Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
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This is your program
designed to bring you news,
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views, updates, analysis,
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and general information on
religious liberty in the US
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and around the world.
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My name is Lincoln Steed,
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and I have a very
special guest on my program,
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Kingsley Palmer.
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He works for
religious liberty in Arizona
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for the
Seventh-day Adventist Church,
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and I should say that
I edit Liberty magazine
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also for the
Seventh-day Adventist Church,
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although Liberty is
directed at everybody.
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Very few of our members
would even see this magazine,
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which is
distributed to thought leaders,
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government leaders,
politicians, and so on.
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I'm sure people
have figured out by now
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that my accent does betray me,
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and that while I have
lived most of my life in the US,
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I have an
Australian ancestry and origin.
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And your accent will
betray you almost the moment
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you open your mouth.
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You grew up and lived
many years in England,
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and now you've
lived many more years,
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I think in the United
States, and the few in India.
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But let's talk about
England, the mother country.
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You know, mother
comes to mind a lot
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when you talk about England.
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Although when you
use the word mother
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in the modern world,
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you think of Saddam Hussein
and the mother of all battles.
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Yes, yes, I remember that one.
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It didn't turn
out to be thankfully.
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But there is a
mother term in England
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that is used now and then.
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They talk about
the English Parliament
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is the mother
of all parliaments,
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mother of all
legislative bodies.
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So I don't feel embarrassed here
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filming in the United States
to sort of reach back there
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because England has been a model
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and a precursor to many things,
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including the
United States experiment.
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And I must admit,
even as I think about that,
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I have fond
memories in Australia
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and in the US of
sitting in my car
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on a number of occasions
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and listening
with some excitement
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to the debates in Parliament.
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Oh, they're very rigorous.
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Sometimes borderline feud.
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Right, borderline street feud.
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Exactly, exactly.
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You know, on one occasion,
someone yelled out to Obama
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during a state of
the union address,
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"You lie," and he was
pretty much objecting it.
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Yes, definitely.
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But that's normal.
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That would just
pass over your head.
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You know, in the
Australian Parliament,
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which again is modeled after
the mother of all parliaments,
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I saw in a sequence once
where the opposition leader
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called the Prime
Minister a liar repeatedly,
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and he was asked to retract that
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or he'd be recognized,
in other words ejected.
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In the end, he was ejected,
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but he retracted at
first and was accepted.
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And then he
says, "Yes, I retract,"
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he says, "but
he's a liar anyway."
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Interesting.
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So that's the style.
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But all of that aside, England,
it's has been an interesting,
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I think, experiment in applying,
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you know, freedom principles
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in an
increasingly turbulent world.
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What's your take on
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how England has
handled some of the stresses?
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In another program,
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you mentioned
the Irish question.
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Yes.
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I can't even say it turned out.
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Well, it turned out well,
but it seems to have gone away
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because they were
afraid that that'd be lumped in
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with the post 9/11 reaction.
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But the underlying
issue is never as old.
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But how is the English democracy
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managed to deal with
so many competing issues,
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not least of which
religious conflicts
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through the ages in England?
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Well, I think...
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The church of
England, the singular church,
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but it's not been
that simple, has it ever?
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No, it hasn't.
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And I think part of that if
I can call it an experiment,
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to me, in fact
the parliament's been
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in operation for
close to 1,000 years,
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and has the demographics
in Britain has changed,
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so as the view of the
world, the Commonwealth
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or what used to
be form a common...
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Colonial dominions,
if I may use that term.
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The British had to
adjust themselves through that,
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the changing and in particularly
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with respect to immigration,
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you know, after
the Second World War,
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you know that you had
the Marshall Plan here
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to rebuild Britain.
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And that meant
people from former colonies
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coming to
Britain, residing there,
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that's how I got there.
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I'm the son of
immigrants, and therefore,
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what they brought to the table
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in order to
rebuild the infrastructure
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of the United Kingdom,
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they brought their experiences,
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they brought
what they understood
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to be important
to them and so...
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Well, you're
ready to getting it.
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I was setting you up.
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You are getting
it, what I really think
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is the part of the
secret of the British system.
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It's ultimately an inclusion
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even though the
societal structure in England
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was very
stratified, and to this day,
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I think they still
have aristocratic...
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Well, you know, you
got class system, they do,
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that I think, you know,
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as successive
generations have come along,
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so has change.
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And adaptability is important.
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If I may look across
the pond, as they often say,
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here, I don't know
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that it's been
embraced the same way.
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If anything extremely, it
has become almost untenable
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in terms of, okay,
you open the doors,
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you invite people to
come in, and let's face it,
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we talk about the
cosmopolitan melting pot.
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It shouldn't be a melting pot.
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We used to use
that term back home.
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No, it needs to be a salad.
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In other words,
if you've got people,
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we have the
Church of England, right?
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You have many
different churches there,
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Birmingham, you know,
you're either one of two camps.
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You either
Protestant or evangelical
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or you're Roman
Catholic or what have you,
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and then in between, you've
got all these different groups.
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And adaptability is important,
and being open-minded.
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That's one thing I do
like about my development,
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my growth at the same time,
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but you don't find that here,
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and people have resisted for it.
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You've seen
parliament, you've seen,
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an honorable noble
gentleman, he's got the floor.
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You say honorable,
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but dishonorable
things are exchanged.
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But yet, they can
find common ground
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for the good of everybody.
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Now it's not perfect.
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Here, it's pretty different
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in terms of your
political affiliation.
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It's sometimes
attached to what you believe
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and depending on
which side of the aisle,
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whether you're left,
right or center somewhere.
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That guides and influences
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how you see other people
even in a public setting.
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That's worth mentioning that
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there was a big political debate
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in the early American
experiment about parties.
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They didn't have
parties at the very beginning.
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And not by accident,
they had rejected the parties,
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Whigs and Tories
system of England
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because they saw
some issues there.
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And it's worth remembering.
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While it works
pretty well at the moment,
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there's been some
dangerous polarizations
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in the English system.
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And I love
history, and, you know,
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favorite part of my history
of England was the period
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with the Puritans
and the civil war,
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and the protectorate and so
on, politics got toxic then.
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Of course, it became a republic
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for a short space
of time under Cromwell,
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but reverted
back to what it was.
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But I think at the
moment, it's working quite well,
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given the
dysfunctional world we live in.
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And you're right,
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in the US, which
is heading rapidly
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toward
dysfunction on many levels,
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but particularly with the
religious dynamic behind it,
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wouldn't hurt to take a leaf
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from what England
has gained by experience,
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hard experience often.
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Well, again,
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with the arrival of
people from around the world
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into the country,
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and there's had to
be a level of okay,
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acceptance,
understanding, open-mindedness.
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I was raised in it.
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It wasn't perfect.
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Immigrants were
not always treated
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as well as they
should have been.
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But now successive generations
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have been born and raised there,
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brought into the idea,
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this is the country
which you are now a part of,
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and have moved up
the ladder as it were
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to places which grandparents
would never have dreamed
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could have happened.
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And so the
dialogue has had to change.
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The viewpoints
have had to change.
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And let's not even talk about
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the entrance into
the European community
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because that's a
whole another story.
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Or the exit.
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Or the exit or the Brexit.
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But they've had to
have an open-mind, right?
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And to keep the peace,
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and it's probably
less class stratified
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now than it ever was.
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And it's been healthy.
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And we and I can
sit down and talk
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and have a conversation
about so many different things,
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and yet respect.
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We have a Muslim mayor.
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Think about having that
here in the United States.
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You know, this is the Congress,
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the last elections that
they had, you know, for...
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Back in November,
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you've seen the diversified
House of Representatives
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and the more
stratified, you know, Senate.
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So
adaptability, open-mindedness.
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We've learned, we
haven't got there yet.
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And I say we
going across the pond
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have had to be adaptable.
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And I think it bodes
well in terms of engaging.
00:10:52.48\00:10:56.32
I think it bodes well in
terms of having an open mind
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and understanding,
and a degree of acceptance
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or choosing to
agree to disagree.
00:11:03.56\00:11:05.26
You know, I'm
pursuing this for good reason.
00:11:05.29\00:11:08.76
It seems to me at the moment,
00:11:08.80\00:11:10.63
the US as much of
the rest of the world,
00:11:10.67\00:11:12.83
but in particular,
00:11:12.87\00:11:14.20
the US is going through
a very stressful period,
00:11:14.24\00:11:16.67
stresses from immigration,
00:11:16.71\00:11:18.14
finance,
internal political issues,
00:11:18.17\00:11:22.34
polarization at
the parties, and so on.
00:11:22.38\00:11:25.61
But it's not reacting well,
00:11:25.65\00:11:28.62
and I'm afraid the lashing
out is going to get toxic,
00:11:28.65\00:11:31.75
and it should learn a
lesson from other things
00:11:31.79\00:11:34.92
that humans have gone
through, and in particular,
00:11:34.96\00:11:36.56
the England that had
an empire and it's gone,
00:11:36.59\00:11:40.90
but it turned out
to be a fairly benign,
00:11:40.93\00:11:44.50
accommodating country.
00:11:44.53\00:11:46.47
You know, it's not by accident
00:11:46.50\00:11:48.37
that the masters
of these refugees
00:11:48.40\00:11:51.67
that flooded Europe recently
00:11:51.71\00:11:53.04
were trying to get
through the tunnel.
00:11:53.07\00:11:54.41
Even once they got to Europe,
00:11:54.44\00:11:55.78
they still trying to get
through the channel to England,
00:11:55.81\00:11:58.61
which connects to Brexit,
00:11:58.65\00:12:01.22
you know, we've seen
as an existential threat.
00:12:01.48\00:12:03.75
Yeah, we still buy
those whose minds are so close
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to what makes
Britain great, right?
00:12:09.72\00:12:13.56
And I'd be
careful how I phrase that.
00:12:13.60\00:12:15.23
But I'm speaking from
across the perspective,
00:12:15.26\00:12:17.67
across the point,
00:12:17.70\00:12:19.03
what has made Great
Britain as we know it,
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and it's not perfect,
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and I can tell
you many, many stories
00:12:23.37\00:12:26.31
about its imperfections
is the open-mindedness.
00:12:26.34\00:12:30.45
What you learn when you travel?
00:12:30.48\00:12:32.48
So when you, people come to
the country in whatever way,
00:12:32.51\00:12:36.38
shape or fashion they get there,
00:12:36.42\00:12:38.22
you have an understanding.
00:12:38.25\00:12:39.59
And I think the
educational system has
00:12:39.62\00:12:41.22
a lot to do with it
as well in terms of it.
00:12:41.26\00:12:44.09
Let me really throw a wrench in,
00:12:44.13\00:12:46.19
we're nearly the
break, but we can get started.
00:12:46.23\00:12:48.53
Part of the dislocation
in the US at the moment
00:12:52.23\00:12:54.84
is a mixture of
politics and religion.
00:12:54.87\00:12:57.07
Those are the two topics
00:13:00.21\00:13:01.54
just supposedly
don't bring up normally,
00:13:01.58\00:13:03.11
but they
characterize this program
00:13:03.14\00:13:05.75
or at least commentary on...
00:13:05.78\00:13:07.98
But this is not a
political program,
00:13:08.02\00:13:09.55
but we are always talking about
00:13:09.58\00:13:11.05
things that have political
ramifications or in politics,
00:13:11.09\00:13:14.99
and religion is right in there.
00:13:15.02\00:13:19.16
We've just extolled
England for relative success,
00:13:19.19\00:13:22.16
but what's the role of religion
00:13:22.20\00:13:24.07
in English
society and governance?
00:13:24.10\00:13:26.20
Well, you ask any
Brit regardless of stripe,
00:13:26.23\00:13:30.97
and they will tell you,
"That's a private matter.
00:13:31.01\00:13:34.18
That's a personal matter.
00:13:34.21\00:13:35.78
We don't need to discuss
that, we live and let live."
00:13:35.81\00:13:39.28
We don't make legislation
based upon religious attitudes
00:13:39.31\00:13:44.19
or perceptions of what is,
00:13:44.22\00:13:45.79
you know,
acceptable or not acceptable.
00:13:45.82\00:13:47.99
So when did it become private?
How did it become private?
00:13:48.02\00:13:50.23
I know that attitude,
00:13:50.26\00:13:51.66
and I didn't think
you'd say that so simply,
00:13:51.69\00:13:53.93
but I know that that's.
00:13:53.96\00:13:56.03
In Australia, the
same, that's what's thought.
00:13:56.06\00:13:58.33
And it isn't a
private matter per se,
00:13:58.37\00:14:00.47
but it shouldn't
be a public matter
00:14:00.50\00:14:02.94
as far as government
00:14:02.97\00:14:05.91
to get involved in
projecting religious values
00:14:05.94\00:14:10.01
and dictates to the whole.
00:14:10.05\00:14:12.11
No, and that's...
00:14:12.15\00:14:13.48
And, of course, we have
the first amendment designed
00:14:13.52\00:14:15.05
to protect that,
but that's disputed
00:14:15.08\00:14:17.59
in the US today.
00:14:17.62\00:14:18.95
We need to take a break.
00:14:18.99\00:14:20.32
So stay with us.
00:14:20.36\00:14:21.69
And we will delve further
00:14:21.72\00:14:23.09
into this discussion
of religion and politics,
00:14:23.12\00:14:26.39
and how it's operating on
either side of a great pond.
00:14:26.43\00:14:30.10