Transcript of Episode 1 Season 2

LaMondre Pough:  And you it’s tough for me because I see how differently people are treated.

I’m talking about. When you have peaceful protestors that are met with tear gas and, full on military force so that someone can go and take a photo in front of a church with an upside down bible.

But then you have people who are coming in with improvised, explosive devices who are coming in with spears and swords and pitchforks and guns and zip ties.

And they’re taking selfies with them.

Welcome to 3DVU one conversation, three different perspectives. I’m LaMondre Pough.

David Pérez: I am David Pérez.

Richard Streitz: And I’m Richard Streitz. Thank you for joining us

LaMondre Pough: January sixth, for most Americans and I would dare say many people around the world was a day that none of us had ever seen before. And many of us had never imagined that it would really be a thing I’m talking about the day when terrorists attacked the US Capitol and their goal was to stop the peaceful transfer of power through the certification of the ballots that were cast in the 2020 election, many in the media and many people throughout the nation are saying that these attacks on the US Capitol were instigated and encouraged by the sitting president Donald John Trump. And we really want to take this time to discuss it. There are so many different aspects that we, could come from this. There are so many different perspectives that we could add, but that’s what this show is about. This show is 3DVU. It’s one conversation, three different perspectives.

And so that’s what we’re going to talk about today. So gentlemen, January the sixth, the nation cap, the nation’s Capitol being overrun by a mob.

Richard Streitz: Yeah. Frightening. Certainly a day that will live in infamy, not to quote, a distant, a similar sort of tragedy that the country has seen something that I think no one ever believed we would ever see images of the Confederate flag being run through the state Capitol something that was, has actually never, ever happened and was, actually averted the first time it happened during the during the time that the British actually burnt down the Capitol have we seen something as, dramatic as, this but during the civil war, we were able to block the the confederates from getting into the Capitol.

And it seems that we weren’t able to do that this time, or at least the emblem of, a Confederacy. So shocking just, really and, know, LaMondre, like you said, just so many different angles to talk about this. And it was a mob it was a mob that comprised of many different people from all walks of life.

And I think that’s one of the things that makes it even more shocking and surprising. You had Individuals of all levels of education individuals of all professions, attorneys doctors civil leaders, elected officials running the entire gamut all the way to hourly hardworking individuals w trying to support their families and for whatever reason, all of them were compelled to feel that this was something that was necessary or essential. One thing I think it’s important to point out is that it was a horrible and egregious act to our democracy. And, to all of us, but not everyone that was in that demonstration actually got into the Capitol. And so some of them were compla, complacent in their preventing of it, just standing there observing it.

And maybe thinking that was a line that they didn’t want to necessarily cross when they started actually breaking windows and tearing doors down and jumping in. Cause there were quite a lot of people, but not all of them got into the Capitol. I think it’s only fair to, say that it was a mob spurred on by words from from the commander in chief, our elected president.

But ultimately executed by individuals who I think anyone would label as extremists in, regard to the level of destruction and, deliberate intent to disrupt a legal, congressional activity with the sole intent of doing, that as well as property and, harm to individuals.

What’s interesting is that some of the news I’ve heard and I don’t cater to any one news outlet. I listen to all outlets that I can not only just domestically, but internationally as well, because I try to get as much as a large perspective from all points of view and try to digest an opinion based on what I hear from everyone.

I think that’s, only prudent and fair to myself in making a valid opinion. I think it’s wrong to necessarily listen to only one news source. I, think it’s important to understand and get a perspective from all news sources. And, interestingly enough, foreign news sources, I think sometimes I get the most accurate rendering of news from foreign news sources.

Not all the times, but some, but sometimes it’s interesting. You get a very interesting perspective that you don’t necessarily hear. It’s a third perspective. Then the than the opinions that you hear. Either from the left or from the right here in the U S so I think it, and that’s why I give it some level of validity in regard to digesting, hearing and understanding and digesting.

So, with that, you know, there are certainly some interesting things that that have come up and one is that this wasn’t necessarily just a, mob frothed up, there on the day as more of a strategically planned event by some professional activists that took the opportunity of the, heat of the moment to execute a plan that they have been planning for months.

And this is something that’s now coming out and, we’re only in the infancy of hearing the how’s and the why’s behind all of this. Again there are just so many different level to, to this agregious act against our democracy that I think everyone would agree is something that we can’t just let go by and we need to react to prevent from ever happening again.

It certainly is a litmus test to where we are as a people and as a society at this point in time. And it’s hard to draw parallels from the past and, parallels of what’s gonna happen in the future, predict what’s going to happen in the future. We’re really in a unique place where we as a country have stretched.

Stretched our, democracy to, its, limit. And we’ll see if it snaps or if it can actually withstand it and bounce back as it has in the past. We are a resilient people, no matter what I think we, as Americans are an extremely resilient people and we will come back from this. We’ll be stronger.

I, I think the three of us actually listened to Arnold Schwartzenegger, Schwarzenegger’s video on this that has had millions of views already. And I think the analogy he has of annealed steel of, hitting it, putting in the forge, putting in the water, I think there’s a lot of truth to that about us and our democracy.

Our democracy still, is really in its adolescence in regard to compare to other global governments. And, so I think what we’re doing is going through that process of annealing and, making stronger. And making it better for the future.

David Pérez: Yeah. One thing that I would like to, talk about is the fact that we were all basically on cloud nine, thinking 2020 was over. Everything was better. And I say this coming from Costa Rica right, being completely away from, what happened, but it really was like a grounding moment, letting us letting everyone in the world know and pretty quickly in 2021, that we’re still in this right.

That 2020 was not just a year that ended on the 31st of December or, that we were, we have a clean slate. Absolutely not. But we have a lot of work to do because there’s everything that happened in 2020 is going to have repercussions. It’s going to have a ripple effect across, the world. And of course, in, in the U S mostly because the US has suffered from neglecting a lot of people for a lot of time. And all of those groups are angry at the system. And now the system is trying to control this. And I understand that urge to, to try to, make people understand that this is not right, that you cannot be against democracy and, go get away with it.

Do something so blatantly absurd and post pictures of yourself on social media and pretend like nothing happened. But I would also like to, bring to the conversation a time in Costa Rican history. That something like this happened. And I know that when we think about Costa Rica, there’s always a Pacific country that has a very stable political system.

And that’s mainly true. And the reason for that, I think stems from this event that happened  in the 18 hundreds. I think when we were fighting for our independence, there was a group from our independence from Spain, there was a group of people that thought that we should remain part of a kingdom. And there were others that thought that we should become a state, a full fledged country.

The ones that wanted to remain part of a kingdom since Spain was not gonna keep us anymore, they had to find another one. So they found Mexico, the Kingdom of Mexico, and they decided to fight about it. And there was a civil war. Of course the scale is absolutely small. Almost no one died. If you, take into consideration the amount of people, but there was a big fight.

And in the end, the people that won were the ones that were in favor of becoming a country. So they had to decide what to do with the insurrectionists, the ones that were against the state and in those conversations, there was a very wise man that told them. So you want to kill them. If you want to kill them, you don’t kill them with guns.

You buried them and leave their heads outside of the ground and have the dogs come and eat them. So of course everyone was like no, we don’t want to be so,

Richard Streitz: So barbaric.

David Pérez: About it. Yeah. So barbaric. And he was like, if you’re not willing to do it like that, then don’t do it at all. Because what you’re going to be sewing is a lot of hatred from their children who are then going to rise again from the children of their children, who are then going to rise again.

So you have to treat them with a little respect because in the end they had their ideals, they had their, own concerns about what they thought was the best thing to do. So you have to punish them because they need to understand that this is not okay. But you don’t have to punish them absolutely.

Because that’s only going to sew a lot more hatred and from hatred comes division, and from division comes more problems like these ones that we were seeing in the U S. So the fact that they decided to just basically remove them from their houses, they moved them from one part of the country to another part of the country when traveling was very hard.

They were basically exiled from, their families. And that was enough because they, could still be visited. They could still be accompanied by their family members and nothing ever happened again like that in Costa Rica. I think there’s a lot to learn from, that peaceful reaction to, a situation.

And that might be a good perspective to take into consideration when we’re talking about this, because I know that US citizens. You guys included are very angry that this can happen and angry at the people that provoked it and angry at the people that actually went inside and did those horrible things.

And there’s reason to be angry, but there’s also reason for sense in the fact that we need to strategize a little bit and think about the future of the, country of the United States as a union.

LaMondre Pough: Yeah. Really, good great story there. And, I love the example of it, but I will tell you we, we had a civil war here in the U S as well.

And the side that lost, never really quite understood that they lost. And this is why you have the Confederate flag being paraded through the Capitol in this insurrection. Okay. And the other piece of that is at the end of that civil war extreme kindness was showen to the Confederates, extreme kindness.

In fact, the whole war was fought, I know people will say state’s rights. But it was about state’s rights to own slaves, to own other people. That’s what it was about. And I don’t care how history tries to or, the writers or rewriters of history, trying to try to dress it up and make it pretty. The truth is that war was fought over the rights of human beings to own other human beings. And what did the US government do after that? They paid those people who owned other people because of a loss of property, but there was never any kind of anything given to those who were previously owned.

And so while I, love the example that you gave with Costa Rica David, in the U S those who were, really bore the brunt of such brutality of such hatred, of such barbarianism are now being asked again, along with other people to show some kindness. And I, understand it because we are we, need to appeal to the, better part of us, because obviously that’s not what happened on the other side. So you can’t, you, you can’t in, in, good faith meet kind of hatred with the same kind of hatred. I get that, I fully get that and I’m not advocating for that at all, but I think that we have to be serious in our approach. When we say there has to be some kind of consequence for these actions, because if there is not consequence. If there is not consequence for this action, really all that was preparation and practice for the big one that’s coming. And you it’s tough for me because I see how differently people are treated.

I’m talking about. When you have peaceful protestors that are met with tear gas and, full on military force so that someone can go and take a photo in front of a church with an upside down bible.

But then you have people who are coming in with improvised, explosive devices who are coming in with spears and swords and pitchforks and guns and zip ties.

And they’re taking selfies with them.

They’re being escorted into the building. It’s what Richard said. You realize then that this was a coordinated thought out planned out event. And yes, there have, may have been thousands of people in the background that they weren’t down with the breaking into the Capitol,and that not, they really thought they were going to just stand up there and go ‘Rah, Rah, Shish-kum-bah!’, you know that’s what they thought they were going to do. But no, there was a point of that spear, there was a tip that spear that had other ideas who knew exactly what they went in there for and had the plans to do so, they erected a noose and a scaffolding on the West side of the state Capitol, they chanted ‘Hang  Mike Pence’.

So when we started thinking about, how we move forward and we absolutely have to think about how we move forward, but my thinking is we have to move forward without the rose colored glasses on, without the concept of very good people on both sides. Because those people who broke into the Capitol, even if they got whipped up into the, heat of the moment, there still has to be severe consequences for those actions.

And I’m not saying that we should line them up and shoot them. I’m not saying that at all, but I’m saying we, we have to do this. In a way that democracy stands strong and that we’re not, we can not be the company that co-signs this foolishness in other words. And so am I angry? Yes. I’m angry. Do I feel like if there was not an example of two Americas, this should be your greatest example of it because we saw it play that and we’ve seen these things played out.

I hate when I hear the equivocations of what happened as a result of the protest, when people’s lives have been taken by the police in this country and very little has been done about it. And then you compare that to this. It’s a false equivalence, it’s a false equivalence. Yeah. Yeah. I hear you.

And I agree that we need to, be very strategic in our approach as to how we do how we deal with this, but we also need to be swift and we need to be exact.

Richard Streitz: Yeah. I think one of the, one of the things in regard to going after those individuals is that the FBI was immediately that same day they were already starting to investigate and hunt down the individuals, especially the ones that were on, pictures and, on social media and so forth.

And they’re going through the cameras that were throughout the building, identifying individuals. And they’ve made today that we’re recording this, I think they’ve made 90 plus arrests already of, individuals. And so there, there certainly is a reckoning in regard to that, and that’s just the individuals themselves, but going beyond that there’s corporations that are now identifying individuals that are their employees and, taking action, they’re disciplinary or, removing from employment.

There are sanctions that companies are, doing on, individuals and, organizations that were associated with this. I, think it’s interesting that we see, and again, this is what I mean about how we’re, stretching to the limit. The democracy in, in, in regard to how we all react to it as a peoples as, a, country all aspects of it political business civil and, otherwise and it’s.

We are really, truly truly split with that. Some, level of fraction, whether it’s a minority or it is a minority, but how big is that minority, I guess is what is, is somewhat up in the air in, regard to how staunch is that, is that minority are we talking about the rabble of ultimately a couple of hundred individuals that are that are the, you know, professional activists, if you will, the ones that are, going out and or is it more is it really, truly an army of thousands and thousands of individuals it’s, that is something that ultimately is not, I think completely known, at least not, publicly or, immediately after.

I mean, I think everyone, myself included have opinions about, that, but in regards to the fact it’s certainly to be seen but there’s certainly action happening. And and even at the at the political level in dealing with the impeachment which those hearings are going as we’re recording this, so the impeachments are hearings are going on right now.

And there’s there’s a lot to be said about the, actions of that and, cleaning the slate and allowing the new administration to come in to do their good work for the peoples. That we desperately need. I think we need to look at what happened and, prepare very seriously for the things that are going to continue happening.

And LaMondre to your point you’re right. You can’t compare what happened. It’s, farcical to see the double standard that exists. It is, just. It’s plain for everyone to see it’s in plain sight. The, extreme privilege that exists between the standards of how one group is treated versus another.

And how much of that I and I’ve heard stories, and again there’s, a ton of stories because this is all happening in real time in regard to history. As time goes on, history will be able to in hindsight, be able to see exactly what happened and how, but certainly I’ve heard stories where the national guard actually was sitting, standing by, but they were never allowed to come in.

And, that is disturbing. The there was a lot of information about how serious this preemptive strike was going to be given the guise of it being a mob. So it’s not, and a lot of this was out on social media prior, and a lot of agencies knew and understood, but they lacked the final permission because it’s a state property because of the, legality of, the location of the Capitol itself.

They have to be asked to go in. They can’t just go in uninvited.

And that is what never happened. And that is what is even more disturbing than anything else. And again, that’s information how true that is, I don’t know. Again, time is going to tell about the reality of all that, but that’s certainly information that I’ve heard about from a couple of different sources, not just one.

And, so it’s, interesting how troubling, how really truly disturbing how and why the actions were allowed to transpire the way they did without any sort of interaction. It was six hours during the course of that. And at the end, I think it was very, important that the house came back when all, after they had cleared, they weren’t going to allow it disrupt them.

They weren’t going to allow this to interrupt the people’s work. They came back and they did an executed completely what needed to have happen.

LaMondre Pough: A connection issue. Right there. And you, know what? I agree that it is good to see that they still continued to certify the election results.

Even after a full day of being under siege, that the process of democracy that the institution of democracy still stood even after, even after people whose lives had been threatening, undoubtedly, some people had lost their lives at that point. So it does, help us to realize that our institutions, are strong, that our institutions are robust even, even.

though we saw an example of how fragile we are as well. And I think that helped to, if nothing else, it helped to realign that this democracy is fragile and that there has to be faith and a commitment to ensuring that our institutions stand. A part of sustainability is trust. And the shared set of values.

Those are key elements in sustainability. And I think to Richard’s point, and I think to Richard’s point, the fact that those that, that, certification of those votes still carry it on is a real testament to the commitment that even if we don’t agree all the time, that the majority of those that we have elected to represent us still hold true to those institutions, being a value.

David Pérez: Yeah. At least at, at some level, there’s still some ingrained respect for democracy more than anything else, because it’s, a very thin line. The one that democracy hangs from, it can break at any point when any part of society starts to lose trust. And we have talked about this. Trust is an essential part of living in society because basically the reason that society exists is because there’s a social contract.

But if, it keeps being broken from one side being more favored than the other, when we talked about equality or all of those types of things, keep happening. That those thin lines that connect democracy start breaking. And when all of them break democracy is no more. And I, think what could have happened if Trump had more support inside the, Senate.

If they really wanted, they could have overturned the election and there would have been nothing to do. They could have done it legally quote, unquote, and make, made it legal. As it has happened in many other countries like Venezuela, like Cuba and, and he could, would have stayed in power against the people’s choice.

There were a , a few people that were against him or were more pro system than he thought. And he lost that battle. But the thing is that even if Trump is impeached and if he can’t run once more, because we know he will run one, run once more, if he’s allowed to. There’s always going to be a chance for someone else to do this.

And, we need to understand that’s a that’s a possibility all the time. So we need to be vigilant. We need to be very vigilant and trust the system. And if you don’t trust the system, work the system to make the system better, not work against the system, because if you don’t do that, then you’re going to break what you hold dear that’s democracy. I’m not saying that democracy is the best thing that’s out there because there probably is a better way of doing government, but we don’t know it yet. So if we want something better, let’s build it together and let’s find consensus and just build back better, really build back better.

It’s it’s, there’s nothing else that we can do. And again, this was a wake-up call for every single one of us to, remember that life keeps going on. Even if, you’re celebrating with your family on January 1st. We, we, still need to work. We need, still need to make the world a better place.

We still need to, fight for what we think is right. And try to take that fight within the system, because I really believe that if the farm is getting rotten from the inside, there’s nothing you can do from the outside. You’re only gonna see it rot and break. So political participation is going to be very important for all of us that are angry to take part in this and make things better, but we need to make it from within.

Richard Streitz: Yeah.

And in a peaceful civil way.

David Pérez: Yeah.

Richard Streitz: Of course. It, it’s interesting Ben Franklin often referred to democracy as the divine civil experiment and, a work in progress. And, I think that’s very true. The democracy is a living entity. It’s, ever evolving and, having to continually adapt to the times and change to the times.

We, live in very different times than we did two, 300 years ago. And as a result, we’ve had to make slight adjustments to to democracy to our sacred documents, to the constitution as time has gone on. Yeah. And and, we will continue to do that. We will have to continue to do that, to adapt and to mold and to it’s not, wholly perfect.

Because we’re not a wholly perfect people. No one is, this is the curse of of, our species. We are an imperfect, we are imperfect beings. And so as a result, we’re not always going to get it right. We, will try very hard to do the best we can but, it’s sometimes we may, miss the mark.

And I think this was one of those periods and times where we can, when we can say we may have missed the mark. How did we get who, we got here from for a number of different reasons for four years of complacency, this didn’t happen overnight. And, it’s more than four years. It’s more than four years of complacency. This, is just a catalyst of many, societal ills coming to head at the same time.

And and, so we just have to, we have to let cooler heads prevail and let the serious thinkers examine and come to a to, to, some sort of solution and resolution as to how we can all move forward in a way that is unifying and, together be proud of what we’re doing as Americans.

LaMondre Pough: Yeah.

Yeah. I, believe that we must go back to the ideals that were set forth in the constitution. And the idea that the very country was founded on that it was about our institution. It was about the.

It was really not about personality, not about charisma, not about an individual, but it’s about country. That it’s not about a party. It’s not about allegiance to a political ideology, but it is about the institution of democracy and what that means. And really and, really live up to that standard.

Because we realize that not everything goes your way, your guy or girl doesn’t always win, but the institution is what holds. And so I think we have to make a real commitment to that. And I think we have to make a real commitment to decency we’ve talked about the decline of decency before, but making a real commitment to decency and what that means, but that also means that we have to have real consequences when those things are not upheld when those things are violated, when those things are when those things are no longer valued.

So I believe that we will recover from this. We will move on from this. Do I believe that some other things may happen? Absolutely. I think that they’re planning for other events to happen soon, but I believe we will, we will get through this. I believe we will survive this. And I believe that the better of us will prevail.

As, David touted president elet Joe Biden’s slogan ‘build back better’. So that’s the goal to build back better. And I will tell you, we did not expect this to be our first show of the new season at all, but Hey, that’s the way that things are. And. Ultimately, I know that a part of our goal is to present different perspectives is to present different viewpoints and, how we see the world.

And honestly, this is just what’s going on in the world right now. So welcome to 2021. Thank you all for listening and we so appreciate your time. Take care.

David Pérez: Thanks for joining us this week on 3DVU. Make sure to visit our website Ruhglobal.com/3DVU. That’s RUHglobal.com/3DVU where you can subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts or join our YouTube channel.

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