Tim Wildman: Thank you for your prayers for American Family Radio

Ed Vitagliano Today's Issues continues on AFR with your.

Steve Jordahl Host, Tim Wildmon, president of the American Family Association.

Tim Wildmon Hey, welcome back, everybody, to Today's Issues on the American Family Radio Network. Today's Issues, the name of this show on afr. Tim, Ed Vitagliano, Wesley Wildmon. And now Steve Paisley Jordal. Good morning, brother Steve.

Steve Jordahl Good morning, everybody.

Tim Wildmon Hey, let me read this letter real quick. It's like, take me two minutes here, but every once in a while I get a letter across my desk that really is heartwarming.

Steve Jordahl As they say, positive and encouraging.

Tim Wildmon Positive and encouraging. Dated, July 2nd. The note, handwritten note. See this right here? Handwritten note, July 2, 2025. Dear AFA, as I am 97 years old, be 98 in a month, living on Social Security and pension plus legally blind, my money is very limited and unexpected sum of money came to me and I have to share with you. And I have to share with you. I do pray for you all and thank you for all that you do. May our Lord keep you all safe and give victory in all your efforts. And this is, I'll just say Christine is her name.

Ed Vitagliano Wow.

Tim Wildmon From Virginia.

Steve Jordahl Thank you, Christine.

Tim Wildmon She put her name, she put her name here and her address, but I'm not, obviously not going to say that. But she lives in Virginia. But I thought, wow, she's in August, she'll be 98 years old, living on Social Security and a pension. And she got, some extra money and she sent it to us.

Ed Vitagliano Well, listen, we love our listeners and let me just say this. Thank you, Christine, for your gift. Thank you for all of you who, give regularly to American Family Radio. We do appreciate that we have Share a thon coming up in October. But let me also say I know there's people out there who, who want to give and can't. And even those who do give, listen, please pray. That is not a minor thing. We don't think of that as being a minor thing that you do. If you can't give us what we really need. We need your prayers because this is, these are difficult waters we, that we swim in and they are shark infested waters, okay? And there is tons of pressure and who knows what the future is going to hold for our country. Hopefully God will continue to give us grace, but we want to be here to speak, the truth of God's word and to preach the gospel. So continue to pray. Pray that we will remain faithful to the calling that God has put on this ministry. Pray for Tim and the Others in leadership and their families. And for all of those who work here and pray, I'll tell you what else. Pray for new opportunities for us to get some other radio stations and maybe even in difficult, territory, spiritual territory, all sorts of things. You can pray for us. And these are. This is an important part of the ministry, your prayers.

Tim Wildmon And also if you run across any extra money.

Ed Vitagliano Yes.

Tim Wildmon And, you can feel free to do like Christine and send it our way.

Steve Jordahl Good example she's setting.

Tim Wildmon We would. Wanted to. We wouldn't want to give anybody the idea that we wouldn't accept that.

Ed Vitagliano That's absolutely. That that is true.

Steve Jordahl Shark infested waters and it's always Shark Week.

Ed Vitagliano Shark Week. It's been Shark Week in this country for 75 years.

Tim Wildmon There you go. We did. We do have a. We did buy a new station in, Des Moines, Iowa. Do you know this? I'm serious.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon And we'll be, we'll be sharing more about that later. We gotta have probably a couple months before we go on the air there.

Ed Vitagliano And I'm just. I'm just gonna say, I say this periodically. I do pray that God will give us an opportunity to get a station in Boston. So we have a voice.

Tim Wildmon Look into that.

Ed Vitagliano So we. So we have a voice in New England, kind of the birthplace of the.

Tim Wildmon Right.

Ed Vitagliano The country Christian.

Steve Jordahl In case. In case you're out there wondering why we don't have, stations in major cities like Boston, New York, Los Angeles. Those are major markets. And the hugely expensive M. Way expensive to put a radio station in those markets.

Ed Vitagliano And we probably way down on the list to get those spots. But God can do anything.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano So.

Wesley Wildmon Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano Anyway, that's just that being from that neck of the woods, that's a dream of mine.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon Stay. First story.

The New York Times ran an article saying Gaza is suffering from starvation

Steve Jordahl All right. so, if you've been following the news, and, reading about or watching about what's going on in Gaza, the Gaza Strip, the mainstream media is talking about a famine, starvation. and the mainstream media is saying that Israel is causing it and they're all to blame. And they are doing whatever they can to kind of push the. This narrative. It happens to not be true, which we can get into in a second. But one of the things you may have seen is a picture of a mom holding a little baby. That is the skin and bones. And they said, here it is. This is a. This is a starving. This is the poster child for, the malnutrition and the starvation that's going on in Gaza. And a, little fact checking was done by some people and they found out that, well, it's not exactly that this child has, cerebral palsy and he's malnutourished because he can't eat properly even in healthy times. He has a brother that is healthy and well fed, standing right next to him in another picture that the media all could have used but didn't. And so they've been called out by conservative media and others. And finally the New York Times is having to admit that they made a mistake, kind of.

Wesley Wildmon I want to hear the apology.

Steve Jordahl Well, it's not much of one, but I'll read what they got. So the original, article said Gazans are dying of starvation after 20 months of devastating conflict with Israel. Gaza's most vulnerable citizens, the young, the old and the sick, are facing what aid groups say is impending famine. And then they have a note, they tweeted out a note that says, we have appended an editor's note to a story about Muhammad Zakaria Al Mutawak, a child in Gaza who was diagnosed with severe malnutrition. After publication, the Times learned he also had pre existing health problems. Read more below. And then they have, children in Gaza are malnourished and starving, as the New York Times and others have documented. We ran a story about Gaza's most vulnerable citizens and showed this picture of this child that they say suffers from severe malnutrition. We have since learned new information, including from a hospital that treated him. And medical records updated our story to add context. Now here's what they did. They put the original, the New York Times put the original story out. They publicized it on their Twitter feed. Has 55 million followers on the New York Times truth feed. The, correction, it went on the New York Times communications Twitter page. That's 89,000, not nearly as many. And they never really admitted that. They never really admitted that they were wrong. They just said, oh, and in addition to the fact that they're starving Israel, are starving these people. Oh yeah, he also has some medical conditions. That's not at all the case.

Tim Wildmon Yeah.

A photograph claiming that Israel is starving Palestinians went viral on the Internet

All right, so the propaganda war against Israel continues and many people in the world are complicit, with this because they hate the Jews, they hate Israel and they, they think that, that the Palestinians, the Arabs there in Gaza, they should have their own state over there in Israel. So now great, Britain is talking about a two state solution again. so what happened here? This went viral. This photograph went viral.

Ed Vitagliano And there's other photos on different newspapers. I'm looking at the Daily Express. The headline says, for pity's sake, stop this now. Same child.

Tim Wildmon The picture went around the world. And what you're drawn to conclude from this is that the Israeli government and military are starving people to death. Right in Gaza. The Gaza Strip, which by the way is Israeli land. Did you know this is.

Tim Wildmon Really?

Ed Vitagliano But they had given it, they call.

Tim Wildmon It occupied, but it's actually Israeli land in the first place.

Ed Vitagliano They had given it to the Palestinians to run this.

Tim Wildmon We mentioned this before. The Israelis are in a no win situation on the, on the, on the propaganda side, on the media perception side. But I, don't know, Wesley. I don't know what Israel is supposed to do. Tell me what they're supposed to do.

Wesley Wildmon Well, what I always like to own on, stuff like this, I always like to go back to how we got here.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Wesley Wildmon Okay, first of all, this, first of all, the image is a lie. The way it was, the way it was presented.

Tim Wildmon Because the mother is healthy looking.

Wesley Wildmon Oh yes. Yeah. So she's being fed.

Tim Wildmon Right.

Wesley Wildmon Okay. So it's a lie. However, in the event that they're even wanting to make the case that what you're saying that the Israel's are starving Israelis, Israelis are starving the the people in Gaza. How do we get here? Okay, if that was true, it's because Hamas, committed a terrorist. A whole day of terrorism where they murdered 1100 people. Right? Slaughtered, slaughtered. Yes. And all the other thing, and the raping and the beheading, all that. So that happened. So now this, until they, this, this is solved. One, of there was an elected official said there may have been Tom Cotton, but this is solved when they release the hostages and walk out with their hands up. And they, that this is how this is solved.

Tim Wildmon Right.

Wesley Wildmon Anything short of that, Right.

Tim Wildmon Israel is going to continue because of what was provoked. Yes. And Israel now is on guard against this happening, this kind of terrorist attack ever happening again on their soil, against their people. So we've talked about this before. The Israelis are in a tough situation in this sense. On the PR side, Hamas is a terrorist organization. They're the ones who butchered the 1100 Jews on that day. They're a terrorist organization, but they are, they are the quote, government in Gaza.

Picture that went viral used as propaganda against Israel about starving Gaza children

All right? The people of Gaza support Hamas, if you believe the voting and so forth and so on. And so, the Hamas fighters hide behind the non combatants, civilians, civilians. They hide their rockets behind hospitals under hospitals. They. We know all the underground tunnels now that have been discovered. They put weaponry under mosque. Why do you do that? You say, well, because they know if Israel bombs a mosque to try to get to their weapons, they're going to use against Israel. Israel gets called out by the other Arab countries and Muslim countries and international media as being, targeting school, targeting. Targeting church.

Wesley Wildmon Yes.

Tim Wildmon Targeting hospitals, killing children. In this case, they want to say Israel is starving, the children of Gaza, as you said. This picture that went viral, which is meant to be used and has been used successfully as propaganda against Israel, shows the mother holding this baby who's emaciated the child. I don't know if it's a baby exactly, but the mother is healthy looking. Okay. And you go, why doesn't the mother feed the child her food? And they're.

Wesley Wildmon So they could be the other way around.

Tim Wildmon Because it's a propaganda piece, that's why. Otherwise the mother would also be emaciated. and they don't tell you the underlying health issues that the baby, slash, child had. So anyway, this is just being used. Mike Huckabee's talked about this, the ambassador to Israel. but we can talk about this another time. But this just. Israel, is just, and then. And then Great Britain now, or the uk, however you want to say. France and France. They're calling for Israel to accept a official state where Hamas rules and they're on the border of Israel. How insane is that?

Steve Jordahl They're saying that they are going to recognize it as a state.

Tim Wildmon Gaza.

Steve Jordahl Gaza is going to be a state officially in the eyes of the eu, a lot of the eu. And this is like, we're ready to talk about this tomorrow, I think.

Tim Wildmon Yeah. Okay. This. The world turning against Israel and the Jews. Is this. It seems biblical.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Tim Wildmon M. You know what I'm saying? Just seems like this is part of Bible prophecy.

Ed Vitagliano Well, and. And and I'll just say this and we can move on.

Amazon is buying a wearable bracelet that could potentially record your conversations

Tim Wildmon Okay.

Ed Vitagliano And and especially the sharp turn that a lot of people have taken in this country in protesting Israel and, and supporting the. The quote, unquote Palestinian cause, when in reality this. The issues. Hamas, the. The terrorist organization that runs Gaza.

Tim Wildmon Why don't these same people have a. Have problem with Hamas? Why don't they speak out as much against Hamas as they do against the Israeli government?

Ed Vitagliano I think, I honestly, I think that they view Hamas as freedom fighters.

Tim Wildmon Okay.

Ed Vitagliano Against.

Tim Wildmon So they were justified in butchering the people.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Steve Jordahl They don't want to talk about some say that actually.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Steve Jordahl One fact if. And we can move on, but one fact I want to bring out here. Israel is airdropping food to the Gazans directly because the un, who is supervising the trucks that go in, give it right over to Hamas, which holds it hostage from the people. So Hamas is starving the people. The only war ever in history where the combatant has fed the other combatant in the middle of the war. We certainly did feed Germany after World War II, but that was in reparations afterwards because we're a good country. Israel is doing it in the middle of the war. They are air dropping food to the Gazans. So that should tell you something. Hey, you remember when Amazon's, Alexa first came out and everybody said, watch out, it's going to be listening to you. Listen every. And Amazon, said, no, you have to say the. Hey, Alexa, you have to say the word to wake it up. it's not listening. It's not listening. And they spent a decade saying it's not listening. It's not listening. Well, Amazon is buying a wearable bracelet called the Bee. It's buying. The company made this. That is listening. And they say it is 100% of the time without having to wake anything up. And it's transcribing your conversations. They say what it'll help you do is summarize a conversation. For example. it will, allow you to. I used this the other day. Tim said it wasn't a good idea, but solve arguments. I didn't say that. Yes, you did.

Ed Vitagliano Well, here.

Steve Jordahl Here's the transcript.

Ed Vitagliano There's a transcript.

Tim Wildmon You mean like with your wife?

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano no, that's not.

Steve Jordahl Not a good idea.

Ed Vitagliano You do not want to be that, right?

Tim Wildmon No, I don't care for an argument. It doesn't matter if you're right in the end.

Steve Jordahl But that Amazon saying it is a positive. They're also able to use this as a collection point for their AI data. They're getting tons and reams of information. And they personalize. They can personalize this for you. They can make your plans because they've heard you talk about the plans. Scary stuff, though. The privacy concern is off the charts, Ed.

Ed Vitagliano And. And not just for the person wearing the bracelet. This is. Again, this is a company that. The. Is the company named B, or is that the product?

Steve Jordahl The product is named B.

Ed Vitagliano Okay. so that's. Amazon bought this company. Here's one of the other things. When I. When I saw this story.

Steve Jordahl Oh, actually, the company's name B.

Ed Vitagliano When I Saw this story. Part of the. The. One of the additional concerns is it doesn't just record your conversation. If I had that bracelet on, it would record everybody here. Everybody I talked to in the hallway, everyone I talked to. You know, you go out for lunch or at the gas station or whatever, you talk to yourself. It's recording. It's recording the conversation with people who don't know they're being recorded. And, listen, that could pause or.

Wesley Wildmon Cause some legal issues, could it not?

Ed Vitagliano Well, it. It could. In states. In this state, in Mississippi, where our. Where our headquarters is located, only one person has to know a conversation is being recorded. But in some states, both parties have to, or it's considered a violation of wiretap laws.

A bracelet that can record conversations raises concerns about privacy and surveillance

And so you could get into big trouble for recording all those conversations. You could be recording a conversation with.

Wesley Wildmon A doctor, and you can't cut it off.

Steve Jordahl Right.

Ed Vitagliano And. And as far as I know, you. You. That the purpose of the bracelet is to record everything you say.

Tim Wildmon Who had to wear something like that?

Wesley Wildmon That's what I was about to say.

Steve Jordahl A lot of people would, They.

Wesley Wildmon Are you going to now?

Steve Jordahl A lot of people.

Wesley Wildmon Hold on. What would be the reason? Just a couple reasons.

Steve Jordahl One, let's say that, I have been talking with my wife, and we need to get, grocery list going. And what are we gonna have for dinner? We're gonna have this and that. Nether. And everything. And then I go to the store and. Oh, what was I supposed to get? There's the list.

Wesley Wildmon Or I'm m. Trying.

Steve Jordahl Or.

Wesley Wildmon Yeah, dad, you're missing. Hold on.

Steve Jordahl We need. We're talking about getting airline tickets. And so we say, well, we need to fly here, we need to fly there. We want to get. We don't pay the. And then we can just say, b. Buy the tickets.

Wesley Wildmon Okay.

Steve Jordahl And it'll go buy the tickets for you.

Wesley Wildmon Okay.

Ed Vitagliano Oof. listen, I never. I never. I never got the Alexa thing.

Wesley Wildmon Me either.

Ed Vitagliano I mean, I never, never participated.

Wesley Wildmon I refuse to talk to my phone. Yes, well, she's driving.

Ed Vitagliano I will. I will talk to the text. I know half of my words wrong, but that always creeped me out, the Alexa thing. Now the. The thing is, it is handy. So my. My wife and I went to visit my dad passed away a couple years ago. We went, two years ago to visit his widow, and she has the Alexa thing. And it is. It is kind of handy in that you could. You could say, Alexa, play Elvis Presley Blue Suede Shoes, and it'll do it. And and that part's cool. But the downside of all these things is the privacy concerns and the possibility for surveillance and. And that for the b. Thing that becomes my issue is how much of this is the government getting their hands on? And does the bee sell this information to companies that heard me talking to my wife and saying, hey, what do you think about this car? Or what do you think about this vacation?

Steve Jordahl Say they don't keep a copy of the transcript. They give it to you. Right.

Wesley Wildmon Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano I don't believe any of these people.

Steve Jordahl Exactly.

Ed Vitagliano They're all liars.

There are expected to be tens of thousands of tarantulas wandering the countryside

Eventually, everybody has their next story.

Steve Jordahl The tarantulas are coming.

Ed Vitagliano Oh, man. This is. I've already texted.

Tim Wildmon Listen up, people. I've already got some breaking news.

Steve Jordahl Yeah. typically, from late August through October, it is tarantula mating season, where the males come out of their holes and go start looking for mates. And there are expected to be tens of thousands of tarantulas wandering the countryside in 13 states. Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nevada, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas, and Utah.

Ed Vitagliano It's more than five states.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano More than five. Okay. I thought the story I saw this morning said five. You've got about.

Steve Jordahl Well, this is where they live, and I'm assuming they. Wherever they live.

Tim Wildmon Tarantulas. but they're going to be giants, right?

Ed Vitagliano Well, softball size.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano What I saw. That's a big. Typically tarantula.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano And listen, there's your description of the tarantulas coming. The males coming out of their hole.

Steve Jordahl Right.

Tim Wildmon Looking for a mate.

Ed Vitagliano Looking for a mate. You, know what I immediately thought about was these young men was these young men who live in their mom's basement and they play video games. At some point, they got to come out of the hole.

Tim Wildmon Right.

Ed Vitagliano And try to. And look for a mate.

Steve Jordahl It's not in August, though, necessarily.

Ed Vitagliano So you young men, if you're listening. So not playing a video game, get out there.

Tim Wildmon So we're saying this is a serious story. These, these, tarantulas are coming.

Ed Vitagliano now, they generally don't bite people.

Steve Jordahl No, they're. They're generally docile. They're safe. They only bite if they're provoked. And their venom is not necessarily toxic to humans.

Tim Wildmon Right.

Ed Vitagliano Or be painful, I think.

Steve Jordahl Who?

Ed Vitagliano I don't want to check it out.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano Let's see.

Steve Jordahl See what they do.

Ed Vitagliano You know, there's some guy that does this.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano On social media. He does the pain.

Steve Jordahl Yeah.

Ed Vitagliano I forget what his name is. He does, he'll try all these painful wasps yeah. Yes. And he. And he has it.

Wesley Wildmon He holds a snake up to his, like.

Tim Wildmon Sound like he got a clickbait from y'.

Ed Vitagliano All. Well, I don't.

Tim Wildmon I know I'm being tricked.

Ed Vitagliano He. He did. Like a bullet ant or something like that. And I said, I'm watching this. I click through and watch it.

Steve Jordahl You're right.

Wesley Wildmon I remember the one. I've only seen a handful of the. Of what you're talking about. I remember the one he put on a jar, and he put it. Covered it up to make. Make.

Ed Vitagliano And he shakes it up to get a mad.

Wesley Wildmon That's what you're going. Who does this?

Ed Vitagliano Well, and I've only seen a handful because there's only so many videos I want to see of some guy going, ah, this hurts.

Wesley Wildmon It's so creating it.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon I mean, clickbait is, You won't believe who died today. You know what? And then.

Wesley Wildmon Oh, that.

Tim Wildmon Show a picture of Tom Hanks, and you click on it.

Ed Vitagliano Yeah.

Tim Wildmon go.

South Korean man arrested with 320 tarantulas at airport

Tom Hanks did not die today. They used his picture.

Ed Vitagliano Yes.

Tim Wildmon To get me to click here time here. But guess what? I'm not going to do that again.

Steve Jordahl I have an article from 2014. A South Korean man was arrested at the airport with 320 tarantulas, 110 centipedes, and nine bullet ants strapped to his body.

Tim Wildmon How many?

Steve Jordahl 320.

Tim Wildmon Okay, listen, if. If I'm keeping tarantulas at my house or strapped on your body at 100, I'm stopping right there.

Steve Jordahl Okay.

Tim Wildmon Because you get. You can't manage more than that.

Wesley Wildmon No, you can't.

Ed Vitagliano That's the guy. He was trying to. He was trying to get him smuggle, him so he could sell.

Steve Jordahl Yeah. So. But they noticed he had a big belly.

Wesley Wildmon Yeah, big.

Steve Jordahl That's what they said.

Ed Vitagliano Well, I'm glad I don't get pulled over.

Wesley Wildmon What kind of fine that is or what kind of penalty. that is.

Steve Jordahl Penalty.

Ed Vitagliano Trying to figure out how much the penalties.

Steve Jordahl They just cut the. The restraint, open. Let him crawl all over.

Tim Wildmon Yeah, there you go.

Ed Vitagliano Those centipedes are bad dudes, man.

Tim Wildmon All right. Giant tarantulas on the way.

Ed Vitagliano Coming, to a backyard near you.

Tim Wildmon Just when we. The tsunami passed.

Ed Vitagliano Coming.

Tim Wildmon We got giant tarantulas coming to a shower.

Ed Vitagliano Honey. Better get the rain.