EP 17 Latest News + Is the MMR Vaccine Safe and Effective?

Odysseas (00:00)
What do you think? How do I look? it’s bumping against a Union Cavalry ⁓

AJ Layon (00:03)
What the f- What is that?

Are you trying

to be like George Galloway?

Odysseas (00:12)
⁓ I’m trying to be like a ⁓ Ulysses S. Grant. Yeah, it was alright. was alright. Maybe not the best president, but yeah, except it’s certainly not the worst. Okay, so we are back. Welcome back to Comrade Uncle. I’m here with my comrade and my uncle, Abraham Joseph Lyoun. ⁓

AJ Layon (00:18)
Well, you know, friend was okay. mean, you know, he was, was, all right, there you go. Nah, but certainly not the worst. Certainly not the worst. Certainly not the worst. Right, right.

I’m here with my comrade

nephew, Odysseus of Lydopolis.

Odysseas (00:43)
Woo, that’s me. And ⁓ we are here to talk to you today about a variety of things. First, a quick rundown of the news. ⁓ Israel, of course, has broken its ceasefire ⁓ and has been relentlessly and brutally bombing Gaza, know, thousands dead, ⁓ and many more maimed. And let’s see here. ⁓

A group of lawyers in the UK have brought a suit ⁓ on behalf pro bono on behalf ⁓ of Hamas. guess I’ll probably bleep that out. And I don’t know. don’t know. I don’t know. I could see it causing problems for us on YouTube. Yeah, the resistance. There you go. Of a certain resistance group, ⁓ Palestinians starting with an H.

AJ Layon (01:22)
Are we not allowed to say the word Hamas now either?

How about if we say the resistance?

Odysseas (01:38)
⁓ in the UK challenging their designation as a terror group. ⁓ And let’s see, what else? ⁓ Then a few other things that we’re actually gonna dive into a little more deeply. That’s about the long and short of it at the moment. ⁓

AJ Layon (01:56)
Well,

there is another thing. The International Court of Justice has ⁓ requested, I believe it’s a request, that made a request to the government of Hungary that they present themselves to explain why they didn’t arrest Netanyahu when he was recently on a state visit to Hungary. That’s one. And I think that that’s actually quite important. ⁓ It’s the ICJ sort of move, they’re pretty, they’re slow, they’re gonna be slow, of course.

Odysseas (01:59)
Yeah, hit me.

AJ Layon (02:26)
But it appears that they’re at least moving on this, which is important. And as far as you mentioned at the top of this, the Israelis had broken the ceasefire, which actually, I don’t think it was ever a ceasefire, just like the Lebanese ceasefire, sorry, the ceasefire with Hezbollah was never a ceasefire. They’ve broken it thousands of times. ⁓ And it’s unclear precisely what’s gonna happen, although there are reports

Odysseas (02:46)
Good point. Yeah.

AJ Layon (02:56)
that I have read that the resistance, that resistance organization whose name starts with an H has taken credit for the destruction of a handful of Merkava tanks and so forth. So ongoing things that we just don’t hear about. Probably the best place to hear them is electronic Intifava. I don’t know if we have that ⁓ linked in this podcast, but we should. They do a weekly update. I mean, first of all, they’re just good. And they do do a weekly update on resistance activities.

Odysseas (03:16)
I will. Yeah.

AJ Layon (03:25)
⁓ throughout. I think the other thing is, although I don’t know that I have anything new to say, is the Yemenis who continue to simply boggle the mind at their resistance and their steadfastness and their just unwillingness to be kicked around by anybody. I mean, there may be things that these guys, that we would criticize these guys for. I have to admit, I don’t know as much about them as I probably should, but my God, when it comes to

Odysseas (03:34)
yes.

AJ Layon (03:56)
being upright, steadfast, and saying we’re stand up for the Palestinians. Actually, when it comes to defending the genocide convention, which of course, as I know you know, the United States of America was one of the principle signatories. There’s a different term principle, but what it means is that we were like a co-convener, this country, which makes us even more responsible for defending that convention, which of course we’ve not done.

Not in the slightest. So the fact that the Yemenis have done this, the fact that Hezbollah, although it’s not a state, it’s a resistance group, has done this. The fact that Iran has done this is like extremely important. mean, you know, there are, as I’ve said to my own friends and family, there are many things we could disagree on and still, like James Baldwin says, still be friends.

Odysseas (04:26)
disregarded it.

AJ Layon (04:54)
But when the disagreement or your disagreement, not you, but this generic disagreement compromises my ability to be seen as a human, that is the brick wall. And for me, and I think for many, genocide is that brick wall. ⁓ And we and our European brothers and sisters… ⁓

And many, including in the Middle East, are turning their eyes away from the genocide and saying, well, whatever, doesn’t matter. I think it is the central issue, as much as some people have said, when I say some people have said what I’m really referring to, I’m not being Trumpian here. I’m being, it’s that there are people who I know whose names are best left out. Well, you know, it’s not that big a deal. I mean, come on, it’s just fucking Palestine, really. You know, just like Spain in the 30s was just Spain.

Whatever. Vietnam is just Vietnam. ⁓ And I think it is the central issue. So.

Odysseas (05:49)
Yeah, good example.

Yeah, for what

it’s worth, the Genocide Convention ⁓ states that it’s the duty of all the signatories to intervene if there’s a genocide going on. ⁓

AJ Layon (06:10)
In

the, to the, there’s a phrase though, to the extent that they can, right? I mean, in other words, you’re not expected to be a small country and send a hundred thousand troops somewhere to the extent that you’re able. And that’s what Yemen has done and Hezbollah has done and Iran has done.

Odysseas (06:15)
Yeah. Right.

All right, yeah. Yeah, yeah, and specifically

with Yemen, ⁓ because it’s worth stating, because it never gets said in the mainstream media, what they’re doing is blockading the canal, ⁓ stopping Israeli and Israeli allied traffic, shipping traffic from going through. ⁓ Yeah, no other, and…

AJ Layon (06:42)
Yes. No other. No other. No other. And they stopped the blockade when

the ceasefire was signed. They said, right. I in other words, they’re not being pirates. They’re standing up for the Genocide Convention. That, I think, is extremely important. And in other news, we have, as you may have noticed, our own homegrown Gestapo now in the United States arresting children, mostly brown people, brown children.

Odysseas (06:50)
Yeah. ⁓

Yep, yep, okay.

Yeah.

AJ Layon (07:11)
Brown men, brown women off the streets, actually not arrest, arrest is the wrong term. Sweeping them off the streets, abducting them, breaking into their cars, breaking windows ⁓ to take them to hearings where they might be deported. Actually, no. There are no hearings. There are no hearings. We are basically sending them, it appears, to, ⁓ I think the term would be, if not death camp, because I’m not sure they’re death camps, but at least concentration camps.

Odysseas (07:15)
abducting.

If they get a hearing, maybe. Yeah, right. Right.

AJ Layon (07:41)
In El Salvador, we have allied ourselves. Actually, we have been allied with the Salvadoran right wing for decades and decades and decades and decades. We have allied ourselves with Bukele, who is, I’m exceptionally sorry to say, but it simply proves the point, parenthetically, that there is no solidarity, but class solidarity. But he is, I’m sorry to say, a Palestinian. ⁓ And he is in El Salvador. He’s the president and he is an absolute thug.

Odysseas (07:49)
Yeah.

Yes.

AJ Layon (08:11)
So he is taking some millions of dollars from our orange-haired master and taking people who have been swept off the streets and put into these camps, concentration camps, at least. And you know, there are those of us, there are those who say, well, God, you know, that’s a problem, but they’re here illegally. I mean, come on. Well, let me say, so, Obisie, you’re walking along the street. You know you left your wallet at home. I mean, you

I wish you wouldn’t forget that stuff, but you did. And you you’re kind of like a brownish, whitish guy. I you’re not black, you’re not, but, and some ice guy comes and says to you, I don’t like the, what is that phrase? The fit of your jib. That’s probably not the right phrase. No, not the color, it’s the, way it’s, there we go, the cut of your jib. And you know, and he sweeps you into a van after handcuffing you.

Odysseas (08:49)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, the cut of your jib or your tattoos maybe. Cut the cut of your jib.

AJ Layon (09:09)
You know, if there is no due process, a very boring term by the way, due process, but if there’s no due process, how in God’s name will you ever prove you’re a citizen? You won’t. You will simply be put in the concentration camp, full stop. And that’s what these criminals, and they are criminals, have done. It is, and those among us who say, well, you know, again, they’re illegal aliens. Sorry, I don’t buy the term.

They may be unpapered people, whatever they’re… If the feds can do this, if the cops, if ICE can do this to them, they can do it to you, person who doesn’t really care. Because if there’s no hearing, if there’s no due process, how will you ever prove that you are not an unpapered ferner? You can’t. So this is really very dangerous. And as you also probably know, when the Supreme Court said, bring this one guy, this one guy…

that some 70 percent, according to what I’ve seen in the press, so it could be off, but some 70 percent or more of the people swept off the streets not only are not gang members, but have no records of criminality, full stop, anywhere at all. But how, of course, how would we ever know that if there’s no hearings? They’re just kicked out of the country into a camp.

Odysseas (10:28)
Yeah.

Well, and now you’ve got, ⁓ now you’ve got, ⁓ you know, I just saw some news of Trump was talking with Bukele talking about expanding it potentially to, ⁓ did, what was the phrase? Yeah, basically, yeah, yeah. Homegrown, yeah.

AJ Layon (10:44)
bad guys that are Americans. Yes, yes, yes. That’s right. You know, it’s like, so

our own homegrown ⁓ criminals. So the bad guys, people who push people into the the subways is what he said. ⁓ and then when the Supreme Court in a very strange nine to zero here ruling said that, well, while this federal judge may have overstepped her boundaries a little bit.

Odysseas (10:57)
⁓

AJ Layon (11:13)
You have to bring this guy back full stop, bring him back now. And Biden gave him the middle, Biden, forgive me. Trump gave him the middle finger and said, not going to do it. So now if, if, you know, you and I have perhaps on this air, but certainly in private, we have disagreed a little bit about the foundational aspects of American fascism and kind of depending how you define things.

Odysseas (11:19)
You’re not wrong.

AJ Layon (11:40)
We weren’t, but we are, or we were, and we are. But as you know, Mussolini defined his fascism as a corporatist state where the state and its means of repression allied with big business. And that was what he considered that. In German fascism, it’s of course, it’s the ignoring of law, international and national, the suppression of democracy, racism, and so forth.

I think we’ve achieved both of those. I think we have. And this is, ⁓ I find incredibly dangerous. And of course, to my, you know, since we are after all, socialists, and we do believe in redemption, or at least changing people’s minds, to my right wing sisters and brothers who joined the NRA a long time ago because don’t tread on me, motherfucker, don’t tread on me.

Odysseas (12:11)
Yeah. Yeah.

AJ Layon (12:34)
Where are you guys? I’m not suggesting we need to have violence, but why weren’t you at this hands-off marches? Where were you guys? I mean, this is, if not fascism, I don’t know what this is. And I believe it is, definitionally, fascism. So this is an extremely dangerous thing. It’s certainly unconstitutional. It’s certainly unconstitutional. I think it’s worse than that, though. And I say what I have said in the past, which is the Dems, the Democratic Party,

Odysseas (12:48)
All right. I mean, it’s unconstitutional. Yeah, go ahead, go ahead.

AJ Layon (13:03)
opened the doorway for this as liberals are wont to do. They opened the doorway and the fascists have walked in and kept it open.

Odysseas (13:09)
kept it open. I mean,

you could draw a direct line from this to ⁓ this from the ⁓ extraordinary rendition. ⁓ basically, know, mean, Guantanamo, Bush, ⁓ you know, this is not a new thing. And not only is it not a new thing, but the ⁓ Dems, even with the super majority, failed to close the door, decided not to close the door on any of this sort of stuff. Same thing with ICE, you know, Biden could have reformed it or abolished it. Nope, forget it.

Instead, he did Trump’s policy, which frees Trump up, of course, to do this policy.

AJ Layon (13:45)
And it’s not

just the Bush issues, right? There’s a author, Ellen, I believe it’s Ellen Schrecker, whose book, Great Are the Crimes, talks about the ⁓ anti-socialist scares and sort of illegal ⁓ suppression of the left movement in the United States back starting World War I. So no, that book is actually… ⁓

Odysseas (13:47)
Which isn’t to say he’s not worth worse.

Yeah.

Yes.

Yes, yes. Yeah, Wilson, absolutely. Very, very

good point.

AJ Layon (14:15)
I will say

that book is important to read because it as in another book, has, you know, it can happen here. It has happened here and it’s happening again here. Only this time, the union movements are extremely weak. The left opposition is weak. The liberal opposition is non-existent. I mean, you we saw the president of Harvard finally stand up, excuse me, and say, we will not put up with your nonsense, Trump, you know, echo Sierra.

Odysseas (14:23)
Yup. Yup. Yup.

AJ Layon (14:45)
Alpha, delta. ⁓ Each hit and die is what it means. I’m not arguing that threatening our glorious orange-haired president. It’s simply… ⁓ But Harvard did stand up and the president of Harvard stood up. Finally, Columbia totally knelt down, as did Johns Hopkins, as did… As have a bunch. So, I mean…

Odysseas (14:56)
Yeah, though, though, figuratively satire. ⁓

Yeah.

AJ Layon (15:14)
Good. So this is good. And

Odysseas (15:15)
Yep. Yeah.

AJ Layon (15:17)
so this is, there are some very worrisome tendencies that are political that we’re seeing in our country that ⁓ do not bode well. Do not bode well. At the same time, we have ⁓ an economic crisis that’s near us, near upon us, based upon Mr. Trump’s breathtakingly stupid economic policies. I think I’m going to have tariffs on everybody.

Odysseas (15:29)
Nope.

AJ Layon (15:44)
in the world, everybody. Because those foreign governments will pay money to us and it’ll roll into the government coffers. Maybe we can even get rid of taxes that way. That’s what this very ignorant man, very unread man, very unlettered man said. mean, and of course, so we now have…

Odysseas (15:46)
Yeah, tariffs are taxes, by the way.

Yeah. Well.

AJ Layon (16:10)
tariffs and trade wars with everybody from Mexico to Canada to the EU to China, name it. I mean, just breathtakingly stupid. So we will, I’m afraid, you know, and, and, know, although making a little bit light of Trump and his stupidity and his, and the stupidity of his cabinet, in fact, I should say the fascistic nature of his cabinet. ⁓ you know, when you have these illegal activities ongoing and then an economic crisis, that’s just.

Odysseas (16:19)
It’s… Yeah.

AJ Layon (16:39)
perfect for a declaration of a state of exception, which is what this man, I believe, thinks about, so that he can simply rule with an iron fist. And that will be that. If democracy is not dead here already, and there’s, I do believe it’s quite seriously wounded and has been for a while, that will be the end. That will be the coup de grace. So it’s very worrisome. mean, you know, listen, know, know.

Odysseas (16:56)
Yeah.

Yeah.

And if not him, then the next guy, and if not the next guy, the next I mean,

AJ Layon (17:05)
Could well be. Could well be if things don’t turn around. I mean, I’m old enough that I’ll probably be dead, but you won’t be.

Odysseas (17:06)
we’re going there. Yeah. ⁓

AJ Layon (17:12)
My other kids. Not quite yet, but. You know, but grandkids, nephews, ⁓ nieces, ⁓ kids. I mean, you guys are going to have to pull up with it. Many years ago, actually, many, many years ago. This is a vaguely funny story. It’s not actually not funny at all.

Odysseas (17:13)
Don’t count yourself out just yet. might ⁓ wind up in El Salvador yet. You do look a little brown. Yeah, man. Yeah, man.

AJ Layon (17:35)
I sat with my three kids, Maria, Nick, and Danielle. And this is before we moved up to PA. And I forget, there was a context, but I said, you know, I just want to apologize to you guys. And they looked at me and said, what are you talking about? What? Apologize for what? I said, well, your mom and I, along with millions and millions of other people, have…

Odysseas (17:36)
Ha ha.

AJ Layon (18:03)
thought we were doing work that would make the world a better place, mean political work, organizing work, putting our lives on the line in some cases, and we have utterly failed and ⁓ you’re gonna have to deal with it. Everything from the, this was perhaps around the time of Iraq, don’t quite remember.

But the climate emergency, everything, you guys are going to have to do it. I mean, we can still do what we can still do, but nothing’s been fixed. Which of course raises the, believe, I think we talked about this a little bit last time, that old saying, I believe that comes from the Torah, but I could be wrong, that the obligation that humans have is not to finish the struggle for justice, but to at least start the struggle for justice. I mean, I think we’ve done that.

how successful we’ve been at even our start, you can argue about, but we certainly have not finished it, certainly. Anyway, sorry, yeah, I’m not very happy.

Odysseas (19:00)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean,

don’t sell yourself too short, man. I mean, it’s one of these things, ⁓ you know, you do never know. And all we can do is play our small part and it’s not, ⁓ you know, the struggle is long. All we can do is play our part and hope for the best and do the best that we can. And that’s the least that we can do and also the most that we can do.

AJ Layon (19:27)
Yeah, and the small part. Well, we may not see it. That’s Martin King’s. I’ve been to the mountaintop. I’ve seen what comes next, but I may not get there. That is true. Again, that topic of another discussion at another time. No, no, no, I know. But what you can do also depends on how you’ve been ⁓ sort of

Odysseas (19:29)
I wouldn’t say it’s in vain. You know, it’s…

Sure, yeah, let me not derail us into existential questions. ⁓

AJ Layon (19:56)
designated by powers that be. And we talked a little bit about this before we came on air. ⁓ And the whole issue, I’m thinking of Julian Assange and actually in John Kerry and Swift voting and what is this, ICC Khan. There are ways to take voices out of the mix because a powerful political group

fiscal group, corporate group, ⁓ makes you untouchable. Untouchable. I think that would be something worth talking about at some point in the near future.

Odysseas (20:36)
Yeah, yeah. Well, on to the next one. And then there’s measles. Because I wanted to get time to talk about this. ⁓ So ⁓ Dr. Lyon, ⁓ does vitamin A cure measles?

AJ Layon (20:41)
And then there’s measles. And then there’s measles. And then there’s measles.

Odysseas (20:55)
Was it vitamin A he said? Yeah.

AJ Layon (20:58)
Vitamin A, it’s Vitamin A.

Vitamin A doesn’t matter to me.

Odysseas (21:04)
huh.

AJ Layon (21:06)
If you are vitamin A deficient, your immune system may not work as well as it should, and you would want to recoup it. But for essentially notwithstanding even the financial difficulties in our United States, the dietary difficulties in our United States, and so forth, notwithstanding all of that.

I would be willing to probably nobody’s vitamin deficient. The thing that cures, if you will, better, prevents measles is immunization. That’s what you got to do. Immunization. and, know, so, I mean, measles is an exquisitely infectious RNA virus, exquisitely infectious, kind of like smallpox infectious. It’s not as bad as smallpox, course, but smallpox infectious.

Odysseas (21:44)
gasp

AJ Layon (22:03)
that is passed basically when aerosols and droplets and it can be alive for a couple of hours after someone coughing with measles in the infectious stages, the infectious stages onset of symptoms just before the rash. Passes through a hall, then you walk in the hall without a mask and you breathe in and you can become infected for several hours after they pass through. You know, it is…

debilitating. mean debilitating. ⁓ One to three people in a thousand who develop measles will be hospitalized. About one in a thousand will develop pneumonia and need more aggressive slash intensive care. The pneumonia can be viral or can be post viral bacterial pneumonia. Still started because of the measles. About one in five thousand develop

⁓ systemic sclerosing panencephalitis, SSPE, which is ultimately fatal, ⁓ slow, miserable, And, as if that weren’t enough, the immunology of measles is such that when the measles virus enters your body and macrophages see this foreign entity,

They ⁓ glom onto the virus and then present that antibody to T cells and ultimately B cells.

And because of the nature of the virus, T cells and B cells that have been previously sort of, if you can think about it, they’re in your library ready to come into action if some other bacterial or viral agent ⁓ attacks you. Either from immunization or having seen the agent before or something. It destroys those cells.

So it makes you relatively immune deficient. That may be a little strong. Probably immunologists wouldn’t like that term, but relatively immune deficient for a while. It eventually fixes, but this is not a virus to be toyed with. In fact, none of these are. None of these are. mean, the RFK Jr., Robert F. Kennedy Jr., I don’t even like saying his name because I had such respect for his dad.

Odysseas (24:13)
Interesting.

Suppressed, are you?

AJ Layon (24:39)
I saw his dad murdered in front of my eyes on television when I was a kid, and when he was running, I believe it was in 1968. You know, I have no respect for this creature, none. I he is way too smart to be this fucking stupid. And he is hurting people. He is hurting people with this ⁓ make America healthy again silliness, right? I mean,

Odysseas (25:04)
Yeah.

AJ Layon (25:05)
It’s one thing to say, let’s try and get rid of fast food because it’s not good for you. Absolutely true. You know, I was in the intensive care unit last week ⁓ on service and had a guy ⁓ maybe 30 years younger than me ⁓ in the unit who had developed diverticular disease, diverticulosis. That’s a disorder of the colon in advanced, advanced, economically advanced. I don’t know how advanced we are anymore. I’m not sure that’s even the right term.

countries where you’ve got processed lots of processed foods, so low fiber constipation, diverticular disease. Well his diverticuli ruptured and he had developed diverticulitis and then a huge retricolic abscess. I mean this guy was sick. And he ended up after we did everything we could to keep him out of the OR, he ended up going to the OR for a subtotal colectomy, colostomy, drainage of abscess.

Odysseas (25:51)
Hmm.

AJ Layon (26:03)
All this stuff that, you know, mean, it didn’t have to happen is only my only point. That’s, you know, and it does happen because of the kind of foods that we eat, okay? Okay, fine. If he wanted to make America healthy again, M-A-H-A, take on that stuff. But instead what he does is he says, don’t get immunized. And the consequence of that, I mean, the consequence of that is that children die. There have been…

Odysseas (26:05)
Fuck.

Yeah.

Yeah.

AJ Layon (26:33)
now. It was as of yesterday. I haven’t looked it up today. I believe it’s 712 new measles cases in Texas, New Mexico, ⁓ Oklahoma, and a smattering of other places. Three or four deaths. Several hundred hospitalizations. I mean, this is not minor league stuff. And this is not minor league stuff in a country, ours, ⁓ with a, and I say this,

having worked in this system for 45 years with a grossly inadequate, it’s the nicest way I can put it, health system, grossly inadequate. I mean, there’s a lot of other ways I could put it. Grossly inadequate. And he argues to not get immunized. these are the, I mean, it’s, know, Bannon had got it right. I mean, he’s not a stupid guy.

Odysseas (27:12)
criminal.

AJ Layon (27:32)
flood the zone with shit, people will not know how to respond, and we’ll get away with everything. And it’s absolutely true. mean, it’s hard to know how to respond to such ignorance, such breathtaking stupidity, such callousness, without resorting to a string of curse words. And what did my mother used to say? I think she used to say that cursing is the sign of a

low intelligence. Maybe she never said that because she would curse too. I don’t know. Somebody said that though. But it’s just breathtaking. And you know, and it’s simply difficult to know where to start. So I think where we start is by doing what we’re doing, by working with our brothers and sisters and comrades. I mean, this is no different, frankly, than the deaths that need not occur, that do occur because of these abortion bans that are happening. And again,

Odysseas (28:02)
⁓

You

AJ Layon (28:28)
If you want to, if you really and truly want to make America healthy again, there’s a bunch of things you could do. If you really and truly want to minimize abortions because you just leave in life, you would probably follow the Dutch example where number one, sex education is robust. It’s in school. It’s early. It’s, it’s graphic. I mean, I don’t mean pornographic. mean graphic, you know, two.

birth control is available, three, abortions are freely available, four, ⁓ there’s a national health system so you can get access to all this stuff. And they’ve got the lowest abortion rate, I believe, in the EU, at least as of about six months ago when I last looked at that. If you really want to, but if you really don’t care about any of that, but what you want is to have women in the homes cooking food, popping out babies, like a la 19…

Odysseas (28:58)
clear.

AJ Layon (29:26)
40 or 50 or I don’t know what. Never. How about Allah? Never. You would do what the right wing here does. You know, the so-called pro-life group does. This is also what Kennedy, I mean, this is also Kennedy. I mean, he’s head of HHS. I mean, ⁓ second, third, fourth, fifth rate human being in a position of incredible power. I mean, he’s rich. He’s got a name. That’s all he’s got. He’s rich and he’s got a name. You know, money.

Odysseas (29:49)
Yeah.

Yeah.

AJ Layon (29:55)
Whatever, good for you, you’re rich. I’m happy you’re rich. But, you know, really. Well, you what I’m saying, but it’s like he should not be in the position. And what he’s doing is hurting us. And, you know, and we talked at the top of the hour about everything going on in the country from our own homegrown Gestapo, ICE, which, yes, should have been abolished and defunded. Absolutely. It still should be.

Odysseas (29:58)
Yeah. Well, I’m not, but… Yeah, yeah.

Now, now, that’s wacky.

AJ Layon (30:25)
to the economic crisis that’s looming, to this stuff. mean, it’s like where in God’s name do you start to deal with this stuff? And we went not last Saturday, the Saturday before, to the hands-off march. There were a bunch of good people, including people with demanding an end to the genocide in Gaza, demanding, ⁓ I understand that not all these hand-off marches were like this, but it doesn’t matter. In Gainesville it was, demanding,

Odysseas (30:52)
Yeah, what?

AJ Layon (30:54)
rights for women, including rights to control their bodies, it was actually very impressive. so, mean, this is about, that’s the start that marches are easy. You’ve got to organize. Organizing is slow and tedious and so forth. But that’s the thing. I think that’s what we have to do.

Odysseas (31:13)
Yep, yep, and get vaccinated while you still can.

AJ Layon (31:17)
And get vaccinated

while you still can. Yeah. I mean, and you know, I think we need, I have to tell you, I’m sure most of the people who listen to us have no idea what the Jane committees were, but I think our brothers and sisters need to reconstitute Jane committees throughout the country. Jane committees were organizations made up mostly, but not completely of lay women. When I say lay, I mean, non-healthcare workers.

Odysseas (31:20)
⁓

AJ Layon (31:46)
who had been taught by those who knew how, how to do ⁓ uterine evacuations, that is to say D and C, that is to say dilatation and curatage, that is to say abortions. ⁓ And they did them, not to make money, but to take care of their sisters who needed help. I think that needs to be thought about again, aggressively, now, while we still have time. I think we need to…

lay in a supply in multiple places throughout the country of Miphipristone misoprostol, the oral agents for oral abortion, which you can do 10, 12 weeks. And you store them in a dry, cold environment. They’ll stay good for a very long time. I think cold, like in the refrigerator. Dry. I mean, dry.

Odysseas (32:36)
cold.

In the fridge, okay. All right, yeah, that’s good to know. And we

bought some.

AJ Layon (32:44)
Yeah, I mean, I think not that I would ever buy and do this because of course it will become illegal soon, but I’m just saying I appropriate pause. I just think that we, there, Jesus, they say, Jesus, who kind of a host are you?

Odysseas (32:50)
Hmm.

Don’t blame this on me.

AJ Layon (33:03)
But I think

⁓ a bunch of things need to be done. And that’s just one issue. And that’s just one issue. I think we need, you I’ve seen it. I want to say somewhere there in Wisconsin with you, Guy, where you are, but I can’t quite remember the city. ICE came to arrest some people, to disappear them, I should say. And the community.

Odysseas (33:08)
No, you’re right. Yeah.

Yeah, no.

Yeah.

AJ Layon (33:31)
surrounded them and refused to let ice in. I think it was in Wisconsin, but I can’t quite remember now. This is, we need to, I mean, this is civil disobedience. We need to do that. We absolutely need to do that. We need to grind this government clown show to a halt so that our country survives. I mean, somebody, cop who listens to this might say, my God, that guy’s a radical. I mean, no, I mean, actually no.

Odysseas (33:39)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

AJ Layon (34:01)
Have you completely forgotten, I would say to that cop, about Pastor Niemüller’s poem? Have you utterly forgotten what the Nazis did? And this is no better. The ISIS behaving no better than the secret police in Germany. No better at all.

Odysseas (34:18)
Well, you know, a lot of them are trained in ⁓ both the police, a lot of ⁓ our law enforcement ⁓ people, which isn’t to say that all of them are evil, but whatever. A lot of them are trained in Israel. you know, there’s a little continuity for you. Yeah. ⁓

AJ Layon (34:33)
Yes.

No,

Hedge’s comments, I’m sorry for interrupting, forgive me, Chris Hedge’s comments that the white shirts, the officers are to be reviled, but that the guys, the frontline guys, he says, don’t curse at them, don’t be mean to them. He said, I’ve been arrested more than, I forgot how he said this. I think he said, I’ve been arrested more than once. And the frontline police officer said, listen, I’m sorry, I don’t want to do this. I have to do this.

Odysseas (34:41)
No, no, it’s all right.

AJ Layon (35:07)
So, I mean, think once again, we are, are socialists. We are not right-wing thugs or something like that. We believe in that you can redeem, I guess is the proper word, everybody. Right? So I think we we want to try and talk to these guys as much as possible. But, but, but I’m telling you, it’s, it is, it’s a, we are at the stage that I believe we either save our country or we lose it utterly.

Odysseas (35:21)
Yeah.

Yeah.

AJ Layon (35:37)
utterly to authoritarian ⁓ one creature rule.

Odysseas (35:47)
Yeah, you know, the other thing, ⁓ you know, it reminds me the talk of, ⁓ you know, sort of community solidarity and, know, ⁓ those that are more protected kind of standing up for for those that are less or, know, and the sort of high profile arrests ⁓ of arrests. I don’t know. Can you call it arrest when somebody has just disappeared? You know? ⁓ Yeah, disappeared.

AJ Layon (36:12)
I think we should call it disappeared because there’s no good process, it’s

not an arrest.

Odysseas (36:17)
You know, you know, so, so, but the targeting, let’s put it this way, the targeting of, of folks like Mahmoud Khalil, ⁓ you know, this Columbia, Columbia student protesters, ⁓ you know, one thing that we learned, ⁓ that we have learned many, many different places and many, many different times, but certainly in the Wisconsin uprising, is that you don’t put the most vulnerable people in the front. ⁓ it, the, person, you know, so, ⁓ for example,

⁓ You know Rosa Parks the the narrative kind of around Rosa Parks has been she just was tired and one day she decided no That’s not what happened. No It was very well planned ⁓ and they chose someone who had no record who was not vulnerable Vulnerable in a variety of ways who you know, they chose a good candidate for it ⁓ in Rosa ⁓ and you know, and she was the one she didn’t pick the guy who was a felon they didn’t they didn’t put

AJ Layon (36:53)
No, she didn’t. That’s not what happened at all.

Odysseas (37:16)
make the negotiator Palestinian, for example, which isn’t, I’m not criticizing them, you know.

AJ Layon (37:21)
Yeah, yeah, it

shouldn’t have caused a trouble. And as you remember, I think you remember, Rosa Parks was a graduate of the Highlander School. I believe that’s in Tennessee, a school run by the left to teach people about civil disobedience and what to do and what not to do. As were a whole host of people in that era. I think that school still exists. I’m not positive. The Highlander School. I mean, this is the stuff that most of our…

And I don’t say this in a paternalist way. just say this because I’m effing older than everybody else, or not everybody, but a lot of people. You know, this is one of the reasons why I have old folks around. ⁓ You know, as my dear friend Roberto, ⁓ former head of genetics at the place I used to work, says, you know, us old guys, all we’re good for is telling stories anyway. So we might as have a few good stories. And so we know a few things we can tell stories and it might actually end up helping. But there was or is a Highlander school, I believe it’s in Tennessee.

Odysseas (37:55)
Ha

AJ Layon (38:19)
I don’t remember the city, but it was in the mountains. And it was a school that taught civil disobedience. mean, nothing more, nothing less. You know, this is the kind of stuff that we need. That level of organization is what we need. It’s not enough to go to a demonstration and say, okay, I’ve done my duty, done. I wish it was. I mean, I wish we didn’t even have to, but we have to. For my grandkids, for my nephews and nieces, for my kids.

Odysseas (38:27)
Interesting.

AJ Layon (38:48)
for whoever comes after you. It’s not just my, my. Because as I believe Che Guevara once said, anybody who struggles is my family. Anyone who struggles for justice is my family. It’s true. And that’s why I’ve worked out of the country a bunch of places, from Nigeria to Nicaragua and so forth and so on. That’s why. These are all our family. So we…

Odysseas (38:53)
for us all.

AJ Layon (39:16)
we have to begin to think about that. But in order to do that, we have to begin to think about how we might organize. And I’m not seeing much of that. I’m not seeing much of that. And I wish I knew how to make that happen.

Odysseas (39:28)
Mm.

Well, you

know, mean, we look for it and we will find it. ⁓ You know, ⁓ one thing that I can recommend is it doesn’t hurt to, you know, consider getting, you know, getting in touch with your local DSA, Democratic Socialist for America, if you’re in the U.S. ⁓ And if you’re outside of the U.S., ⁓ you know, I don’t know, you know, look to, look around for some groups, see what you can do. You know, even if it’s something like, you know, writing letters or making

phone calls or anything, know, do, do your small part. Look, we, none of us can do it on our own. Uh, and we never really know if what we’re doing is enough. Uh, you know, the, the, the idea of the great man theory, you know, that the one, oh, this visionary comes in and he changes everything. Nah, that’s nonsense. We all play our little part.

AJ Layon (40:22)
Well, maybe

it is, but would there have been a Bolshevik revolution without Lenin? I’m not sure there would have been. I’m not sure. I think there are moments in history, moments. OK, and I’m biased. My dream was always to be a Che Guevara when I was young. Obviously, that never happened, but whatever. whether it’s a man or a woman, it’s not a gender issue. But can an individual at a particular moment in time

Odysseas (40:29)
Yeah. I think so,

Sure.

There’s still time.

AJ Layon (40:51)
make all the difference in the world? I think the answer is yes. ⁓ And counterfactual history, we can’t do so, who the heck knows. But ⁓ yes, but all we can do is a small stuff, you’re right. Someone’s not gonna ride in, Lenin’s not gonna ride in on a white horse, as it were, and save us, it’s up to us. And whoever that great woman or man is, or just more outspoken woman or man is at the particular moment,

they will rise from amongst us. It’s not like something fancy from somewhere else.

Odysseas (41:22)
Yeah,

I’ve got a great line that this really cool guy told me ⁓ one time, ⁓ know, was riding in a car with a really wise, ⁓ you know, maybe you know him, his name was, ⁓ well, my uncle Joe ⁓ said, ⁓ all you can do is play your small part and be ready. ⁓ If the time comes for you to step up, be ready to do so. ⁓

And that’s all you can do. And that’s the best you can do and all you can do is your best, which, and I always, that always stuck with me. The other thing is, brief linguistic aside. So when I say man, in fact, man, total digression, man is actually gender neutral because originally in old English, it was, man was,

Was modified by so whiff man would mean ⁓ woman ⁓ where man would mean ⁓ Like male ⁓ Got it nailed it nailed it nailed it it exactly That’s where it survives and it also survives in the gender neutral form in mankind ⁓ great man theory, although, you know that has other connotations, but

AJ Layon (42:29)
Where is like werewolf would mean man wolf. ⁓ my god

Odysseas (42:45)
Yeah, yeah, and in werewolf. Yeah, exactly. And whiff man turned into woman. ⁓ So, so. ⁓

AJ Layon (42:52)
Interesting. Interesting. I did not know that. I would

expect this from Noam Chomsky, and my nephew knows this. Good deal. Good deal. Good deal. I don’t. I don’t.

Odysseas (43:01)
Yeah, I do love linguistics. There

you go. There you go. so man, you know, man, man, woman.

AJ Layon (43:10)
some and well, or in Chicago, wait,

wait, there is another one. And I’ll spend four years in Chicago, 1979 to 1983, at the Cook County Hospital, the people’s hospital of the United States in that era. And in Chicago, when you come up on a group of people, a gaggle of people, a flock of people, a murder of people, you say, hey guys, it’s non-gender specific, Chicago.

Odysseas (43:35)
Hey, there you go.

AJ Layon (43:36)
There you go. So if you’re from Chicago, you can say guys anytime. And that’s what I do. And my kids look at me and people are like, you’re not in Chicago. I know what I once was. Hey, Chicago. How are you, police? I had a, we rented a house near the hospital. And the guy, I won’t say the guy’s name, but the guy who rented it to us was ⁓ a lieutenant in the Chicago Police Department.

Odysseas (43:45)
Chicago stays with you, is a, it’s a, it’s, know.

AJ Layon (44:05)
And one day I was at his house, his daughter was having some difficulty with school and one of our roommates was tutoring her. I forget why I went over, but one day I went over there for something. I don’t remember. And I was trying to be, you know, young Dr. Leon, nice guy or something like that. And I said something about the Chicago cops and how they were, you know, was no, no, no, was, you know, know, honorable people mostly, blah, blah. And he looked at me and he said, and he said,

Odysseas (44:26)
no.

okay.

AJ Layon (44:33)
What did he was afraid I don’t quite have it but he said don’t ever say that don’t ever think that stay away from us. my god this guy knew yeah this guy knew this guy knew so on that happy note I think it’s time to end this for now. ⁓ As great as always we’ll do another one again soon I hope okay and you’ll get this one out relatively soon because it is more timely.

Odysseas (44:41)
⁓ dude. Well.

Wow. Yes. Yeah. Thank you so much for your time, Uncle Joe.

Yes, yes. You got it.

You got it, my man. All right. Love you. Bye. Bye.

AJ Layon (45:02)
Okay, thanks for listening. Talk to you later. Bye bye.

Odysseas (45:09)
All right, so that’s it comrades. Thank you so much for joining us today. Me and my uncle, I love that guy. He’s pretty cool, huh? And yeah, us little bit of love. If you’re listening to it in audio, leave a review. If you’re on YouTube, give us a thumbs up. Follow, subscribe, whatever, blah, blah.

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Stay strong, we love you guys and ⁓ catch you on the flip side comrades. Bye.