Dr. Ben Carson | On the Homefront with Jeff Dudan #39

We have forces that are attempting to divide us on every level. Race, age, income, gender, religion, political affiliation, you name it. Driving wedges, trying to divide us, make us think we hate each other. Everybody was saying, you should run for president. And I said, these people are crazy. The person who has the most to do with what happens to you is you. It's not the circumstance. It's. It's not somebody else. It's you. You control it. Hey, everybody.

Welcome back to on the Home Front. I am Jeff Duden. Today we have the pleasure of speaking with distinguished author, neurosurgeon and former United states presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson. Join us as he opens up about his inspiring journey becoming the youngest chief of pediatric neurosurgery in the United States at the age of 33. Listen to his unique perspective on America overcoming division and what it will take to unite the country once again. This is a powerful episode you won't want to miss a moment. Stay tuned for our conversation with Dr. Ben Carson. Welcome to on the Home Front with Jeff Duden. Today we are honored to have Dr. Ben Carson with us. Welcome, sir.

Thank you so much. Glad to be with you.

So excited to have you on today. I am a big fan of what you have done. I've studied your books and enjoyed the lessons that you've shared over the years and the times that I've been able to be with you. Would you care to start this morning and share just a little bit about how you grew up?

Well. Well, it was a very interesting childhood. The beginnings were actually okay. Both parents were there. We lived in a 700 square foot GI home, but it was our 700 square foot GI home, and I thought it was paradise. And then when my parents got divorced when I was eight years old, after my mother found out that her husband was a bigamist, things changed dramatically. We were homeless for a while. Some relatives in Boston took us in. And it was a typical tenement, large, multifamily dwelling, boarded up windows and doors, sirens and gangs, rats and roaches, a lot of violence. Both of my older cousins, who we adored, were killed. And, you know, that was sort of the environment. My mother was out working extremely hard, two and three jobs at a time as a domestic, and she wanted to be independent. And after a couple of years, she was. We were able to move back to Detroit, still in a multifamily setting, still with significant wildlife, but at least she was independent at that point. And, you know, she was very alarmed by the fact that both my brother and I were doing extremely poorly in school, and she didn't know what to do. And she prayed for wisdom and came up with the idea of turning off the TV and making us read books. Now, as you might imagine, as young boys, we were not enthusiastic about this project of hers. In today's world, we probably would have called social services, but, you know, we had to do it. And the other thing about my mother is she never accepted excuses. And anytime we came up with an excuse, the next thing out of her mouth was a poem called Yourself to Blame. And I think that was really critical to our development, learning to accept responsibility for what was going on. But, you know, after a while, I actually began to enjoy reading those books. I couldn't wait to get home and open those books up because we were desperately poor. But between the covers of those books, I was in a whole new world. I could go anywhere. I could be anybody. I could do anything. And as I read about people of great accomplishment, entrepreneurs and scientists and surgeons and explorers, now, I began to realize that the person who has the most to do with what happens to you is you. It's not the circumstance. It's not somebody else. It's you. You control it. And, you know, I used to hate poverty, but once I came to that understanding, I didn't mind poverty anymore because I knew it was only temporary. I knew I could change it. And, boy, was that a sense of empowerment. And isn't that what America is all about? It's a place of hope. It's the reason that people come here from all over the world, that beacon of opportunity. And if it was such a horrible place, like so many people try to make you think systemically racist and unfair to people, why would all those people be trying to come here? And when they got here, wouldn't they call everybody and say, don't come here. It's a horrible place. Obviously, that is not happening. And we need to do everything we can to make sure we maintain it as a place of opportunity. And we do have some challenges in that. Right now. There are some forces that are trying to fundamentally change our nation to something else. And we have to be careful, make sure that we preserve those opportunities for our children, our grandchildren, and all those who are coming after us. But, you know, I got on the track academically. That was wonderful. On through college at Yale Medical School, at the University of Michigan, Johns Hopkins, for internship and residency. After that, I actually went to Australia. Spent a year in Australia as the senior registrar at the major teaching hospital in Western Australia. Got an enormous amount of experience there. So that when I came back and joined the faculty at Johns Hopkins, I was only 33 years old. But you know, the position opened up for chief of pediatric neurosurgery. And normally they would get somebody with a lot of gray hair and a big reputation and they said, you know, Carson is very young, but gosh, he can do everything. So I became chief of Pediatric neurosurgery at Hopkins at 33 and started getting involved in all kinds of amazing cases. But you know, I give all credit and glory to God, but I did work extremely hard to get there. And one of the things I like to tell people is you get out of it what you put into it. And you know, don't expect good things to happen. If you're just sort of an observer, you gotta roll up your sleeves and really jump into it with both feet.

When you moved to Boston, you were in different circumstances and race related issues started to become more apparent to you. And I've read Gifted Hands, it's an incredible book. My soon to be daughter in law is medical school at UNC Chapel Hill and she read this book when she was 8 years old and it's the reason that she is pursuing medicine, one of the reasons why she is. And then recently read Created Equal over the last week or so. And the through line that you have is that you faced racial differences when you were growing up, when you were playing sports, when you went from being a D student into an A student and the top student in the school. And then also during your residency. And you never let it dissuade you, you never let it impact you in a way that would, that would in any way impact your desire to help people and to further your life. I'm interested in your comments on race relations today based on what you experienced as a young man growing up. And then where we have moved, making so much progress over the years. And your thoughts on where we can go from here.

Well, I think we've made enormous progress. I remember as a six year old going to Chattanooga, Tennessee and seeing the whites only and colored only signs and being able being told what those mean and why it's important to observe those things. We've gone from that in the same lifetime to black admirals and Generals and CEOs of Fortune 500 companies and heads of foundations and university presidents. We've had a President of the United States. I mean that is enormous progress in one lifetime in a society. And it shows the ability of our society to change. Does that mean that all unfairness and racism is Gone? Of course not. Because we live in a world with human beings, and human beings are imperfect. So as long as you have imperfection, you're going to have some things like that. But to say that we haven't made enormous progress is absurd. And, you know, there are some people who convince themselves that racism isn't everything. So whatever situation they're in, they see racism because that's what they're looking for. It doesn't matter what you say to them, aha, I told you they were racist. You know, that's a miserable way to live. And, you know, I just don't find that to be the case. But in cases where it is apparent that people are racist, you don't have to let their racism control you. You know, I remember when we bought a farm in rural Maryland and one of the neighbors had a reputation for racism. He immediately put up a large Confederate flag on the barn. But you know what? All the other neighbors immediately put up American flags, and he was shamed of taking it down. And we were very nice to him. And, you know, he eventually became a friend. You know, it really. A lot of it depends on us. You know, do we take umbrage at everything and do we say, well, I'm going to get them, or do we stop and say, you know, we are determinants of the environment in which we live. We don't just have to be victims, and we can help change the attitudes of people by the way we treat them. And you have to remember that racism and prejudice is largely the result of ignorance and fear. And if you can eliminate that ignorance and that fear, that racism and the prejudice goes away as well.

Personal accountability is something that I hear from you in various ways when you speak. If you were to speak to the youth of today in America about personal accountability, what might you share with them?

I would help them to understand that each one of us has a sphere of influence, and we have a lot of influence in that sphere of influence. We get to decide. We get to choose how we're going to react and how we're going to present ourselves to other people. We get to decide how much effort we want to put into something. If you're taking a chemistry class, you get to decide, are you going to learn all those formulas? Are you going to learn a periodic table, or are you just going to sit around and say, that's too much stuff, I don't want to do it. You know, which one of those attitudes you take will determine your grade in that course. And by the same token, the Attitude that you take as you face life will determine your outcome in life.

We're heading into an election year and the country on certain issues seems divided. What steps can we take going into next year to rally together and find some common ground as Americans?

Well, you know, you can take the most radical left wing person and the most radical right wing person in America. They're going to agree on 90% of stuff. But we allow the media and others to take that 10% that they disagree on and inflame it and magnify it to make it the most important thing so that we end up thinking that we're each other's enemies. We are not each other's enemies. The reason that this country succeeded when people didn't think it would is because we had a sense of community. You had people. There were 25, 50, 100 families in one little area 100 miles away from the next community. Why were they able to not only survive but thrive? Because they understood the concept of the common good, what's good for all of us. Many cases they could barely even speak to each other because they came from different countries, but they understood that concept. And if Mr. Johnson fell out of the apple tree during harvest time and broke his leg, everybody else harvested his crops. No, no questions asked. Don't care what his religion was or his political leanings. He was your neighbor and he needed your help. And that's what we have got to get back to. In this country. We have forces that are attempting to divide us on every level. Race, age, income, gender, religion, political affiliation, you name it. Driving wedges, trying to divide us, make us think we hate each other because the next door neighbor has a different yard sign. You know, that is just garbage, but it is effective and it works and has worked in many other nations over the course of history. You think back to the, the Chinese Cultural Revolution and say those rich Chinese, they're the ones who are causing the problem and getting the students to rail against the rich and even to rob them and destroy their possessions while the police just stood by and watched. These are the kinds of things that destroy nations and that destroy communities. And there are those who, who want America out of the way because we stand in the way of one world government and a lot of other things.

Is that the reason that you chose to enter public service? You were a. Go ahead, sir.

I didn't actually choose to enter public service.

Thrust upon you.

If you had asked me, you know, many years ago, would I end up in government, I would have said, absolutely not. It's the last thing in the world I would ever do. But in 2013, after I gave the presidential prayer breakfast speech, everybody was saying, you should run for president. And I said, these people are crazy. I said, if I just ignore them, it'll go away. But it didn't go away. Everywhere I went, there were people with placards. Run, bin, run. I had more than 500,000 petitions in my office. I could barely get in there. And I finally just said, lord, if you really want me to run, you got to give me all the things that a person who runs has. That means a Rolodex with all the important names, an organization, a lot of money. Next thing I knew, all those things were there. Our organization was raising more money a month than rnc. It was amazing. But, you know, in the process of running for president and traveling to all 50 states, to the littlest hamlets, to the largest cities, one thing that I was impressed with was the fact that most Americans actually have common sense. What they lack is courage. Many people will just stand in the corner and stare at the floor and hope no one calls them a nasty name or that they don't get canceled. And if our nation is to survive, it is to thrive as a republic. People have to realize that you cannot be the land of the free if you're not the home of the brave. And Benjamin Franklin said when he came out of that constitution hall in 1787, after a very ruckus meeting that almost ended in disaster, he was asked, sir, what do we have here, a monarchy or a republic? And he said, a republic if you can keep it. We've kept it for more than 240 years. We're on the precipice right now of deciding which direction we're going in as a nation. Very important that people educate themselves, because before nations switch over to domination, there frequently is an attempt to dumb down the population. And you may have noticed that our population is dumbing down. Sometimes you see those man on the street interviews. They ask people the simplest questions. You know, who fought in the civil war, Portugal and Cuba? I mean, they have no idea. And people who are ignorant are very easy to mislead. You can tell them anything you want, and you just keep repeating it. And they'll say, oh, okay, that's what they said. You can say things like, our southern border is secure. We have complete control of it. And they'll say, oh, well, the government said it was secure and that it's in control. You know, that's what happens when people are ignorant.

Ignorance coupled with Arrogance is a very bad personality combination.

Yes. No question about it. Well, and you know what's interesting is we were once known as a nation of knowledge when Alexis de Tocqueville came here in 1831 to study America. Because the Europeans just could not fathom how this fledgling nation, barely 50 years old, was competing with them on every level. How could that be? One of the things he looked at was our educational system. And he was just blown away by the fact he could find a mountain man in the middle of the woods who could read and who could tell him about the Declaration of Independence. That was a hallmark of the kind of nation that we were. And if you really want to be impressed, take a look at a sixth grade exit exam from 150 years ago. What you needed to know to get a sixth grade certificate. You'll be blown away. And we have really dumbed things down, and we really need to pick them up again.

Of the things that you worry the most about, maybe the answer is education. Which do you have the most concern about being either facing an inevitable fate or have reached a state where it's unreversible?

In this country, I think the biggest problem that we're facing is the loss of our faith, our Judeo Christian values, which set us apart from so many others. Our founding document says that our rights come not from the government, but from our Creator. And those Judeo Christian values teach you to love your neighbor, not to hate your neighbor, not to cancel your neighbor if they disagree with you. And as we throw those values away, they're being substituted by things that are not good, that are resulting in the division of our nation. Our united status gave us strength divided. We are rapidly declining, and it will destroy us if we don't reverse it.

You mentioned education, and that's a particular concern of mine. And I have to say that I don't think we were paying attention for the last couple of decades as to the trends in education and outsourcing our children's development, and maybe not paying as close attention as we could have or should have during that time. Is that why you and Candy started Carson Scholars?

Yes. We noticed the survey, and it was looking at the ability of students in 22 countries of the world in science and math. And we ranked number 21 out of 22. We only beat out one country, and that was Jordan, where the kids were running around in bare feet dodging bullets. And that was very alarming to us. And we said, we've got to do something about this. And we started thinking, you know, when we go into these schools, and I would go into a lot of schools to speak, what are you met with as soon as you walk in the door? Trophies. All say basketball, I'll say basketball, wrestling, baseball, what have you. But what about the academic superstar? Where did they get a National Honor Society pen, a pat on the head? They're their little nerd and no one really cared very much about them. We said we have to start putting those people on a pedestal too. And that's how the Carson Scholars was founded. And we actually give them scholarships starting in the fourth grade. Now, you know, if you're a fourth or fifth grader and you got a thousand bucks, that's like, whoa, this kid is automatically cool. And the school gets a trophy. It goes right out there with the other trophies. They get to go to a banquet, they're celebrated sort of like the athletes. And you know, that makes a huge difference in their lives. Now they have to achieve at a very high level academically in order to get it. And in addition to that, they have to demonstrate that they care about other people more than just the six weeks before the application is due. They have to have a consistent pattern of caring about other people because we try to develop the future leaders of our country.

What can the student spend the thousand dollars on? Is it earmarked towards educational expenses?

Yes, the money goes into an escrow account. They get an accounting each year as to how much it's worth. If they win it in the fourth or fifth grade, it'd be worth considerably more by the time they go to college and they can win recognition year after year. And the other portion of the Carson Scholars fund are the reading rooms. We've got 280 reading rooms now around the country. And these are fancifully decorated areas frequently in Title 1 schools where a lot of the kids come from families where there are no books or very few books and they have very little. But they can go to this place. This would be their place of escape. And just wonderful books in there that are inspiring and uplifting and that frequently will get them started on the kind of academic performance that will lead them to become Carson Scholars later on.

A Title 1 school would be an inner city school or an under resourced school.

That's correct. Those are the, that's the lowest category. And they receive school lunches and things of that nature.

So putting free access to an environment within the school where they can go instead of hanging out in the cafeteria or hanging out in the, in the hallways and have access to the same types of books that made an impact in your life.

Right. Those are the kinds of things that made the difference for me, you know, once I started reading, once I developed a love of reading, and then I began to have a love of acquisition of knowledge. And that set me on a completely different trajectory.

My son Zach, through our affiliation of Homefront Brands with the Carson Scholars, was asked to be on the board and.

We are delighted to have him.

I can't tell you how proud I am that he was given that opportunity. And I wanted to take a minute to personally thank you for that. It's an incredible source of pride for him. And he, he is just, it's a. He's, he's worked very hard and he is a very caring person, is very servant like. And to have the opportunity at a young age to be able to participate for him is very meaningful. So I didn't want to.

He's a very impressive, very impressive young man. And, you know, we are cognizant of the fact that, that we need to have the perspectives of young people because these things are aimed at young people. You don't want a bunch of 60 year olds determining what's important to young people.

That's right. So, Dr. Carson, we've got an election next year. What is your plans for the future in terms of public service, if any? Or are you, are you doing other projects that you can share with us?

Well, right now, as the founder and chairman of the American Cornerstone Institute, that's taking up a great deal of time trying to redirect Americans everywhere to those cornerstone principles that made us great. That would be our faith, liberty, community and life. And then we have our little patriots program, which we call the inoculation to the indoctrination of our kids and teaching them about all of our history, the good, the bad and the ugly. But of course, an honest appraisal and evaluation of our history shows there's a heck of a lot more good than there is bad and ugly. And we want them to come out and be proud of our nation. We want to learn from the mistakes that we made and move forward. And then we have the executive branch for America, which teaches people how our government works, how the executive branch functions. And why is that so important? Because when a lot of people are elected to public office or their staffers, they're like deer caught in the headlights. And it takes them at least a year to even figure out which way things are going. And we want people to be able to have that knowledge before they get there so they can hit the ground running so we can make some real progress. And we want to encourage people, particularly conservative people, to go into government, to go in as career employees and to help rebalance things.

Is that program targeted towards elected officials or is it anybody who wants to work in government?

Anybody who wants to work in government. Elected officials as well as their support staffs are so much needed. And anybody who knows anything about how the government works, it's really the staff that does all the work anyway. The elected official is frequently just the face of what's going on. And we are working behind the scenes to help many people in the government, let's just put it that way.

There's so much that.

People.

Say today that creates flare ups and controversy. Are there unsayable things that you would suggest that everybody needs to hear?

Yes.

What might some of those be?

Some of those might be that science has determined that if you have two X chromosomes, you're a female. And if you have an X and a Y, you have, you are a male, end of story. That's what science says. People don't want to hear that. They want to hear that they can be whatever they want to be. But science has already made that determination. And then you have your people who are saying, well, that may be your truth, but that's not my truth. There's your truth and there's my truth. No, there isn't. There is the truth. And we need to be spending time looking at those things that are proven, that are well known. And we need to base our actions on the truth, not your truth and my truth. And then we need to understand that there is a power that is greater than ourselves and that is God. And it is the fact that we honored God for a long time before we tried to push him out and become secular, that we excelled, that we just went right to the pinnacle. And as we threw away those godly principles, we are decelerating very quickly. And I think it's time for revival in our country.

There are trends today with respect to immigration that are unclear, I think, to many Americans on what our position should be because we are a country of immigrants and that we're able to come together and unite and create the greatest nation that's ever been on the planet in existence. What do you think about in terms of our policy and our need for immigration in the near future?

Well, it is true that we are a nation of immigrants, but we're a nation of legal immigrants. There is a system. If you don't have borders, you don't have sovereignty and in the long run, it creates great danger for your country. Right now we live in a world where there are people who want to destroy us, there are terrorists. If we don't have an orderly way of determining who comes into our country, they are going to have a field day. And if they're not coming into our country and planning some catastrophic event, then they're guilty of terrorist malpractice. But I'm sure that they are doing that and they are preparing something pretty big for it. And it, you know, it's just a matter of common sense. Do we need to have immigration? Absolutely. Can we come up with a reasonable way to do it? Absolutely. A controlled way? Absolutely. And why we don't solve that problem and we put politics in instead is obviously to our detriment.

Dr. Carson, you are an inspiration to many for a variety of reasons. Who inspires you?

Well, of course, my Lord and savior, Jesus Christ. But in terms of human beings, it was my mother. My mother who just refused to be a victim. And if anybody was a victim, she was. Came from a huge rural family, dire poverty, bounced around from house to house, less than a third grade education. Married at age 13, trying to get out of that desperate situation, then discovering that your husband is a bigamist. But she never gave up. She always said, we can do something about this. She always taught that to me and my brother. Don't blame others. You have yourself to blame. Get out there and perform. And you know, I took that to heart. My brother did too. She got criticized all the time. You can't make boys stay in the house and read books. They'll grow up and they'll hate you. And I say, mother, you know they're right, but we had to do it anyway. And I think she got the last laugh because one son became a brain surgeon, the other became a rocket scientist.

Your brother Curtis is.

Yes.

You had quite the adventures together that you shared in the books.

And.

It'S a really well told story. Not only weaving in the values and the lessons, but also sharing the personal anecdotes. On any of your books, I highly recommend that people should all have on the shelf and their children and people they care about get many fine lessons from them. And your mother, it. I was really inspired by the self confidence. You didn't have resources, you might not have had the clothes. I think you said there was only one period in your life where you actually cared about what you were wearing and it was a brief time in your life. And they.

Just.

Her steadfast beliefs and principles that were unwavering, really gave you the confidence, and it gave you the pillar, the guidepost to hang on to and really build an inspirational life around.

And her wisdom, you know, when I was complaining about the clothes, she finally said, okay, Benjamin, I'll tell you what. I'm gonna give you all the money I earned this week scrubbing floors and cleaning toilets. You take the money, you pay the bills, you buy the food, you take care of all the necessities. And with all the money left over, you go out and buy all the fancy clothes you want. And I tried that, and I realized that my mother was a financial genius to keep us on anything.

Well, Dr. Carson, this has been an amazing conversation. I'm so thankful to get to spend this time with you. Thankful for the relationship I've got with Ben Jr. One of my best and most cherished friendships that I have. And we appreciate your time sharing your perspectives today on the home front.

And we appreciate the fact that you're patriots, and we love the fact that Carson Scholars is associated with home front now.

Appreciate that we will build at least two rooms together, reading rooms together this year and many more for the decades to come.

Beautiful.

Have a good day, sir. Thank you.

And Merry Christmas.

Same to you.