeah, there were those tariffs that Trump did put a lot of tariffs

on China. All right, Matt, I h I really loved you show.

I wish you could want it to lad Flock today. Me too,

me too, But thank you, Ron, I appreciate it very much,

and I appreciate the call. All right, buddy, all right, Ron,

take care bye bye. All right, that was our friend Ron.

Let's get to a break. But Ron did ask a couple of very interesting

questions that will address on the other side. But we'll get to a break.

I'm gonna play a track from Where Did It Go? Oh? Here

it is. I'm gonna play this song so tomorrow on the show. I'm

very excited because in the second hour, we're gonna talk to my old friend

from high school, Dave Wally, and he's got this band, Satellite Union,

and we're gonna play. This is a performance, live performance of that

I found on the website for his band, Satellite Union, and the website

is Satellite Union music dot com. Dave sent me some specific tracks to play,

but I'm gonna save those for tomorrow. But I found this and I

really like it. The name of the song is if You Don't Go and

this is really really cool. So we're gonna play, and we're going to

show some love to our amazing sponsors, and then we will be back with

the balance of our program today and we'll answer those questions, those other questions

that Ron had. Welcome back everybody, as we cruising our final segment today

of Matt Connerton Unleashed, and we are live from the studios of w m

n H ninety five point three FM and Glorious Downtown Manchester, New Hampshire,

also on Comcast ninety seven. If you're in Manchester and hello to Oliver our

online listeners across the nation and around the globe. You can go to my

website Matt Connerton dot com for all your live streaming options, social media links,

contact in folk show archives, etc. Etc. Today is Thursday,

July thirteen, two thousand to twenty three, so nice to have you all

with me. By the way, that song I played as a live performance

of If You Don't Go from the band Satellite Union, and tomorrow on the

show in the second hour, my friend Dave Wally will be skyping in all

the way from the Windy City, Chicago to talk about the band, and

Dave and I will get caught up. We're old friends. I actually went

to high school with Dave, so I'm really looking forward to this. Dave's

a great guy and enormously talented, and he sent me some tracks for tomorrow.

But I found that live performance online of that song and I said,

you know what, I think I'm gonna play that today, kind of give

everybody a little sneak peak. So that'll be tomorrow on the show. And

of course we also have tomorrow because it will be Friday, Eric Pilcher's Classic

film review and this week the subject is National Lampoon's Vacation, so that will

be tomorrow as well. So we have a busy, busy show tomorrow.

But if you'd like to join us today, six ZO three two five six

Z seven is a studio line six ZO three two five six seven. You

can also text me at six I'm sorry six one seven. Uh see,

I screwed myself up. Wow, I never do that. Six one seven

nine one seven four four seven six. I never screw up the phone number.

Six one seven nine one seven four four seven six. I'm all worried

about this whole Cuba stuff. I'm distracted. Let's see. I'm on social

media at Matt Connerton. You can email me Matt at Matt Connerton dot com,

and of course you can interact and no pine in the Facebook live chat.

But the best thing to do so that we can here and enjoy your

dulse at Tones is to give us a call at six three two five H

six Z seven. By the way, speaking of the Facebook lap chat,

I see a new name in there. Lewis Tivee joins us in the chat.

Hello, just uh and again just to follow up. Oh, and

Joe Friday joins us in sus Aloha peeps, Aloha to you. Joe Friday.

Ron had asked some questions during his when he called in earlier regarding Japan.

Mike from Queen City Cabinetry set in the chat room. I think it

was either we were sending troops there to train their troops or we are having

our troops there. Yeah, we um. You don't hear Japan come up

a lot in foreign policy discussions, but I do know that Japan gets very

nervous about and we're not gonna get into this today in detail. We won't

have time. But North Korea, of course constantly saber rattling every now and

again, and sometimes I get concerned that it's becoming increasingly common, these test

launches of missiles and shooting them right over Japan. And you know, Kim

Jong un, we have to figure out how to contain him and control him,

and that can just keeps getting kicked down the road, doesn't it.

But uh yeah, so Japan is always very nervous. Another thing that Ron

had asked about, by the way, was what Dave Ridley was saying about

guns. No, you you did not misunderstand him. Ron. What the

argument that Dave was making. And this is something that you often hear.

You'll hear Second Amendment activists say this, and you know, and I'm a

I'm a pro Second Amendment guy. That's an issue where I tend to be

more conservative. But of course we live in New Hampshire. Where you're in

New Hampshire, we're one of the most heavily armed states in the entire country,

but we're also one of the safest, interestingly enough, But you'll often

hear activists say that part of the reason why the United States never gets invaded

is because so many people here have guns. So if anyone tried to invade

the United States, there would be somebody hiding behind every bush with a gun

waiting to shoot them. Now, the context that Dave Ridley was bringing that

up in, though I thought, was a little again, I had to

push back on it a little bit because I understood what he was saying.

I understood his point but and it's not that he's wrong. From a logical

standpoint, of course, it would be difficult to invade the United States because

not only do we have the largest military in the world, exponentially larger than

any other military, certainly with what we spend on it, but we are

also a such a heavily armed populace. But the thing is, even with

us being so heavily armed as individuals gun owners in the United States, we

still have the largest military in the entire world. No one is ever,

ever, ever going to invade us, regardless of whether the citizen re is

armed or not. Joe Farriday says, shout out to firefighters, police and

first responders. God bless them, be safe. So I think that answers

Ron's question. Oh no, I'm sorry. So the other thing that's right.

There was another thing Ron brought up, and it's it's a he makes

a good point. Does it really matter if the Chinese do establish a base

on Cuba because we have bases all over the world and we have the military

capability to shoot anything down, to fuse any situation, etc. In other

words, even if they do have a base in Cuba, is that really

a threat to US. Now, my response to that would be whether it

is a direct threat or not. First of all, I think it could

be. But I'll circle back to that the broader point that I would make

about that, and this is kind of the underlining point of what I've been

talking about today in terms of Cuba and they're ever growing relationship with China and

of course the rekindling, to an extent of their relationship with Russia. The

broader point is that we don't need our enemies being able to set up shop

and spy on us or established themselves in any way militarily one hundred miles off

the coast of Florida. Even if even if what happens there and what is

established there is not necessarily a threat in the sense that it's not anything that

we can't handle, it certainly doesn't feel very good, and I think it

would be destabilizing. Sorry, I just got a weird pop up on my

computer that distracted me. But going back to would it be a direct threat,

Well, what if the Chinese, the Chinese, they have nuclear weapons.

What if the Chinese, in the course of setting up their base there,

they put nuclear missiles there? Allah the Cuban missile crisis and what we

had to deal with with Russia. Now that is a direct threat. The

whole reason in sixty two with the Cuban missile crisis, why that was so

harrowing and so dangerous, And again, as I talked about in the first

hour of their show, thank god we had a president at the time,

JFK who was able to you know, Shepherd and stewarts us through that that

terrible time. I mean us, I say us as in America. I

wasn't here yet, And like I said, I'm glad I wasn't. I'm

glad I wasn't alive for that because that would have been terrifying. So I'm

glad that. You know, if you talk to somebody who does remember it,

yeah, they'll tell you it's pretty pretty scary because at any given moment,

you know, they knew it could be the end. But the reason

that was so massively destabilizing was because that gave the Russians first strike capability to

the extent that first strike capability matters in the terms of global thermonuclear war.

If nuclear war breaks out, you know, it'll ultimately even if you're not

in a blast zone, there's going to be radiation, and there's going to

be a nuclear winter that will kill everyone on the planet anyway, So it

almost doesn't matter who has first strike capability. But if you've got nuclear missiles

one hundred miles off the coast of Florida, you can probably get those in

the air pretty quickly and hitting the United States before we have any chance to

respond. And that's scary to think about. So it does matter in the

sense that. Look, and I'm not naive, I understand that even if

there is not a military base near the United States it is occupied by a

foreign power, there are nuclear submarines that can launch missiles, that can sail

up nice and close, not sail what do you call it sailing, You

don't sail underwater, But anyway they can get in there. You can get

in with a nuclear submarine, probably largely undetected, and you can launch something

right off the coast and hit US. I understand that. I'm not naive

to it. But again, the idea of the Chinese having a base,

because once that military base has expanded, remember when the Russians first started putting,

they hadn't become operational yet. Okay, they had to set them up

and I'm sure the technology has changed over the decades. But when the United

States first detected that there were Russian missiles on the island of Cuba via that

aerial photography, it's not like we knew. I mean, obviously we knew

that the Russians we're bringing something to Cuba. Anyone could see that, could

see those ships. But we didn't know what was on those ships. And

you know, it could have been could have been anything, could have been

food, you know, grain for food, could have been anything. Right,

we didn't know they were missiles until they were spotted from the air.

Now you could see it with a satellite. I mean, I think we

had satellite technology then too, but not like now. But you know,

but there were flyovers that were done by the military to they were able to

take those pictures, and then those pictures were you know, those were clearly

missiles. Again, they weren't operational yet, and then it became a race

against time. Well, you know, what do we do. Do we

go and bomb Cuba and bomb those missiles where those missiles are and wind up

killing a whole lot of Russians in the process. Do we do that?

Because those missiles were going to become operational. And by the way that that

timetable kept getting moved up, where you know, JFK was told, okay,

well we've got we've only got so many days until those missiles are operational,

and then it became actually, probably within the next forty eight hours,

those missiles are going to become operational, and thank god, you know,

we're not for the back channel communication that was happening, you know, thank

god Khruschev back down and that was the end of that. In exchange for

the Jupiter missiles in that we're in Turkey at the time, I think that

we had there. Those were actually scheduled to be decommissioned anyway because they were

outdated, so they need needed to be taken down and disassembled. But the

Russians didn't know that. So that was something that JFK could offered a cruse

chef, We'll take those missiles out that you don't like sitting there on your

doorstep in exchange for you taking your missiles out of Cuba before they even become

operational. And that's ultimately what happened. But yeah, the idea of the

Chinese having a base on the island of Cuba again one hundred miles off the

coast of Florida is unacceptable and we cannot We cannot have that. Lots of

comments in the Facebook live chat, so I do want to get to some

of these. Crispy says, China needs us and we need China, but

NATO now out guns everybody. China needs us and we need China, referring

to of course, says Dave and I were talking about the interdependence economically,

we are intertwined and which I hope will will prevent ultimately prevent war. And

Saturn says, we hashtag Matt Connerton. We have to take a shower and

so enjoy your afternoon show. Thank you, en Saturn, you enjoy your

shower. Crispy says, sorry, but guns are nothing compared to bombs,

and China can't afford to attack us, and we can't afford to attack China.

But we do need to protect Taiwan at all costs. After all,

a bully regime won't be stopped until they are stopped. Yeah, I,

and that is something that we've talked about on the show too. I had

some criticism of President Biden when he said flatly that yes, we would defend

Taiwan when he was asked, This was months ago, when he was asked,

if China were to move on Taiwan, would we defend Taiwan? And

Biden said yes. I'm personally a big fan of strategic ambiguity. Although I

also found it fascinating that in that moment, you know, when people were

kind of pulling their hair out saying, Wow, I can't believe Biden just

discarded strategic ambiguity. Strategic ambiguity, of course, being where you keep your

opponent off balance by not letting them know exactly, by not telegraphing or saying

outright exactly how you might respond to whatever move that they make. You know,

it's a bit of a chess game. It all is right in terms

of foreign policy, and you don't want to You don't want your opponent to

know what your move will be in response to their move if you can help

it. And I had some criticism of Biden for that, but it was

interesting how when everybody was so upset, everybody just kind of collectively forgot that

George W. Bush had done the exact same thing. When George W.

Bush became president. It was very early in his presidency, so early I

believe it was before nine to eleven happened. It was within that first eight

months he was asked the same quite almost the exact same scenario. He was

asked by somebody, what will you do? What will the response be if

China were to attack Taiwan? Will you defend Taiwan? And he said yes,

and same thing. People people went nuts, well, what about strategic

ambiguity? He just went said it out loud, he can't do that,

but so it had already been done by a previous administration. Strangely enough,

I thought Trump recently in an interview was it with Bret bare That interview with

Bret Bair I thought was disastrous for Trump in a lot of ways legally.

But one thing I did give Trump credit for. I thought he gave a

smart answer. And you won't hear. Look the list of things that I

give Trump credit for, and if you're a regular listener, you know how

I feel about Donald Trump. It's a short list. But I did think

something really smart that he said during that interview was when Brett Baer asked him

about what would your policy be on if China were to move on Taiwan.

Trump said, well, I'm not going to answer that. But but Jijing

Ping he knows what I would do. I thought that was a smart because

that is strategic ambiguity. I'm not going to answer that hypothetical, but he

knows what I would do, so it's strategic ambiguity, but with a little

bit of a threat underneath. I thought that was I thought that was a

smart uncharacteristically, so let's see. Oh my goodness, Scott Robinson said in

the chat room. Now, this is in response to what Ronda said about

Dave Ridley. Sounds like Dick Cavett, which I'd never noticed before. But

Scott Robinson said, the difference being with Dick Cavett. Dick Cavatt didn't hate

America. I don't think Dave Ridley hates America, but he does want to

leave America. He wants for newer listeners who don't know the reason Dave Ridley

mentioned Nhxit, or maybe I mentioned it. He didn't want to be a

shy about plugging anything. Today. Dave Ridley is part of a secessionist movement

called nh Exit, and they want to secede from the United States and have

New Hampshire be its own country. But I don't think he hates America.

I wouldn't. I wouldn't characterize it quite that way. Crispy points out US

dollar is strongest dollar than any other country. That is true. Chrispy also

points out our nuke submarines are everywhere. That is also true. And I

think that goes to Ron's point. Joe Friday says, bad guys will get

weapons. Responsible weapon owners don't need to secure them, don't leave them in

an unlocked car or a closet. Absolutely, we only have a little bit

of time left, but if you'd like to get in with a quick call

six three two five six seven six three two five six seven. I did

want to go through this timeline just quickly. This is from CFR dot org,

This timeline of our relationship with Cuba, which has been the subject today

on the show. But we're gonna pick it up at nineteen fifty nine,

and we're gonna try to get all the way into the present day with this

time permitting. So in nineteen fifty nine there was growing antagonism. Castro nationalizes

all foreign assets in Cuba, hikes taxes on US imports, and establishes trade

deal with the Soviet Union. So this is prior to just a couple of

years prior to the Cuban Missile crisis. So Castro is getting cozy with Cuba

and antagonistic toward the United States. We're going to kind of speed through this,

so I'm gonna leave a lot of this out. But nineteen sixty one,

of course, the Bay of Pigs invasion, Executing a plan developed and

approved by the Eisenhower administration, JFK deploys a brigade of fourteen hundred CIA sponsored

Cuban exiles to overthrow Fidel Castro. The Cuban military defeats a force within three

days after several mishaps, disadvantage the invaders and reveal US involvement. Despite the

failed invasion, US administrations over the next several decades conduct covert operations against Cuba.

Okay, here we go the main event, or at least we're getting

to it, Okay, So nineteen sixty two. In February of sixty two,

the Kennedy administration imposes an embargo on Cuba that prohibits all trade. Cuba,

whose economy greatly depended on trade with the US, loses approximately one hundred

thirty billion dollars over the next sixty years according to Cuban government and UN estimates.

All right here it is the Cuban missile crisis from October fourteen to October

twenty eight. This is this is the big one. This is again to

me, this is the single most fascinating moment in American history and also the

most terrifying. US spy Saddle I discover the Cuba has allowed the Soviet Union

to build nuclear missile bases on the island. In response, Kennedy demands the

Soviet weapons be removed and orders a naval quarantine of Cuba, igniting a thirteen

day standoff. By the way, they were very careful to call it a

quarantine and not a blockade, even though it really was a blockade. But

a blockade is considered an act of war, so they were very careful,

you know, a little semantic game, but they called it a quarantine for

that reason. With the threat of nuclear war on the horizon, the US

negotiations with Russia. Negotiates with Russia via back channels. As the crisis nears

its third week, Kennedy secretly agrees to withdraw US nuclear missiles from Turkey within

a few months if the Soviet Union withdraws its missiles from Cuba. And again

those missiles were outdated anyways, and they were already scheduled to be decommissioned.

But Krushchev didn't know that, didn't need to know that. Kennedy also pledges

to invade Cuba. Soviet Premier Nikita, by the way, and you know

the reason that he needed to say that was because of the Bay of Pig.

Had the Bay of Pigs not happened, maybe there would never have been

any paranoia regardless. Okay, So Nikita Khrushchev accepts the deal and announces that

he will order the missiles removed. The following July, Kennedy prohibits US nationals

from traveling to Cuba. So we're going to kind of skip forward here.

There was a little bit of diplomacy here and there, but in March of

nineteen eighty two, US labels Cuba a terrorism sponsor nineteen ninety two US titan

sanctions after Soviet collapse. Um, I'm skipping ahead because we're so low on

time. We're gonna go although, oh remember the nine ten ninety nine,

Wow, that was all the way back then, the Elian Gonzales controversy,

I always thought they shouldn't have sent him back. They took him to Disney

World. How could they send him back after taking him to Disney World.

Okay, we're gonna skip all the way forward to the Obama administration. Okay,

So December of twenty fourteen, A moved to restore diplomatic ties. Barack

Obama and Raoul Castro announced they will restore full diplomatic ties following the exchange of

a jail US intelligence officer for the three remaining Cuban five prisoners. All right,

So that was the beginning of that. And in twenty fifteen, Cuba

was removed from the terrorism list in twenty fifteen July of that year, US

and Cuba reopen embassies. In twenty sixteen, Obama made in March of twenty

sixteen, Obama makes a historic visit to Cuba. In November, Fidel Castro

dies, but Raoul was already running things because Fidel was in poor health.

And then Trump came in and in June of twenty seventeen, Trump reinstated travel

and business restrictions, and in September of twenty seventeen, US cuts embassy staff

in Cuba. This is what I was talking about at the top of the

show. There was a lot of work done during the Obama administration to re

establish diplomatic ties and try to normalize things. And Trump came in and they

dismantled all of that. And then Biden came in and you know, made

a pretty meager attempt at re establishing some of it, but really didn't do

much. In May of twenty twenty two, Biden eased Trump era sanctions.

But that's about it. So the point of all that, and again,

it was a long way to get there, I know, because I started

this all the way at the beginning of the show today. But I go

back to my original point, and if you've hung in with me for the

whole thing, I appreciate it. But my original point was we're at a

point now where we're worried about Cuba. They're growing relationship with China, and

they're sort of a re establishment of a strong relationship with Russia. Cuba this

island that is one hundred miles off the coast of Florida, and this is

strategically very bad for US. And this is being not covered enough in the

media in my opinion. It is getting mainstream media coverage, but not enough.

This is an important moment in this whole as as as we continue to

have problems with our two greatest adversaries currently in the world, Russia and China,

and we've got this island of Cuba, who during the Obama administration made

a good faith attempt and made some real progress in terms of re establishing our

relationship with Cuba in a very positive way. Trump administration come in and came

in and dismantled that. Biden administration came in, failed to re establish most

of what Obama had done, and so there's blame to go around. I

blame both the Trump and the Biden administrations for the fact that now again without

us having a positive strategic relationship with Cuba, of course, of course our

adversaries fill that vacuum, and we didn't even get to a lot of what

Russia's doing right now. We talked a lot about China, we didn't even

get to what Russia's doing with Cuba. And it's I mean, we did

a little bit, but you know, in terms of supplying them oil and

so forth, because Cuba's having a rough time right now, kubas having a

very difficult time. They're having their own energy crisis. Maybe we could have

helped with that and had a good strategic relationship with that little island that sits

one hundred miles off the coast of Florida, But no, we let somebody

else do that. And I think that this is a very dangerous moment and

it's probably too late for us to do anything about it now in terms of

Cuba. But none of this had to happen, as my point, and

I blame both the current administration and the previous administration for allowing this to happen.

And it didn't have to be this way. That's my view of it.

All Right, we are out of time, don't forget tomorrow. We

got a big show tomorrow. Of course, we have Eric Ulter's classic film

review National Lampoon's Vacation, the original Vacation film, and then and then in

the second hour tomorrow we have Dave Wally from the band Satellite Union skyping in

from Chicago. Really looking forward to that. And if you miss any part

of today's show, it'll be up in just a little bit at WMH radio

dot org and on my website Matt Connerton dot com. And thank you to

Dave Ridley and Ron of course, both for calling in and everybody in the

chat room and easyg if you're listening, I hope everything is okay. He

might be taking another break. There was no entertainment report today and I haven't

heard from him, so hopefully he's all right. Hopefully all as well.

But that's gonna do it for us for now. I'll leave you with a

little more Satellite Union, a little more, a little more of a preview

for tomorrow's show. Really looking forward to that. And I'll talk to y'all

a little bit later. Oh and if you're listening live on Thursday, coming

up next immediately after this show, Through the Stage Door, hosted by the

Great Rob die On. All right, I'm out of here, by everybody,

Game Plan