Point of View September 1, 2026 – Hour 2 : Trump vs. Canada Trade Tariffs

[00:00:04] Across America, Live, this is Point of View, Kirby Anderson. Second hour today, we're going to talk for a little bit about tariffs and if you have been listening to the program any length of time, you know that oftentimes we allow Dr. Merrill Matthews to talk about that. He's written numerous columns and op-ed pieces in that regard.

[00:00:34] And if you're not familiar, there has been this ongoing battle between the United States and Canada, which I think is something that probably is ill-advised. And I actually think it is, but I'll even be a little bit more ambiguous about what that means.

[00:00:51] Because when we're lashing out against one of our largest trading partners, our neighbor to the north, and then just the other day the president said that they were going to increase tariffs on cars and trucks and auto parts and steel. And then of course in the past, he's also had tariffs on steel and aluminum and a number of others.

[00:01:13] There are of course the ongoing costs that you pay for at a time when during the midterm elections we're dealing with this issue of affordability. But I thought it would be helpful for you to also just hear and put a human face to some of this as well.

[00:01:29] And so one of the things we've posted here is a very good piece that came out through the local Fox outlet at Fox 4, in which they did an interview with Lance Thurkill, who is the CEO of Printed Technologies, as well as All Metals Fabricating. That's located in Allen, Texas, just north of where we're broadcasting right now.

[00:01:53] The All Metals Fabricating is a national company that does a little internationally, but again they buy various things that are imported because we don't produce enough aluminum here to meet all the needs. So we're going to buy them from China, going to buy them from Canada, wherever it might be. And so I thought it would just be good for you to hear, as we've talked about before, some of the impact that these tariffs are having on small business. So Lance, thank you for joining us today here on Point of View.

[00:02:22] Yes, sir. Thank you. Glad to be here. I'd love to hear your story about building a business. It is hard to build a business. And, of course, you are not only using 3D printing to build affordable housing. That's a fascinating story, which I think is very interesting. But also dealing with metal fabricating. But talk about what it takes because you have to deal with so many different rules, regulations, and it's hard enough to keep the bottom line where it needs to be.

[00:02:52] But then when you have these on-again, off-again tariffs, that hasn't been very helpful for your business, has it? No, sir. Yeah. So particularly in metal fabricating where you're used to just predictable pricing, relatively flat, small incremental changes in materials pricing,

[00:03:18] all the turbulence over the last five years have been very impactful. So, yeah, to answer your question, give you a little bit of history on me. So I'm the third-generation owner of All Metals Fabricating. We're a contract manufacturer that specializes in sheet metal fabricating and machining and powder coating for virtually every industry.

[00:03:42] Our biggest industries are alternative energy, data centers, telecom, and medical. But we do a little bit in aerospace as well and a little bit of everything. Basically, we can take a sheet of metal and make it into just about anything or take a block of metal and machine it into just about everything. And so we're doing high-precision commercial products.

[00:04:05] And then I invested in and co-founded printed technologies, built print 3D technologies. And so we're vertically integrated through All Metals Fabricating as our manufacturing partner and equity partner. And we design and manufacture 3D home printing systems. And so we're trying to help solve the affordability crisis by helping automate construction through hardware and software.

[00:04:33] And so as part of our go-to-market, we're also building homes. And we've built three homes thus far. We've built one for just $103,000. And the past year we've been raising capital to gear up and really grow the business. So, yeah, doing a startup is not for the faint of heart. It is no joke.

[00:04:58] And then I couldn't be in two more opposite universes than running a 73-year-old legacy business while also doing a startup. But I've got great people around me, and they're the ones really running both businesses. I'm just a visionary with all the crazy ideas, right? So, anyways, but, yeah, I mean, predictability, stability, I mean, the same thing you see in the economy, you know, in the public markets.

[00:05:23] So much is tied to stability and consumer confidence and predictability and stability. And so when you have, you know, massive disruptions even through just a simple tweet, you know, never did we dream that the, you know, public equities markets would be tied to something as not like a tweet. But it affects, you know, general confidence levels. And so as does these trade wars.

[00:05:52] And, you know, it's wild. I mean, last summer when we started this, you know, I mean, it affected real estate transactions. Sure. Consumer confidence affects everything, the market. And so consumer confidence is everything. And a lot of that is grounded in stability and predictability. And so you nailed it on the head. It's running a business is hard enough. And then when you've got pricing, you know, jumping all over the place, it makes it, you know, very much more difficult.

[00:06:21] To give you an example, we do about, it's all metals. We do about 300 to 500 different jobs a month of, you know, parts. And that can vary from, you know, a couple pieces to thousands of pieces. And so 95% of that's repeat. And so we're not having to re-quote that when the markets are predictable. But when pricing is changing, we're having to re-quote it every time. And so that's, you know, hundreds of jobs you're re-quoting with customers there. They've already priced their products to their customers.

[00:06:50] And so having this, you know, then basically we end up getting squeezed on it because, you know, it all rolls downhill, you know, and the last person kind of gets holding the back. So, yeah. Well, let me take a break. And when we come back, I want to get into a little bit more detail because the article we've posted here is where you remind us that we only have four aluminum mills. And so if you are wanting to meet the capacity that, and even the demand that is out there,

[00:07:19] obviously the aluminum, just use aluminum as an example, has to come from China. It has to come from Canada, wherever it might be coming from. And so that is the case. One of the places I can actually find some connection with you is the very first job I ever had was in a machine shop. And a good example of that was where we were producing, well, the people that knew how to run the machines a lot better than I did, all the kinds of parts.

[00:07:46] But here's a good example because some of those parts were going to aerospace. And those bids were there. You bid based upon a set of assumptions which could just go flying out the window if, in back then, we had so many kinds of tariffs like we do right now. So I want to come back and talk about, again, some of the other aspects of your job. And for just a minute, since you are involved in the 3-D printing of homes,

[00:08:15] that's something that I think people will find fascinating as well. But we need to take one of our mandatory breaks. If you'd like to know a little bit more about Lance, of course, we have a link to his website. So you could actually find out more about printed technologies and see some of the 3-D printing they're doing there. Fascinating story. As well as, of course, all the other links. But I just wanted to put a human face on tariffs

[00:08:41] and how I just think a tariff war with Canada right now is ill-advised. We'll come back and talk more about that right after this. This is Viewpoints with Kirby Anderson. Today is the first day of September. It seems like a good time to talk about another first.

[00:09:11] This is the first time the national debt has reached $40 trillion. The Treasury Secretary declared there's nothing magic about the $40 trillion number. That may be true, but it is worth taking a moment to try to understand how large this number has become. Our friends at Scientific American want to remind us that the number is truly astronomical. For example, $40 trillion is 4 with 13 zeros.

[00:09:33] If you took $40 trillion bills and laid them end to end, it would go from Earth to the Sun and back 20 times. If you tried to spend $1 per second, it would take you 1.2 million years. The distance from Earth to Alpha Centauri is 25 trillion miles. So how did we get $40 trillion in national debt? Well, those of us who were older saw it happening and were warning about it.

[00:09:58] But we as Americans kept electing politicians who were content with ignoring the growing national debt. The U.S. did not rack up $1 trillion in national debt until October 1981. President Ronald Reagan said, if we as a nation needed a warning, let that be it. Think about that. The accumulated debt from George Washington to Ronald Reagan was $1 trillion. We now add $1 trillion in national debt every five to six months. The first time the federal budget reached $1 trillion was in 1987.

[00:10:27] Our current budget is $7 trillion. And I think we can now agree that we aren't getting a government that is seven times better than what we had 40 years ago. Instead, we have government spending that is out of control and there is no end in sight. I'm Kirby Anderson, and that's my point of view. Go deeper on topics like you just heard. Go ahead and visit pointofview.net.

[00:10:55] That's pointofview.net. You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. Let's go with us for a few more minutes. Again, he is CEO of Printed Technologies and All Metals Fabricating, which is based in the state of Texas. And, you know, I've been somewhat critical of the president. Let's point out why he's doing what he's doing.

[00:11:18] First of all, there are certainly some very significant trade barriers that Canada has erected, which are unfair. A good example that I use for our listeners in Wisconsin and New York, say if you're a dairy farmer and you're producing cheese,

[00:11:34] the trade barrier and the tariff barriers which would prevent you from even being able to sell your cheese across the border in Canada is so prohibitive as to not even provide an opportunity. And yet, again, I'm well aware of some of these individuals producing cheese in Wisconsin where it is shorter to go across the border and sell it in Canada.

[00:11:59] But it's so expensive that they have to go south to sell it in the United States. There are all sorts of other concerns. And, Lance, I want to talk about that because I pointed out just a minute ago there are only a few aluminum mills in this country. The goal that the president has, and one of the reasons he's trying to use tariffs,

[00:12:19] is to see if he can bring manufacturing back and if we could have more steel mills and aluminum mills in the United States, that would make your job a lot easier, wouldn't it? In theory, yeah. I mean, the reality is, you know, in his first term, you know, let me just start by saying, I mean, starting mills here is a massive undertaking that requires tons of capital. Yes.

[00:12:49] And time. And is it for jobs that people actually want? You know, there's a reason why a lot of this work went overseas and these were shut down. There's the other issue. Yeah. You know, but the sentiment is like we need to not be so dependent on foreign countries for materials. You know, I attribute it to the reason we won World War II is because we were able to start producing.

[00:13:17] And, you know, whatever we needed to do to win that war. And that's what we did from a manufacturing standpoint. And so if we were at war with one of these countries that we're getting a lot of our metal from, then it would be very problematic for us. Yes. And so the overarching theme is good, but the reality to get there would have to take multiple terms with the same vision and the same, you know, execution.

[00:13:43] And it would just take a massive effort where it would be a cohesive vision across both parties, you know, or unless one party remained in control for multiple terms in order to accomplish that. And so while it's good at heart, it's a little bit far-fetched to think that we could be independent, you know, not needing to import, you know, metal materials. All right. I think so.

[00:14:11] And, again, you raised the other issue, which I'm going to raise after we'll let you go, because we're going to talk about young men. And, of course, one of the good news is a lot of young men are going to church, but a lot of these young men are not working. And we've talked about millions that are not working and not looking for work. And so the argument has been if we bring manufacturing back, I'm going to sound like Mike Rowe now of Dirty Jobs, will we have enough young men that will want to or even older men that will want to work in those plants?

[00:14:38] And so, again, more is being done through artificial intelligence and through technology and robotics so that it may not be as dangerous and demanding. But, nevertheless, that is the case. And I just wanted you to be here to talk about and to illustrate the fact that we are dealing with supply chains. And supply chains can break down, especially since one of those supply chains is with an enemy like China, which is a friend and an enemy at the same time.

[00:15:08] But we have so much in common with Canada. And it seems to me right now just the problems that we've had between the Prime Minister there, Carney, and, of course, our President Trump, this is just something that would be better off if we did not have such a conflict at the border,

[00:15:29] since we have some of the largest trading relationships and, if you will, integrated supply chains between the United States and Canada, which makes kind of a North American structure something that would rival even something that they would want to have in, say, the European Union. But I thought for just a minute, since I did mention this, if people go to your website, and we do have a link there, they can actually see what this 3D printing is.

[00:15:59] I have never really spent much time talking about it, but since you have a video that's about three minutes long, this is fascinating because basically what you are able to do is, for a very significant reduction in cost, produce 3D printed concrete homes, and for many people, that's something to consider. And that's another aspect of what you've been involved in. Can you tell us more? Yes, sir. Yeah.

[00:16:27] Essentially, we have a supply and demand crisis. We've got a skilled trade crisis in this country. One thing I will quickly note on is I'm very encouraged to see what's going on in, you know, I can speak just for here in Allen ISD, Collin College. You know, when I was going through high school, it was just expected that everybody went to college and got a degree, and you'd have to go into debt if your parents weren't going to pay for it to do that.

[00:16:55] And so, you know, but 60% of people don't use their degree and their jobs. And so you went and took on debt for something you didn't even end up using. And so the narrative is changing. I just wanted to note that. And manufacturing, to your point, I mean, we're implementing AI. You know, our factory is clean and safe. It is not, you know, what we grew up thinking in, you know, your dad's shop type of thing. This is cutting-edge stuff. And the narrative is changing, and kids are coming back into it.

[00:17:22] And, you know, we need the saying to be true of electricians and plumbers because there's a massive skilled labor shortage that's happening. And so what we're doing at Printed Technology is automating construction, particularly automating, right, currently only automating the wall system. So we have a 3-D home printing system that will print a cementitious material, you know, whether it be concrete or a 3-D mix that is a cementitious mix, that prints the house.

[00:17:48] So when I say print it, think of like a soft-serve ice cream dispenser, but dispensing concrete. And it goes around and prints the exterior and interior walls of the house. And so now you've got a mold-resistant, termite-resistant, you know, hurricane, tornado, fire-resistant structure that is built, you know, like they used to build homes essentially in Europe that are standing for hundreds of years out of much better materials at a much faster pace.

[00:18:15] And so, yes, we are building them for less than traditional construction, but the real way to solve the affordability crisis is by having supply meet demand. It doesn't matter how cheap you can build price per square foot. Until you can have supply meet demand, you're always going to have the price rising. And so by automating construction, we believe is the only way forward, and it's going to be a matter of have to because of the skilled labor shortage that is here

[00:18:45] and is just beginning once all these boomers start retiring. Yes. Well, again, I just think it's fascinating. And, again, the video is there. And as you said, mold-resistant, fire-resistant, tornado-resistant. You may say, well, I'd like to put some more on the walls. We can certainly do that afterwards. But it's just another way to begin to recognize how we can with maybe fewer people in the labor market

[00:19:11] because they aren't going into the trades, we can still build some homes in a way that would be pretty effective. So, again, we have all the links on the website. And if nothing else, Lance, I just appreciate you coming on just to talk about, in some respects, that these tariffs have an impact on small business, have an impact on people that are entrepreneurial like yourself. And that's something to pay attention to as well. And so thank you for joining us today here on Point of View. Thank you, sir. Have a great day.

[00:19:41] We are going to take a break. When we come back, we'll get into a couple of issues. I sort of gave you a preview. One of those is, you know, we have these young men that have said, you know what, I'm thinking of going back to church. And Time Magazine said, ah, don't worry about that. That's not anything significant at all. We don't want to overplay it. We don't say that we're in the midst of a great revival. I'd love to say that we were.

[00:20:04] But at the same time, as we said in one of our Outlook Magazine issues, we have at least some rumblings of that. And it was interesting that Time Magazine said, you know, just they were trying to use the old phrase, poo-poo it or downplay it. And I think it's worth a mention. Some of the comments they make are on target. Some of them seem to actually want to keep the narrative going that young people have given up on God. Young people have given up on the church.

[00:20:33] A lot have, but not all of them. And so we're going to cover that. And then I do have a very good piece about Big Brother and Flock cameras. Oh, my goodness. I just think we were a couple weeks ahead of time when we were talking about the action alert, which is still up there. So you can still take action on the issue of these Flock cameras. But, boy, you are starting to see a number of states, a number of cities starting to rethink this whole issue of surveillance.

[00:21:01] So we will wind down with that as well. All that coming up. Don't forget, as I mentioned before, just yesterday, an email went out about our point of view radio talk show mobile app. And also some information about the upcoming Truth Team Week, which will be taking place later this month. We've got a lot more to cover. We'll do that right after this.

[00:21:32] Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. Those are the words of President Ronald Reagan, a staunch defender against socialism. Sadly, too many Americans have failed to educate this generation about the dangers and failures of socialism. Surveys show that a majority of young Americans hold favorable views of socialism. And here's what's really surprising.

[00:22:01] More than a third of churchgoers prefer socialism to capitalism. How can we prevent freedom's extinction? It's up to patriotic Americans like you, those who believe in the existence of truth, to band together and defend freedom's legacy. Thankfully, there is a team dedicated to doing just that, the Truth Team. And we have a spot for you. Join us in defending freedom's legacy.

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[00:22:53] You are listening to Point of View. The opinions expressed on Point of View do not necessarily reflect the views of the management or staff of this station. And now, here again, is Kirby Anderson.

[00:23:15] Back once again, let me, if I can, mention that tomorrow, just as a program note, we're going to spend some time, first of all, talking about this remarkable drop in the crime rate. I think some people, if they were asked right now, if you go out on the street and say, do you think crime is rising? Everybody think yes, because, of course, that's what you cover in the news. But the reality is, the crime rate is lower than it's been since we first started recording it back in, I think it was 1936. So we're going to talk about that. I've seen some very good articles.

[00:23:44] The one I picked was one from Senator Charles Grassley. But there were many documentations of various statistics, which we'll cover briefly. Then, I just thought it would be practical. It's with a back-to-school theme. We have a very good book that has come out by Corey Pennepacker called Backpack Faith.

[00:24:03] And really, the whole ministry is called Bible to School, which is really just helping you prepare your children or grandchildren to really stand for their faith and to know how to apply biblical principles. So we'll be talking about that. We'll have a guest second hour just to come in for a little bit to talk about how many of these food banks are suffering.

[00:24:26] As we talked about with Bishop Johanan just a few minutes ago, the least of these is certainly one of the responsibilities we have to serve those people who are marginalized. And it may be something that you could think about in your community, trying to do what you can to encourage people to help support the local food bank. Then we'll talk about some of these data centers. They're a very good piece that came out through the Wall Street Journal. Put together some facts.

[00:24:56] Point, counterpoint. I always like to cover some of that. And we'll even get into that in just a few minutes when we talk about the flock cameras. But let's, if we can, come to a piece by Kevin McCullough. He is a fellow talk show host, been on the program with us before. And he has the title, What's Time's Deal? Because he said, why is Time Magazine working so hard to convince you that young people aren't returning to church?

[00:25:22] According to the latest Gallup polls, and you can also look at Pew Research, and you can look at Barna and all the others. Everybody's saying pretty much the same thing. But he uses the Gallup latest numbers show that attendance at religious services among young men rising seven points to 40%. Now, again, are we in the midst of a huge revival? No. Is there an uptick? Yes, there is. And I think both of those are important points to keep in tension.

[00:25:52] This is the highest reported level for, well, more than a decade. And attendance among young women rose even three points, stands at 39%, which is interesting. Higher percentage of young men in church than young women? That has never happened in history. So something's going on. And the increase is larger among men, but the current rates are nearly identical. And also they found something else.

[00:26:19] Gallup poll again found that the percentage young men who consider religion as very important in their lives jumped from 28% to 42% in two years. So Kevin McCullough says these numbers are significant. They're also fascinating. So with that as a background, and that is, I think, very accurate.

[00:26:42] Now you have Time Magazine, he says, that seemed to want to throw cold water on those numbers and devoted 2,000 words in Time Magazine on the possibility that there was maybe not that much spiritually significant happening among Gen Z. Now, Kevin McCullough says it didn't disprove Gallup's findings. It couldn't.

[00:27:08] Instead, they gathered enough skeptical voices and competing measurements to give readers permission to ignore them. For example, one of those is the PRR. And again, that one is Pew Research. They found no evidence that young men are converting to Christianity in large numbers. Okay, true.

[00:27:29] Other surveys measuring weekly attendance haven't always found the same increase that those were found by Gallup. And so, again, you have to recognize that there are different surveys. And so Kevin McCullough says, okay, fine, put all that in your story. But none of it disproves Gallup because Gallup wasn't measuring mass conversion. It was measuring what? Attendance, affiliation, and whether or not religion was important. And it was.

[00:27:59] And it jumped enough to be statistically significant. A weekly attendance is not monthly attendance. Conversion is not affiliation. Affiliation is not spiritual interest. He says time knows the difference. So here's something that we've talked about before. And maybe it's about time to bring Steve Cable on this program. He's been the expert to really kind of delve into all the different kinds of surveys and studies.

[00:28:27] On the one hand, we see a little bit of a heightened interest. We don't want to overplay it. But a heightened interest, a more at least statistically significant interest on the part of young men towards church and religious things. Does it mean that all of them have become Christians? No. Has that particular increase been due to other factors? Well, some people have called it the Charlie Kirk factor.

[00:28:54] You know, we're coming up to the anniversary of the death of Charlie Kirk. We'll be talking about that more probably next week. That is part of it. But, again, you have to say that something is going on. It's not a full-scale revival. Let's not overplay it. But at the same time, it's kind of interesting. And if nothing else, this, I think, illustrates how, again, Time Magazine covered it.

[00:29:21] Because they wanted to talk about skeptical voices. And then, are you ready for the punchline? Waiting for the other shoe to drop? Here it comes. Then came the inevitable attempt to connect rising religious participation with, you knew it, Christian nationalism and mega-politics. You know, make America great again. Naturally, young man walks into church and Time Magazine goes looking for Donald Trump.

[00:29:50] Okay, you can kind of see how the political bias in the writers, this particular writer for Time Magazine. And they have had some evangelical Christians over the years that have written for Time Magazine, even in the religion section. But they're not there anymore. And so, as a result, you knew it. We doubt that there's really an increase in spiritual interest. But if there is, it all has to do with Republicans.

[00:30:15] And, again, Gallup did find much of the increase concentrated among young Republicans. That deserves examination. But, again, Time treats the political correlation as if it suggests that religious activity isn't legitimate. And, of course, you have to say that. He asked the question, can't Republicans not experience spiritual hunger? They may be more likely to be looking for that, as a matter of fact.

[00:30:40] And so, here, again, is how Kevin McCullough summarizes this. For years, America's cultural gatekeepers have treated religious decline as an established feature of human progress. Educated societies become secular. Young people abandon organized religion. Churches empty. Faith recedes. And enlightened people move on. That theory wasn't merely reported. It was welcomed, he says.

[00:31:07] Now, Gallup has produced evidence that at least part of Gen Z may be moving in the, what? Opposite direction. And Time's instinct is to explain why readers shouldn't make much of it. And, again, he says there are probably some reasons for this. This could be a temporary post-pandemic correction. Might be the so-called Charlie Kirk effect. There are all sorts of things that people have talked about. But the uncertainty is the reason to keep reporting.

[00:31:34] Not a license, as Time magazine engages in, to dismiss what has already been measured. If nothing else, I think there's a lot of things going on. He points out that young Americans have spent much of their time and their lives online. And they feel profoundly alone. They possess instant access to more information than any generation in history. Yet information hasn't answered their deepest questions.

[00:32:01] They were told to invent themselves, define their own truth, and look inward for fulfillment. Hasn't worked out particularly well. Perhaps they are entering church because they want something older and sturdier than the latest social theory. Perhaps they want community that exists beyond a screen. Perhaps they are looking for answers that politics, entertainment, and technology have failed to provide. Maybe they're looking for God. Is that really so difficult to imagine?

[00:32:31] As Time evidently believes that it is. He says no responsible person can declare a nationwide Gen Z revival from the evidence we have. Gen Z remains less religious-affiliated than older generations. And Gao found the strongest movement among young men. Again, we need more polling and more time. But again, we see some things that are happening.

[00:32:56] And those conclusions are not necessarily the way Time magazine illustrates them. Instead, Time treated Gallup's numbers like hostile witnesses and spent the article trying to impeach them. Perhaps this isn't a revival. Maybe it doesn't result in a revival. Right now, the story is young people are showing up. And Time seems to be hoping that it doesn't. Very good piece by Kevin McCullough.

[00:33:26] We need to get him on again sometime in the future. But if nothing else, don't believe everything you read in a news magazine like Time. Don't necessarily overextend some of the facts that we're seeing. But it is maybe the rumblings, we say, of a potential revival. We should pray that maybe that would take place. I'll be right back.

[00:33:58] You're listening to Point of View, your listener-supported source for truth. For a few more minutes, of course, you know that we've been talking about this idea of flock cameras. And you can go to our website and find that we, of course, have the action item there for you to pick up. Protect privacy against flock cameras. We've been doing that for some time. But once again, that's in the news. So I thought we'd talk about it for a few minutes. But even during the break, I thought, you know, I need to go over, I want to check on what we've posted right now on Spotify.

[00:34:27] Because Megan does a very good job of posting that. And this is the advantage of maybe getting the Point of View app. I go in there. Oh, it wants my email. What's my password? Then it's trying to verify that I'm a human. Then it's asking me how many motorcycles in this picture. And I must have hit it wrong. How many bicycles in this picture? How many stuff? I never got into Spotify.

[00:34:49] Whereas if I have the Point of View app, I can, of course, check the daily broadcast, the podcast, all of those, the viewpoints, commentary, the action alerts and everything. Which just illustrates, again, we try to put everything in one place. And if you have the app, of course, we have that now. But I was just trying to see by going to Spotify, which I shouldn't have bothered. Never got there. At least in the time I had the break.

[00:35:16] And it just illustrates, again, why now, for the first time, with this wonderful app, we have everything linked to the website. You don't have to go to two or three different places to get all the information. And so if you haven't taken advantage of that, please do so. Okay, let's talk about flock cameras for just a minute. First of all, for those of you in the state of Florida, drumroll, please.

[00:35:39] The Republican governor of the state of Florida, that's Ron DeSantis, says he's removing automated license plate readers from state roadways. This from a memo that came through the Florida Department of Transportation. On Monday, Ron DeSantis, Governor Ron DeSantis, ordered all flock cameras to be removed. Are you ready for this? From state highway system. That includes the interstate, such as I-10 and I-75, within 30 days.

[00:36:08] And it grows because of this increased concern about the misuse of these systems. And so already you had some of the different counties in Florida already announced that they would end their own license plate reader programs. But it just illustrates that around the country, this has become quite the issue. So this last article, very good commentary.

[00:36:36] Big Brother Loves Flock Cameras. He says, in the aftermath of the 9-11 terrorist attacks, the privacy of American citizens has been seriously compromised. To keep Americans safe, which was kind of the argument and the mantra at the time, we created this bureaucratic monolith known as the Department of Homeland Security, which also includes the Transportation Security Administration, the TSA.

[00:37:05] Then you have the Patriot Act. And since the beginning, we raised concerns on point of view about the Patriot Act, which made it easier for the government to spy on ordinary Americans by expanding the authority to monitor phone and email communications, collect bank and credit card records, and track the activity of innocent Americans on the Internet.

[00:37:30] As a matter of fact, under the Patriot Act, the government never destroys the private information it collects. I remember a conversation Carmen Payton and I had at the time in which we were told that that would not be done. And here we find out that this information has been collected and is widely accessible.

[00:37:52] There are 34,000 law enforcement and intelligent agents that can retrieve collected phone records from what is called the NSLs, that is the National Security Letters. And I think we may have misled you at the time, but we were using the best information. I remember being on a phone call with some of the people on the White House at that time saying,

[00:38:17] you know, I know you're all really excited about the Patriot Act because, after all, you have an attorney general that you like. But what if you end up with an attorney general that's like Janet Reno, who had been the one for Clinton? Of course, we know what happened later on under Obama. And, of course, that's the case. And the Patriot Act, of course, set the stage for the use of surveillance cameras, which the police department now believe are essential technology.

[00:38:47] But, again, Flock cameras, as we've described in our action alert, are used for automated license plate readers to track or reconstruct movements of vehicles in criminal investigations. As I pointed out, there's 120,000 cameras. One camera is a tool. 120,000 cameras is what? A massive surveillance system which capture billions of data points every month.

[00:39:16] So, as you might imagine, this article goes on to talk about opposition to Flock cameras is growing nationwide. You have cities such as Fort Collins, Colorado, Knoxville, Tennessee, Syracuse, New York, that have canceled their contracts. You have 214 cities and counties that have ended their Flock camera contracts since 2021. And the pace of terminations is accelerating.

[00:39:43] Here's the part that this article doesn't mention, but we dug out. That is, they may get rid of the Flock cameras, but they'll use cameras under a different name. And so, some of that needs to be addressed. And so, again, there's a very good quote here from the head of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, who said, look, Americans enjoy the freedom to drive and view their vehicles as extensions of their homes.

[00:40:13] Critics contend that cameras that track their vehicles represent the government intruding into their personal lives. One state where protests have been increasing is, where I'm broadcasting from right now, the state of Texas. At least 3,200 Flock cameras have been purchased in Texas. The government agencies involve, including the Mortal Vehicle Crime Prevention Board and the Department of Public Safety,

[00:40:39] which is now where the governor of the state of Texas, Greg Abbott, has ordered state agencies to stop funding those as well. And, of course, in an interview with Glenn Beck, Governor Abbott promised that the use of Flock cameras would be reduced dramatically. And, of course, we've talked about the fact that there has been a push to address that. And later on in the article, it points out what we are encouraging you to take action on,

[00:41:05] a bill by Representative Keith Self introduced with the appellate to actually require federal agencies to obtain warrants before accessing Flock camera data and also to not have that data exist in perpetuity. And, of course, we just mentioned how some of these other concerns have surfaced in Florida with Governor Ron DeSantis. Those of you in Florida certainly are aware of this.

[00:41:35] And for those of you in the state of Missouri, I might point out that Senator Josh Hawley, Republican from the state of Missouri, is also launching an investigation which is to determine, here's his line, who has access to hundreds of millions of Americans' data and what are they doing with that? So, again, if you've not taken action, we one more time have kept up on the take action item, protect privacy against Flock cameras.

[00:42:05] If you've already sent email to your representative, very good. Thank you for doing so. There is a way in which you can find out a little bit more about that. Of course, you can also look at this article. It's our fourth article on the website today. And it gives you some great information about Big Brother and Flock cameras. And, of course, there is a suggested letter that you can send to your representative. You can then send it or you can print it out and mail it.

[00:42:34] And so, again, all of that is available at the website pointofview.net. One last time on Flock cameras, and tomorrow we'll get into the whole issue of data centers. We want to address many of these cutting-edge issues, and I hope that that's one of the reasons why you will pray for pointofview. And as we get closer to truth team, consider what you might do to support pointofview. As always, I want to thank Megan for help engineering the program. And, Derek, thank you for producing the program.

[00:43:03] Look forward to you joining us tomorrow as we educate you about how to prepare the next generation for school. We'll see you then. It almost seems like we live in a different world from many people in positions of authority. They say men can be women and women men. People are prosecuted differently, or not at all, depending on their politics. Criminals are more valued and rewarded than law-abiding citizens.

[00:43:32] It's so overwhelming, so demoralizing. You feel like giving up. But we can't. We shouldn't. We must not. As Winston Churchill said to Britain in the darkest days of World War II, Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy. And that's what we say to you today.

[00:43:58] This is not a time to give in, but to step up and join Point of View in providing clarity in the chaos. We can't do it alone, but together, with God's help, we will overcome the darkness. Invest in biblical clarity today at pointofview.net or call 1-800-347-5151. Pointofview.net and 800-347-5151.

[00:44:29] Point of View is produced by Point of View Ministries.