Live from Music Row Tuesday morning on The Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy – broadcast on Nashville’s Talk Radio 98.3 and 1510 WLAC weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 8:00 a.m. – host Leahy welcomed GOP candidate for Nashville’s Fifth District, Robby Starbuck in studio to talk about growing up in a Cuban family and working hard for a future in America.
Leahy: In studio Robby Starbuck, a candidate for the Republican nomination for Congress in the Fifth Congressional District currently represented by Jim Cooper, the brother of the tinpot dictator known as Mayor John Cooper. Those are my words, not Robby’s.
(Starbuck chuckles) Robby, yesterday you had a big YouTube video announcement. Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky has endorsed you in glowing terms. You put a YouTube out for that. Tell us about how he came to endorse you and what impact that YouTube videos had so far.
Starbuck: First of all, is there a better endorsement than Rand Paul right now? He’s been right at every step of everything that happened throughout COVID. Like, no question. All along the way, the media says he’s crazy.
And then three months later, he’s proven right every single step of the way. There’s been no bigger advocate of freedom. But this came to be because I made friends with him and his wife a couple of years ago through social media.
Leahy: Through social media?
Starbuck: Yes. We started a relationship through social media.
Leahy: How does that happen with the United States senator?
Starbuck: I have sort of a larger social media accountant.
Leahy: How large is it?
Starbuck: Before the great purge of the election. It was 250,000.
Leahy: That’s pretty good.
Starbuck: And then on YouTube, we’ve got it. I don’t know the exact number. It’s like, 140,000.
Leahy: Is YouTube still allowing you to be on.
Starbuck: So that’s a really funny question. Yes, we have our YouTube account. But our numbers changed this summer. (Leahy chuckles) I made a joke about the fact that I had more subscribers than Joe Biden did.
Leahy: Oh boy are you in trouble.
Starbuck: And literally, I did this whole thing about that. Right afterward, we get a report. There’s a thing called Social Blade that tells you how your metrics and analytics are going. And literally, the next month, we had negative views. (Leahy laughs) Negative 100,000 views.
Leahy: Gee, how did that happen.
Starbuck: No idea. So I send it to our person at YouTube. And he was like, I’ve never seen this before. The loan Republican at YouTube. There is one.
Leahy: Don’t out that person.
Starbuck: No, I’m not outing that. But there’s one. There’s one.
Leahy: There the one Republican at YouTube.
Starbuck: So I made friends with him over social media and with his wife. And we had them on my podcast. My wife and I did a podcast together. And so I was a big promoter of their book, The Case Against Socialism because it’s one of those books that I wish was in every school that every kid would read because we don’t educate kids anymore on the history of socialism and communism.
Leahy: Let me just interrupt for a moment. I’ll invite you to attend the National Constitution Bee that we sponsor every year. I don’t know if you know about that.
Starbuck: I’m in. Yes, I’ve heard about it.
Leahy: And we’ve got a book. We’ll give it to you, but you’re welcome to come. And we give educational scholarships to kids that actually study the Constitution. And back to your point.
Starbuck: You’ll love this then. My daughter this year memorized the Constitution. My oldest.
Leahy: How old is she?
Starbuck: She’s 12 so she did it for a speech meet.
Leahy: We’ve had a couple of 12-year-olds participate in this, so if she wants to come she can participate.
Starbuck: She would love it.
Leahy: I will tell you to get public school teachers to actually promote this, it’s like pulling teeth. We’ve got a few. We’ve got a few out there in a couple of counties. But most public school teachers, because it’s the Constitution of the United States verbatim apparently don’t seem to have much interest in that.
Starbuck: Yeah, that seems like something not super popular in public schools right now. They prefer things that are not based on reality.
Leahy: Critical Race Theory. Black Lives Matter.
Starbuck: Exactly.
Leahy: That’s what they want to promote. 1619 Project. All historical falsehoods.
Starbuck: Exactly.
Leahy: What’s wrong with that picture?
Starbuck: This idea, I think the most dangerous thing about it is the idea that you’re born either a victim or an oppressor, and that’s at the core of Critical Race Theory.
Leahy: What are you, Robby? Are you a victim?
Starbuck: Well, see, that’s the thing is, I’m kind of in the middle, aren’t I? So you can’t really nail it down. I guess I could say I’m the child of a penniless refugee, and I have every reason not to succeed in America.
Leahy: You are a victim.
Starbuck: You can go that route. because And this is actually an argument I’ve made to people as I go. Listen, when I was a kid, I was told every step of the way by my grandparents and my mom that I can do anything. This is America. It’s full of opportunity.
You don’t do what you want to do. That’s your fault. You did something wrong. You work your tail off, you will get what you want. That is why I graduated at 16. If I had been told in school by the people that I was told I needed to trust, by my teachers that I was oppressed and I was somehow a victim, my life story would look very different.
And that’s a scary thing to think about. How many kids with amazing potential are we holding back by telling them you’re automatically a victim and all these people hate you? Its disgusting.
Leahy: And your personal circumstances I think you said your mom was a refugee from Cuba. Your dad was from Oklahoma, but he sort of been in and out of your life.
Starbuck: Yeah. He’s been sort of in and out. It’s one of those things where you could say you had a rough childhood, but I was so lucky to have my grandparents.
Leahy: Your grandparents were key, weren’t they?
Starbuck: They were especially my great-grandpa. My great-grandpa was really like a father to me. He taught me everything I know about life.
Leahy: What did he tell you about jobs?
Starbuck: And he said, you never let go of a good job or a good woman. And that’s why I married young.
Leahy: That’s a good line.
Starbuck: I married at 18, and I never let her go. So it was the best advice I’ve ever been given I think.
Listen to the third hour here:
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Tune in weekdays from 5:00 – 8:00 a.m. to the Tennessee Star Report with Michael Patrick Leahy on Talk Radio 98.3 FM WLAC 1510. Listen online at iHeart Radio.
