Join John Rush on Denver’s Afternoon Rush as he engages with author Brayden Sorbo in a conversation exploring masculinity’s evolving role in society. Delving into topics like societal pressures, the age gap in relationships, and the return to deeper value systems, Sorbo outlines the need for men to step forward and lead a moral resurgence. With fascinating anecdotes and real-world implications, this episode sheds light on how today’s standards have paved the way for a society divided in values and the potential paths to reconciliation.
SPEAKER 17 :
This is Rush to Reason.
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You are going to shut your damn yapper and listen for a change because I got you pegged, sweetheart. You want to take the easy way out because you’re scared. And you’re scared because if you try and fail, there’s only you to blame. Let me break this down for you. Life is scary. Get used to it. There are no magical fixes.
SPEAKER 06 :
With your host, John Rush.
SPEAKER 17 :
My advice to you is to do what your parents did.
SPEAKER 16 :
Get a job first. You haven’t made everybody equal. You’ve made them the same and there’s a big difference.
SPEAKER 14 :
Let me tell you why you’re here. You’re here because you know something. What you know you can’t explain, but you feel it. You’ve felt it your entire life. That there’s something wrong with the world. You don’t know what it is, but it’s there. It is this feeling that has brought you to me.
SPEAKER 12 :
Are you crazy? Am I? Or am I so sane that you just blew your mind?
SPEAKER 04 :
It’s Rush to Reason with your host, John Rush. Presented by Cub Creek Heating and Air Conditioning.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, we are back. Hour number two, Rush to Reason, Denver’s Afternoon Rush, KLZ 560. Brayden Sorbo joining us now. Brayden, welcome. How are you?
SPEAKER 09 :
Good, good. How are you doing? Thanks for having me.
SPEAKER 05 :
Good. Embrace masculinity. Lifting men up in a world that pushes them down. And appreciate you joining us again. So talk to us about your book.
SPEAKER 09 :
So the book is essentially a handbook for men living in America today. However, I didn’t exclude the women. I threw a little note in at the very end. The final chapter of the book is basically for all the young ladies who might be looking for a potential husband. They should be checking off the criteria and seeing if their boyfriends or men in their life meet what the book talks about. And so it’s essentially a guide.
SPEAKER 05 :
Amen. It’s funny you write this because this is a hot topic, I think, for me personally. My wife and I talk about this particular topic on an ongoing basis pretty much every time we travel. And we’ve got some young ladies that we actually know very well and will bring up this topic. Thank you so much for having me. No, no, no. It’s the opposite of that, Braden. It’s is this a manly man? Can he handle his own? You know, where is he at in the relationship with his folks? And on and on we go. And the reality, Braden, is so many young men especially can’t meet very many of those criteria.
SPEAKER 09 :
Oh, without a doubt. That’s why I wrote the book. I saw that we have this kind of society full of weak men, and unfortunately, it goes both ways, where men are now complaining about the lack of good women that they’re finding. And I tell them, I say, look, you are not worthy of a good wife so long as you remain an improper man. You have to grow up yourself, and we can point the finger all we want, but at the end of the day, it’s the men who are going to have to take that first step, which is unfortunate. Yep, absolutely. because it’s a lot of work, but that’s just how it is. I posted a video saying a group of pro-life men, you know, the average pro-life guy looks like this, and I received a comment from a woman who does pornography saying, well, you’re going to have to wait until marriage because no woman will sleep with you. But the reason she’s doing that is because weak men are willing to pay for it and subsidize her. And so as much as I want to point the blame and say, well, it’s all your fault, it’s more or less a joint kind of double fault with society and the people who are responsible.
SPEAKER 05 :
The other thing that I’ve noticed, and I wanted to get your take on this, knowing you were coming on today, and that is there are ladies also out there like Carolyn Leavitt, who’s 27 years old and married a guy that was 59. Granted, that’s a large age gap, and I don’t think that’s typical. Although, I think what you’re starting to see, Braden, is a lot of younger women looking to older men, and they’ll get criticized, or the men will get criticized for actually having that relationship, and yet all these women are looking for is real men, and unfortunately, they’re not finding them in their own age group.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, without a doubt. And it’s funny because you don’t see the reverse. You don’t see too many older women marrying younger men, and there is a reason for that societally. I mean, you get these kind of the older generation with the alpha and maybe millennial women who are still single. Studies are showing that by the year 2030, 45% of women are going to remain single after the age of 30, which is crazy to me, and that’s terrible. I mean, the average age for getting married back 40, 50 years ago was twenty one for women and twenty four for men it’s now gone up six years it’s twenty seven for women and thirty one for men and so there’s a reason why these younger women are looking to older men who are more established who have a more secure identity in themselves and their belief system and that is what women look for in a guy is someone who’s secure and stable like you said you don’t have to make eight hundred thousand dollars a year and have a six pack and drive a mclaren like those are bonuses and not the criteria that need to be met. So having security and stability in yourself and who you are is what really matters at the end of the day.
SPEAKER 05 :
And I get it, Brayden. I’m sure you talk about this in the book. There has been a societal push to literally push men down, if you would. I mean, I don’t know any other way, any other phrase to use. Literally hold men back, teach them to be more feminine, if you would. Feminine, I guess I should say. And at the end of the day, it’s not how we’re made internally. And I think there’s a lot of men, young men especially, that are struggling with their own identity because of the fact of what I just said a moment ago. Am I right in that?
SPEAKER 09 :
You are beyond right. I mean, I wish I had multiple green buzzers to hit there. It’s really quite sad, and I call this generation the Peter Pan Neverland Lost Boys. You know, they’re refusing to grow up, and there’s a reason for that. We’re looking around at the society around us, which puts down men who do valiant acts. I mean, you have Daniel Penny, who withheld a crazy homeless person from hurting a woman on a subway, and unfortunately the man passed away, and Daniel was almost thrown in life. or thrown in jail for life simply for protecting a woman. Whereas you see another individual get robbed and everyone calls out, where are the good men? It goes, well, the good men are being punished for trying to protect people and do good things. And so these guys are watching this in real time and going, well, shoot, maybe I don’t want to be a good man. Maybe it’s just not worth it anymore. I mean, I spend all this time building myself up to get a woman who’s still best friends with her ex and has all of these problems that she’s refusing to work through. And so why would I even want to put myself through that? I’d rather just be single and act like a teenager for all my life.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, wow. Again, if I had a buzzer, I’d be buzzing all of that, because well said. Okay, here’s maybe a dumb question on my part. Granted, I’m 60 years of age, and I’ve been watching this happen for quite some time. On the same token, I know you’re not my age because I can tell that from your voice. So here we are talking. We both have an age gap. We both, though, see the exact same things. We’re not the only two out there noticing this. Why is this not becoming a bigger deal?
SPEAKER 09 :
Well, it really goes back to the family system in America. I mean, you can see it better than I can because you’ve lived through it a little bit longer than I have. I’m 23 now. But when we started destroying the family with ideas like the sexual revolution and all of these things, kind of morally degrading aspects that we’ve been incorporating into society slowly but surely, whether it be through the music that people consume and listen to, through the media that they watch. It’s these aspects that really change someone’s life, and we have devalued what it means to have a family. It’s something to achieve after you’ve had a successful career, after you’ve done all your fun things and you’ve gone out. And what people are not realizing, yes, but what they’re slowly coming to realize is those things lead to the detriment of a society. Right. The divorce rate for non-Christian couples, for example, is, I believe, above 50%. And I know for a fact that second marriages end in divorce 50% of the time, with women initiating the divorces nearly 80% of the time, with one of the biggest reasons being stated, not enough money. And so what we’re valuing as a society is no longer security, love, trust, Kind of this foundational idea of I’m going to be with you and I’m going to stick with you through the hard things. Like the vows, they don’t mean anything anymore. Better or worse, it’s supposed to be better or worse. Not just, well, you know, if you get a cold and you start looking bad because you lost weight or something or you don’t make enough money to make me happy, I’m just going to leave you. We devalue what it means to get married. And so people are no longer working towards that goal, which… It eliminates drive.
SPEAKER 05 :
Right. No, no, you are exactly right. The other thing, too, that I think is a part of this, and I don’t know if you talk about this in the book or not, but there’s an old saying, you either pay on the front side and play on the back side, or you play on the front side and pay on the back side. It’s always easier and cheaper to pay on the front side. And by the way, that’s true even when it comes to life and relationships and having kids. And let me explain. I was one of those that started fairly young. By the time my youngest graduated high school, I was only 45. It’s given me the ability these last 15 years or more even to do some things in my life that, by the way, a lot of folks my same age that were still raising kids because they started much later. And again, you can do it either way. My point was I paid, I guess you could say, on the front side. I don’t want to say having kids is painful or anything like that. But There’s sacrifices made, Braden. I wasn’t able to go out and party and do a lot of the things that a lot of other. In fact, I was a big drag racer back in the day. I had to give a lot of that stuff up because I was starting to raise a family and there was other needs and more important things that were there versus my own needs. And you sacrifice those to raise your family. And so at the end of the day, yes, I did sacrifice on the front side, but it’s given me the ability on the backside to go do all sorts of things, including be here on a daily basis. And frankly, if I was still raising a family, probably couldn’t do.
SPEAKER 09 :
Yeah, without a doubt. I mean, you answered your own point really quickly right at the end there when you said there were things that were more important than going out and partying, than doing the drag racing. Even though you may have loved it, you put that to the side and sacrificed it for the betterment of your family. And that’s what people are failing to do. I didn’t quote that exact quote that you had, which was a fantastic one, by the way. But I wrote in the book that a good woman is an investment and a bad one is a bill. And it goes the same way for men. Women who choose to marry the guy with no money but has potential are investing. They’re taking a risk on that guy. Nick Freitas is a representative from the House of Representatives in Virginia, and he has been with his wife since they were 18 and 19, respectively. She took a chance on him because she saw potential in him. He became an Army Ranger, and now he serves in the House. He’s been very successful with the public speaking, and I met him this past weekend at an event, and we had a great conversation. But he stands as a testament to this idea of you have potential and you need to live it out. Every single person has an inherent value, but if they do certain things, they devalue themselves. If they act certain ways, they eliminate parts of their own value. And so I’m aiming with the book to try to warn people so that they might take better precautions.
SPEAKER 05 :
Awesome. Well, I appreciate you having the book, authoring it, because the reality is, as you can tell, it’s a huge need. I mean, I know it’s a need. You know it’s a need. You wouldn’t have written a book over it. The reality is, unfortunately, Braden, your book alone, as much as I appreciate you doing it, will not be the total changeover. So the question I have for you is, outside of your own book, how do we get young men? I mean, yes, we need them to read that. We need women to read this as well. But beyond that, how do we societally fix this?
SPEAKER 09 :
also highly there needs to be a return to the fundamental morals and values i mean i was raised non-denominational product in my entire life and i’m actually converting to catholicism this easter vigil and there is a reason why so many young men it’s like you said it’s not just me so many young men are searching for this we have people in droves specifically guys my age who are coming back to the organized rooted deep religion of catholic and orthodox route the date back two thousand years right this idea of well, you know, go do whatever you want, and then on Sunday sing a rock concert, and then, you know, go live your life however you please, isn’t really sustainable long-term for these young men, and they’re waking up to it. And so that is going to be the turning point, is this return to morals and values that the young men are going to have to lead the charge on. And I frankly, I see it very possibly happening in the next decade or so as we kind of return back to these norms.
SPEAKER 05 :
know what that’s encouraging i appreciate you saying that and i’m with you i i agree the only way this is going to happen is on a you know ground level up if you would we’re not going to get it from tv hollywood any of the cultural things we’re not going to get it in most education systems unless you’re in a catholic slash you know christian school those values of course will be taught there braden but by and large not many young men are going to hear this in in many places unless it’s a groundswell effect, a revival of sorts, if you would, and what you just said leads me to believe that could easily happen.
SPEAKER 09 :
Thank you. I appreciate that. That’s the goal, and that’s the hope. We just work from the ground up, like you said.
SPEAKER 05 :
Awesome. Braden, I appreciate it. You’re welcome anytime. Lastly, where do folks get the book?
SPEAKER 09 :
They can go to sorbostudios.com if they want a personalized signed copy from yours truly. Those are shipping at the end of April. Or they can go to Amazon if they want to support Amazon for some reason.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right. I appreciate it, Braden. Thank you very much, sir. Thank you. You’re very welcome. Have a great rest of your day. I’ll tell you what, what a guy. He’s got some great stories along those lines. He’s one of those guys worth meeting, talking to, not only about your windows and doors, but just his own life experiences. And by the way, everything we just talked about here with Braden, Dave would be amening all of that because he feels the same way I do about all of that. Talk to Dave today. Just go to klzradio.com.
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SPEAKER 15 :
Putting reason into your afternoon drive. This is John Rush.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, Rush to Reason, Denver’s Afternoon Rush, KLZ 560. By the way, that last topic, I could go on and on and on. I want to respect our guest’s time, of course, but literally I could keep talking about that. I know a lot of you could as well. And I had a great experience along those lines. And my wife and I – actually, there were several of us that were walking back to the hotel from the auction. Some of you may or may not know, I went to the Mecham auction down in Phoenix over the weekend, so I wasn’t here on Friday or Saturday. Great experience. I’ll talk more about that on Sunday, by the way. Totally different auction than what you would find at Barrett-Jackson or whatever, and I’ll get into more of that on Saturday on Drive Radio. But at any rate – We were walking back in, and as we were walking back in, I was about to grab the door, and there was a man about my age, maybe a little younger, and he had a teenage boy that was there. And he actually made that young man stand there and open the door for those of us that were coming in. Of course, the ladies were first, and then I was second, and my other friend was behind me. And he actually made that young man hold the door for the four of us. And I commended him. I said, you know, thank you. You don’t see that very much anymore. And you’re doing a great job with your son here by showing him, you know, what to do in that particular regard. We had kind of a little chuckle in the lap. But I really meant what I said, because the reality is, no, you don’t see all of that going on at the same time. That, by the way. was contrasted. Now, okay, please, no judgment here. Charlie always asks me, what did you learn on, this really wasn’t a vacation. It was more of a business trip, if you would, to do some things along those lines. And I had some clients that I met with and so on. But anyways, long story short, it was quite the contrast. And I haven’t told Charlie this yet. But at the same hotel we were staying at, there was an anime conference. And if some of you don’t know what anime is, go look it up. And all I will say is, not my jam. Again, somebody listening might be into it. That’s fine. So be it. To each his own, I guess. That old saying, you do you and I’ll do me, and that’s all fine. Although I will tell you that… The contrast to what’s going on at the anime conference versus what we just got done talking to our guest Braden about, and even what this young man and his dad were learning, what the young man was learning from his dad in holding the door for us, is probably, not probably, it is literally the direct opposite of what I was seeing from a lot of these folks attending the anime conference. And I’m not trying to be judgmental here, but there was a stark difference between Masculinity speaking, between the majority of these individuals, men especially, going to this conference versus me. And again, I’m not trying to be judgmental here by any means. I don’t know these people on an individual basis, so I wouldn’t have the ability to sit down and have a chat. And how do I say this in a nice way? You can tell a lot… about a young man and even young woman but really a young man in several things just looking outwardly how are they carrying themselves how are they standing how are they talking how are they walking And I know it’s hard for me to explain this on air without actually showing somebody in even a video as to what I mean by do you walk like a man? Do you walk like somebody that’s not a man? Do you stand like a man or do you stand like a woman? I’m sorry. I don’t have to say this. Do you talk like a man? And I’m not saying you’ve got to swear. No, because I don’t. And you guys all know that. That’s not who I am, so I don’t do any of that anyways. But do I talk like a man? Yes. Was I raised by a man’s man? Yes. A thousand percent. And then some. My dad was definitely a man. You guys have heard some of the stories I’ve talked about with my dad raising my brother and I. And yes, we were raised by a man’s man. There were certain things that we were not allowed to do. In fact, my dad, we were talking about this the other day with my wife, my dad was so strict with my brother and I on certain things, we weren’t allowed to spit. Now, I know a lot of men would say, well, that’s kind of a man’s thing to do. Not according to my dad. To my dad, it was a vile thing that only vile people did, and no, you don’t spit on things, period. Nobody needs your saliva on their plants, their pavement, their whatever, and no, that’s not really being a man’s man. You don’t spit. No, I’ve never chewed tobacco either. In fact, sorry, guys, if some of you do, more power to you. I can’t think of a more filthy habit. Sorry, but it’s disgusting. And I know it’s one of those hard—it is the hardest nicotine habit to break. So if any of you are chewers, I get it. And most of you want to quit, and I fully understand. And by the way, there are really very—how should I say this? There are those that chew tobacco that are very— cognitive of and are very discreet with and you would never know they did and those guys you know love you because you never know you you never know you do there’s no you know chew cups things like that hanging around and so on my point being is my dad was a man raised us to be men’s men and spitting even was one of those things we were not allowed to do because he looked at that and just didn’t think that was very appropriate for a man to do a quote unquote distinguished man to do I guess you could say And again, nothing against the whole anime conference that was going on, but I’m just going to tell you straight up. I saw things walking around that, frankly, I was amazed at. I’m just thinking… OK, I know a little bit about that whole end of things. I don’t know a ton about it because I’ve never really been into it. But this is one of the weirdest things I’ve ever encountered. And I’m not trying to belittle anybody that’s into it. I mean, again, to each your own. But, you know, I don’t know whether that would be any better or worse than a furry convention. But either one of those would just be a little strange to me. Just saying. And the whole anime thing in and of itself is it’s just I’m sorry to say it’s just weird. And then to dress up like all the characters of, and they had booths and different things, and you could see the vendors coming and going. And I just found the whole thing to be very unmanly. I don’t know how else to say it. Again, it was the direct opposite of the last guest I was talking to about being a man’s man. And I’m sorry, I just don’t see how that whole anime thing and dressing up like a character is a man’s man thing to do. I’m sorry. I don’t know how else to say. You guys know me. I speak my mind. Sometimes that gets me into trouble. But in this particular case, I don’t know how else to say it. And I’m sure I might get a few hate. Texts or emails on that. And I don’t know how else to say it. I just I don’t see that being manly at the end of the day. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. And I saw a lot of it this past weekend, Friday and Saturday and even yesterday as I left to come home. I just I watched some of these people even coming into the convention yesterday as I was leaving, thinking this is just weird. And no, it is not being a manly man at the end of the day, I’m sorry to say. So with all that being said, guys that are listening, please teach your young men especially to be men. Ladies, some of you are out there raising your own boys, your single moms, and my heart goes out to you because I know that you’re looking for that manly figure to be around and help your boys as much as they possibly can. And all I can tell you on that is, you know what, if nothing else, have them listen to me. Because I can at least give out some pointers on a regular basis when it comes to some of these things. At least have your boy listen to me. And I will also throw this out, and I’ve done this many, many times. If any of you ever need somebody to meet with your young man and have a conversation with them about these things, I will do that. I’ll throw that out. I have no problem doing that. I would love to teach young men how to be men at the end of the day because there’s nothing more important, in my opinion, in doing that and helping out our society when it’s all said and done. Back to the book we were talking about with Braden a moment ago. All right. Golden Eagle Financial coming up next. When it comes to your financial future, please talk to Al. We talked about Social Security, by the way, in the first hour with John and Joe both. Get this right from the horse’s mouth on what’s best for you and your particular situation. Al Smith can help you with that. Go to kozradio.com and find him.
SPEAKER 13 :
Al Smith of Golden Eagle Financial knows that when it comes to putting together an effective retirement plan, sometimes you don’t even know what you don’t know. Al meets clients who spent months searching the Internet for the best options and strategies. But without a great guide, you’re unlikely to find the right solution. Al Smith helps you get organized and can formulate a plan based on when you want to retire and what you want your retirement to look like. You’re probably great at socking money away and disciplined enough to leave it there. But is that money going to grow as much as it could with Al Smith’s guidance? Probably not. Al will get you organized and focused toward your ultimate goals for your retirement. Playing golf, traveling the world, spending time with family, or having the time and resources so that you can give back without being concerned about your finances. Don’t try to do it alone. We’ll be right back.
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SPEAKER 06 :
call in to the KLZ studio line, 303-477-5600. Now, back to Rush to Reason.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, we are back. Rush to Reason, Denver’s Afternoon Rush, KLZ 560. Richard Rush joining us. Now, Richard, one thing I did not, because I was doing other things over the weekend, did not look at all. I heard some people on the plane or somewhere, maybe it was at a restaurant, I can’t remember now, but somebody over the weekend was talking about, oh, my bracket blew up during the first round or something to that nature.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, well, and the bracket busted, right, Dan, where you pick a team and it’s now – well, it sort of gets overused, and the reason I say that is because there was actually not a whole lot of – there’s not as much commotion this year as there has been in years past. There’s a couple theories, but we’ll get to that here in a second. The biggest upset in round one was Clemson. They were a – I think they were a 5 seed. They lost to a 12 seed. McNeese State, which it was a semi-popular pick. CSU actually beat the team that they played against, which in the opening round, I think they played Missouri in the opening round. Maybe it was Drake. I’m not sure. CSU ended up winning. They actually almost won last night. But, yeah, the term bracket busted, right, where you pick a team and maybe you pick them to go super far. Maybe you pick them to be your champion. And they lose in the first one or two rounds, which is sort of a rough go of it. But that didn’t happen too much this year. And so you actually had a perfect bracket go well into the second round yesterday, Dad, which I think it was up until like the second to last game that actually ESPN still had a perfect bracket on the docket for someone. But ultimately, there’s no more left, at least in ESPN. I don’t think that there’s many left. Again, we talked about this last week, right? There’s just too many combinations of things to choose from that make it pretty difficult to happen, and that’s kind of, I think, what ended up happening this past year. But one of the theories, Dad, as to why there wasn’t as much commotion this year as there has been in years past is because of the transfer portal, right, which is now the rule is you basically can go to whatever school you want to as many times as you want to as long as you fit into a window in which you can declare. And right now for college basketball, that actually opened up today. And it used to be that you could transfer, but you had to sit out a year. But now, because of litigation and everything else, essentially people have sued the NCAA saying, well, you guys are restricting the free market. I should be able to transfer as many times. And so what happens is if a… If a guy has a really good season on a mid-major team, I’ll say it, on a CSU team or a team like St. Mary’s or any one of these smaller teams, even some of the lesser quality power schools, the bigger schools, if that person has a really good year, they actually have the ability to make some money and transfer to a bigger school because there’s no longer a penalty period. for sitting out. Again, it used to be you had to sit out a year. Or in some cases, Dad, if you graduated from the school you were at, you could go play as a graduate transfer. But in most cases, that would only give you two years at your new school rather than now. If you have a good freshman year, maybe you’re not good enough to go to the draft, you can transfer to one of those bigger schools. And so it’s almost like a minor league situation, right, where some of these smaller schools are basically – the minor leagues for the bigger schools. And so there’s speculation that moving forward you may see this. Because, again, March Madness used to be just that madness, right? You would get these smaller schools. They didn’t have great players, but maybe they caught that bigger team on the right or on the wrong night, right? The bigger team didn’t. Maybe, again, it was a team like Belmont playing – Duke, and maybe Duke was just having an off night. Belmont was shooting great. Or maybe they were just a better team, right? You know, one of these smaller schools and a little bit more cohesive. They have a better offense. You know, they play harder on defense, things like that. The – bracket buster, right, or bracket being – but not as much. And so we’ll see. We’ll see if this is a one-year trend or if it becomes – becomes more of a trend, right? Maybe it’s a one-off, or maybe it is a trend. But yeah, there was definitely some brackets being busted. Mine are doing okay. Nothing crazy. Again, it’s really all about that, to win a lot of these pools. Can you pick the team that wins it? And if you can pick the team that wins it all, then you have a pretty good chance of winning your bracket, just because you get more points as you move on in the brackets, right? As you move on later in the round. So… Yeah, I’m sure you’re hearing people talk about it, but definitely not as crazy as it has been in years past, to be honest.
SPEAKER 05 :
Okay, talk to us about it. I know we touched on this a little bit last week in regards to CU and what’s going on up there, but give us an update.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, so we went through the last week where the spring game is coming up, right, and for a lot of college programs, this is a chance for you. You can get some early enrolled freshmen playing. It really gives you a chance to – have those spring practices. I think you get like 15 practices that you can have per NCAA rules, and you come together, and then you have a spring game, and really it’s just a glorified scrimmage, Dad, but a lot of teams have, well, you pay for it, or not pay for it, you sell tickets for it. CU up until Prime arrived, it was a free endeavor. You basically kind of went out to it, and it was really for the most diehards of all diehards. Well, once Prime arrived, that game was… And typically how many people showed up? to a CU spring game, you’re lucky if 5,000 showed up. Okay.
SPEAKER 05 :
5,000 diehard fans are going to be there no matter what.
SPEAKER 10 :
No matter what, right? Your rain, snow, shine, whatever. Well, Prime’s first year, CU sold it out, right? 50,000 seats were sold out, I think, at a tune of $20 a piece or something like that. So crazy. Even last year, and mind you, that first year was in the snow. Even this last year, it was I think it was rainy and colder. They still sold, I think they sold like 35,000, 40,000 tickets, which is still a lot for CU. Now, for other places, Alabama, Texas, some of these bigger schools that they sell out every year pretty much, right? It does not matter. And so it’s a source of revenue. Well, you have some schools, we talked about this last week, Nebraska, I think USC, a few of these other schools are choosing to not participate because they were getting – Basically, players who were doing well in these games, whether they were televised or not, were being poached, right? They were being said, hey, we’re at a different school, bigger school. We can offer you $250,000 to come play for us because now we’re, in addition to the transfer portal like we talked about, we’re in the era of NIL, right? Name, image, and likeness. Players can profit off of that. And so teams were getting players stolen. Well, Prime… up at cu has sort of gone the opposite way so instead of canceling games he mentioned last week hey maybe we should we’re actually trying to schedule a game against another opponent and make it kind of like a real game okay and people like okay well it didn’t take long the syracuse head coach um decided to tweet out that hey hey coach we’ll come to boulder for three days and they are actually now in the process of trying to get ncaa approval to in order to play this game against syracuse now i will say this dad it is the ncaa for as much as they’ve gotten their hands slapped over the past few years because of everything else and you know they can no longer allow or they can’t restrict transfers and all these things you they still do control teams and kind of how teams handle things and so they’re still controlling this situation and they basically have to give the okay that it’s okay to essentially have competition outside of the designated fall window, right? And so they are working on doing it. I think it would be a great optics thing for the NCAA because it would be a great trial. It would prove that it could be done, and it would give other schools a blueprint of how to do it. And it would also give the NCAA the ability to say, no, we are letting players capitalize even more on it because it’s another opportunity to nationally televise games and do some things that way. And so we’ll see what comes of it, Dad, either way. Because I think that in the same way that some of these schools – are revolutionizing the sport in a bad way, that they’re actually not having spring games, they’re having practices, but kids aren’t getting the benefit of games. I think this has a possibility that of being able to kind of revolutionize it in a way of saying, hey, maybe we are going to give the opportunity to these schools to have an additional game. And it gives players a chance to show themselves. It gives schools the opportunity to market themselves more and to have an additional nationally televised game if you see fit. Or you can capitalize on some more local marketing revenue. It just kind of is all – there’s opportunity abound, I’ll say. And so to me, this will be a fascinating experiment. I think the NCAA – Obviously, I think the NCAA should allow it without question, but I think ultimately it should be a positive because it gives – well, it’s just one more thing to be cool. And how cool is that for these players to have an opportunity to have a real-life game in the springtime that maybe they wouldn’t have gotten before and some of these down-the-roster players that have an opportunity. Good point. I know a lot of folks may not care about it, but it is something to keep an eye on because it may change college football dramatically. moving forward in the same way that Dion has changed the transfer portal.
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SPEAKER 06 :
We don’t yell at you. We inform you. Now, back to Rush to Reason.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, we are back. Rush to Reason, Debra’s Afternoon Rush, KLZ 560. Time of the week, Richard, where we do a car review. You recently drove a 2025 Hyundai Kona. Talk about that.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, Dad, so this is Hyundai’s small SUV, right? It’s definitely smaller. It can fit four full-size adults. That second row is going to be a little bit tight. No big deal, though. It does fit two kids. We’ll talk about that a little bit later in the review, but if I don’t, it does fit two kids with a booster seat, Dad. This is one of my more favorite cars because, in my opinion, it has a great value proposition, right? The one we drove was the Limited. It was about $35,000, $36,000. It’s got an upgraded turbocharged engine on it and all-wheel drive, which is available as part of this vehicle. And so especially at our altitude, Dad, right, sometimes the four-cylinder engines or even the naturally aspirated and some of the larger engines, they don’t do too well, right? They’re just not as much oxygen. This little turbocharged engine was fantastic. It was fun to drive. Is it going to win any races? No, it’s not. But is it going to get you what you need to do? Is it going to merge into traffic? And can you do so safely without having to kind of get on the – you know, get on the pedal and mash and be like, come on, go, go, go. And the answer is no. This thing’s going to do what you need it to. It’s got a lot of tech features that are standard on it, a lot of infotainment features that I think a lot of people will like, and just a lot of nice apportionments throughout the cab, Dad, that I think some people would be surprised by, to be honest with you, especially if they haven’t driven a Hyundai in some time. It’s a car that was remodeled for 2024, so this is the second generation of it. It looks great. They’ve done some updated styling. I encourage folks to check it out. There’s also an electric version of this car, Dad, which that’s not what we drove. Again, we drove the typical combustion engine, right, as far as the turbocharged four-cylinder. But outside of that, Dad, it handled really well. It’s got a lot of feature comforts that I think you’d like. It’s got a lot of safety features. And we talk about this a lot, and I don’t have the Monrovia in front of me. One of the benefits of Hyundai, Dad, and kind of their brand – is the value that you get with the warranty, right? I believe it’s a 10-year, 100,000-mile warranty on the powertrain, if I’m not mistaken. They’ve also got, I think, a five-year 60 that covers the whole car. And I apologize if I’m not getting those correct. But overall, it’s just something where if you’re wanting, if you want to have the backing of the manufacturer when you purchase a vehicle, this may be the vehicle for you, right? You don’t want to have to mess with it. I also think they’ve got some other programs as far as, some of the basic maintenance and stuff that’s available to it. Again, I would encourage folks to check this out, Dad. And you’ve driven this car, obviously, other models or the older ones. But I think when you and I both drove this car several years ago, I think our comments were similar, which is this is really a great value for the money.
SPEAKER 05 :
Yeah, again, for those of you that are in the market for that, I guess you could say, Richard, smaller SUV because that’s exactly what this is. The Kona is an SUV. They’ve got, by the way, really quick for those of you listening, some great deals on this right now. What I mean by that is some money off or cheap interest rates or whatever the case may be, whatever you’re looking to do. But, yeah, for those of you that are looking for a car that is in that – How should I say this, Richard? $25,000 to $35,000 range max. Really, it’s more like mid-20s to low-30s. If you’re looking for something along those lines in a vehicle that, you know, is this going to be for a family of four? Probably not. Could this work for a family of three or especially a family of two? Absolutely. And if you’re just looking for a daily, you know, go to work to and from, it’s usually just you. You want to be able to fold the seats down and reconfigure things accordingly. Is this a vehicle that would work for that particular situation? Absolutely.
SPEAKER 10 :
Again, I would 100% agree with everything that you just said. Again, can you get the kids to and from school in this? Yes, you can. You’ve got a little car room in the back. Is it the biggest SUV out there? No, it’s not, but it’s not meant to be. This is great for an urban environment. You can fit this car anywhere. You can pull it into some tight spots at the supermarket or in downtown without worry. And like you said, the other thing I would factor in is they are really running some great specials on this, and obviously that’s going to vary by area and availability. But, again, Dad, you can get a brand-new car that is an SUV. And, again, in Colorado, folks, all-wheel drive, you can get for – because an all-wheel drive, by the way, is available on every model, Dad, right? You don’t have to get the Limited, which is the top of the line for us. So to your point, you can get a SUV, Grant, on the smaller side, an SUV with all-wheel drive for less than $30,000, depending on how you configure it. So we encourage folks, check this out. Head to your local Hyundai dealer. And like you said, they may even have some specials in your area that we really encourage folks to check out. And when you do, let them know that John and Richard Rush from Drive Radio and Rush to Reason sent you.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, Richard, before we close out, something you sent me earlier, I didn’t get a chance to get to it. I may talk a little bit more about it in the third hour, but I thought we’d at least touch on it. And that is that China, and I say it all the time, they are not doing as well as even a lot of the globalists and especially the press would want you to believe. And they’re doing everything they can to try to prop their economy up. And you sent me an article today proving that.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, it’s a rather interesting thing because you see some stuff that kind of comes out of China, and sometimes I don’t think it gets covered. I think the thing I sent you was from the Financial Times, which is that China is going to basically subsidize or provide subsidy to their markets, right, which is subsidized, which is the government basically paying farmers or whatever it might be. I don’t know exactly what segment it is. But China’s struggling, right? And everyone’s talking about Trump and tariffs and everything else going on. And what I’ll say is this, Dan, I think sometimes even myself, and you can attest to this, you may have had some lively discussions about the economy and economics and some of the policy and everything going on. I think it’s important, though, to say, sort of compare ourselves at times to the rest of the world and say, okay, we’re still doing pretty great. We still have an economy that’s that most people want to do business with. And the reason is that is because we have a true free economy, right? You can do anything here that you want to do. Yes, we have government regulations that get in the way of a lot of things and all sorts of stuff. But dad, if you have a great idea, you can come here and do it. And we typically, yes, I’m not saying we don’t bail people out because we do. We bailed out farmers before. We bailed out the banks, right? We bailed out the automakers. We’ve done bailouts and we’ve subsidized the market. But typically speaking, dad, if you have a good idea, and you want to come to the best place in the world, in yours and my opinion, to kind of take that idea to fruition, this is still the best way to do it.
SPEAKER 05 :
Absolutely. So for those of you, yeah, and I know I talk about it a lot. I’ll probably get into it more on Wednesday with Scott Garlis. Reality is, no, China’s not doing that great. They’re having to do everything they possibly can to prop up their own economy. I talk about that a lot. You’re not going to hear a lot of that from the mainstream media, by the way, and or from even some of the talking heads that are out there, you know, financially speaking. So, Richard, thanks for sending that. And I’ll leave it with that. Have a great rest of your day.
SPEAKER 10 :
That was good to see you.
SPEAKER 05 :
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SPEAKER 06 :
Now back to Rush to Reason on KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 05 :
All right, closing out this hour and our conversation that we started this hour with talking about masculine men and the book that was written and all of that. Several of you have texted in and have given some comments along those lines. And by the way, I thought I would maybe get some hate. a text or email along those lines and frankly they have all been very supportive and in line and some of you have given some great stories as to what some of your young men and the raising that they have had their upbringing by the way have done and all i can say is those of you and you know who you are keep up the great work keep teaching your young men how to be masculine men and it will bode well for them on down the road because, frankly, there’s not that many of them left, and we need all that we can get. So please keep doing what you’re doing, and thank you for those text messages. We’ll be back. Hour number three is next. Rush to Reason, Denver’s Afternoon Rush, KLZ 560.
SPEAKER 17 :
I’m a rich guy
