Flock cameras, sold as a way to catch criminals, look to Manuela Callini like something she has seen before. She was born in communist Romania in 1986 and was not quite four when Nicolae Ceausescu fell, old enough to remember standing in line before dawn with her father for one kind of milk, and being sent home when the shop ran out. The youngest voice in the Surviving Communism series tells Jenny Beth Martin what the regime did to her family: the collectivization that took her mother's family land, livestock, equipment, and even clothes, leaving nine children one pair of rubber boots to share for the walk to school; the state that chose her father's job, his city, and his apartment; hands inspected on white handkerchiefs at daycare; and a Christmas Day trial of under an hour that ended the dictator himself. Then the conversation turns to America, where Callini has lived since 2013 and now works in grassroots activism in Arizona. Flock and Axon cameras sold as safety, free things that make you the property of the state, a younger generation that never shows up to a legislative district meeting: she says it is the pattern she grew up in, and it always arrives dressed as safety, fairness, equality, and compassion. Where to look first: law enforcement and the courts. Guest: Manuela Callini, born in communist Romania, in the United States since 2013, now in grassroots activism with EZAZ in Arizona. Learn more at teapartypatriots.org and jennybethshow.com.
Guest:
Manuela Callini was born in communist Romania in 1986 and was almost four when the Ceausescu regime fell in December 1989. Her mother came from a landowning family whose estate was collectivized; her father studied economics in Bucharest and was assigned his job and his apartment by the state. Callini studied international relations, worked with the Leadership Institute in Romania and Europe, and came to the United States in 2013 to work for the Institute in Washington, D.C. She became a citizen the legal way, lives in Arizona, and is involved in grassroots activism with EZAZ, where she learned the state's Request to Speak system and how bills are written.
Key topics:
• Ration cards, lines before dawn, and a shop that closes when you reach the front
• Collectivization: her mother's family lost its land, livestock, equipment, and clothes; nine children shared one pair of rubber boots
• The state chose her father's job, his city, and his home; businesses were nationalized overnight with no compensation
• Children under the personality cult: identical uniforms, inspected hands, Ceausescu's portrait in every classroom
• Ceausescu's end: fruit tied to trees for his visits, a Christmas Day trial of under an hour, and the lesson that nobody is safe under communism
• Informers, a summer sweater, and a family that could trust no one
• Flock and Axon cameras: mass surveillance sold as safety, and why no technology should require trusting the officer who holds it
• The "new man," faith as a crime, and Pastor Richard Wurmbrand
• The 250-year-old house the state handed her family, and the owners who came back after 1989
• Illegal immigration, free health care, and the patterns she sees in America
• Why there are no young people at legislative district meetings, and what changed her mind in one day at EZAZ
• The one thing to guard first: law enforcement and the courts
• Her message: do not be deceived, start asking questions, show up
Timestamps:
00:00 — Cold open: her mother was one of nine children who shared a single pair of rubber boots
00:42 — Who Manuela Callini is: born in communist Romania, not quite four when the regime fell
01:43 — The interview begins: what growing up was like
01:59 — Born in 1986: ration cards, lines before dawn, and a shop that closes when you reach the front
03:45 — School under the personality cult: identical uniforms and state-given names
04:29 — Hands inspected on white handkerchiefs, like merchandise
05:23 — Ceausescu's portrait in every daycare; her wish for America
05:56 — Almost four when it ended: a dictator surrounded by his own relatives
06:55 — Streets painted overnight and fruit tied to the trees for his visits
07:36 — Christmas Day 1989: captured, tried in under an hour
08:48 — Nobody is safe under communism, not even the man at the top
09:15 — What her parents lived through: a mother from a family documented to the 1200s
10:03 — Collectivization: the state took the livestock, the equipment, even the clothes
11:27 — Nine children, one pair of rubber boots, three miles to school in the snow
12:57 — Her father: economics in Bucharest, then the job and the apartment the state chose
14:09 — The government controls your education, your job, and where and with whom you live
14:49 — Businesses, real estate, even children: everything belongs to the state
16:11 — Romania was not the Soviet Union; as Moscow loosened, Bucharest tightened
17:17 — A summer sweater, and why her mother said no
17:45 — Cold, electricity a few hours a day, two hours of television
18:20 — Oranges were a luxury
18:46 — December 1989 on a black-and-white TV: the euphoria on her parents' faces
19:55 — Communism left a mark: taught not to have a voice
20:25 — Informers, rewarded by the regime
21:08 — When no one can be trusted; the standard-issue haircuts
22:05 — Did you ever go hungry?
22:36 — Children going to bed hungry; broken shoes in first grade
23:17 — Ceausescu bragged about saving the economy
23:48 — A palace in Bucharest while the people had no heat
24:49 — The system eats its own; the Soviet bloc comes down; Tiananmen Square
25:52 — It always comes dressed up as good intentions: Flock and Axon cameras
26:36 — What the secret police would have done with this technology
27:27 — No technology should require trusting the officer who holds it
27:49 — Trafficking has not changed; data centers
28:34 — To America in 2013 through the Leadership Institute
29:32 — Margaret Thatcher's first impression of America
31:35 — Her father's visits: clean streets, and why nobody walks
32:33 — Private property is the first thing they take; land as sacred
34:33 — Her grandparents saw it happen; a grandfather who became a pastor
36:21 — The "new man": stripping people of their identity
38:21 — Pastor Richard Wurmbrand, and the lie told to his wife
39:18 — Abortion banned, contraception unavailable, foster homes full
40:53 — Why: external debt and a bigger workforce
42:15 — The socialist pitch sounds wonderful: free housing, free health care
42:56 — You don't own anything, but you are owned by the state
43:47 — The 250-year-old house taken from its owners
44:57 — After 1989: the rightful owners come back
45:35 — Big government arrives gradually, dressed up as your own good
46:01 — Patterns in America: free things that are not free
46:16 — Illegal immigration: she came the legal way
47:51 — Europe's immigration lesson
49:35 — EBT cards, free health care, and what it does to the people who pay
50:30 — The patterns are alarming; the younger generation was never taught
51:15 — Twenties and thirties, oblivious to the socialist agenda
51:44 — No young people at legislative district meetings or Request to Speak
52:38 — Distraction as strategy; walking into the EZAZ office in March
54:10 — The country thrives only if citizens get involved
55:18 — The one thing to guard: how communism entered Romania in 1945
55:58 — Watch law enforcement and the courts first
56:28 — Cameras, gender ideology, and an eroded identity
57:35 — Her message: do not be deceived
58:49 — Wake up: nobody dreams the North Korean dream
59:36 — The close: share the series, vote for liberty, iwillsaveamerica.com
Links mentioned:
iwillsaveamerica.com
jennybethshow.com
teapartypatriots.org