The Jack Hopkins Show Podcast
The Jack Hopkins Show Podcast; where stories about the power of focus and resilience are revealed by the people who lived those stories
Jack Hopkins has been studying human behavior for over three-decades. He's long had a passion for having conversations with fascinating people, and getting them to share the wisdom they've acquired through years of being immersed in their area of expertise, and overcoming the challenges and obstacles that are almost always part of the equation.
The Jack Hopkins Show Podcast
Empowering Missouri: Erik Richardson’s Vision for Change
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How can one person make a difference in a seemingly unwinnable political race? Discover the compelling journey of Erik Richardson, a Democratic nominee from Missouri, as he shares his heartfelt motivations for stepping into the political arena. With a rich background in education and rural economic development, Erik sheds light on the critical issues facing rural communities—from the decline of healthcare to the challenges of public education and the scarcity of childcare. His insights offer a fresh perspective on the power of proactive political leadership and the importance of running for office, even in predominantly red districts.
Erik's story is a testament to the multifaceted victories that come from engaging in local politics. We explore how his campaign efforts have increased voter registration, fostered a sense of community, and instilled hope in marginalized groups who often feel isolated. Erik passionately discusses the personal courage required to advocate for change and the broader social impacts of visibility and representation. Drawing parallels to other social movements, he highlights how challenging stereotypes can promote broader acceptance and understanding in schools, the military, and beyond.
In addition to his political aspirations, Erik emphasizes the value of mentorship and resource connectivity in empowering individuals, especially women and veterans, to succeed in business. He talks about the tangible actions that make a significant impact on people's lives, such as hosting workshops and providing follow-up support. Erik's dedication to lifting up fellow candidates and supporting local political campaigns underscores his commitment to community engagement and educational outreach. Tune in to hear more about Erik’s inspiring vision and how you can support his journey to bring meaningful change to rural Missouri.
Twitter/X: @Richardson4MO
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Eric Richardson
Speaker 1Welcome to the Jack Hopkins Show Podcast , where stories about the power of focus and resilience are revealed by the people who live those stories and now the host of the Jack Hopkins Show Podcast , jack Hopkins .
Speaker 2Hello and welcome to the Jack Hopkins Show Podcast . I'm your host , jack Hopkins . Hello and welcome to the Jack Hopkins Show podcast . I'm your host , jack Hopkins , and today I have Eric Richardson with me , who you are going to learn a lot more about in just a moment .
Speaker 2I had a phone call with Eric two or three days ago . He's a Democratic nominee in my state of Missouri and you know there are times in life where a politician can give you like a two or three word label of what they're going to do for you if elected , but they can't tell you how or they can't explain it to you the process of getting there and nine years of Trump now . If it's taught us anything , it's taught us that we need to know more about how people are going to do what they promised to do . And on this phone call , eric Richardson took this topic and explained it in such a way that right in the middle of it , I had this epiphany . I'm like my God .
Speaker 2This guy is explaining this in a way that not only holds the attention of , but will be understood by , anyone who's listening to it . This is a guy who can communicate . He can back up any idea he presents in terms of what he's going to do , and he can also explain why we should all be considering doing something that he's doing and that is running for office as a Democrat , especially when a little voice in the back of our head says what's the point ? We're in a red state . So , eric , welcome to the show Great .
Speaker 3Yeah , Thanks for having me , Jack . I love the show and I've been a big fan of yours online following your work and appreciate your insights , so this is a really cool opportunity for me .
Speaker 2You know , I know you have an online e-teaching business . Can you tell a little bit more about that , because I want people to be able to tie in why your brain works like it does .
Speaker 3Sure . So I mean I have kind of a broad background . I have worked in corporate life , I have an MBA and a graduate degree in philosophy , but then I also went back and got 60 graduate credit hours of work for a teaching certification and a lot of my career has been spent in teaching , from kindergarten all the way through college and then now beyond college . So in one form or another , whether I was teaching college courses or teaching first and second graders or middle school a lot of those things still carry over into my business role . But they also carry over and it's easy for people to hear when they're talking to me it carries over into the kind of things that I really want to accomplish and what pushed me to go into politics .
Speaker 2When you were talking to me on the phone , I was very clear that you were not going through some pre-planned template of explaining it . This is something that's just become part of how you communicate . It's part of how you think . Yeah , that's accurate . Yeah , part of how you think about the world and how you communicate with others . Can you tell us a little bit about why you decided , with everything that you have going on , because it sounds like you certainly are a busy guy ? What prompted you to run for office in the first place ?
Speaker 3Yeah . So you know , it's kind of an interesting shift in direction , because what happened was that I started getting more and more engaged and involved with rural economic development . So I've done some research and a little bit of freelance writing , and then I've started doing some training on what it really takes at a nuts and bolt level to help rebuild and rejuvenate rural economic communities right beyond just the agricultural sector , communities right beyond just the agricultural sector . And as I looked at those things and started to see how those pieces fit together , I realized , like you know , part of the challenge is that the help that we need to help the small communities need . They can't do that all by themselves . And you know , in missouri we've had a republican super majority for like 20 years , right , and for those of you who don't know , a super majority means that they , the legislators , don't need any democrats to sign on to a bill in order for them to be able to pass it , so they don't have to collaborate , they don't have to compromise at all , and so the things that they're not doing to help those communities . So communities can't solve these problems themselves . They need resources and a lot of times there are resources out there but nobody's helping the community , learn about them , find them , access them , walk them through that process . And so our , our rural communities are are imploding , right , there's all this low-hanging fruit that the legislators could be helping us reach , and they're just not .
Speaker 3So we see things , like you know , healthcare is disappearing in rural communities for Missouri and you know , the sad thing is it's not just Missouri , right , I mean , this is a common challenge for a lot of states and a lot of rural districts . So healthcare is disappearing . Our education , public education , is getting squeezed . Our access to childcare , like something like 70% of Missouri is a childcare desert , which means if you're outside one of the major metro areas , it's almost impossible to find childcare , and that means that predominantly , like , a lot of women are being trapped out of the workforce . And so I looked at that and I went look the things that are missing . Predominantly , like , a lot of women are being trapped out of the workforce and there . And so , right , I looked at that and I went look , the things that are missing are not complicated or hard to understand in the way that my mind works . I'm like we just need somebody who's taking the effort to teach them about these and to put policies in place to make it easier for people to get access to this stuff , so that these communities aren't having to solve these problems by themselves . They've got sort of a big brother or a mentor , a big sister holding their hand and helping them do this .
Speaker 3And so , you know , I fight very hard for , for philosophical reasons and political reasons , to create true equality for women , so opportunities and roles and support systems . But I also take on that fight as a politician on a very practical level , because a lot of the the things that are causing these rural communities to shrink and and decline in terms of their prospects , those are centered around the same issues that have to do with women's opportunity . So that disappearing child care , that disappearing health care , I mean that means that women are trapped out of the workforce and that hurts us in two ways , right . So one is the available talent pool that we have in a community is shrunk down , which means it's harder to attract businesses or to maintain businesses that launch here . But the other problem is is that those exact same factors also prevent new families from wanting to move here . So right , if there's not access to child care , if our education system is is on the decline , if there's not a , you know , a close health care and , like you know , maternity doctors . In rural Missouri it's like playing a lottery to try to find one . They're not going to move here , they're not going to come to these communities , and that's the talent . Those are the people that are in a position to relocate , but they're not coming here , and so we're trapping these women out of the workforce .
Speaker 3It's hurting us in both of those ways ways , but it also perpetuates some of those dynamics that we see , that we see the republicans talk about , like , oh , the poverty levels , oh right , well , I mean part of the reason that we have poverty levels as high as we do , because for women , the incidence rate of being below the national poverty level is like three times higher . And these are the reasons because they're trapped in this situation . Because , as much as we like to think that we've advanced right , the child care burden , the senior care burden , is a very similar challenge , right , that tends to fall on the women in the family . So that means they're not pursuing their careers , they don't have resources , they don't have options . Then it makes it a challenge for them to get housing , affordable housing , and so it kind of goes around in a circle .
Speaker 3So I'm very passionate about that and it's easy to be passionate in a way , and because of the training that I've done and the research that I've done , I see exactly how we can put those first few pieces . If we can connect a couple of nuts and bolts , that starts a domino effect . If we can create business and nonprofit and government coalitions to strengthen the childcare seats available in a given community , that's a huge domino . As soon as you free up an additional 10 or 20% of your workforce , that spills over . Now you've got you know , businesses staying afloat or growing or new businesses launching . You've got increased sales tax revenue for the community . You've got you know , sometimes the smartest people in the community are the women . And now they've got time and resources to be involved with city leadership or with community organizations or the chamber of commerce , and so it starts to multiply and spread outward in our phone call and I want to address what you talked about there specifically .
Speaker 2Yeah , what you couldn't have known during that phone call because I had never told you . So I'm revealing this to you for the first time today . But , as you were explaining that , you very clearly explained to me , without knowing it , why I probably made a mistake just a few years ago , and I was thankful for being able to understand that on a much clearer and cleaner level , and I want other people to be able to understand this as well . So the reveal is during about the middle of COVID in my county , someone who knew I had a background in the Navy as a hospital corpsman and had done some nursing for a while after I got out of the Navy and also knew I was very pro-vaccine right , they knew I was very outspoken against Trump they messaged me and said look , there's a position coming open on the Department of Health on the board , right , we'd like for you to consider running Now one of the first things I factored in after they had sent me this message In 2020 , of the people who actually voted and , as you know , in these smaller rural counties , the actual number of people who vote is embarrassingly slim .
Speaker 2But of the people who did , almost 8 out of 10 people in my county voted for Donald Trump in 2020 . The first thought that came to my mind was nobody who's anti-Trump is going to win the election for this Department of Health spot , and of that I was right . I wouldn't have . But I also realize why . Now , after your explanation why it might have been a mistake for me not to run anyway , can you elaborate on the explanation you gave me without knowing it ?
Speaker 3yeah , yeah , I mean
Rural Community Empowerment and Engagement
Speaker 3there . There are two parts to that . Um , you know , the one part is you still , we still need people to run , because those members of our community still need to have an opportunity to feel heard . They need to see those things being addressed . And even if we can't necessarily flip the seat right which is what people tend to focus on right right , everything that we can do . There are a lot of ways to win everything that we can do that can count as a win , whether that's teaching people how to engage , increasing voter registration right , growing the , the involvement in the local democrats club .
Speaker 3Every time we do one of those things , it helps to give people who have a feeling that it's a hopeless fight . It gives them back a feeling of empowerment , like it's not hopeless , right . If we can show them that they can make a difference , they can move that needle . Then one of these times it it is a flippable district , right , I mean . So you know , part of the challenge of doing that is that we still want those people to have a voice , even if they don't have the seat , and the reason for that is that it's not hopeless , it's not impossible , right , it's hard , it feels challenging , no-transcript , then that gives people all over missouri and into the other states .
Speaker 3It gives people in these rural districts that feel really red a sense of of hope , a sense that there is a reason to do this and a reason to fight , because every time they engage and they push for these kinds of changes they can create those small impacts right , like they could increase the childcare available in their community .
Speaker 3So they don't flip the seat . But people realize they're not alone because we've all started speaking out . Right . We've got this phenomenon where you have blue dots in an ocean of red and they think there are fewer than there are . And once you start speaking out they realize like wait , one out of four of us , one out of five of us , one out of three of us actually feel the same way . That's enough people to accomplish something , even if it starts small . That's enough of us to help make a difference in who ends up on city council , or that's enough to make a difference in whether or not we get access to some rural health care options . And so you know what people , that of realization that it's not impossible , that they're not alone , that's , you know , that's huge you know one thing I I compare this to eric I .
Speaker 2I look back . I graduated in the mid 80s from high school right I . I thought we had one gay student in the community when I was in high school right yeah years later , you know , 40 years later , I find out no , we had several gay students in our school system here . It's just that because nobody was stepping forward , nobody else felt comfortable stepping forward , so they didn't get to have that feeling of I'm not alone right .
Speaker 3Well , that's a perfect example and an issue that we fight with in rural communities . I mean , that's one of the things that I have tried to tackle and you know it's funny . I I use an example that I think you'll appreciate . You know , as I began reaching out to talk to some of the people in the community , I wanted to put together a panel discussion for our democratic group , because not everybody has lgbtq in their family , for instance . But so in a community like this , reaching out to try to make connections , it's a little bit like being a Cold War spy , like .
Speaker 3I don't know . Are you , are you a spy ? Like who's asking ? Why do you want to know ? Like well , I don't know if I am , you know , I might say that I am , but I don't know who's asking . And so there's this problem because you don't want to . You know , as I call them , the hillbilly stasi right , Like you don't want to alert the antagonists who are going to become hostile , you don't want to accidentally out people that aren't out , but you have to take those tentative first steps . I mean , that's a beautiful example that I lived through myself and that I try to figure out a way to solve exactly the same . I love that you brought that comparison in .
Speaker 2Well , and you bring up an important point about people not wanting to feel outed and being kind of thrust into that position where maybe , in some cases , you know , they find themselves in danger . And looking back , I know one of the reasons , if not the reason the person who had contacted me and said , would you consider running for this ? They knew that was not a factor for me . They knew I had no reservations If it was something I felt like I should do , that that wouldn't prohibit me . Now , granted , and it's taken me a while to realize this , not everybody thinks and feels in that same way . I'm kind of an outcast in that , or the black sheep , I should say , in terms of how much I'm able to , or willing rather to put out there and then go . You know , whatever happens happens . That's not most people . So I kind of feel like I missed an opportunity to do something there at
Empowering Community Engagement Through Representation
Speaker 2a critical time .
Speaker 2Again , I was focused , as you talk about so clearly . I was focused on I win this , can I win the election ? Can I get the seat on the board ? Now , if you ask a question like that and that's the only question you ask , then in a community like this you're probably not going to run . But if you're asking different questions , like , can I not win the election but still make a difference just by having run and campaigned ? And the answer to that , as you've painted a clear picture of , is yes , you can talk to somebody who would potentially be a great candidate who's thinking about running but then kind of gets stopped in their tracks by that I can't win , Right . And you can lay out a case , as you did for me , why that's not necessarily a reason to say no , I'm not going to run to say , no , I'm not going to run .
Speaker 3Yeah , and you know it . Um , the way the media likes to portray elections and campaigns sort of plays into that . Right , because they really love that horse race analogy like he's running , he's raising more money , he's not raising more money . I mean , one of the one of the the challenges that that I set early on to try to circumvent , that is that I don't want us to raise as much money as the Republicans , because , if you do right , that's not a model that you can replicate everywhere , right ? So I haven't shown people a new way to solve that problem , right , I haven't made it believable because they could look at that and go , oh well , yeah , but he raised you know what ? $300,000 . I'm not going to do that . So if I only won because I did that , then I haven't actually accomplished what I was setting out to do , which is to show them that it's a lot more achievable than they think . And so you know , I've raised very little money and I hope to spend very little money Now . You know there are pluses and minuses . That changes how likely I might be to to flip the seat , but as much as I move the needle , people can look at that and go . That's what he did , without having to get a huge pile of money underneath him , and that's more of a win , that you know . And look , I mean , I'm not a perfect candidate and that's another challenge .
Speaker 3People like oh well , you know the kind of people who run for office , they're whatever , they're beautiful , they're smart , they're accomplished , they don't have mistakes in their past , they've got amazing careers and , like you know , I am always glad to sit down and go oh , no , no , no , no . Now , certainly we've been helped in that by characters like Marjorie Taylor Greene , who have that illusion that we often have . But people sort of imagine to themselves like , well , I'm not the kind of person who . Well , no , in fact you are , and here's like , just you getting involved , here's what happens to your community , here's how people start rallying around and people start feeling heard and people start getting involved .
Speaker 3I mean I would love and I'm always straightforward involved . I mean I would love and I'm always straightforward , like I would love to have five new candidates running across rural sections in missouri next year . They're like yeah , you convinced me that I should be one of the people who runs and that doesn't have anything to do with whether we , we flip the seat , and it doesn't even have to do necessarily with whether they succeed in creating economic change in their community . Right , that's an additional win . But every one of those people that feels like wait . I am the kind of people who run or get engaged or who become community leaders .
Speaker 2That's empowering . To go back to the example that I used a moment ago and to bridge over from what you are saying , when there's just one , let's go back to the mid-80s . If there's just one suspected gay student in the entire school system , there's no question about it . There's not going to be any curiosity or inquiry into even wanting to know about the life of a gay person or what are some important topics and concerns to them . Topics and concerns to them .
Speaker 2When you have five who are no longer suspected because they've come out as openly gay , you reach a number where it gets much harder for people not to become curious and not to just look at that one anomaly and say see , the rest of us are normal , we've got this one gay student . But when you've got five , 10 , 12 , now all of a sudden you're having to face a reality . Right , that it's not the anomaly that you are , that it makes you comfortable to believe that it is . So I see that same thing . You know , as you know well , in a small rural community there's a lot of overlap between somebody running as a Democrat and a gay student .
Speaker 3Right .
Speaker 2Let me give you another example , jack .
Speaker 3I mean you know there's another really great example that has to do with overcoming the version that we're handed right . So when we had integration of the armed services , right so when there were black men serving right beside white guys in World War ii , that did so much to overcome , because people , you know and I can give an example for myself as a kid growing up , right like people were able to look at that and go wait , I know , like I served in the military , I had black guys in my unit . I they're not like that , like I'm being told they are , they're not , they don't fit that , that caricature that we're being handed and that helps to puncture that , that myth that got built . So with , with , you know , african-americans in the military , with gay people in rural community , whatever that example . Well , and you know what , with women it happens very much the same way .
Speaker 3So there was a very interesting study that showed , you know , people like oh well , you know women have are are better at certain things in management , like they have certain strengths that are different than men's strengths in management , and so that's why it ends up not having as many , but in fact , that perception of what things they were strong at . It turns out that's determined by whether you've ever known women in leadership positions . The more you've been exposed to women in leadership and management positions , the less likely you are to think that their strengths are in a different area and there's no amount of talking about it that can get you past that . You have to bump into it . You have to . You know . You find out like wow , eric's a great guy , he's done a bunch of stuff for the community , oh , and he's a Democrat . So maybe Democrats aren't quite what we thought .
Speaker 2That's a great point . That is a fantastic point because , the more you can make that , the fact that you are a Democrat just a thin sliver of the pie .
Speaker 3Exactly .
Speaker 2Right , yeah , because so often you are dead on and so often what happens and part of it is by design the entire pie becomes he's a Democrat , right , and so they can't see beyond until you decide to run . What your political affiliation is ? Just know you're a good guy . Hey , you know what this guy . When he talks about things , about things , man , he really explains them well . It is just not some we ought to do this , it's . He says this is why we should do it and here's how we would do it . And again , that's what stood out in that phone call about you .
Speaker 2I I'm not going to mention any names , but I've had phone calls with some people fairly high up on the ladder running for office who could tell me all kinds of things we should do . But when I would ask them you know how do we do that ? Right , or why specifically would we do that ? They tried , but I really didn't learn anything I hadn't already known before . They tried to explain it . You know , and I'm thinking look , um , this , this particular person may be able to get into office because they've got that charisma as you spoke about . You know , it might be a beautiful woman or really handsome guy , or just have that appeal , but once they're in , I'm not comfortable that they can do anything different than the person that they're going to defeat .
Speaker 3Yeah , no , very much so .
Speaker 2So you are really drilling down to , and I think as a country because of this last eight to nine years , we know that , right , we , we know that , look , we've got to become a more educated voting base , right , right , yeah , we can't just settle for I'm gonna make america great again . Right , because we saw how that worked right , yeah um , it sounded great . It was a . It's probably one of the best hooks , political hooks , of all time right but it was empty , but he couldn't execute .
Speaker 3Oh , I mean , you know , or look at the wall , like he can have this great idea , but , like it turned out , he actually didn't know anything about how you actually get a wall built , right , right you know ?
Speaker 2uh , yeah , I I'm to date . I don't think that . Uh , we've seen a check from mexico well , and you know there's another .
Speaker 3There's another really good example , too , jack . I mean one of the one of the things that that I know you'll resonate with um you know that I talk about is that . I mean , you know , here in missouri too , I mean this is ike skelton country , right , yes , I , I am one of the strongest advocates for our armed services and our veterans . The care we take of our veterans right For a non-veteran that you will probably see in politics and I love that about Ike Skelton , and there are a couple of concrete examples . So I talk about things like creating opportunities for women and I talk a lot about our veterans being one of the people that have been pushed away from the table and need to be brought back .
Speaker 3And in both of those cases , right , creating opportunities and educating them so they can access business startup funds , making that available to them .
Speaker 3But then , right , not just throwing that money at it but then pairing them with mentors who can help them get through that first five-year danger zone for businesses .
Speaker 3Right , like some , 80 or 90% of businesses collapse by the end of their first five years in business . So give them mentors , because we've got people , brilliant people with talent and potential that could be launching businesses in these communities . And when you do that , so this is a very nuts and bolts piece , right . So then , when you've got veterans who are bringing this experience , that they've acquired this leadership ability , these , this core integrity , or you've got women who are in these roles , that changes the dynamic of the community , right , those automatically , right , kids from both sides , but people from both sides are looking at that and going well , of course , women are strong leaders , of course our veterans are an important voice in our community , and so once we do that , that's another one of those dominoes , right . So you've got small businesses that are launching , but , more importantly , you've got talent that we already have , that you're creating an opportunity for them to unfold that talent in a way that impacts the community around them , like I would love to
Building Business Success Through Mentorship
Speaker 3see right .
Speaker 3So you know , when I took people talk about like , oh , I'm going to pass this and I'm going to pass that , they get focused in on that legislative side and they they forget the constituent services side . Right ? I mean , look , we're still going to have a majority in the state legislature even if I get elected . Hopefully they'll have to listen to us once in a while . So I don't go out there , I don't tell people like , oh , here are the eight things I'm going to pass . My freshman legislator , I'm going to pass all these bills uphill . No , I'm not going to promise that and that's not the scorecard I want you to look at at the end of that first two-year term . What I'm going to promise and what we can point to is how many workshops did he have in the district to help people access resources for launching a go ? Did he help me understand that better ? Did he connect me to resources ? Did he follow up ? Right , like , I can point people to resources all day long , but that doesn't mean they're easy to use or easy to to implement . Did he follow back , you know , did he check back to see if I got an answer from the , the people I reached out to ? I mean there are all of these great opportunities , low-hanging fruit , right .
Speaker 3So when I talk about , you know I will , you know I will get on a soapbox and talk about how we build up honor as this important value . When we're selling our young men and women to go to war and then , when they come back and it's time for us to treat them with honor , we kind of forget about that right , like if we lived up to this . If we want to tell them , this is a noble way to live your life , this is a thing worth doing is living by this code of honor , and then we don't well , that kind of puts the lie to that . That means we don't actually think it's a way we're kind of spitting on that right . That's , that means we don't actually think that honor is a way that we should live our lives .
Speaker 3So when you see politicians voting against veteran initiatives , you see them denying health care , the PACT Act you know those guys high-fiving after they vetoed the oh my God , that gets my blood pressure up . But so there's an example there . Like you know , I can talk about those values and those virtues and the kind of america that we want to be , but I can also turn around and say which you you know , which really resonated with you , and here's how we do that right . I mean one step think about , because not only then does that veteran see that we lived up to our promise , we so we built this set of skills and now we're creating a way for for him to leverage those or for her to leverage those in the community , but think about , you know , their ability to access health care , like now they're able to get benefits right , maybe through their work , if not the , the veterans benefits , but then everybody that knows them right I mean my , my father and my stepfather and my grandfather were all veterans and and I watched them struggle in different ways with that right , whether it was with healthcare or with career transitions or whatever .
Speaker 3So it's not just the veterans that we're holding our promise to , but it's everyone in that family and it's everyone who knows them right . It's everyone at work who's like oh yeah , you know , jack is a great guy , boy , he sure has a lot of health issues . Being a veteran doesn't look like all that great of a thing to have done .
Speaker 3Well sure so every and then we're like I can't figure out why our recruitment is so low like I can , because every one of those guys , every one of those women that we don't live up to our part of the deal , that's like dropping a grenade and into the community perception of whether or not that's a way they want , like why would ? Why would those kids grow up wanting to go into the military ? Why would those co-workers or the , you know , the students in class , I mean so anyway . So , but every one of those people that we can help set up a business . Now the perception is like , oh , we've helped . Like this veteran yeah , I , I know jack ran this great business in town when I was growing up . He was on the Chamber of Commerce Like that's the way it should work and so that one nut and bolt that we put in place that ripples outward .
Speaker 2Right , you talk about the importance of mentorship in that whole process , and I posted just within the last couple of days and I can't remember whether it was on Twitter or in my newsletter , but it was a study that I'd pulled up that , as you know , as a small business owner , most small businesses fail , right , right , oh yeah , but here's a very important statistic that ties right into your idea on mentorship If you are over 55 years of age and start a new business , you become an entrepreneur at 55 or above . You have a 73% greater chance of your business making it , and the reason cited were that you've already failed many times in life , you've gotten feedback from the world and you've had to think things through . You've developed wisdom . Now , there are two ways , then , in my mind , upon reading that study , upon reading that study , I immediately said look , here are the two paths to a 73% greater success rate at your new business . Either wait until you're 55 .
Speaker 2Be that wiser or mentor or get mentored or find one . Yeah , when you , when you are 23 , that's brilliant . Yeah , so you know . Otherwise , look , I , I had , uh , small business ventures when I was in my 20s . Right , uh , you make a lot of mistakes and some of them prove to be deadly mistakes to the business . Right , you just don't have that .
Speaker 2I was trying to do it on my own and I think a lot of young entrepreneurs get into this . I didn't want to be able to say I succeeded because somebody helped me . Right , I want to show the world I can figure this out . I'll show you . Right , well , uh , I did . Okay , but looking back , I needed help , I needed mentorship . And so there's when you go through a small rural town and you see all of the empty buildings , all of the businesses that used to be there , and we know a lot of that has come as a result of online business . But we also know that a lot of the new businesses that come in and try to fill that empty building don't make it , and we don't always know exactly why they didn't make it , but we can take a guess and probably get pretty close to they made some mistakes that they wouldn't have made if they would have had mentorship , and that applies to to the veterans . Look , anybody that served in the , even if they've just been in four years , they've learned some basic leadership skills .
Speaker 3Yeah , exactly .
Speaker 2While they are in the military and they can be a mentor . I think too many people I'm talking about veterans specifically here , yeah , talking about veterans specifically here . Yeah , I think too many veterans who have those basic leadership skills . They come out and maybe their mos or the the job that they had doesn't necessarily apply in civilian life and so they've not been successful at a business and , you know , maybe they wind up going to work at a factory and they think to themselves I'm just a factory worker , right ? Who the hell am I going to mentor ? Forgetting , they have the very essential basic leadership skills that they can teach . And if you get those to somebody 12 , 13 , 14 years old , rather than waiting until they're 19 , 20 , as you did when you joined the military , right , maybe that person goes to college or goes to a trade school where they otherwise would have just followed in the path of their family and worked at the local factory . You never know just how much you can deviate the path forward through mentorship .
Speaker 3Well , and there's another great thing too that you sort of touched on , but maybe by accident , because it's not just about the leadership skills , it's also a lot of it is about the teamwork skills .
Speaker 3So I mean a part of it is that you know , you described the challenges that you had and you had learned some of those things about being part of a team . Right , you got to amplify those a little bit more for people who weren't in service , right , so they didn't necessarily learn those . Now , you know , some people learn some of those things because they were really engaged in sports or for other reasons . But part of what the veterans can bring to the table is knowing better than to think at least often knowing better than to think that it's about doing it on your own . You don't do , I mean you do nothing on your own . You barely get to go to the bathroom on your own , right . I mean that sense of teamwork because even if you can't find a mentor no-transcript that idea that being a part of the team is that , of course . That's how you succeed at stuff .
Speaker 2They do because the the military , at least when I was in . It's been a while , but the military is pretty good at weeding out those that can't be a team player . In other words , the longer you are in .
Speaker 2If you just can't coordinate with other people and work as a team , you're probably not going to last long . You're probably going to find something else in life to do so . Somebody that's been in for any length of time you know whether they originally liked working with others or not . They found a way to do so and that's the thing . Look , not everybody has to love it , but if you've learned how to do it and can do it , you are light years ahead of somebody who doesn't know how and has never experienced it .
Speaker 3Yeah , yeah , I think you know , if we're not , if we're not plugging our veterans into opportunities like that , that's a . That failure is on us . That's not a failure on them , right ? If we're not helping them to see that their MOS doesn't define them , if we , if we can translate what made them good at that and show them how that applies to other areas , right ?
Speaker 2That's a failure on us and shame on us . Young men and women who have come back from war who have psychological trauma , ptsd , major depression and the stigma of mental health issues . One thing I think that gets in the way for a lot of veterans in fact I know it does is If they are somebody that has struggled at any point after their military service or during their military service . If they know that anybody in the community knows that , they immediately by default think who would ever want me to help mentor them ?
Speaker 2But here's the thing , things not everybody , who , in fact a large portion of people who come out of the military and deal with psychological issues , will not be dealing with them for the rest of their lives .
Speaker 2With proper treatment , they'll come back to a baseline , or close to it , of pre-military . So just because you feel like right now , while you are struggling , you might not be the best mentor , that's not who you are at the core . And and once you , once you come back up to closer to who you are and you've still got that same skillset , there's no reason at all to think that people would look at you and think , oh , he can't be a mentor , right ? But I think that's the mindset and we've got to come up with ways to help people not only get through those psychological struggles , but then to also be able to shed the stigma , because you can get through the psychological issues . But then to also be able to shed the stigma because you can get through the psychological issues but then pack that stigma around with you as a healed individual for the rest of your life .
Speaker 3Well , and that's a perfect example that I talked about that communities , and in this case individuals , can't necessarily solve on their own right . So you need somebody above , know , above them , somebody with a better sense of the bigger picture , who's organizing that , who's connecting them with that . Because then , like you know you're , you're not necessarily going to jack and asking him to be a mentor . There's an organization that partners you with a mentor . So they've already evaluated this person , right , so you're not . You wouldn't think , like , well , is he a good mentor ? Like , oh , you know the Veterans Mentor Initiative , whatever we call it ? Right , sure , the Veterans Mentor Initiative , like , they've already looked at this guy's background , they've assessed his skill set , they , you know , maybe they've put him through some workshops to help him learn . So I'm putting my trust in them , not directly in him , and that's how we accomplish something that the individuals couldn't accomplish on their own or that the community couldn't accomplish on their own .
Speaker 3Same thing with women in business , right , I mean , especially , one of the things that's especially important is not just creating opportunities for women in business , but especially helping them launch and sustain businesses that are non-typical or non-predictable . So , right , like women opening coffee shop , I mean that's valuable , but that's sort of that still confines them to a niche , right ? Yes , show me a woman who wants to open a construction project business , or a woman who wants to open an auto shop , or a woman who wants to open , right , a community lending organization . What is something that breaks them out of the the stereotypes ? Right , that's great . Of course , you know it's often the case that women might be who run the flower shop , but that doesn't change our perception of women in leadership roles , the way that all of these other areas that women are good and talented at . So getting them a resource , getting them a mentor , helps them overcome those public perceptions like , oh well , yeah , but women or this or women or that or whatever , the misconception is .
Leveraging Resources for Community Empowerment
Speaker 3Having that organized resource that that helps to connect them and , you know , pairs them with an older you know woman in business mentor , that makes a huge difference in how other people perceive them . Like , oh right , but she went through the women's business initiative so I know she's on track . Like she's a good person for us to , to ask to us do this community project . Like we've added a sort of filter and a credibility stamp that changes the whole profile of success for them . The resources that we have access to . That doesn't have anything to do with changing the legislation right . I don't have to pass a piece of legislation to help them connect with each other or to help them connect with resources . But by virtue of being in that position , I have a credibility Like I've been . I mean , it's a similar , it's a similar process , writ on a bigger scale . Like oh , he knows what these resources are , so we'll trust him . And then he plugs us in and now we've got access to these resources .
Speaker 2Right .
Speaker 3Because it's just , I mean a lot of this stuff . You know , I had a great conversation a while back with one of the guys from the Shark Tank and he said you know , one of the interesting things that he has found in coaching businesses is how often we know the stuff that we need to do . We just don't do it right . We just need somebody to help us like , okay , yeah , let's get over this hump . Same thing with helping these veterans get set up in business . They know a bunch of things they need to do .
Speaker 3It's just hard to do , it's intimidating , it's daunting , there's a perception of the failure risks that get in our way . So that ability for a legislator to turn around and say , look , my measurement of success isn't going to be how many bills I pass , it's going to be how many new businesses launched in my district . Right , that's a . I mean , that's a metric . That means I , I helped people , I got some people to step up and maybe created some on thethe-ground nuts-and-bolt impact . Right , I could pass bills all day . Sure , somewhere there still has to be the person between the bill and the ground level that actually makes it happen .
Speaker 2Right , and when I think of because you mentioned the term resources so often in this episode , I think of it like this Look , if I have strep throat , a bottle of antibiotics in my cabinet , that's a resource . But if I don't build the bridge between that resource and my involvement in utilizing that resource , nothing changes with my strep throat . And what winds up happening is I just build this continual supply of resources in my cabinet but still have to deal with all of the issues those resources are designed for . And that's where I see that mentorship role come in . It's like , okay , so often , as you've pointed out , there have been resources available for counties or small communities that nobody even knew existed . Yeah , exactly , they really mean without knowing it . They're really saying if we just had someone to connect us with and get us started in utilizing these resources .
Speaker 3Oh , 110% man . That's a perfect example . I love that .
Speaker 2Tell me , eric , how can people ? First of all , how can people find ?
Speaker 3you the easiest place to find me . I know not everybody's on twitter , but that's where I tend to be the most active . So if you go on twitter , I'm richardson and then the number four mo . So if you go in there , I mean that's a great place to connect with me . My bio line you know , of course I have to say this my bio line includes a link to donate to help me .
Speaker 3Right , and you're not betting on who's going to win the horse race . You're investing money , like this guy's going to take this money and he's going to use it to educate people . He's going to use it to help get people involved . He's going to reach out to volunteers and get them to step up and and be heard . So , yeah , connecting with me on twitter is the easiest , best place to do it . I've got a website , but right now it's broken . I have to . I'm not a tech guy , so I have to have my tech guy update my security certificate or something like that . You got it , but the most valuable thing there is that it'll point you to someplace like social media , where I'm active . Share my opinions . I'll comment on current issues , so I would love to have people jump in and share their thoughts with me .
Speaker 2So I would love to have people jump in and share their thoughts with me . Good , good , I think we can make that happen . One thing that has stood out about you during this episode that I can't really say has ever been the case with any other candidate that I've been talking to . For the entire time you have talked not about things that you will to me that you have a vision for making the country a better place , not just putting the spotlight on yourself and saying I'm running for this election in this community , please help me . That never happens . People localize all of their suggestions or what they're going to do or how you can help , and so to have somebody come on and be willing to share and talk about how other communities , how other states from coast to coast , can implement this mindset , this belief system and these very tangible and workable solutions , I think speaks a lot about who you are as a person , which , as we've learned , who someone is as a person matters a lot when they are running for office .
Supporting Local Political Campaigns
Speaker 3I appreciate that . You see that , jack , I mean that's maybe the highest compliment that I could get . I mean there's very much that sense and if you follow me on Twitter , I know you do and other people actually had a really nice quote from Jamie Harrison , who is the Democratic , the chair of the National Democratic Party , and he said you know something about how how much work Eric is always willing to do to lift up the whole team . And same thing , like that's about the highest compliment . I mean , right , sure , as a teacher , a part of me will always be a teacher . You can hear that in me talking about , you know , making the people in my district better and smarter .
Speaker 3But you know , I didn't go into teaching because so I could get in the spotlight . I'm not a spotlight person , right , and I certainly didn't do it to make myself feel smart . I did it because I want to see other people succeed and so I'm constantly looking . You know , you'll see , I probably spend what 20 of my time online trying to lift up other candidates around the state and around the country that I see , highlighting stuff that I love .
Speaker 3It's hard to follow me for longer than a day and not know that I hold Mark Hamill up , as this great example is one of the most iconic figures and he spends all this , all this time , like you know , connecting with people and lifting them up like right , celebrating their birthdays . I'm a dog person , so it gets to me when he goes on and , like you know , it puts a broken heart for people who have lost their pets . I mean sure , it's amazing what kind of impact that could be , but it also , you know , helps to highlight what I'm saying , like that's the best kind of person I could picture being , so it means a lot that you saw that come through Well .
Speaker 2I think let me , before I forget , how can people ? Because you've talked this entire time . You've talked about helping other people , which , obviously , when we are looking at avoiding catastrophe , in the end of democracy , that's something we do want to talk about is how we can help each other as a nation , but you've talked about that almost exclusively . How can we help Eric Richardson ? What can we do ? What can listeners , viewers do to help you ?
Speaker 3what ? What can we do ? What can listeners , viewers , do to help you ? You know , honestly , one of the things that I need at this point is is support , is donations , right ? So , because of the way the campaign laws work , all of the work that I did to raise money for my congressional campaign , none of that can roll over to my state legislature campaign , and you know , and I should . I should maybe highlight just briefly how that happened , right ?
Speaker 3So I ran for most of last year running for that seat in congress and the day before the deadline to file with the missouri secretary of state had amazing conversation with two different people in the in leadership for the state democratic party and they said you know what , like , we really need your help to try to break this super majority . So the thing is , in missouri , we're only three seats away from being able to break the super majority , which means at least part of the time they've got to ask , they've got to get us to agree , and the reason that's important is that that means they have to make their bills a little bit less extreme or we won't agree to them . So anything that helps to pull the extremism back toward a balanced middle I haven't even started on that . That's a huge issue for me . I want there to be two strong , healthy parties and we are far from that right now , on a national level and on a local level . But the help that I can get from people if it's a dollar , if it's $2 , if it's $5 , that allows me to make up for that gap . So , because I couldn't roll over that fundraising and that means being able to put signs out .
Speaker 3Signs don't necessarily sway people directly , but it helps to fix that feeling that you're the only one that you're alone , correctly , but it helps to fix that feeling that you're the only one that you're alone . So every time people bump into a sign I mean it's a lot like bumping into pride flags when you're driving through a community if you see pride flags , that may or may not make you go to that business , but it also automatically makes you think I'm not the only one in this community , right , and that this community , you know , listens to to some of those people part of the time . So you know it allows me to get signs . It allows me to get thank you cards into the mail to people who do support me . It allows me to get you know out here in rural , out here in the rural districts it's almost impossible to knock enough doors right . So that means you got to do , you got to have money to do mailings and you got to have newspaper ads and you got to have radio spots . So every dollar helps me do that right . I mean , and the thing is , in a campaign like this , the benefit to a down ballot campaign is that you know , like a thousand dollars that's a shoot that makes a huge impact , right , thousand dollars . You know ruben gallego running in arizona , that's not going to tilt the scale on his campaign , but here that's huge . That's like three more ads or another radio spot during drive time or whatever that is . So you're looking at like a 10% increase in my advertising budget Because , as great as my ideas might be , a lot of times it's people just having seen and heard my name , it's just knowing there's an option , so that then when they get partly so , they'll go to the , to the , the ballot box , right , like well , why go ?
Speaker 3There's only ever one person to vote for . Because in districts like mine a lot of times there aren't democrats even vote for , so a lot of the democratic voters don't even show up like well , what's the point like I'm not going to vote for . You know , for the old boy network guy on the republican side . They've been , they've been killing our , our country , our county for 20 years . So why show up ? But oh , there's an option . Okay , well , I'll show up . Well , so they've got to know there's that option . That means they've got to bump into my signs or my ads or my hear me on the radio yeah , or you know they become listeners of the jack hopkins podcast .
Speaker 3And then , like sure , sure we're all set .
Speaker 2then I want to point out to people because I think we so often get locked into this I know I used to get locked into this mindset of , well , I'm going to donate for him because he lives in my state or I'll donate for her because she's running in my community . Look , one thing I have known the importance of since I left the republican party is the importance of donating to democratic candidates everywhere , to the extent that's possible yes , I , I have donated , yeah to countless , uh , democratic candidates in other states .
Speaker 2Right , because the mindset has to be look , this is a , this is a national problem . Yes , uh , we have people run on local levels on up , but now the idea is , the way we approach solving the national problem is starting on that local level . So it goes . It's bi-directional the more we can do to address the national challenge , the more we'll help the local level , and vice versa .
Speaker 3Well , 100 you know , david pepper has done really cool work . I don't know if you've read his book . Um , david pepper is a is phenomenal . He's done a lot of work showing that it's the state , the state houses , where a lot of these battles are won and lost . And missouri is a great example because you look at that and you go well , this , you know . So this guy , this candidate , I've never heard of in a district I've never heard of .
Speaker 3But that super majority is part of the reason that that the missouri is able to create these toxic politicians and then launch them into the national bloodstream right .
Speaker 3So people like josh hawley and eric schmidt and sam graves I mean these guys who who were able to build momentum because they were in an environment where they weren't being challenged and where they were able to drive these extreme policies to become noticed on the national stage and get , get those resources .
Speaker 3I mean those guys didn't get sent to Washington DC because of Missouri money . They'd get like once they come to the spotlight , they'd get money poured in from around the country to raise them up to that next level . So , helping me win my seat , that sets an example that all the other candidates in these districts that feel impossible . That inspires them . But also , if I flip this seat , it means we get , we slow the production of these toxic comic book characters like josh hawley , who then , you know , get larger and become villains that impact all of us . I mean , not only was hawley the first member of senate to challenge the results of the election the 2020 election his wife drove the lawsuits that helped to cause the downfall of of roe v wade absolutely one , one toxic politician like that , like everything we can do to stop that .
Speaker 3And that means , you know , sort of putting putting obstacles in place at the beginning of the river , because once it gets to the mouth of the mississippi , you know it's massive . But if you go up to minneapolis and you make changes at the , at the headwaters , you can have a huge impact downstream , and that's sort of what's happening to us . So I'm a lover to put that up each seat .
Speaker 2Well , I one other thing I I want to bring up because I think , especially here's what I find . I find that , as I'm sure you have , on more local elections , rural community elections , there are a lot of uh , preconceived ideas about politics and how things work that aren't true , that don't apply . That sometimes keep people from getting involved in a way they otherwise would . What I'm talking about here specifically is and I want to just lay this out on the table is and I want to just lay this out on the table unless you are Donald Trump , who has tens of millions of dollars coming in and a staff of attorneys three blocks deep to allow you to be able to do something like this , the run-of-the-mill candidate running for election is not able to funnel any of their campaign donations to themselves for personal use . There are many , many barriers and checks and balances put in place to keep that from happening the kinds of checks and balances that , again , donald trump has the resources and the money to be able to keep at arm's length right .
Speaker 2So I think that's always important because , as I was growing up as a kid , uh , and I still hear it today in in some nooks oh they , yeah , money , money , money . They just want more money , as though it's going to them personally , and that's , that's not how it works right , no , exactly well .
Speaker 3And you know , for my case , for some of the other talented people that are running this cycle , that ran last cycle , I mean you know a lot of the democrats still have to have their day jobs . I mean campaigning is very time intensive , so you've got campaigning and you've got , you know , keeping your yard mode so the city doesn't come visit . And then you've got , you know , taking care of your family and you've got , you know , leaving time to sleep or eat or exercise . And then you're comparing that against these people who you know have resources and money to just campaign full-time . I mean it's ill and it's and it's a challenge .
Speaker 3It contributes to the burnout and it contributes to people thinking that you can only run if you're independently wealthy . And so if you know , if , if you guys help me show that that doesn't have to be the case , then that means all those other people out there who are more talented than I am , they'll step up and run for offices , right , like I would love to have , you know , smarter people than me stepping up , and there are plenty of them . But we've got to show them that stepping up for office allows them to make an impact and that they're not in it by themselves , and so those donations show them that like , oh , if I step up , the community will get behind me . Not just my district , but people from all over will help me pull that off .
Speaker 2That's how we get , you know , amazing people who are able to go in and make the , the landmark changes well , eric , on behalf of the listeners and viewers of the jack hopkins show podcast , which I experience has shown me there's some pretty cool people right . There are some avid followers that truly have an interest in preserving democracy and learning about how they can do that on many different levels . So I hope we can get you a nice boost in donations . And I want to , one more time , have you tell people where they can find you on Twitter , how to get in touch with you .
Speaker 3Yeah , so on Twitter I am Richardson and then four , the number four , and then Mo . M-o is capital , so Richardson4Mo . And if you're familiar with ActBlue , you can just look me up on ActBlue so it's Ericic richardson and you'll see my name there . So it's erik and uh , it'll say like richardson for missouri , I think is what it says on the account for when you plug it in to search for me . But , like I said , if you're on twitter there's a link right there so you can go to the act blue page . But you know you can also reach out to me .
Speaker 3I've got email set up , eric at richardsonformocom , so again with the number in it . So eric at richardsonformocom . You can shoot me an email if you want to find out ways to connect or if you need help . You know , maybe you're thinking about running , maybe you're a candidate , maybe you're looking at how to help the people in your state or your district . I mean , reach out to me and I'm glad to be a resource for whatever that means . If you're reaching out to help me , that's great . If you're reaching out because you need some help , I'm happy to do that too Perfect .
Speaker 2I will be sure and put that contact information in the show notes as well , so people can find that easily copy and paste or whatever works for them .
Inspiring Thoughts on Community Engagement
Speaker 2Again , on behalf of my listeners , my viewers , I want to thank you for what I feel like is the wealth of knowledge you have shared about workable uh concepts , strategies , beliefs , about how we can shift our perspective and look at things like should I run for office or not , or does it matter that I might not win ? You know you've really put a lot out there for people to think about and I thank you and maybe we'll get together and chat again sometime .
Speaker 3No , that's perfect , Jack . I love your work and I love the show , so it was an honor for me to get to be on and to hear your perspective on some of this stuff too , anything , I can do to help you be more successful . Let me know .
Speaker 2You got it , Eric . Thank you and I'll be in touch . Perfect Thanks , Jack .
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