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Thank you very much for joining us for Last Call.

These are the topics we didn't get to on the very first segment.

I think they're very important topics, including this one, Wendy.

You know, I think it should be front and center throughout the region that a 16 -year-old from Collinsville on the way to work, you know, he wasn't causing trouble at the Sky Zone or at the Chili Fest or whatever festival.

Or trying to adopt a pit bull.

Yeah, well, I like pit bulls.

I like Alvin's view, but I'm concerned about that.

Okay, so he's arrested.

Turns out that he may have had some issues with his legality in the United States.

We're not exactly sure because the case wasn't adjudicated.

He's been taken, the 16-year-old, to some sort of detention center in the state of Texas.

Now, here's a kid who was going to work and now he's sitting in a jail in Texas.

And the question is whether this should be a story.

Where's the outrage?

The outrage, I mean, I'm sure there are people who are outraged individually and for a moment before they are, you know, distracted by something shiny and even more harrowing on our world stage.

But I think that when I had many alerts today in my cell phone about the president threatening to rain hellfire and damnation on Iran and, you know, it just got worse every hour.

It's going to get worse and worse and worse.

And then by mid-afternoon it was the administration says, no, we're not going to do that.

So, I mean, I think when you're talking about Armageddon on an hourly basis, I just think, I think people have, I think in their minds, they have existential threats.

And I don't know that we, I don't know if Missouri and Southern Illinois, if we just have the same level of, you know, that kind of alarm that goes off every time there's an immigration story.

I don't know that it pings the way it should, the way the Richmond Heights, the Maplewood Richmond Heights story did last week.

Because that actually had, we had quite a response online with that story.

But there's, I mean, there's something happening like this every hour.

Even with the online response, whatever, we didn't have hundreds of thousands of people on the streets complaining.

I mean, there's just something about maybe we're just too laid back.

But, you know, in New Jersey, in Chicago, certainly in Minnesota, people got more outraged about, you know, they're grabbing our neighbors off the streets.

We're kind of like, well, that's, you know, a shame.

There were several hundred Maplewood people who came downtown, which I thought was great to see.

And I'm sure that family, that meant so much to them.

But, I mean, you're right.

It's a relatively muted protest here.

And I feel like on some level, I wonder if St.

Louis is just a little bit protested out.

You know, there were so many protests here that were so big for like a lot of years.

And I think a lot of people just hit this point of fatigue where they're like, does it even matter?

Maybe this all just comes down to voting.

I don't know.

I think it's the voting.

We're coming up on August, which will then quickly be November.

I think people do turn out for the No Kings, you know, demonstrations.

Hundreds, if not thousands, at pretty much every site.

I also, there is a certain part of the, I know the St.

Louis community, that, okay, something that happens in Collinsville or over there is not the same as here.

And there's another factor, too.

There are a group of people that said like, I seem to remember when President Trump was reelected, a large portion of the Latino community for some reason voted for him.

And there are people out there who are thinking like, well, elections have consequences.

And, hey, you know, we tried to tell you this was coming and, you know, a large percentage of you all didn't listen.

And now you're reaping what you sow.

Now I think that's terrible, but I think that's a true reality.

Weren't there a lot of black men who voted for Trump?

That has not been proven out.

And same thing for them.

You know, like I said, like, that won't change how, you know, the overwhelming majority of black people vote.

But, oh, yeah, Nelly, others, there's going to, yeah, you're going to find out.

There's also where it's placed in the newspaper, too.

This week, you know, it was treated like a tragedy that we lost an animal at the zoo.

And St.

Louis is kind of weird.

When we have a birth at the zoo or we lose an animal, it's front page above the fold or close to it anyway.

I think, you know, David Hoffman is very carefully reading his new acquisition.

You know, I read an interview with him where he's marking each newspaper that he owns every day with a red pen.

He wants more stories about St.

Louis Zoo.

I don't think he wants quite that.

But it's always been that way.

It's always been that way.

And it's weird.

But the other cities don't do that.

No, the New York Times doesn't have a Brooklyn Zoo.

Well, that's because they don't have a world -class zoo.

No, no, no, they do.

They do have excellent zoos.

No, no, wait a minute.

Wait a minute.

What she's saying is that the St.

Louis Zoo has a part in our society in this area.

Higher human beings.

No, no, no.

Hopefully 16-year-old boys do, too.

I'm not disagreeing with you.

I'm just saying that we think of our zoo as something that's really the highest echelon.

It's like the arts.

I'm starting to think that the 16-year -old boy and others, and I know this is an exaggeration, but it's reminding me of what happened in Germany around 1939 or so where people are taken away without adjudication.

They're taken away, you know, deported or whatever.

And I just think that we're kind of a little too laissez-faire about it.

I think so, too.

Now, if there was no election coming up, then, you know, and I felt like, oh, this is perpetual, going to go on forever, then how we react would be a little bit different.

I don't think we're going to have a big change in Missouri.

It doesn't matter.

If you change the president of the United States or you change Congress, this nonsense stops.

Right, right.

But it's not going to happen in Missouri.

Sure it is.

Sure it is.

But a lot of people voted for Trump simply because of his stance on immigration.

I know.

You understand that.

I know.

I'm saying that there's some people that... I'm saying that to Charlie.

All right.

But he's not the only popular leader who did things like this.

If... I... Ain't nobody... If... I don't know if this is going to happen, but if the House and the Senate flipped in November, all this people getting snatched off the street would stop.

Right.

I'm saying that I don't think that the House and the Senate are going to switch in Missouri.

Okay.

No.

Let's move on.

Time is limited, as always.

We have an unforgiving clock.

And I do want to get to, Sarah, a story that you had in St.

Louis Magazine where you took a look at this Raj Jeti, I guess it was research, indicating that kids at the bottom rung of the ladder really benefit when they go to the same schools with kids at the top of the ladder.

And in St.

Louis, the Catholic schools are doing that.

And they showed some examples out of Rosati Cain High School, where you had the two different demographic groups together.

And voila, the kids at the bottom weren't languishing, they were succeeding.

So, I saw that and I go, okay, well that's the answer.

More help for Catholic schools.

Let's get some public money in there.

No.

Charlie.

Oh, no.

The ghost of Ray Hartman is rising up and wants to throttle you right now.

I feel obligated to speak on his behalf, sitting here in his chair.

No.

And I say this as someone who is sending their kids to Catholic school.

The last thing we need is to divert more public funds and try to put them into these private entities that have chosen to go their own way and pursue private funding.

Our public schools are starved for money right now in this state.

They are not doing well.

And to think like, oh, yeah, let's throw it into the Catholic system, which is doing pretty good on its own.

Even Rosati Cain, which was front and center, they are going to survive this.

They're closing one school after another.

What are you talking about?

We're doing good.

Including a school for Latino kids in North County called Guadalupe.

There have certainly been some closures.

And, you know, the Catholic Church overall is less popular than it used to be.

But Rosati Cain will survive, and that's a great thing.

And any Catholic school could give a scholarship to any kid from the lower rung, from any part of society in St.

Louis if they chose to do so.

Well, and they are doing so.

And they are.

That was what the story was.

I think it's absolutely ridiculous that we look at all of these potential options to improve things for kids in these impoverished areas where they cannot find teachers, they don't have transportation.

But the one thing that we're never, ever going to consider is having any kind of Catholic adjacent just do a pilot program.

I mean, we've had that kind of thing here in the St.

Louis area before.

I just think it's obscene not to consider it.

And you're entitled to your view of obscenity.

Good for Rosati Cain and the people that succeed.

But the kids succeed.

What are the public schools?

If you give money to Catholic schools, the Catholic schools, they don't have to take everybody.

They just have sort of the leftover kids in the city schools.

Well, the article seems to indicate that kids who are not doing all that well get to Rosati Cain.

That's how it used to be, Bill.

It's not for the straight-A students.

Actually, there is a woman who is the first two-star general of the armed services from Rosati Cain, Marcia Anderson.

I think she's a judge now in Wisconsin.

From East St.

Louis, African-American student and just one of many successes.

And you know that right now, every year, okay, somebody graduates from St.

Louis public schools and goes on to be a great, great success story.

We don't hear about that.

But let's take money from the private schools and give it to St.

Louis public schools because they have a success story.

Hey.

This isn't about, it's not about money, though.

I mean, it's really not, I don't think it's about money.

Yeah, the Catholic schools spend less per student than the public schools.

And they spend less.

Selective admissions.

I don't.

Parents who care enough to throw in money.

Bad idea, not going to happen.

I'm sorry.

All right.

I think we're going to do triage here.

Too many topics, too little time.

Bill, there was an article in Sarah's Rag about the Rock Island railroad turning that into a bike trail, hiking trail.

I love that idea.

I think it would be a great success if we could take that old railroad and turn it into something that tourists from all over the world would ride their bikes on or hike.

What do you think?

Oh, well, I love the trails idea.

And I've walked from St.

Charles to Jefferson City on the Katy Trail.

But I think it's a great thing.

But I'm not certain that it's been a huge economic boon for Duttsow and all the little towns along the trail.

So I'm not sure how big it is.

I do think that this is a huge new pastime for people who have a lot of money.

You get on some of these bike trails around the world.

And not just people who have a lot of money.

No, there's a lot of doctors.

No, they are wealthy people.

And what they say is, hey, who's done the Katy Trail?

Who's done the Montezuma Trail?

Who's done the Hiawatha Trail?

Who's done the Great Allegheny Passage?

There's a famous Catholic Trail, right?

There is, actually.

There is.

It's in Rome.

And in Spain.

I know people who have walked it.

It's a huge... It's not for everybody, but people do this.

No, I think it's great.

You know, my brother-in-law, who is not an exceptionally wealthy person.

He's a contractor.

He flew to Missouri so that he could bike this Katy Trail.

He was very excited about it.

And I think we do get some tourists from it.

I think the Rock Island Trail would be great, too.

Unfortunately, the legislature, I guess it was the Senate, just zeroed out the $73 million that Mike Parson wanted to put into it.

And guess what?

Now the state is broke.

Like, I feel like that ship sailed.

Unfortunately, we are out of time.

We'll talk about the closing and the demolition of the Euclid School on a future program.

But check out St.

Louis Magazine for more information about that and St.

Louis American, the Post-Dispatch, and beyond.

Thanks for joining us.

We'll see you next week at this time.