AP Dillon on Kirk's murder (09-15-2025--Hour3)

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT Radio in Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to vpteclendershow dot com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button. Get every episode for free, write to your smartphone or tablet, and again, thank you so much for your support. It is Monday and two o'clock and that means we usually talk to Ap Dylon. She is a reporter at the North State Journal n sjonline dot com. You can also read her substack called more to the story, Ap, how are you? I'm doing great, Pete, how are you doing? I am doing okay. So you wrote about on your substack under the headline a nation mourns and you wrote America has changed, It cannot and will not be the same. So how has it changed and why will it not be the same? Well, this felt different. The assassination Charlie Kirk just felt different from any other event that I had witnessed in my lifetime. And it just there was like something shifted, like a like the tectonic plates underneath the Earth's crust, like something just moved, and not in a good way. I'm hopefully, hopefully this is going to calm things down, but it doesn't seem to be going in that route. Considering that what we're seeing online with nasty messages being posted about his death, I think that what the positive side of this is and that things won't be the same, is that there's been a little bit of an awakening going on. Turning point. USA has reported that they've had tens of thousands of chapter new chapter requests filed with them today for Vice President Vance set in for Charlie Kirk for his radio show today. I was watching part of that earlier, so there's things going in both directions, but there was a fundamental shift there. I mean, it dropped a clear divide between those who would cheer a murder and those who would pray over one right. And I saw a clip I'm trying to see if I can pull it up here Steven Miller with the administration. He tells JD. Vance that they are going to be going after the organizations. And in the first hour I talked a little bit about some of the reporting and some of the stuff coming out of the government, the federal government saying that they are investigating people in the social media discord, group chats and such that appeared to have knowledge some of them may have had knowledge of the plot, and so now they're going to start trying to investigate them. But Miller also talked about going after the funding networks. Uh, these n g os, these nonprofits that have been uh, you know, fomenting this kind of discord and chaos and now assassination. Well, I hope they're also going to look at some of these violent extremist networks too, like seven sixty four Colm, Uh, murder murder people dot com. It was another one. I think the wait, their name is murder people dot com. Yeah, I believe so. Yeah, it's a website that I believe. The Antidefamation League has written several things about these are These are groups and organizations that literally radicalized children and teenagers and young adults into doing violent things. They use sexting, they use blackmail, they use all kinds of different angles, and they get through these kids to online apps. There's been some complaints in some lawsuits dealing with Robox with predatory behavior and these kinds of groups finding their victims on platforms like that. Also, you know some other games out there that we're children frequent and you know, it's it's just prime for the picking. And they find a kid who's just lonely and on there all the time, and they groom them. So I really hope that they're going to be taking a look at some of those things. I've written a few of those things on my sub stack about these things are called NPEs. So if folks want to go over and take a look at that, I have some I have one post about the seven sixty floor cult which resulted in the arrest right here in Chapel Hill in North Carolina not so long ago. Yeah, and I think we talked about it. I think we did talk about that that that particular group I had not heard of, the murder people folks. Yeah, kind of given away the game. That's that's not. Very to the information. Yeah, that's fun reading. I'll tell you what. It was highly depressing. Yeah, and it makes you really want to just, you know, take a look at your kids web browser history like every day. Yeah. So yeah, and I do wonder if if we will see some sorts of leasing of this kind of stuff either by the platforms themselves. I don't know how you would go about doing that. They speak in code, so you know, they learned the words that are going to get them in trouble, and they just won't use those words. So, yeah, they use words like cheese, pizza, and weird things like that to talk about, you know, ordering up a child. Yeah, and so like here's what like one of the one of the people in this in this discord group apparently or on a TikTok account rather said because the assassin's name was Tyler or is Tyler? And I said saw Tyler June thirty. And then right after Kirk was murdered, we bleeping did it? Is what they said. And so people are. Trying to decipher what does this Saw Tyler June thirty mean? Well, the gun that they recovered was a Mauser thirty six bolt action rifle June thirty thirty six, And so like are they giving out these code words and stuff as like, oh, we're all in on this, you know, this great victory of ours, which like I don't I said this last hour and I've said it before since the assassination, which is that they've made him. They've made Charlie Kirk more powerful in death than in life. And the amount of people now that are going out and watching videos of Charlie Kirk and realizing, Oh, this guy's not saying anything that's hateful. He's not. He's not engaged in violence. His speech is not violence. And that's you know, one of the predicates I think that the left has used this equation of speech equalling violence in order to then justify violence against speech. Well, yeah, I mean he challenged their narratives, right, challenged their ideologies, He challenged their basic platforms, and he rarely lost one of those debates. He rarely you know, came away with you know, a draw or a tie or that sort of thing. I mean, he made his arguments, and I'll tell you, I would challenge anyone to go and watch his videos. You're not going to find him cursing, slandering, or abusing any of the people that come up there. No, he doesn't. Maybe a little bit funny and put in a little bit of humor here and there, but he's not he's not. No. Yeah, And he would he would silence the crowd when they would get rowdy towards a speaker that you disagreed, you went to the front of the line, and so he like he that's those are the debates he wanted to have. And like I've said for years, unchallenged ideas are easy to hold. And what he did was challenge ideas and well and. He did it in a in a space that would pull pull on against him, right. And those and the people that occupied those spaces. The college kids were told by their teachers and professors and administrators that this is a quote safe space, and that any language or words that might challenge your thoughts and opinions that these are you know, triggering events, and we got to give you a warning. And oh my gosh, I don't feel safe. I can't stand here and listen to a difference of opinion. It's like that's precisely what you're supposed to do in college. Though that's why he went there, so maybe we should. I found that website. It's the actual website is called watch People Die. Oh that's how that's even better. Oh yeah, so sorry about that. I just pulled it up while we were talking. Wow. Yeah again, Like I'm not I'm not sure you're going to be able to to convince law enforcement or a jury that you didn't like you didn't have some sort of animus and an inspiration to violence with a name like that, if they if they do track them down, yeah. I mean, if they have if he's got ties to certain certain discords, which apparently he did and made certain comments within there, and other other individuals have been screenshots of that. They've been posted it on x and places of screenshots of this one particular discord forum with people agreeing or seeming to have knowledge that this is going to happen, you know, like watch out on September tenth, right, you know something's going to happen, Like this wasn't his account, This was other accounts, right. Other accounts that were following his transgender boyfriend. That, Yeah, they were followers of the other one twig. Twigs or whatever. Yeah, it's a strange situation all the way around. But I mean there's there's a common component between all the tragedies that we've seen with the recent shootings of the Catholic school recently. You know, there was one the same day in Colorado, and all these are you know, in somewhere the articles and somewhere in the reporting it will say that these kids are radicalized online. Right, so yeah, left wing radicalization. Which I noticed that there are a lot of people over the last few days that have been trying their hard artists to lie about the obvious motive involved here that like I saw people trying to argue, like mainstream legacy media outlet people trying to argue that like, we don't know what the motive is. It appears it appears he came from a Republican family, he was a he was a right winger, and all of this, like and none of that is true. And it almost makes me wonder, like, are you just trying to pollute the environment? So nobody knows what the truth actually is, right, because I think that, you. Know, it's the old adage. You know, a lie gets us all the way around the world before the truth gets its panton. Yeah, you know, he gets you know, a million views that's completely inaccurate, and then you know, the correction comes up and it gets like five views, yeah. Right, or yeah, or they put it up on there. What's the couple of the outlets have done this where they they promote the lie in the story on their main account on Twitter, reaching millions of people, and then their correction comes in the form of the pr account for the news operation, and they've got like, you know, ten thousand followers, so nobody sees the correction. It's just yeah, yeah, it's despicable. Yeah, that's you know why people should just, you know, when all this information is coming out, take it with a giant shaker of salt. Yeah, and you know, wait for everything to drop, because you know, the assumptions the news media is you know, zero for a million when it gets you know, when things like this happen. Well, and I yeah, first reporting. Right, and I always say that too, Like the initial reports are always going to contain false information, right. People are racing to report what they know and find out stuff and they get duped or they promote lies and they get bad reports. And so like the information in the initial hours after our tragedy, you should never you should never believe them until you get verification. And usually that takes a couple of days. And that's part of what journalism is. And so we should give we should have patients as they you know, as investigators, investigated, reporters report. We should give them the time and space to do that. And now we have a clearer, fuller picture. And I think we're going to get even a clearer picture what after tomorrow when this guy makes his first appearance in court. Yeah, and we're going to get some evidence presented by the prosecution, I expect. So yeah, I have a feeling it's going to be very watched. Yeah, we'll see what happens. There is a there's a vigil here tonight in Raleigh for Charlie Kirk, which I'll be covering for a North State journal. And from what I understand, there's going to be one in Charlotte on Wednesday, So that's in your stomping grounds. Yep. There's one in Monroe downtown Monroe. I've been told at seven tonight as well. Yep. So we'll see. We'll see what said and who turns out. Well, he may be interested to know this Argerie Keel High School is doing an investigation to find out who painted on the high school rock live like Kirk. Oh, yeah, I saw that. I actually responded to a story that was posted about that, and I asked, you know, so it's a unauthorized and I said, so was the Black Lives Matter stuff in twenty twenty authorized? Right? Is every birthday message authorized, Like. I thought, just the most ridiculous thing I'd ever I had seen. Yeah, so far, I mean talked about splitting hairs, right. I thought the whole point was to paint that rock, so you don't paint other you know, property at the school anyway. Yeah, it's a freedom of expression rock. And you know clearly there are students who felt strongly about it and they went and did it. I mean, if this is their way of reaving morning or give you a tribute, then you know, let them get it out. You know, you shouldn't call it unauthorized. What kind of adult does that to children? I don't understand. We got to leave it there, Ap Dylan. You can read her work at North State Journal NSJ online, and you can also subscribe to her sub stack. It is called More to the Story, AP, Thanks so much for your time. So when I was a kid, my grandpa died with Alzheimer's, and before he died, my mom and my dad took care of him as he got worse. Forty years ago, there were no treatments and not much support for caregivers and family. Things are different today because of the work of so many people, including the Alzheimer's Association of Western Carolina. It's a great organization with awesome people with huge hearts. I've been a supporter for twenty five years. This cause means a lot to me. 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I like what Jeff has opted to do. Jeff is claiming on Twitter that he painted the rjorie Kel rock. Jeff from South Carolina says there's no need to investigate. It was him and my response, I painted the rock, oh captain, my captain, I painted the rock. So if rdrie Kel's principal wants to investigate, investigation over, I painted the rock, you can pint it on me. I did it. Jill's here says on Twitter. It's a pete tweet. She says, based on the nonsense that's been going on at rjorie Kel since it opened its doors, you would think the principle would welcome an uplifting message on the rock. The rock is in much of the administrators and educators in our schools. All right, you hear me talk a lot about incentives, right, Well, let's talk about incentive trips, the kind that companies offer employees to fire them up and reward their teams. If you own a business or you work somewhere that offers these incentive trips, first. Off, good for you. But also there is a custom app that's a game changer for these trips. It's called Incentive Tripkit. Private group messaging, shared photos, you'r itinerary, travel details, all built into a single, easy to use app. There's even a traveler locator, so Carl from Accounting doesn't get left behind. The best part about Incentive trip Kit it's totally private. No email captures, no sign ups, no cringe ads. It's simple, clean and secure. And when the trip is over, Incentive trip Kit turns those highlights into a professional storytelling video. So think about it. When you launch next year's incentive trip campaign, that video becomes your greatest motivator. Talk about a return on investment, right, you got to check out Incentive trip Kit for your business. Visit in incentive tripkit dot com because great trips deserve even better returns ron in Rockhill he claims he painted the rock at Audrie Kill High School. William He too claims to have painted the rock. Well, maybe not painted it, he says, but I provided the red, white blue paint. That was used. So put me on the investigation list as one involved. If everybody claims to be the painter of the rock, then I don't know who they can painted on, you know. Hmmmm. Jeff is lying he did not paint the rock. It was me. Corey from Matthews Chris says no, it was me. I painted the rock, and he says, stop this nonsense. I painted that rock, and then he adds and I won't stop until every high school in Charlotte has long lived Kirk on their rocks. Another Jeff, now claiming he did it. Anonymous says I helped to paint the rock. At Ardrikel Rodney claims no it was him. Kenny from Bessemer City says no it was him, and Bob claims it was actually Bigfoot that painted the rock. Maybe it's Corey Booker, he of the Spartacus moment right to be the case ap Dillon also wrote at her substack about the murder of Irina Zarutzka, and she says the focus quickly became Democrats soft on crime policies that allowed her assailant to Carlos Brown, a man with a long criminal history and clear mental health issues, to be allowed to roam the streets. Former Governor Roy Cooper's Racial Justice Task Force, which he set up following the George Floyd riots. The summer of fiery but mostly peaceful riots was highlighted as a prime example of Democrats soft on policies and contributed to Brown being free. The General Assembly is now looking to introduce a package of reforms aimed at making sure that what happened to Zarutzka is not repeated. The key areas the lawmakers say they want to handle when they come back into session in a I think a week. They want to end cashless bail, they want better vetting and training of magistrates. They're going to look to reinstate the death penalty. They're going to also look at laws on involuntary commitment, and they want to look at the grants that have been handed out to cash list bail activist groups in the Charlotte area. Then there was this exchange that occurred on real time with Bill Maher over the weekend. He has on the program Tim Alberta from the Atlantic, and he has Ben Shapiro and they talk about out the light rail murder out of Charlotte and listen to. The wet the other horrible violence we saw this week. And of course this is the kind of violence that happens every day. Two lots of people of all racism and so forth. This happens to be a white girl on a train who was killed by a black man. So people are making a lot out of that. But this happened in Charlotte, North Carolina, to me is tailor made for Republican victory because the mayor there in Charlotte. Of course, she said prayers and thoughts go out to the victim, and then she's not villainizing. Those who struggle with their mental health are those who are unhoused. She couldn't give, she couldn't resist giving a shout out to the mentally deranged, homeless demographic. I'm just going to say, the Democrats are going to lose another election if they don't get it. You can say homeless and crazy. We could say those words, and you can come out against this fully. You know, why don't just do a land acknowledgment before you say that. Sake? And this guy was the guy whodit it had been arrested fourteen times. I mean, this recidivism, this is Trump's next low lying fruit. I'm sure because when you look at some of the stats of people like in Washington, d C. They say five hundred people are responsible for seventy percent of the gun violence. What is the point of arresting people if they go right back on the street. What is the point of mass transit? Listen to the crowd safe on it right? You know, Traditionally, built democrats representing urban areas had taken these sort of soft on crime policies in part because they were afraid of alienating a core constituency, black voters. What's interesting is that even as polling has shown clearly that more and more black voters have advocated for tougher policing policies, many of these Democratic politicians have remained very reluctant to get tougher on crime. Why because they're afraid of alienating a different demographic. It's so liberals in the subject, right, that's Tim Alberta, and he's exactly right. They don't want to alienate the other core constituency, which is the awfuls affluent white female liberals. And so you've got the people who are actually suffering under the defund the police movement, the soft on crime approach. The people who are suffering under this are saying, we want more cops, we want more policing, we want justice. And you've got this other Darren Well. I will make reference to the quote luxury beliefs of these liberal white women in the suburbs that are like, no, we can't do that, that's mean systemic racism. Are these are lefties and they're not advocating for a core part of the Democrat constituency. They're making their lives more difficult, more dangerous. And then Bill Maher goes on, and then now you're going to hear Ben Shapiro Chriman. It's so racist. It's kind of saying we think the black people are the criminals. Some are not, most not most implicitly the argument that we happen is soft on crime to how in order so they get black votes like black people want crime. It's racist, of course it is. Of course it's racist. And the idea that you're going to leave people on the street because they are crazy is so benighted. Honestly, it's cruel to people who are severely mentally ill, truly, like leaving a bunch of people a horse schizophrenic, homeless schizophrenics on the street not taking their drugs is not good for them, it's not good for society. And releasing people back onto the streets after fourteen arrests, and then you know what the mayor said, She said, you know, we can't incarcerate our way out of this problem. Well, actually, actually you can't. It turns out that you can certain part. Of this solution. The crowd reaction tells you everything you need to know about the preference cascade. There has been a vibe shift, not like Kamala Harris said, this is an actual one the normies. The last week has been really clarifying. People realize they're not alone in these opinions, and they have become dare I say woke. They have awakened to the people around them that have these radical beliefs and what they will accept and justify and rationalize. And people are horrified. 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Hey, just real quick, I'm enjoying listen to you during my walk today, So thank you very much, certainly. And I did not paint the rocks. Ah, got that out of the way, all right, Pete, I wanted to talk to you a little bit about the light rail. Try to make it real quick here. My wife and I period we're not regular periodically. Let's ride the light rail and every time we're on there, we're look up and now on the car we ask ourselves, you know, how many of those people paid for their fare like we did, and how many did And so we were in Vancouver a couple of weeks ago and we decided to ride their rail system from the airport to downtown and it was amazing. So when you ride the rail system Vancouver, you can't even get really, you walk up to the station, but you can't get until you buy your ticket. And then once you buy your ticket, you go up to the barrier, you put your ticket on a pad there, the gate swings open, you go through, and then it swiftly and firmly closes behind you. Then my wife comes through, and so then we ride the train uptown and when we get off in downtown Vancouver. This is what really shed the light for me, is when you're leaving the station, you have to use your ticket again to open the barrier to get out of the station. So what great data is that for planning and scheduling. They know where I bought my ticket, they know where I got on the train, they know where I got off the train. I mean, it's so good. And whose idea was it ever to make our system an honor system. It's just crazy. Well, the original architects of the system, the Charlotte City leaders, Metropolitan Transit Commission, and the original head of CATS Ron tober Right, they they were the ones that built the system the way it is, this open honor system. And I've never liked it. I've never felt good about it, but going to Vancouver just really opened my eyes. So yeah, that's what I wanted to say. And the second thing is is they want more money to build a new line. Hey, let's install some instill some integrity in our current line or our current system before we go build a new line somewhere else. Yeah, it's a fair point, Jim. Yeah, I appreciate the call, buddy. Thank you. Good to hear from you. Enjoy the rest of your walk too. Now, this is a it's a major problem, and not only from the safety perspective, but also from the revenue site. You're asking us to approve an increase in our sales tax to fund an expansion of a system that isn't collecting the full amount of money that it should be collecting. That should offset some of the need for us to pay for the sales tax, right, and it just seems obvious to me. All Right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast, So if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to thepetecleanershow dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.