Ken Soleyn and James Jordan

[00:00] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[00:02] KEN SOLEYN: So, James, I'm just having a coffee and I'm a. Yeah, I'm a retired fellow. I worked for 25 years for GE.

[00:12] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, really?

[00:14] KEN SOLEYN: So it afforded me to travel all across the United States. So I've been. I've been to Kansas and other states. I think I've been in every To all the states except Hawaii.

[00:28] JAMES JORDAN: Oh yeah. Have you been to the GE facility in Kansas?

[00:32] KEN SOLEYN: I can't say that I have. I worked out of Billerica, Massachusetts, which was we did controls and instruments. My area was for measuring pressure, temperature and humidity in an industrial process.

[00:53] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, well, I was a journalist for a very long time, but I finished up my career with four or five years at GE.

[01:00] KEN SOLEYN: Oh, okay.

[01:02] JAMES JORDAN: In Kansas.

[01:03] KEN SOLEYN: So you probably had an SSO number, right?

[01:05] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So that was, that was, yeah, go ahead.

[01:13] KEN SOLEYN: No, I have to say that GE never missed a paycheck of mine.

[01:19] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, I don't know, with us, a lot of times you're just sitting around doing nothing.

[01:24] SPEAKER C: So.

[01:26] JAMES JORDAN: But, yeah. So anyway, that's something in common there. That's cool.

[01:31] KEN SOLEYN: I had the opportunity also to travel overseas. I was a product manager.

[01:36] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[01:37] KEN SOLEYN: Because of GE, I went to China, Japan, Australia.

[01:44] SPEAKER C: And.

[01:46] KEN SOLEYN: So tell me a little bit about yourself.

[01:50] JAMES JORDAN: Well, I was just going to mention, too, part of my job at GE was I was escorting Chinese Nationals who were getting their airplanes fixed. So anyways, but, well, I was a journalist for 30 some years, Kansas, South Carolina, Texas, this, that part of the country, you know, and South and, uh, Kansas, the last several years as a editor of a small newspaper. I was a sports writer for a lot of it, but, uh, also political reporting, uh, state house, lots of Statehouse stuff. Let's see. That's. I'm a big Outdoors person, camping, that sort of thing. Hiking, physical fitness. That's kind of the basics.

[02:38] KEN SOLEYN: I. I enjoy hiking and snowshoeing as well in the winter.

[02:41] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Yeah, we don't get snow.

[02:46] KEN SOLEYN: Since I retired, I have more time to do it. So my wife and I. We do that on a regular basis and if I miss it, I don't feel right.

[02:57] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[02:58] JAMES JORDAN: Well, you got lots of snow there and you say you're in Massachusetts now or New Hampshire?

[03:03] KEN SOLEYN: New Hampshire.

[03:04] JAMES JORDAN: New Hampshire, yeah.

[03:05] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[03:06] KEN SOLEYN: We're about an hour from Boston.

[03:08] JAMES JORDAN: Oh yeah, my wife's from was from Rhode Island. So I know a little bit of that area.

[03:16] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[03:17] JAMES JORDAN: Well, let's see. Yeah, so what made you want to do this conversation thing?

[03:26] SPEAKER C: Well.

[03:28] KEN SOLEYN: I started becoming a little bit more politically active in about April of this year.

[03:33] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[03:36] KEN SOLEYN: Everything going on, my parents were Democrats. They were both union people. My dad was in the carpenters union in New York.

[03:47] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[03:48] KEN SOLEYN: And my mom was a nurse's aide, so she was in a health care. So they were very much, you know, Democrats. And I grew up in Brooklyn, New York.

[03:59] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[04:00] KEN SOLEYN: I was born. I'm an immigrant. I was born in, yeah, in the Caribbean.

[04:07] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[04:07] KEN SOLEYN: And my family immigrated to the U.S. in, uh, 1960.

[04:11] SPEAKER C: 60.

[04:12] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[04:14] KEN SOLEYN: So I grew up here, you know, all my memories of, you know, childhood are here. I grew up living in Brooklyn and, yeah, I can remember, you know, riding my bicycle and taking the subway.

[04:29] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[04:29] KEN SOLEYN: Kids back then, I think, were a little bit more independent, you know?

[04:32] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, I think so.

[04:33] KEN SOLEYN: We weren't afraid to go out.

[04:36] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[04:36] KEN SOLEYN: Outside, you know, on our own.

[04:39] JAMES JORDAN: You know, we, yeah, yeah, I grew up, I grew up in East, East Tennessee in a very rural area. And, you know, when I was 10 or 12, we thought nothing of going out and sticking our thumb up and hitching a ride, you know, getting the car with a stranger and go to the next town, you know, and, and my parents knew that and didn't care, you know, you know, it was just a different world, you know.

[05:02] KEN SOLEYN: But, yeah, I became a naturalized citizen. I was only seven years old at the time. I can remember. Oh, They actually had you study.

[05:13] SPEAKER C: There.

[05:13] KEN SOLEYN: Was a book and they said they were going to ask you questions. So even at seven years old, they had a couple of questions for me. You were pretty young.

[05:20] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, wow.

[05:23] KEN SOLEYN: I can remember writing the document. I still have it. It's a certificate that says you're a naturalized citizen.

[05:31] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, wow. Yeah, I didn't know how they did that for kids.

[05:34] SPEAKER C: You.

[05:36] KEN SOLEYN: Go with your parents. It's kind of really under your parents. Toddling.

[05:42] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[05:42] KEN SOLEYN: But it was back then people wore a jacket and tie when they went to things.

[05:49] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[05:49] JAMES JORDAN: Oh yeah.

[05:50] KEN SOLEYN: You wore a jacket and tie if you went on an airplane, you know.

[05:53] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, right. Yeah, I know. At GE you probably wore nice clothes, you know. And now they wear suits in the.

[06:04] KEN SOLEYN: Beginning but then in a lot of years it got fairly casual fellows just wear a typical outfit was khaki pants and a golf shirt.

[06:13] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, right.

[06:16] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[06:16] KEN SOLEYN: That was the uniform.

[06:18] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[06:19] JAMES JORDAN: Well, you know, as a journalist, I got, I got kind of jaded with politics and such. I mean, I, I've seen the sausage made, you know, and I, so I'm kind of not political now, you know, it's, it's like. And I see the bias in the media and it's like, man, you know, we can't even find out what's going on.

[06:41] KEN SOLEYN: Oh, yeah, I think. I think it's. My personal opinion is a lot of it's related to big money, so.

[06:49] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah.

[06:49] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[06:50] KEN SOLEYN: You have to remember that these networks have to make money. They have to make profit.

[06:56] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[06:57] KEN SOLEYN: They sell advertising, so, yeah. They're going to cater to what the advertising.

[07:04] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, that's true.

[07:05] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[07:06] KEN SOLEYN: And the policies. And it just seems like, it's almost like if you look at history, you know, you go back to the, the era of, like in New York, they would call it Tammany Hall, you know, that.

[07:20] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[07:21] KEN SOLEYN: Political machine where there was a lot of graft.

[07:25] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[07:26] KEN SOLEYN: Things like that. I can remember growing up in New York, they used to say on election day, there were politicians that would buy the guy's drinks, you know, like the guy who worked.

[07:36] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[07:37] SPEAKER C: Come on.

[07:37] KEN SOLEYN: If you vote for me, I'll, you know, buy you a drink at the bar.

[07:40] JAMES JORDAN: Right?

[07:41] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[07:42] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[07:43] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[07:44] KEN SOLEYN: So you live in, you live in on the eastern side of Tennessee, then lived.

[07:48] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, that's where I grew up. Yeah.

[07:50] KEN SOLEYN: Closer to Nashville or.

[07:53] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, it was real rural, real mountainous, the Beverly Hillbillies kind of thing.

[08:01] KEN SOLEYN: Where I live now, you know, we have a community, but we're only a short distance away from the mountains and a lot of hiking trails.

[08:11] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[08:12] KEN SOLEYN: I grew up close to the Appalachian Trail.

[08:16] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, the Appalachian Trail was just a short distance from where I grew up and. But I traveled around.

[08:27] KEN SOLEYN: My dad was a carpenter and, yeah, he used to listen to country music.

[08:32] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[08:33] KEN SOLEYN: He had this old radio, which was actually vacuum tubes.

[08:37] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[08:38] KEN SOLEYN: And I. I was always a kid who was very curious, so one day I went in and I took it apart. Oh, and I wanted to see what was on the inside because. To me it was amazing, you know, like this box had, you know, music and news and everything coming out of it. So as a little kid I wanted to see how it worked and I was able to take it apart and put it back together again. And my dad never did.

[09:01] JAMES JORDAN: Did it still work? Did you put it back together?

[09:06] KEN SOLEYN: There are a few extra parts that it didn't need. No, I'm just kidding.

[09:10] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[09:12] KEN SOLEYN: I always loved country music. Because of that. The old time country, like, yeah, yeah. One of his favorite guys was Jim Reeves, you know, very like George Jones and the old time, you know, that kind of old country, not, not the new, not the new.

[09:30] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. And then it was Bluegrass, you know, which came from East Tennessee, but that's.

[09:37] KEN SOLEYN: I'm a music lover. I had the opportunity to to see Bill Monroe one time.

[09:42] SPEAKER C: Oh.

[09:42] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, wow.

[09:43] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[09:44] KEN SOLEYN: It was a friend of mine. He was a, it's like a hippie couple that I used to work with. They had some extra tickets to go see Bill.

[09:52] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[09:53] KEN SOLEYN: So we went to see him, and it was Bill Monroe and the Selby.

[09:56] SPEAKER C: Scene.

[09:58] KEN SOLEYN: Played back to back.

[10:00] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. That would, that would have been cool.

[10:02] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[10:03] KEN SOLEYN: And Bill Monroe himself said, uh, what we do. Is not really even the real Bluegrass, where the real Bluegrass is played on somebody's porch somewhere. Yeah, yeah, that's what he said. And he's like the father.

[10:17] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[10:18] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Well, now, now in Kansas, but there's a big Bluegrass Festival here. It's like my back door, so to speak, but it's one of the biggest Bluegrass festivals in the country, so I'm still heavily into Bluegrass.

[10:33] KEN SOLEYN: I grew up listening to everything. You know, we had a, you know, of course we listen to am radio, so pop music rock.

[10:40] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[10:41] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[10:42] JAMES JORDAN: The am radio used to be, you could get stations from all over the country, you know, I I grew up in East Tennessee, but I I got a station out of New Orleans.

[10:53] KEN SOLEYN: Oh, yeah. On a, on a cold day in the winter. We could pick up the Chicago Bulls basketball game in New York.

[11:03] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a big music fan like you are, but I like the history of rock and roll. And I actually did a ghost-written book, study guide of the history of rock and roll back to the 40s, you know. And that's pretty interesting, you know, how Bill Monroe fits into that and how the old blues musicians fit into that and all that. It's great stories from back then, you know?

[11:33] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[11:36] KEN SOLEYN: I was talking to a friend of mine and we were talking about the African American influence on music, you know, like what would this country be like without the African American influence on music?

[11:51] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[11:52] KEN SOLEYN: Because you have jazz and the original.

[11:55] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[11:56] KEN SOLEYN: You know, sort of the origins of rock and roll. A lot of them, like Chuck Berry and. Yeah, and those guys, little Richard, you know, they were kind of.

[12:04] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[12:04] KEN SOLEYN: The icons of rock. Of course, the blues and. Yeah, just about every. Well, you would consider to the American music genre owes a lot to the. The African American.

[12:18] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. And, you know, just a trivia thing, but I stumbled across this. There is a thing called Afro-Brazilian music because there were, you know, a lot of black slaves in Brazil, and they created their own music just like they did here. And it doesn't sound like the blues. It's got kind of a little Caribbean influence, kind of. It's really cool music. You know, but it's, it's not at all like American Blues, you know?

[12:46] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[12:47] KEN SOLEYN: I, I think musicians tend to borrow, let's call it from.

[12:52] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[12:53] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[12:54] KEN SOLEYN: Adapt it to their own.

[12:55] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[12:56] KEN SOLEYN: Even like, yeah. You know, you mentioned Appalachia, but a country music has a lot of roots in, in sort of, like, oh, yeah. Irish, English ballads.

[13:06] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[13:08] KEN SOLEYN: We call it mountain music.

[13:10] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah. Well, you know, too, the Appalachia, they were poor people, you know, they had to fix instruments and create instruments out of stuff that broke. And the same thing with the old ex former slaves, you know, they had to do the same thing and they created the blues. So it was like blues and blue grass kind of came from the same place in a way.

[13:33] KEN SOLEYN: Well, my grandparents in St. Vincent, They only had a battery, they didn't have electricity. And they only had a battery operated radio. So they were very judicious. They'd only played in the evening to kind of listen to the news and maybe they'd have to shut it off because they wanted to save batteries. So the only thing would be to sing and a lot of it was, my grandmother used to sing church hymns. We were Methodist.

[14:02] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[14:02] KEN SOLEYN: Methodist.

[14:03] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[14:04] KEN SOLEYN: And kind of grew up in the church like that. And, in fact, I was a Sunday school teacher.

[14:09] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[14:14] JAMES JORDAN: Well, you know, being an immigrant, sort of. How do you feel about the current controversy about immigration?

[14:26] KEN SOLEYN: Well, I feel like You do need controls. However, we have to know that.

[14:35] SPEAKER C: Like.

[14:36] KEN SOLEYN: For example, migrants, you can go back.

[14:39] SPEAKER C: To.

[14:41] KEN SOLEYN: You like American music, so hey Woody Guthrie song, 40 T, you know, and it's about Mexicans flying to deportees back. And they crash in Los Gatos Canyon. So that's going back to, like, say, the 30s and 40s. So it's not.

[15:00] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[15:02] KEN SOLEYN: And there have been times when these Farm workers, you know, worked and they were just deported and not paid. So there has to be some control, though. I think with today's technology.

[15:15] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[15:17] KEN SOLEYN: My driver's license has, the new one has a star on it, and when I, when I flu. My mom lives in Florida. They just put your license in a machine and it knows what flight you're on. They know. They don't even have to check. Your whole dossier is on your license or they get it from the cloud somewhere. So I think with today's technology, there ought to be some way where these migrants get an identity card of some sort, you know, registered and you know, maybe they've worked towards citizenship because. Yeah, if you, if you're here illegally and you're working, you are paying taxes. They withhold.

[16:00] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[16:01] JAMES JORDAN: Even if it's just.

[16:03] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[16:06] KEN SOLEYN: So I believe there has to be some control. But I, but I don't like the, I don't like the deportation process that's going on now. Process. I they believe in the Constitution, you know, freedom of speech and all those things.

[16:24] SPEAKER C: And.

[16:26] KEN SOLEYN: The founding fathers left Provisions or the amendments that came on left Provisions to ensure freedom. They don't like the fact that a. A policeman could or, you know, someone that, like a policeman, just come up without it, right? Without a warrant, without due process and cart you away.

[16:47] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[16:49] KEN SOLEYN: You know, one of my things is I remember watching a series on HBO called Band of Brothers, a very good one.

[16:58] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[16:59] KEN SOLEYN: And it's about an army unit. And they actually fought at the Battle of the balls at the end. And there's obviously some Hollywood in this. They liberated the concentration camps, these soldiers. And what they saw was emaciated people that they were afraid to even give them food because if they gave them food, they were so skinny and malnourished. They had at the end the actual soldiers and they're older at this point. I would say speak to those guys about this kind of thing because just hauling people off like that without due process.

[17:43] JAMES JORDAN: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. And you can get caught up in that or anybody could, you know. Yeah, yeah.

[17:50] KEN SOLEYN: I also feel that the political climate has been more polarized, you know, it.

[17:54] JAMES JORDAN: Used to be, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[17:58] KEN SOLEYN: We used to be a bit more civil, you know?

[18:01] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah.

[18:03] KEN SOLEYN: They shook hands, If someone won, the other party won, you said, congratulations, let me know what I can do to.

[18:12] JAMES JORDAN: Help you or... Yeah, yeah.

[18:14] KEN SOLEYN: And you know, you've gone and it was a bit more like bipartisan.

[18:18] JAMES JORDAN: Oh yeah, definitely.

[18:20] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[18:22] JAMES JORDAN: Well, you know, like the immigration thing is so complex and then they want to make it just into some simple black and white thing and you know, it doesn't really address the issue at all.

[18:32] KEN SOLEYN: Well, my question is who in this.

[18:34] SPEAKER C: Country.

[18:36] KEN SOLEYN: Either first generation immigrant like myself, or you can trace back a few generations, typically most Americans can trace their lineage back generations. Maybe their grandparents or great grandparents were immigrants.

[18:52] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[18:52] KEN SOLEYN: People who are not immigrants are the Native Americans.

[18:55] JAMES JORDAN: Right, right, yeah. And even, you know, if you go way back, even them, Yeah, yeah.

[19:02] KEN SOLEYN: And just like music, what would food be like without immigrants? We would pizza and tacos.

[19:09] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, right.

[19:10] KEN SOLEYN: Those are just like, well basically you could think of those as being like American food, right? You want to go out to eat? What are we having today? Oh, let's go out for some Mexican.

[19:19] JAMES JORDAN: Food or... Yeah, yeah.

[19:22] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[19:23] JAMES JORDAN: And nowadays you can got Cuban and Brazilian and on and on.

[19:30] KEN SOLEYN: You know, you probably got some good old fashioned barbecue down by where you live.

[19:34] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, it's almost heresy, but I think Kansas barbecue is better than Texas barbecue. I get shot for that.

[19:45] KEN SOLEYN: Yeah, the Texans would have it. Well, I was told, I gotta do it in my southern accent. He said, Ken, you like barbecue? Yeah, of course. He goes, because up in the north, you all don't really barbecue. You all grill. You all throw a piece of meat on the grill and you call that barbecue. I said, yeah, that's about what we do. We heat up the grill and throw chicken or steak or whatever on the grill and flip it over and we eat it. So he gave me this whole thing on Texas barbecue and the whole lesson and he took us out. And it was more, hey, you know, they had a sweet tea and, you know, the whole, all the trimmings. That's what they called that.

[20:31] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[20:32] JAMES JORDAN: And then you have, I guess what they call Soul Food, you know, collard greens and, you know, good stuff. Yeah, but, well, you know, I remember reading about You know, in the early days, you know, that border of Texas, it was pretty loose. I mean, no, nobody really knew or cared where the border really was. But there were stories about they would, both parties would bus Mexicans over to vote. You know, a little town of 3,000 people would turn in five, five, five thousand votes for each candidate. But both of them are doing it, so nobody really worried about it. Well, I think that's true.

[21:15] KEN SOLEYN: With today's technology, like I do my banking and everything, like I pay my bills online and I guess it's because they've been doing it for a few years. So I think with the technology, there ought to be a way of monitoring this so that elections are fair.

[21:33] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[21:34] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[21:34] JAMES JORDAN: And I've covered enough elections where I know how it works. And you would have to really know what you were doing to screw with the voting machines, you know.

[21:46] KEN SOLEYN: To rig an election.

[21:48] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, you would have to really, and you'd have to do it at every town. You know, I mean, it would be really hard.

[21:55] KEN SOLEYN: I live in a small town now called Londonderry, and we have a town council. And in New Hampshire, we don't pay income tax. We don't pay state taxes.

[22:07] SPEAKER C: Right.

[22:07] KEN SOLEYN: Federal. The tax revenue for the state is through property tax.

[22:12] SPEAKER C: And. Right.

[22:15] KEN SOLEYN: We, we, so we have very good engagement. Last presidential election, we had an 83 turnout. So the people here really engage. They, if you talk to them, they listen to the issues and, yeah, you know. Of course, you know, they're kind of the extreme on both sides. I think historically I tend to go toward the middle of the ground.

[22:43] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, I do too.

[22:47] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[22:48] JAMES JORDAN: Well, you know, I'd always voted for Democrats, but George W. Bush, you know, it just so happened I actually met him on the campaign trail. You know, and I actually had a personal conversation with him and just the way he was, I voted for him because, I mean, he was just a nice guy. I mean, you know, and I was a reporter, but he acted like I was his old buddy, you know?

[23:12] KEN SOLEYN: And I'm just saying this to my wife. I look back at it and compared to Trump. Yeah, George Bush was a prince.

[23:22] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[23:23] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, of course there were two bushes, you know, that was more of just an administrator, you know.

[23:30] KEN SOLEYN: But yeah, well, I think some of the best presidents are the ones that are able to hire good people.

[23:39] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah.

[23:39] KEN SOLEYN: You can't do it all yourself, you have to delegate.

[23:42] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah. And you know, people like Jimmy Carter, you know, was probably actually a pretty good president, but He got the economy trashed, so he took the blame. And even Nixon did some good things.

[24:00] KEN SOLEYN: Well, I was in sales and there were some months where I really worked hard. I didn't get anything to show for it. And then there were other months where you would be sort of cruising along and the orders just came in. The timing was right.

[24:15] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[24:17] KEN SOLEYN: Does the man make the times or the times make the man? That's always the question.

[24:20] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[24:21] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, that's a good point.

[24:23] KEN SOLEYN: Carter certainly was a. Yeah. Appeared to be an honest fellow, you know?

[24:29] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[24:30] KEN SOLEYN: That was his sort of moniker.

[24:33] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[24:35] KEN SOLEYN: At. At the same time, you know, a guy like Lyndon Johnson, who was well connected in the Congress. Was a Wheeler dealer and he knew, oh yeah, you know, what palms the slap or backs the slap or whatever.

[24:50] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And you know, in the South, politics is pretty different too, you know, I mean, I was in South Carolina covering the state house for a few years and, you know, of course then nobody really cared which party you were after the election, you know, and I would go to lunch with these guys, it'd be Republicans and Democrats together and They'd actually work out deals over lunch and it's totally off the record and I would agree to that.

[25:17] SPEAKER C: You.

[25:19] JAMES JORDAN: Just don't have that today. It's just not possible today.

[25:24] KEN SOLEYN: I think maybe the media also has a lot to do with that.

[25:28] JAMES JORDAN: Oh yeah.

[25:29] KEN SOLEYN: Let's say years ago, you got your news from reading a newspaper. I can remember as a kid, pick up the newspaper from my dad. And of course, I would read the sports section first. I didn't, I didn't really care about the, the front of the paper. I would go to the back.

[25:45] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[25:46] KEN SOLEYN: Look at this, you know, the Mets score. If it was the summer.

[25:50] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[25:50] KEN SOLEYN: Or the New York Knicks or whatever it was.

[25:53] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[25:53] KEN SOLEYN: You know, I was more into sports.

[25:56] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[25:57] KEN SOLEYN: Read the comics, you know?

[25:59] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[26:00] KEN SOLEYN: But now you, where are you getting your news from? You're getting. These little Snippets of information from the internet and nothing.

[26:07] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[26:07] KEN SOLEYN: In depth. And I think that's part of the reason you're not, you're not getting the in-depth thought anymore.

[26:14] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Especially the national media. And you can see there, like, if you notice CNN and Fox, the mug shots they use, they're talking about Trump or Biden, whatever, and you can just see it in their mug shots they choose to use. You know, like, I was at CNN, and Trump looked like a crazy man, you know, and on Fox, Biden looked like a insane man, you know, and, and it just starts there and snowballs.

[26:42] KEN SOLEYN: You know, or they'll take, you know, little Snippets of.

[26:46] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[26:47] KEN SOLEYN: Word words that, and they'll, they'll, you take it out of context.

[26:52] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Yeah.

[26:53] KEN SOLEYN: It just gives the opposite message or the wrong message.

[26:55] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Oh, I can give you an example. Local politics I was covering and it was just out of the guy took himself out of context. He was talking about the budget and he said, he really said, there's a, there is a million dollars missing in this budget. And of course the media took off on that. Councilman says there's a million dollars missing. Well, that wasn't what he was saying. He was saying that I can't find that. And I need you to help me find it. And the administrator said, okay, here you go. And here's where it is. And it was, you know, he was saying, I can't find it. He wouldn't say it was missing. And a lot of media just took that as major corruption story.

[27:44] KEN SOLEYN: Warren Buffett said, I can solve a lot of political problems by just one thing. Make a law that no politician, no, no one in Congress can accept any money other than their salary.

[27:59] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[28:00] KEN SOLEYN: Paid by the government.

[28:01] SPEAKER C: Right.

[28:02] KEN SOLEYN: Even if we have to increase the, their salary so that it would be.

[28:06] SPEAKER C: Right.

[28:07] KEN SOLEYN: Other money allowed. And the founding fathers originally didn't view being a legislator. The idea was that these men because it was all men back then had their own businesses or their plantations. And it was a temporary thing that they would go to Washington as a legislator and it wasn't supposed to be a long term thing.

[28:32] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[28:32] KEN SOLEYN: You really weren't making money.

[28:35] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[28:35] KEN SOLEYN: Now if you really want to make money, I'd go.

[28:39] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[28:40] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[28:41] JAMES JORDAN: And then you get that salary forever, you know?

[28:43] KEN SOLEYN: Well that and you get to do insider trading.

[28:47] JAMES JORDAN: I think.

[28:49] KEN SOLEYN: There'S an outfit that they developed a program that follows Nancy Pelosi's trades. And if you were to get after that, you'd make money hand over fist. Now how is it that she's able to make that amount of money while sitting in jail as well? It's tantamount to insider trading. They've made oh, yeah. Legal for that.

[29:12] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, definitely.

[29:14] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[29:15] KEN SOLEYN: The thing that is also very scary is crypto coin to me.

[29:20] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[29:20] KEN SOLEYN: That's a way of laundering because it's. It's. It's kind of. It's encrypted behind a firewall, so no one sees these transactions. There's.

[29:31] SPEAKER C: Right.

[29:32] KEN SOLEYN: No monitoring of it. So if you're a. A drug dealer and you've got all this cash.

[29:37] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[29:37] KEN SOLEYN: You could put money into it. And even if you lose money, you don't care because it's laundering money legally now through, through its crypto.

[29:47] SPEAKER C: Yeah. So.

[29:53] KEN SOLEYN: I think that money is, or the, putting money into the political process is the biggest problem we have in this country.

[30:02] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah. Yeah, it could be some way to get a handle on. On that, you know? You know, well, like, you know, at the state level, it is kind of temporary. You go up to the state Capitol for two months and you're done, you know? And I've known people who, like, well, I can't afford to be a state representative anymore. I'm going to go back to work.

[30:20] KEN SOLEYN: You know, our state reps in New Hampshire only get 500, and that just is gas money. So you have, they have to have other means of income.

[30:31] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[30:33] KEN SOLEYN: And typically they'll run two years.

[30:36] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[30:36] KEN SOLEYN: Another couple of years. And the governor changes every two years as well.

[30:41] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. That's kind of an odd thing in Kansas. We always, it's a red state, so to speak, and always have heavy conservative House and Senate, but we elected Democrat governor, you know, and I've just always told that was kind of curious.

[30:58] KEN SOLEYN: Is the J, the Jayhawkers, right?

[31:00] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was a free state, you know, and it's never really been heavy one way or the other, you know, where there's, or there's two, there's two kinds of Republicans in Kansas. There's conservative, conservative and then there's Democrat light, and they call themselves conservatives, Republicans, too, you know?

[31:26] KEN SOLEYN: But when I think of Kansas, I think of miles and miles of fields of wheat.

[31:33] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[31:34] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[31:35] KEN SOLEYN: But is the economy changing there?

[31:39] JAMES JORDAN: Well, it's still heavy farming, agriculture, you know, and it's been going pretty good, really. You know, the state has had a surplus for the last several years. You know, there's a lot of air, there's a lot of air, air aircraft industry like GE, G Aviation, several others. Boeing has a big plant here. Wichita is kind of an air capital. But there are those huge areas of wheat fields. Like sometimes you go 50 miles without another town. That town may not even have a gas station, you know?

[32:22] KEN SOLEYN: You know, I know you probably. I know, like, in Iowa and some places, they'll drive 20 miles just to get an ice cream cone.

[32:29] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[32:30] KEN SOLEYN: Teenager.

[32:31] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[32:32] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah, yeah. Like, well, we. We have to go 50. 50 miles to go to the doctor, you know? I mean, but we're a small town.

[32:43] KEN SOLEYN: I grew up in Brooklyn, which was the big city, so there was a lot of. I grew up in a, when we first moved to the country, we lived in a predominantly black and Hispanic area. It was, yeah, grade school I went to in junior high school was about 95% black and Hispanic. And the house next door down to us burnt down. So my father decided, well, it's time to start looking into moving. There was a thing we, we owned a, apartment. You know, we had six families and we rented out five of the apartments.

[33:22] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[33:22] KEN SOLEYN: Rumor was that the landlord next door caused the fire because it was a way of.

[33:30] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[33:30] KEN SOLEYN: Collecting the insurance.

[33:32] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[33:33] KEN SOLEYN: Those, those, those neighborhoods really, you know, went down. And you could see the schools I went to. I, I, I. I took an exam and I got into a pre-engineering high school. It was a public school called Brooklyn Tech. And the idea was that they would, it was like regular high school for the first two years. And then the second two years, you took pre-engineering courses.

[33:58] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[33:59] KEN SOLEYN: So I really struggled because I didn't feel like I got too good of an education in the other schools. This school was very much integrated. And then we moved to a predominantly white neighborhood. I think we were one of three brown skin families living in that neighborhood. But my next door neighbor to the, on one side, they were Hasidic Jews.

[34:28] SPEAKER C: And.

[34:31] KEN SOLEYN: On the other side were Polish Catholics. And my best friend down the Street was Irish Catholic. So a very like sort of integrated, you know, with respect to religion. We were Methodists. So everybody said, well, what's the, what's the Methodist? Nobody really knows. Oh, we just kind of like go to church on Sunday. We don't drink a lot.

[34:56] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[34:57] KEN SOLEYN: And, you know, but it was, it was, you know, everyone's sort of got along. It wasn't, we're all sort of working class people.

[35:05] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah.

[35:06] KEN SOLEYN: I think working class people tend to have more empathy, you know.

[35:13] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[35:14] KEN SOLEYN: For others.

[35:16] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[35:17] KEN SOLEYN: I can remember one summer I worked at a gas station just pumping gas, and this is back in the days of full service, so I would wash your windshield, check your oil, my jazz, and. A guy in a Cadillac would pull up and he'd give me like a quarter tip. But a guy in like a plumbing van, a working guy, you know, he'd say, I gotta use the bathroom. I'd throw him the keys and I'd say, make sure you don't mess it up in there. And he'd come out and give me like a $5 tip. Yeah, buy some lunch, you know? Or a $2 tip, which is a big tip back then.

[35:55] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[35:56] KEN SOLEYN: So from there, I figured out that other working class people have more empathy for me, who's just like the lonely guy pumping, you know, the grease monkey pumping gas, you know?

[36:05] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think that's true. Yeah, like if you are, if you get kind of in trouble or stranded by the road or something, some working class guy is going to stop and help you before anybody else will, you know?

[36:20] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[36:21] KEN SOLEYN: I think the other problem with this country is that people have lost politeness.

[36:27] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[36:28] KEN SOLEYN: Just the other day, I was, this guy walked right through a door. He didn't even. And it was a woman, an elderly woman behind him. He didn't even hold the door for her. He just, like, didn't look back. He just went through the door and let it shut. I was behind him, so I went and, you know, opened the door for her and. To say hello to her and let her, let her, let her get in the place, you know, and whatever happened to please and thank you and.

[36:54] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[36:54] KEN SOLEYN: Like people were more polite to me. And we actually learned it in school. It was a, what they call it, etiquette or something like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. How do I answer a telephone and things like that, you know?

[37:08] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know there was a, I still work sometimes in this. One guy, they had a guy there, black college guy. And he was all real polite. Oh, yes, sir. No, sir. You know, all that. And it was unusual for somebody to act like that, you know? I mean, that's how we've come to where somebody being like that is unusual.

[37:37] KEN SOLEYN: Yeah, I think that's something they should, you've got to teach that at a young age. And if you do.

[37:43] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[37:43] KEN SOLEYN: Everyone's going to be at least, you know, it's just too much trying to talk over each other, like when, you know.

[37:51] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[37:53] KEN SOLEYN: I've been through a lot of business meetings with GE. I've been in, you know, business meetings in Japan and things like that, and it's very well structured. Everyone has an opportunity to speak. They let the person speak and then the next person takes his turn and then there might be like a bit of a rebut afterwards or a question or what have you. But I look at some of these ones on TV and they're like trying to talk at the same time and talk over each other.

[38:23] JAMES JORDAN: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. It seems like they're on a team, you know, like Team R or Team D and you know, there's not really any discussion of issues. It's like, you know, if you're a conservative, you like this, this and this, you know, you know, as opposed to actually talking about actual issues, you know? Well, I think.

[38:47] KEN SOLEYN: I think we all want the same thing. We want to, you know, a roof over our head, food to eat, and we want to be able to raise our kids in a safe environment. And send them.

[39:00] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[39:04] KEN SOLEYN: And I, I think the polarization and also the, I don't like the tax structure in that. It seems like the middle class.

[39:13] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[39:13] KEN SOLEYN: And the poorer people are footing the burden.

[39:17] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[39:18] KEN SOLEYN: And I don't understand, you know, why, why is all this money going up to these richer classes of people that Yeah.

[39:26] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[39:26] JAMES JORDAN: And you know, something I've done, it's just my study over years of journalism, I have talked to a lot of CEOs, a lot of business owners, big and small. I asked them one question. What makes you hire new people? You know, just that question, no, nothing. Not a single one has said lower taxes. None of them. And some of them I've said, well, what about if you had lower taxes? And they laugh. Like, no, that's not why I hire people. But yet that's the whole Republican spiel, you know? That's kind of frustrating.

[40:00] KEN SOLEYN: Well, I think also, yes, I do see their point of view in.

[40:07] SPEAKER C: You.

[40:08] KEN SOLEYN: Need capital to start and run a business.

[40:12] JAMES JORDAN: Right.

[40:12] KEN SOLEYN: In my state in New Hampshire, 95% of the businesses are considered small businesses. The businesses under five.

[40:21] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah.

[40:22] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[40:24] KEN SOLEYN: I, I don't want to single out any company, but, you know, let take, for example, a big box store that might be headquartered in Arkansas or somewhere.

[40:34] JAMES JORDAN: Right, right.

[40:36] KEN SOLEYN: If, if they have a business here, how much of their profits is going back out of state?

[40:41] SPEAKER C: Right.

[40:42] KEN SOLEYN: One thing about small businesses. It circulates the money within the community. A small brewery, for example, hires local people, buys supplies from local vendors, and those people in turn pay taxes and spend money in the economy.

[41:07] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's true. Well, you know, something that's not talked about a lot and it is a major conspiracy, but there used to be a lot of small town newspapers owned by a family that had been in the family for 50 years. And in the 80s and 90s, they started being bought up by these companies like Don Ray, Gannett, Gatehouse, etc. And a lot of those small town papers don't exist anymore because they came in and they just sucked the money out and didn't update machinery, didn't do anything, you know, and it's just really that hurt newspapers more than the internet. Really?

[41:46] KEN SOLEYN: I think so. I agree with that. It's the same in growing up in Brooklyn, my mom used to walk down to the, you know, the main street, it's called Church Avenue, and there was a butcher, there was a fish monger, And my mom, we ate fish every Friday. My mom would go in and he knew exactly how she liked it, scaled, clean, and cut up.

[42:13] SPEAKER C: Right.

[42:14] KEN SOLEYN: He didn't even have to even tell him. He just knew.

[42:17] SPEAKER C: Right.

[42:18] KEN SOLEYN: You know, there was literally a German bakery and if you went in there to order cake, the lady would say, Papa, can you make this cake by Saturday? And he would say, Of course. And she didn't write anything down if you ordered a cake like your birthday or something and you picked it up on Saturday morning, it was ready for you.

[42:39] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Right.

[42:40] KEN SOLEYN: So these little small businesses, they don't survive anymore because they know the big conglomerate, you know, Walmarts of the world have the bakery in the Walmart and.

[42:54] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah.

[42:55] KEN SOLEYN: They needed the fish and everything.

[42:57] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[42:58] KEN SOLEYN: Green Grocers always have, like, fresh vegetables.

[43:02] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[43:03] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, I remember those.

[43:06] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[43:07] KEN SOLEYN: I think people were healthier back then, too, because you. You ate.

[43:10] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Fresh.

[43:12] KEN SOLEYN: You didn't have to eat more, you know, seasonal vegetables and things like that.

[43:17] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[43:17] KEN SOLEYN: Meat and things like that. And everything is so processed now.

[43:21] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[43:23] JAMES JORDAN: I don't remember. We used to grow cattle, you know? To eat. And if you butcher a cow and put that in the freezer, the meat is brown. It's not red. And I remember people seeing that and they think, oh, that must be ruined. That's brown meat. No, that's real, honest to God, fresh meat.

[43:38] KEN SOLEYN: You know, put on nitrites. Nitrites make it real.

[43:42] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And, but yeah, it's just amazing how, but yeah, but I think the thing of conglomerating all the newspapers really has hurt. Communication and how we get our news.

[43:58] KEN SOLEYN: I'm always amazed that when I turn on CNN, it always says breaking news.

[44:03] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everything's a crisis, you know? I mean, we had the tariff crisis and then we had the Epstein crisis and now we got another crisis and, you know, what's tomorrow's crisis gonna be?

[44:15] KEN SOLEYN: And I think the technology allows for this sort of instantaneous information.

[44:22] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[44:22] KEN SOLEYN: There's no analysis.

[44:24] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[44:25] KEN SOLEYN: Before you.

[44:26] SPEAKER C: You. You.

[44:26] KEN SOLEYN: You got the story and an editor had to review it, and you, the mere fact of writing something makes you think about it, you know?

[44:34] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah.

[44:35] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[44:36] KEN SOLEYN: You know, like, to this day, if I write something out, my thought is better organized.

[44:41] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely.

[44:43] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[44:44] JAMES JORDAN: Like I always say, sometimes you have to write the story to find out what the story is about.

[44:48] KEN SOLEYN: And rewrite it a few times, you know?

[44:50] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[44:52] KEN SOLEYN: I never wrote a few papers and, you know, marketing material for G.

[44:58] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[44:58] JAMES JORDAN: You know, it's to go.

[45:01] KEN SOLEYN: And I always typically write them and rewrite them and rewrite them.

[45:06] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[45:06] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[45:10] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[45:11] JAMES JORDAN: I've always, I just lost my train of thought there. Short train. Okay.

[45:19] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[45:19] JAMES JORDAN: Let's see. Well, we're coming up to the, close to the end here.

[45:24] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[45:25] KEN SOLEYN: So what do you, I, I think this, this, what would we want to describe this as, this session?

[45:33] JAMES JORDAN: I think it's a good thing to.

[45:34] KEN SOLEYN: Get people with different, you know, points. I think your bio said you lean a little bit to the conservative side. Maybe I lean more to the the liberal side, but it sounds like we.

[45:45] JAMES JORDAN: Don'T really disagree much.

[45:47] KEN SOLEYN: I think that's probably true for more.

[45:49] SPEAKER C: People.

[45:51] KEN SOLEYN: Than what's being depicted in the media. Probably most Americans probably agree on more than they disagree on.

[46:01] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think you always say, I'm starting to freeze up a little bit there. But I always say it is, it is, it is, it is the, it is the Democrats pushing me away. It's not that I'm leaving them.

[46:19] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[46:20] JAMES JORDAN: But, but yeah, I still, I mean, I still consider myself independent, you know, but, yeah, but yeah, on social media just makes it sound like, you know, everybody's out in the streets fighting, but they're really not, you know, I mean, it's, Most people you meet on the street are not going to argue with you about politics, you know.

[46:43] SPEAKER C: Well.

[46:49] KEN SOLEYN: An argument doesn't really, you know, change the original premise.

[46:56] SPEAKER C: Right.

[46:57] KEN SOLEYN: Unless you let the other person talk. And sometimes what I've found is just let the other person talk. And they'll come up to their own conclusion. They'll, they'll tell you all the reasons why the points that.

[47:12] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[47:13] KEN SOLEYN: Point out to them as to why maybe you feel that their point of view is the wrong one.

[47:19] SPEAKER C: So. Right.

[47:20] KEN SOLEYN: The listening, listening skills have been.

[47:23] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[47:26] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think, too, just attitude, like, I, I. I don't really know that there is a such thing as absolute truth, you know, or so I don't think anybody's absolutely 100% wrong or right, you know, it's like, well, okay, that might be partly right, you know?

[47:44] KEN SOLEYN: Yeah, that's a trap that a lot of people fall into. They use absolutes, like if you say all immigrants are criminals. Well, yes, there's some immigrants that are criminals. There's some natural born citizens of criminals.

[48:00] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And some people would, would become criminals if they could, you know.

[48:08] KEN SOLEYN: I remember as a little kid, we broke off an aerial. I broke off an aerial from a guy's car and did a sword fighting. Oh, thing with my friend. We both broke. Broke off these or aerials. And when the guy came, he was so disappointed. Someone broke off his or aerial. He couldn't listen to, you know, I felt really bad about it. You know, it was like, where's the remorse? You know, I use that as an. Yeah, where's the rewards now for it? It's. It's like, you can lie, you can get away with crime, and as long as you make money, it's fine. But there doesn't seem to be any remorse anymore.

[48:53] SPEAKER C: That.

[48:54] KEN SOLEYN: And that's.

[48:55] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, that's a good point, too.

[48:57] SPEAKER C: Yeah. Yeah.

[49:00] JAMES JORDAN: Right. Well, I enjoyed it. I don't know.

[49:04] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[49:05] JAMES JORDAN: I could have.

[49:07] KEN SOLEYN: I didn't know that bluegrass is still alive and kicking.

[49:10] JAMES JORDAN: Oh, yeah. Yeah, the third. The third week of September, I'll be at the Bluegrass Festival. And it's quite an experience.

[49:19] SPEAKER C: Yeah.

[49:21] KEN SOLEYN: It'S really like an almost like virtuoso music.

[49:25] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah.

[49:26] KEN SOLEYN: My ears also are more tuned to acoustic music as I get older.

[49:30] JAMES JORDAN: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. In my retirement, I'm starting to learn to play guitar. So that's kind of a new adventure for me. But, yeah. All right, well, I think we're about out of time, so. Okay, yeah.

[49:44] KEN SOLEYN: Well, it was nice to chat with you a bit and you have a good day now. And I guess we can, you know, stop the recording and go from there.

[49:53] JAMES JORDAN: Okay. All right.