Shadowing Practice: THE MOST DISGUSTING CAMPAIGN AD I'VE EVER SEEN - Learn English Speaking with Video
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I want to talk about the Amy Acton ad.
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So for those of you who don't know, Amy Acton is running for governor in the beautiful state.
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First and last time I'll be calling the state beautiful Ohio.
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And Amy Acton is actually beating Vivek Ramaswamy in the polls.
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Amy Acton has also been able to find interesting allegiances amongst the Groypers, whatever, right?
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That's neither here nor there.
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However, in an act of desperation, in a final act of desperation,
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as Republicans increase the silly attack ads and oftentimes racist attack ads against the likes of Abdul El -Sayed,
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Vivek Ramaswamy is leaning into perhaps the most insane line of attack I have ever seen.
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Now, of course, the Republicans are truly psychotic, right?
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Ohio Democratic gubernatorial candidate
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Amy Acton's own mother urges voters not to vote for her daughter.
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This is the attack ad that Vivek Ramaswamy came out with.
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Now, at first, you might be thinking, what the f*?
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Why is Amy Acton's mother endorsing Vivek Ramaswamy, Amy Acton's opposition?
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Well, you'll understand very quickly why this is the grossest thing.
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It's not AI.
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I'm Arthur, and I'm Amy Acton's mother.
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I work at Children and Family Service Association, building one of the first two sexual abuse programs in America.
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I love my daughter, but when I saw her lying about her opponent, it's not easy for a mother to say this,
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but Amy has a serious problem.
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She is a liar.
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She lies about her past.
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She says she grew up living in a tent.
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None of that is true.
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She's lied her entire life.
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My daughter needs help, and she can't help you if she needs help herself.
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people can change but first they have to tell the truth
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and my daughter still isn't doing
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that don't vote for people who lie don't let her become your governor
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if you think she'll make your life better you're fooling yourself it will only get worse
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so you might be thinking why is the grandmother from Squidbillies
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coming out with this fucking insane attack ad against her own daughter.
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Well, turns out the story is the most disgusting one that we've seen this cycle so far.
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And yes, officially Vivek Ramaswamy is the most deserving of a loss this cycle than any other candidate I've ever seen.
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Shortly after this ad was released on the airwaves, it came out that
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Amy Acton, running for governor of Ohio, was raped by this woman's husband.
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Dr. Amy Acton's brother issued a forceful defense of the Democratic
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gubernatorial candidate after their birth mother appeared in a widely circulated video accusing her of lying
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and urging Ohio voters to not elect her next month.
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Yes, it is one of the most demonic things I've ever seen in my whole damn life.
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Amy Acton's mother lost the custody of both
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Amy and her brother after years of documented issues,
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including time spent living in a tent and a spouse who sexually abused Amy Acton.
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Amy Acton's mom in that ad stayed with the spouse.
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She chose her husband after her husband had raped them at the age,
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I believe, of nine.
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She was a minor.
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Vivek Ramaswamy knows this reality.
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And he chose to put this in an attack ad.
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Or she was 12, sorry, not 9.
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Here is Dr. Amy Acton's brother's statement on Ramaswamy platforming their estranged and abusive mother.
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Today, Dr. Amy Acton's brother, Philip Stearns, released the following statement condemning Vivek Ramaswamy's attempt to platform their estranged and abusive mother.
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Oh, sorry, she was 9, from 9 to 12.
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It's not surprising that Vivek Ramaswamy has stooped to such a despicable low as to attempt to turn the sexual abuse
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Amy endured at 12 years old from our birth mother's husband into a political talking point.
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After he was arrested, Amy and I were removed from her custody.
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Our birth mother stayed married to Amy's rapist until he died.
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This desperate, disgusting attack reveals exactly who Vivek Ramaswamy is at his core.
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A pathetic excuse for a man who is willing to hurt anyone as long as it gets him what he wants.
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There are court documents for this as well, by the way.
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State of Ohio.
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The jurors of the grand jury of the state of Ohio within and for the body of the county,
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Afra said on their oaths in the name
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and by the authority of the state of Ohio do find
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and present that Cletith Arthur between September 1976
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and April 1978 did engage in sexual conduct with Amy Stearns not his spouse the said
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Amy Stearns being less than 13 years of age Vivek Ramaswamy doubled down on the ad featuring
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Amy Acton's estranged mother attacking her daughter putting $4 million behind it, despite fierce backlash.
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I don't think this is fierce partisan backlash.
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I hope the backlash is not just partisan.
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I guess they're testing out something totally new here.
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I can't believe I'm saying this, but perhaps they're trying to see if they can go for the coveted pro -pedophilia vote.
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After all, Trump is the pedophile protector himself.
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Amy Acton made a counter -add with her brother.
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I received a lot of abuse, but Amy always got the worst of it.
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She continued to receive that abuse because she knew she had to protect me from that.
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And that if she hadn't done that, who knows where I would have ended up.
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And she's 11 and 12 years old.
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And to think that that's somehow a talking point, shame on Vivek.
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It's the contempt he has for Amy.
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It's the contempt he has for Ohio.
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He's not fit to lead.
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It is truly, truly the most repulsive,
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the most odious attempt of trying to smear an opponent I have ever seen.
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Your opponent was a victim of child rape, child abuse,
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and you chose to air an ad using her estranged mother
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who literally lost custody of your opponent as a child at the age of 13
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and basically fled the state with the abusive partner.
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Republicans are officially pedo -maxing.
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They've been pedo -maxing for a minute.
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By the way, Vivek Ramaswamy aired a campaign ad featuring a registered sex offender.
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So, you know, this was before this was a couple of days ago, almost a week ago, he did this.
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I've never seen anything like it.
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This is just subhuman behavior.
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And now he's doubling down.
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Now he's doubling down, tripling down, quadrupling down on, on, you know, the, the fucking nonsense.
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This does not seem like a stable person to me.
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In August of 2019, police in Bexley, Ohio, responded to a report of a domestic dispute at her home, and she pulled a mirror off.
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I'm serious, dude, dude, dude.
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I'm keeping it a buck fifty.
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This is like we have reached new levels of depravity here in America.
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This can't continue.
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OK, this cannot fucking continue.
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What are we doing?
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Literally, what are we doing?
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I feel like the Republicans every day are unlocking new layers of hell.
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The Republicans are unlocking new fresh hells every single day beyond our wildest imagination.
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It is un -fucking -bearable.
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It is un -fucking -believable.
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Megyn Kelly is now just straight up.
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She did this with the Epstein stuff.
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She was like, what's the big deal?
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He only raped a couple children.
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What's the fucking big deal?
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That's what she was saying during the Epstein stuff when it was obviously becoming quite the problem.
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for Donald Trump.
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As for Epstein, I've said this before, which is a reminder.
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I do know somebody very, very close to this case who is in a position to know virtually everything, not everything, but virtually everything.
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And this person has told me from the start years and years ago that Jeffrey Epstein, in this person's view, was not a pedophile.
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This is this person's view who was there for a lot of this, but that he was into the barely legal type,
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like he liked 15 year old girls.
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And I realize this is disgusting.
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I'm definitely not trying to make an excuse for this.
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I'm just giving you facts that he wasn't into like eight year olds,
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but he liked the very young teen types that could pass for even younger than they were,
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but would look legal to a passerby.
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off of a wall shattering the glass when she became upset,
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those are in quotes, because she felt her husband quote was antagonizing her according to a police report.
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She told officers she had been drinking, she had taken an unknown amount of prescription drugs
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and was about to drive away in her car before her
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husband who also told police he'd been drinking talked her out of it.
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She says she's a doctor but she never actually treated patients so she seems to be the kind of doctor that
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El -Sayed is.
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She couldn't make it through the COVID pandemic.
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She resigned during the middle of that, apparently like unable to handle the stress of it,
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though she claimed she objected to the way he was handling it.
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What I've seen is a woman who will not allow cameras at any of her campaign events.
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What candidate doesn't allow cameras at your campaign event?
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A woman who has refused steadily to debate him. But two things.
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Number one, this is not the first time that this has happened.
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Her mother came forward and made these same comments.
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The mother came out back then to say, don't believe her.
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Okay, so.
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Is there no shame at all?
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Like, there's nothing?
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You got nothing?
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You're actively trying to corner the market on defending pedophiles who rape children?
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That's really how desperate your situation is?
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I would literally kill myself before doing this.
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Like, you have children.
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What the fuck are you doing?
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actually what the fuck are you doing all of the people involved in this have kids of their own
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even the fucking panelists are like maybe
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we're going a little bit too far huh Megan like do
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you feel like we're going a bit too far here Megan the fuck man
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this is not the first time the mother has tried to
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make a thing out of the daughter's alleged sketchy history listen the daughter's
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she was raped as a nine -year -old what the fuck are you i need
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you to understand what megan kelly is saying here about the daughter's alleged sketchy history is
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that she was raped as a child from ages nine to twelve
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she was abused as a child from ages nine to twelve and and sexually abused at the age of 12.
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What more remains after this?
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Because society can't function if we don't have certain social norms that we universally oppose,
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certain social norms that we operate in, certain social boundaries that we operate inside of.
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And what's the next step?
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You're defending someone, raping a 12 -year -old, abusing them from 9 to 12,
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okay and then raping a 12 year old at
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that point what's the next step just like raping a baby in the crib is
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that because that's the only level of depravity that remains at this point
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like is that the next stage of this franchise is
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that where the republicans are going to move once they you know actively normalize this kind of psychotic vulgar barbaric disgusting behavior
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Are they just going to move on?
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They're just going to lower the age of appropriate rape?
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Is that where we're moving?
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We don't know what happened between
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Amy and her mother who first spoke about Amy in 2020, but we know that
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Amy Acton is a serial fabulous who has some serious problems with the truth
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that the public needs to be aware of before deciding who to entrust as a governor.
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This is truly depraved.
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Truly, truly, truly depraved.
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Look, I'm going to tell you exactly what they're trying.
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I will use the example of Abdul El -Sayed.
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to give you a parallel here with Abdul, he's Muslim.
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So they're trying to hit Islamophobia.
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Amy Acton is a woman.
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So they're trying to say, oh, she's a liar.
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Women always lie about cases revolving around rape.
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But what they're doing here, which is a major mistake is twofold.
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Number one, it's the most depraved thing I've ever fucking seen.
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Okay.
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Let make no mistake.
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It's perhaps the most depraved thing that any campaign has ever done.
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But there's two reasons why this will backfire one amy acton is a white woman
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that's number one vivek ramaswamy is an indian american man okay amy acton is a white woman
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this will 100 backfire on him and it should for the record and two
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you're not just even talking about like an adult.
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You're not talking about an adult woman.
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It would be depraved if you did this to an adult woman as well.
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Like, you know, saying that a rape victim was lying.
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It would still be depraved.
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You're talking about a child.
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You're making it.
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You're trying to, what, victim blame and slut shame a 12 -year -old?
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What are you, fucking psychotic?
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The answer is yes, by the way.
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There's a rhetorical question.
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I know that they're psychotic.
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They're fucking depraved, okay?
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They are totally and utterly depraved.
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Amy Acton responds to the attack ad.
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I won't normalize somebody who has said that my childhood is something I'm just complaining about.
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Who today just released an ad using my birth mother who I was removed from at the age of 12.
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Do you know how fucking difficult it is for a court to remove custody from a mom?
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Do you understand?
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Like here, I'll give you the chud response to this.
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Okay.
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Even every chud understands.
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Even every victim of family court,
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you know, the right wing dads probably recognize that you have to be exceptionally evil for a court in the fucking 80s,
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in the goddamn 70s and 1980s to say you are a demonic entity.
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We are removing you from being the parent as a mom.
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You are no longer capable.
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The state has decided you are no longer capable of being a mother, a white woman.
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Nonetheless, it's crazy.
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This is the one thing that would give the court sufficient evidence to do
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that in the fucking state of ohio in 1978 severe abuse
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and neglect and sexual abuse my brother
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and i were removed i just can't normalize somebody who calls me things like a socialist
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which i am not and then follows
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that statement by saying the second amendment yeah look see my mom got custody over my dad
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and we lived in a car like the courts in most cases will keep the children with the mom and
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that was made for times like these to eradicate socialism to get rid of socialists
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that's what i'm made for the words are made for times
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like these to eradicate socialism to get rid of social not
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and then follows
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that statement by saying the second amendment was made for times
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like these to eradicate socialism to get rid of vivek ramaswamy's LARPing.
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Like, oh, I love the, brr, I love the Second Amendment.
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We got to eliminate socialism.
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Socialists, that's what I'm made for.
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The words our leaders use matter,
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and I think it's going to take courage right now from all of us to stop normalizing this sort of rhetoric.
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People need to see that this is a pattern.
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It was a pattern in the presidential debates.
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You know, I remember Chris Christie going at it with him.
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I remember Nikki Haley because he was such a liar
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and he was attacking Nikki Haley's 14 -year -old daughter on air during presidential debates.
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You know, this is a lifelong pattern with my opponent.
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I don't even want to watch the rest of this Megyn Kelly video.
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I can't.
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I can't do it.
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It's just like it's.
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yeah vivek ramaswami's campaign for ohio governor is pouring four million
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dollars into the into a bombshell ad by the way that's how they're that's how they're responding to this for the record
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Amy Acton, stepfather, never stood trial, never faced a conviction after
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Amy Acton accused him of rape.
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She was 12.
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What are you doing?
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What are they saying?
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She was 12.
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He was arrested.
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He was charged.
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He was arrested and charged with rape.
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Rape of a 12 -year -old.
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He was indicted by a grand jury in 1978 but fled the state before trial becoming a fugitive with arrest warrants.
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You know who he fled the fucking state with?
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Amy Acton's mom
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I can't understand look look look look
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I deal with a lot of insane people
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I deal with a lot of insanity all the fucking time as a part of my job
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I am telling you I am telling you I have never seen anything like this and I can't even comprehend there's usually
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Like a logical through line.
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These guys are demonic, but they poll test everything.
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They focus test everything.
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They message.
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They try to make sure that their messaging is intact.
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For them to do this, they have to focus group this stuff and find out that,
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like, I guess the people in Ohio are going to be psychotic, pedophilic perverts, that there is, like, a significant enough constituency for this,
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or that they could angle this as, like, Like, oh, this is a woman who's lying, right?
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Oh, another woman lying.
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But I think they didn't account for the fact that she was 12 years old.
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Because, like, even the most sociopathic, the sweatiest, grossest
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Republican, with the exception of, like, straight -up pedophiles,
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will probably make a separate carve out or distinction between an adult woman accusing a man of rape and a child,
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a 12 year old child who didn't even make the accusation.
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It's just like, this is something that came out in the investigation.
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We've, we've seen over and over again, how anyone can accuse someone of rape.
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They did it to Brett Kavanaugh.
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They did it to president
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Trump liberal, liberal women love accusing men of rape.
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I think we all learned this by now.
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Amy Acton's mother is warning America about how destructive her daughter is.
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Ohio voters should listen.
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Okay.
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No, that's what it is.
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Okay.
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I nailed it from the start.
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Yes, they are absolutely trying to tie this off as like, you know, you know how women lie about rape all the time, right?
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Like they're trying to, I mean, that in and of itself is disgusting, by the way make no mistake
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but they're trying to present this as like anti -metoo backlash
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they are trying to angle this as anti -metoo backlash not realizing
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that they are basically saying a 12 year old girl is
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is now officially in the in their eyes a woman
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there's no way republican women fall for this i don't i don't think
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so i think this is um i i think this was a a major misstep by the the Republicans as a whole.
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I, I mean, I don't know.
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I go back and forth on this stuff.
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I think the, the, the base is fucking nasty.
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The Republican base of support is, is so gross, dude.
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He was already doing really poorly in the polls.
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I guess the more, the more desperate these guys become like, this is what we should expect.
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But I think the more desperate they get, the more they're just going to, the more they're just going to concoct new shit
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and reach new levels of depravity to basically see like what
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the base has appetite for to truly see how repulsive the modern
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Republican party is.
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And not just the politicians.
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I'm talking about the fucking voters.
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I don't vote shame usually, but I will always vote shame.
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The disgusting, odious freaks that vote for this shit.
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If you vote for Vivek Ramaswamy, you are an irredeemable piece of shit.
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Somehow, even more so than if you voted for Donald Trump.
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And you can say that about that as well.
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But this is like a new level, man.
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Ramaswamy took credit for the anti -Acton video after his Central Ohio event today.
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It is an aforementioned campaign.
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And the thing that I want to say is
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that I would love for this race
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and this election to be about the substantive issues that impact ohians
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and unfortunately amy acton has been hiding from those issues
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vivek is gonna lose
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but at least he'll win the consolation prize of having very
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publicly sided with a convicted child rapist against his rape victim bro i think we might have reached
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a new level i don't think michael treacy will defend vivek ramaswamy i think there is one
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instance of verifiable documented rape that I don't think Michael Tracy is going to touch.
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We'll find out.
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I mean, he defended the Epstein stuff.
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He defended the, the, uh, he, he said that the Epstein victims knew and liked it, enjoyed it.
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Like he was a psycho about it, but I don't think he will do this.
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We'll see.
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It's kind of crazy that we, we just have a guy that we all know is the guy to go to
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when rape is happening to see
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if he'll defend it by the way
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that's a strange environment to exist in very strange environment well
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you're wrong oh my god okay this is he is defending
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it oh my god oh my god he is such an insane person oh my god okay that's fair.
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That's, that's, he's defending it.
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Oh my God.
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Oh my God.
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Oh my God.
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Oh my God.
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This person is.
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like there are yeah here it is there's newspaper clippings of the fucking incident
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there are newspaper clippings from 1978 about the husband of amy
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acton's mother being charged with the rape of a 12 year
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old girl national review a conservative outlet just confirmed details of
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amy acton's story against court documents vivek is a scumbag and
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so is everyone involved in creating and promoting this ad one of the reasons it's
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so hard for children to come forward to talk about being abused
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that they're afraid
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that no one even their own family members will believe them team of vague shows why
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that fear is unfortunately valid and goes forth by weaponizing it bro
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attacking a child rape victim like what are we doing man
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this post kind of summarizes what is this do you still endorse vivek yep proud husband of one
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and father of four chief strategist the base mike lee my
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apologies opposed to the video of amy acton's mother without understanding the details behind their relationship
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and the very serious accusations that caused their issues after researching it
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and the disturbing allegations i have deleted the video post will you still endorse me vague yep
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Vocabulary and speaking notes for this lesson
This speaking lesson is built on the video “THE MOST DISGUSTING CAMPAIGN AD I'VE EVER SEEN”. The speaker keeps coming back to these words: amy, vivek, mother, rape, acton. This video has 368 sentences and 3816 words to shadow. The speech runs for 25:51. The speaker talks at a steady 148 words per minute, a comfortable pace for shadowing. Only 81% of the words are among the 3,000 most common in English, so the vocabulary is demanding.
Key vocabulary in this video
15 words from the video worth learning, with pronunciation and meaning:
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| defend verb | /dɪˈfɪnd/ | To ward off attacks against (something or someone). |
| disgusting adjective | /dɪsˈɡʌstɪŋ/ | Causing disgust; repulsive; distasteful. |
| custody noun | /ˈkʌstədiː/ | The legal right to take care of something or somebody, especially children. |
| opponent noun | /əˈpəʊ.nənt/ | One who opposes another; one who works or takes a position against someone or something; one who attempts to stop the progress of someone or something. |
| accuse verb | /əˈkjuz/ | To find fault with, blame, censure. |
| backlash noun | /ˈbækˌlæʃ/ | A suddenly reversed or backward motion, such as of a rope or elastic band when it snaps under tension. |
| insane adjective | /ɪnˈseɪn/ | Exhibiting unsoundness or disorder of mind; not sane; utterly mad. |
| desperate adjective | /ˈdɛs.p(ə.)ɹɪt/ | In dire need (of something); having a dire need or desire. |
| voter noun | /ˈvoʊtɚ/ | Someone who votes or is entitled to vote. |
| socialism noun | /ˈsoʊʃəlɪzəm/ | Any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution… |
| gross adjective | /ɡɹoʊs/ | remarkably great, big, vast in an often unpleasant way; (of behaviour) Highly or conspicuously offensive. |
| kelly noun | A square or hexagonal pipe that is turned in order to rotate the rotary table of a drilling rig. | |
| amendment noun | /əˈmɛndmənt/ | An alteration or change for the better; correction of a fault or of faults; reformation of life by quitting vices. |
| poll noun | /poʊl/ | A survey of people, usually statistically analyzed to gauge wider public opinion. |
| socialist noun | /ˈsoʊ.ʃə.lɪst/ | One who supports or advocates socialism. |
Phrasal verbs you will hear
| Word | Pronunciation | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| come out verb | /ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/ | To be discovered; to be revealed. |
| come out with verb | To say (something) unexpectedly. | |
| double down verb | To double one's wager, particularly, the name of a specific doubling bet allowed in blackjack. | |
| find out verb | To discover, as by asking or investigating. | |
| come forward verb | To offer help or information, especially about a crime. | |
| come out in verb | to be afflicted by (a visible disruption of the body) | |
| end up verb | To bring to a conclusion. | |
| go back verb | To return to a place or state after having been there at a previous time. |
Sentences worth repeating
Short, complete lines from the video that you can reuse in everyday conversation:
- I don't think this is fierce partisan backlash.
- Literally, what are we doing?
- What candidate doesn't allow cameras at your campaign event?
- That's really how desperate your situation is?
- Is that where we're moving?
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Present perfect have/has + past participle — a past action that still matters now | has also been · have ever seen · we've seen |
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | was released · was raped · was arrested |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | people who lie · man who is · before, which is |
Pronunciation to watch
The speaker uses 92 contractions and reduced forms, such as they're, don't, I'm. Say them the short way, as you hear them.
- The “th” sounds: grandmother /ˈɡɹæn(d)ˌmʌðɚ/, pathetic /pəˈθɛtɪk/, nonetheless /ˌnʌnðəˈlɛs/
- The “sh” and “zh” sounds: backlash /ˈbækˌlæʃ/, socialism /ˈsoʊʃəlɪzəm/, socialist /ˈsoʊ.ʃə.lɪst/, accusation /ˌæk.jʊˈzeɪ.ʃ(ə)n/, desperation /ˌdɛspəˈɹeɪʃən/
- Long words — get the stress right: socialism /ˈsoʊʃəlɪzəm/, virtually /ˈvɚ.t͡ʃə.wə.li/, accusation /ˌæk.jʊˈzeɪ.ʃ(ə)n/, desperation /ˌdɛspəˈɹeɪʃən/, imagination /ɪˌmæd͡ʒəˈneɪʃən/
How to practise with this video
- Listen to the whole video once without speaking and note the words you do not know.
- Shadow it sentence by sentence at normal speed, repeating each one until your rhythm matches the speaker.
- Record yourself and compare with the original, paying attention to words like defend, disgusting, custody.
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.