VOTING: Lessons From a Mail-in Ballot

Joe Luther  
Welcome to another episode of Friends in wonder, a place where we invite you to explore meaningful topics without judgment or limits, brought to you by two lifelong friends, sharing their insights, while wondering, how can this help. I'm Joe Luthor. And I'm Vince Kern, and we've got great topics lined up for you each week. So be sure to subscribe, like and even share with your friends. Now, let's wander and wander together.

He Vince! I'm really excited to talk about elections today. You know, it's interesting, you and I talked about wanting to do an episode on elections, and, you know, probably a month or so ago. And then all sudden you got your ballot, because you're doing an absentee are a mail in ballot this year. And and that prompted us to get moving on this quickly. And I think the thing that jumped out most for you was were the ballot initiatives, right?

Vince Kern  
Yeah, you know, it's interesting, because we were shaping up the topic. And I was looking at my ballot at the same time, and I started looking at these ballot initiatives that are on there. And there's been a lot of chatter in Michigan anyway about whether ballot initiatives are clear or not. And we have one listener who even suggested that as a topic, because he was so confused by some of the ballot initiatives, and he sent us a little note, but in my shout

Joe Luther  
Shout out to him, because we're doing it. 

Vince Kern  
We're doing it. But boy, you know, as we talked about it, this idea of trying to find out what the ballot initiatives actually say, and what's behind them, and who's behind them.

Joe Luther  
And it's a bit of an eye opener for us. It wasn't it?

Vince Kern  
 It really was, and especially from a perspective of being an older person who has been voting for 50 years, it made me realize how much things have changed, especially with ballot initiatives.

Joe Luther  
Yeah, I mean, it was it was originally like a grassroots kind of initiative, based on, you know, getting the hippies out on the street and trying to get signatures on whatever the cause was. But now, it's become big business, it seems.

Vince Kern  
Yeah. You know, I always knew that there was a lot of money involved in this process, right. But until you start actually looking at it, I was just amazed. And this, this idea, or this, the reality is that there's a lot of money we'll talk about, I got some we did some research. And we'll share some numbers in a little bit. But the fact that there are actually is a whole industry devoted to writing misleading ballot measures, paying for signatures to get out there. These are lobbyists and PR firms.

Joe Luther  
But to be fair to be, to be fair, though, I do want I think it's good to point out that we're not what we found is there's there's there's something to look at here. But ballot initiatives in general are a good thing. And they started off with the best of intentions and probably still have the best of intentions. I personally think that if a state is going to make marijuana legal, it's probably best left to the vote of the people rather than the vote of a legislature. That's the kind of thing that makes sense. Same maybe with whether gambling should be legal in the state, it should be put to a vote of the people. But some of these initiatives are a little quirky at best. For instance, I think a few years ago, there was a ballot initiative in Michigan, having to do with regulating the hunting or not hunting of wolves in in the Upper Peninsula. And I you know, what on earth is, you know, the urbanites or suburbanites of Metropolitan Detroit, going to be doing making decisions on on the, you know, the decisions of the herds of wolves in the Upper Peninsula. It was basically somebody some activist trying to take that right away from the Department of Natural Resources to regulate and to somehow you serve them Now that to me, that doesn't make sense. Now, I know it got it got voted down and good. The people understood. But you know, some of these things, you've got money behind, promoting it and then you need money behind stopping it and That's That's what I think you found too. And and I think that's a great starting point for what we want to talk about today.

Vince Kern  
Yeah. And just to sort of put a cap on some of the lack of clarity in the in the initiatives themselves. I looked at a couple of different ones. In fact, I looked at the one in the in the perceptual proposal in Michigan, it's called promote the vote. And what's on the ballot? It's number two, proposal two, I think, yeah, proposal two, and, and what's on the ballot are bullet points. And so I looked at my my ballot by absentee ballot.

Joe Luther  
Wait, wait. So just so we're clear on this. They're bullet points. So in other words, there's a proposal that has a lot of detail. But the voter only gets to see bullet points have the details on the ballot? 

Vince Kern  
Sir, that is correct, sir.

Joe Luther  
That seems that seems almost uncanny. So you're voting for something that's right up there with when they said we're gonna pass the Affordable Care Act? And then we'll find out what's inside of it?

Vince Kern  
Well, in a sense, yeah. And so I did some research on why that is, and there, found some articles that said that by putting the full text of the of the initiative on the ballot, it created long lines in on voting day. And so they were concerned that people would spend too much time in the booth. So they decided to, to summarize these into bullet points. Wow. Okay, so that's, and that's nationwide. That's not just in Michigan. That's, that's all over. So I'm looking at, you know, this this Michigan proposal of bullet points. And the thing that I found hard was finding the actual text of the promotion, I had to go to three or four different layers of, of a website to get to the actual proposal.

Joe Luther  
Isn't that something? Yeah, isn't that something. So even if you wanted to find it, it's not that easy to find, even when you go to your, your ballot, there's not a link, you know, your electronic ballot, there's a link saying, click here to see the original text?

Vince Kern  
Well, and so, you know, referencing a couple of other, you know, examples of ballot initiatives just to cap on that, that there's, there was one in California in 1978, when housing, housing values were skyrocketing at the time. So people were concerned about being able to pay the taxes. So there was this ballot proposal that basically, you know, went and said, Oh, you know, this is this is going to protect your your taxes, and it was worded so poorly. And it passed. And it turned out that it was mostly for corporations, and very few homeowners got any tax breaks out of it at all. And people thought

Joe Luther  
they were voting for property tax relief. For residential. It were in fact doing it for

Vince Kern  
Yeah. And in, there's a lot of examples of that out there that you can find. There was a piece in The New York Times by two legal experts who were they said it was a 2016 initiative about some solar energy that had a lot of voters upset. It was 75 words. And that's not a lot that took them over an hour to work out what the amendment actually said. So I guess what I'm saying is that, as I get older, and I want to spend more time and I have more time, and it's it's kind of like I think you called it more like a home home test, that you

Joe Luther  
take home open book test. Yeah. So you're voting when you mean, when you vote by mail, you can sit there and you can open your computer and you can look things up, instead of feeling stead of feeling the pressure in the booth with somebody standing in line behind you.

Vince Kern  
Exactly, you know, in my 30s and 40s, I died. And that's one of the advantages

Joe Luther  
of voting by mail, of course. Absolutely. Right. Of course, there's a lot of disadvantages to voting by me. No. And the main one that I would say, and I must say, when we're talking about voting by mail is, is that if you're going to vote by mail, my humble opinion is we better be very, very careful, and how we keep track of those votes, who's voting and how it's being delivered to, you know, the polling place and being counted because when things start going out by mail, and coming back by mail, there's a lot of what do they call it in police, you know, chain of custody, late chain of custody. Yeah, we want to make sure that that ballots getting where it's supposed to go without any, you know, anything going on in between,

Vince Kern  
and there's a lot of unintended consequences, you know, when people look at it It's sort of one of those things where it sounds great. It's convenient. Okay. It makes perfect sense. Mail in ballots. Whoo. Yeah. Well, guess what, you need a lot more staff to process them. You're as you said the chain of command issues Jana custody, heck, yes, chain of custody becomes much more difficult to manage. So while everybody you know, likes to vote for convenience, and all these things, some of these initiatives don't really take into effect what it's going to take for the state,

Joe Luther  
right. I'm not sure what the percentage of voters by mail versus voters by precinct by by poll. But I still think a majority is doing it on polling day. And they have to sit there and figure out these proposals based on bullet points and may not have done any previous research. So really, what it comes down to is the bullet point writer, making it clear enough, and then the voter making a leap of faith that the bullet point writer didn't leave anything out. Because he's about to vote for something that's a heck of a lot more specific than what's on the ballot.

Vince Kern  
Yeah, exactly. Here. And and, you know, always the editor and and questioner, as a former journalist, here's a few questions that I had, as soon as I started looking at this proposal, as it was written in bullet points, it, and this is a constitutional amendment. And and so what it's what it's actually doing, is it's constitutional lysing some of these points and, you know, one of the points about that is that it's a lot tougher to change a constitutional amendment down down the road. So if there's a new technology, or if there's something that needs to be amended, it's gonna be tough. And I don't know how many people you know, recognize that balance,

Joe Luther  
where you're trying to clarify what you're saying. You're saying that once a proposal is passed, then if something new like, for instance, in this particular case, proposal tubes, if some part of that gets passed having to do with, like voter ID. In again, there's a vague bullet point about voter ID in this proposal. But if something some new technology happens in the future about voter, you know that that is specific to voter ID, we can't really adapt to it, because there's a constitutional provision, saying what we should be doing now. So the legislature's hands are tied to really adapt is what you're saying, We have to go back to the people at the next election two years from now to get them to clarify it or revote on it or something, it

Vince Kern  
has to get the signatures, it has to get all of that. And so that's one

Joe Luther  
of the downsides. But again, that gets down to all the details. They say, the devils in the details. And so when you start ledges legislating by Prop, by proposal, I guess things get a little bit more complicated. Now, we're not saying that that means it should always be No. But people should be aware when they're voting for these proposals. I don't know we weren't aware. And I think the point of this discussion is to shine a light on this idea that you're voting for a summary of something that's far more complicated. So either you need to do some research before you go into the poll, or check out some of the information that we have on this podcast, because I think we've got some we're gonna have some show notes on how you found the actual context of this.

Vince Kern  
Yeah, yeah. And I think it's worth saying that there's a lot of people in organizations that are spending a lot of time and energy and then some cases money to put information out there.

Joe Luther  
Right advertising, which is barraged with it. Well, advertising,

Vince Kern  
but also people who really want to give the voters the lowdown on exactly what the proposition

Joe Luther  
Oh, yeah. The voter resources like the League of Women Voters in Yeah. All these other. Yeah, and probably just the, the companies that are for or against whatever proposition is being proposed. Yeah.

Vince Kern  
Yeah. And well,

Joe Luther  
I know we I know you've got a list right later on. That's gonna be the other part of this is to talk about some of these resources.

Vince Kern  
So when I was looking at this voting proposal, let me just look at the bullet points. I had a lot of questions and let me just walk you through what happened with me. So the first bullet point is that this proposal would recognize the fundamental right to vote without harassing conduct.

Joe Luther  
So without harassing California, isn't that already like guaranteed so that we Yeah, that's the first bullet point. So that's, that's another that's another one of those things, who's going to vote against being harassed sorry. Yeah, so everybody knows, if all you do is read the first bullet point, you can say hi, yeah, I want to vote for that. I don't want harassment at the, at the voting,

Vince Kern  
and everything else comes along with it. So

Joe Luther  
we're not allowed to harass people already. Right?

Vince Kern  
Yeah. Right. So that was a question I had. So I wanted to read that was the first thing that said, I really want to read this proposal. And there's other ones in here that make a lot of sense require military or overseas ballots to be counted if postmarked by election day. Some of those are our common sense. Some of these are already happening, but their constitutional lysing it now. Right, right. Right. You know, so another one that caught my eye, it says allowed donations to fund elections, which must be disclosed. Okay. Great. So these organizations, whether it's, you know, George Soros, or Zuckerberg or, or Trump, Pete PACs, or whatever, you know, can can now give money to counties for helping pay for the elections? What's the quid? What's the quid pro quo? I mean, you're donating money? Usually, you sort of expect something in return. So I mean, yeah. And

Joe Luther  
these are, of course, these are just examples of this Michigan proposal. And these proposals are going on all across the country, the similar proposals, I think there's a number of voter propositions going on. Didn't your research do? Like there's I think there's a handful of a lot of abortion rights proposals that are going on right now. various states and in some of these voter rights proposals, and yeah,

Vince Kern  
there's a lot of there's one is marijuana, abortion, and voter propositions are in the top? Yeah, the top five categories. And I did do some research. And this is again, this is what staggered me in just kept reinforcing the need to understand what these proposals really say. If you if you look at the amount of money that's being spent, so the top five states in terms of contributions to these ballot proposals are California, Massachusetts, Colorado, Michigan, and Kansas. And just in California alone, there's $618 million being spent across seven ballot initiatives. So far, I would I would, so far. Yeah, this is just through October 8.

Joe Luther  
Yeah. Right. Right. Clarify. And in the big push is coming.

Vince Kern  
Yeah. And the big push is coming. Right. So Michigan, actually ranks fourth out of those five states with only three ballot initiatives, and $25 million dollars being spent.

Joe Luther  
So there's tons of money behind these. And like we said earlier, you can have obviously, if, for instance, it's going to be a marijuana proposal, the marijuana industry is going to have an association is going to put a lot of money behind passing that. But then if there's people against that, now they've got to go out and and form a coalition of some sort and raise money somehow to battle against that. It's almost like if if you have enough money behind you for a proposal, it's, you're starting with a big lead in in money being spent for your proposition? Yeah.

Vince Kern  
It's interesting you say that, because if you look at some of the specific measures, I won't get into all of them. But but, you know, this is the top 10 ballot measures having the most contributions and on that list, obviously, California, this proposition it says legalized sports betting and revenue for Homeless Prevention Fund initiative. Now, I can only assume that some of the Reverend Wait,

Joe Luther  
that's that's one proposal for for two issues.

Vince Kern  
One proposal for two issues, right. And so it's like, okay, well, how does that connect? Now, I gotta go read the ballot initiative itself to fully understand that, but in any event, in that case, there was $170 million for the support. And 214 million raised in opposition, but that ballot initiative alone had $384 million worth of money toss behind it. And and it's and so interestingly, there's another California Baby,

Joe Luther  
the TV networks are behind this because they get all the advertising.

Vince Kern  
Yeah, but and then there's another one in California. legalized sports betting on American Indian lands. And that one has much more support than opposition. So, you know, these things are all over the place. Now, interestingly enough, the number eight ballot proposal, the top in the top 10 Is the Michigan voting proposal and it's got $14 million. Now, almost 10 million for support and, and five for opposition, which kind of speaks to what you're talking about earlier. These now this ballot proposition is this particular one is being funded by a lot of very high power

Joe Luther  
pack. Yeah, $10 million is a lot of money. And, you know, where's it coming from? And where's it coming from? And what else could we be doing with it? And then when you start bullet pointing, in vagaries, like no harassing at the pole, you know, it's just, I don't know, it makes me leery, it makes me very leery, and you can find it takes a man of your depth in experience on the internet, a little bit of time to find the actual language for it. It doesn't seem like that's a good process, I don't think. And so I guess what we're saying is, if you're going to the poll, this is friends in wonder shouting out, there's going to be some propositions on your ballot. And first of all, beware what you're reading is not the full, incomplete proposition. So if you want to know what it is, before you bet a vote on it, you have to do some research, either before you go into the poll, or when you have your take home test, like Vince, has you got it? You got to do some research.

Vince Kern  
Yeah, yeah, you do. And you know, the thing. Interesting thing about that is, you know, different stages of life, you're impacted by the amount of time and energy that it takes to do that research, right? Like, you know, I remember voting in my 30s and 40s. And I would get into, and I, you know, like you said, I knew who I was going to vote for, for my candidates. And then I would get in, and maybe I'd read or heard about some of these proposals. There wasn't as much social media, there wasn't the internet, there wasn't as much television ads. And I would look at one of these proposals in the booth and go, Hey, I don't know exactly what it means. But I think I should vote yes on it, and then vote yes on it and come home. And, you know, three weeks later, I find out exactly what it means. Because I didn't research it and say, Oh, God, I got stressed because I should have voted no. Right.

Joe Luther  
It's so I guess, I guess, yeah, I guess the point is, we wanted to, because it seems to be such a growing industry. And based on what our research and you know, look at there, we've only done a week's worth of research on this. And I'm sure there's a lot of other people who would like to chime in about this, maybe with a different point of view. But our research indicates that you're not seeing everything that is on the ballot. So if you want more information, you're going to have to do some homework. And, you know, in that is a good segue into the second part of this. And that's the internet tools that exist now to help assist us with the voting process. And I mean, I know I personally like to, to download, to go out and find a sample ballot, that I'm going to be that it pertains to my vote, right, because, you know, while everybody in the state of Michigan is going to vote for governor, people who live in different districts are going to vote for different Congress, people are different state senators and local representatives, certainly school board members and county executives and drink commissioners, and all that kind of thing. So I like to get my ballot in advance and see who's on it so that I'm not, you know, cavalierly walking in just to vote for the governor. And then after thawing all of these other you know, decisions, candidates and propositions, judges, all that kind of stuff. So it gives gives me a chance to do a little bit of my research and I know that you're allowed to have a written ballot in your hand with your notes on it. So you can go into the booth with your notes and in you know, basically, train transform your information under the ballot. And there's a lot of great resources for that. And in fact, I know that in Michigan, and I think in all states, you just go to your Secretary of State Online website and, and type in either in the search bar there or just in in a search bar in any search engine, you know, find my ballot, and there's a lot of resources out there that do that. I think you and I talked a little bit about the League of women's voters and I think it's their their tool is vote for one one.org. And I was I was actually a little, a little disappointed when I did some, some research on the League of Women Voters I had, I had always, when I was like, huge, like you said, you found in your process of researching this, that things have changed since the days when we were younger, but the League of women's voters was an organization that really was founded right after the suffrage of women in the early 1900s, to help promote the integrity and education of voters. And and they've done a great job of that. But in our research, during this process, I found that they've become a little bit political over the years too. So I would say, you know, but there's still a good, there's still a good tool to find your ballot, or you can do it through your Secretary of State, which is pretty nonpartisan, even though your Secretary of State may be a Democrat or Republican, the information you get on a ballot from them is, is just plain data, it is what is on your ballot. And then you can take that and do your own research.

Vince Kern  
Right. And that's, that's where I found that it was a lot more difficult than I thought it would be to get to the actual information, I had to go like three or four layers in two ballot pedia, to get the actual text of the proposal for that voting initiative. And the other thing that was interesting when I was looking at it is, obviously everybody likes to be up top and Google search. So some of these ballot education sites are, you know, taking out Google ads, so they're the top ones, and then they're presenting a very biased opinion of that ballot. So yeah, to get very like to get to the brass tacks,

Joe Luther  
you got to deal with your eyes wide open, you got to deal with you. Because you're like, so you are. So you mentioned Ballotpedia, that's b a ll. O T pedia like when pedia.org That that's actually I think, funded or sponsored by Lucy burns Institute, which some say is a little more conservative. And then there's vote for one one.org, like we said, which is sponsored by the League of women's voters, which is apparently getting a little bit more liberal leaning, they I know that the President issued a press release after the 262 1016 election saying that the when Donald Trump won, it was rigged. So I mean, they don't shy away from being political, the League of Women Voters, and I'm sure the Lucy burns Institute, really the the reality is anybody who's doing much of anything has an agenda. It's very hard, it's very hard to find agenda free information. And that's what our research found is that it's, it's not easy to navigate going online and finding information. But the starting point, I, my suggestion is the starting point is download your ballot, download your ballot ahead of time, if you're going into the the poll, and just looking for the first time, you're gonna be you're gonna find some things in there that, you know, unless you're just one of those people that we you know, when you get down to the, to the voting for commissioners, or judges or whatever, you just want to vote for the name that that you saw most of them lawn signs or whatever, I guess that's your prerogative. But if you want to, if you want it in

Vince Kern  
my hand, because that's how I used to do it. Commissioner or was

Joe Luther  
right, or what they do. Right, and or why or if you should care. I mean, drink Commissioner, I just think that there's probably some guy, you know, issuing a lot of contracts for, for, you know, laying drains, it's probably bigger than that.

Vince Kern  
But another relevant, but this is exactly what we're talking about. So I, you know, I did a little bit more research into what drain commissioners actually do, and learned that, you know, they are also responsible for things like lake levels and agricultural waste and solid waste and other things. And so, you know, in some counties that are that are on the water or have a lot of water, there's a lot of responsibility and a lot of opportunity for important decisions to be made.

Joe Luther  
Right, right. Well, at any rate, and so, you know, look at people are going to spend as much time as they want to, on voting and I get it and we're not here to tell you that you should or shouldn't, and quite frankly, if you want to vote for somebody because they're handsome, or if you want to vote you know my mother in law, he's my ex mother in law always used to, you know, say that she would vote for the most handsome candidate. And that's fine, if that's your right to do, if that's what you want to do. But if you want to do it in a meaningful, informed way, my suggestion is you download a ballot and see what's on your ballot ahead of time. And quite frankly, if you want to know, you know, what those people stand for, you're going to have to go and go to their own. That's the nice thing about the internet is every one of these candidates should have a website where you can read what they stand for. And if you're one of those, you know, one issue or a primary issue kind of voters for candidates, you can find out all about that candidate, you know, on that issue by going to their website.

Vince Kern  
And we're going to put a bunch of several different tools in the in the notes. Yeah, because you find a lot of them. I mean, you found Well, I mean, ones that are very specific to Yeah, and

Joe Luther  
in what we're putting them there only as an example, not because we feel one way or another, but I don't think there's anything wrong at all, with being strong about one issue and wanting to vote for candidates. According to that issue. Like if you feel strongly about pro choice. There's, there's right to life organizations that have vetted candidates. And we'll give endorsements on people who are strong about right light. And the same is true for the exact opposite pro choice has, you know, a number of resources where they endorse candidates, and we're going to put those in our show notes. So for instance, if you are interested in either one of those sides, you can go online, or you can click our links, and you can see who they endorse. Similarly, for gun control or for gun rights. You know, obviously, the NRA has a tool for the kinds of candidates that stand behind gun rights. But if you're one of those people that want gun control, there is I think it's the Giffords. That, you know, is I think the congressperson who was shot there, there are, there are all sorts of organizations out there, there are medical freedom organizations, you know, so you know, whatever your issue is, you can go online and find out about it, you can either go to an organization that endorses candidates on that issue, or you can just, like I said, download your ballot, find the candidates go to their website, and see if they're passionate about your single issue. And,

Vince Kern  
yeah, and this might be, you know, I think one of the reasons we wanted to do this was because it was a real refresher, at least for me, in terms of how much is involved in actual in actually performing this voting. Honor that we have been blessed with, in for me the most the best way. And, and it's like, it's one of those things where, you know, you got to take a driving test every, every so often. And you're reminded of how important some of the safety things are. This is reminding me of how important it is to actually for me, to have knowledge when I go to vote, and it may sound obvious to people, but I think it's one of the things that over time, you get into a habit of the way you vote and the way you the way you select candidates, yeah, no,

Joe Luther  
look at it. I know every time I walk out of the voters, booth, and you know, out of the whatever the school or wherever that I vote, I have a sense of pride, you know, it is a civic duty. It's the franchise, as they say, and it's what makes this country great. And, you know, again, you can exercise it in any way you want to. They say that this upcoming election is going to be the most important election of our lifetime. They always say that every time we have an upcoming election, but really the truth of the matter is, it's an important thing. And we just wanted to maybe shine a light on a couple of interesting nuances out there, which, you know, obviously these ballot proposals are becoming something of a machine of their own from the grassroots efforts that began it and and now there's a number of resources on the internet and and I think you have to tiptoe very carefully.

Vince Kern  
So, Joe, just to summarize, I guess, because we threw a lot of information out there. We didn't mean to throw a firehose of data and information to you the listener, but we appreciate you hanging with us because for me, this exercise illustrates Just how much things have changed in the voting process over the last 50 years.

Joe Luther  
Okay, Boomer. Right.

Vince Kern  
Right. You know, and I'm not trying to tell you know how to vote, but, you know, it's going in a certain one I was a kid things were different. Yeah. Right. You know, when I was 18, I walked into the lever voted for the candidates and didn't even know what the heck the propositions were

Joe Luther  
all. We were creating hanging chads.

Vince Kern  
I was, but today, you know, we have I guess we just wanted to say there's a lot of information out there. But be careful what you look at. Yeah. I

Joe Luther  
mean, well, we didn't want to get involved in talking about candidates, because you know, that's, that's well covered. We really thought that it would be more interesting to get a little more nuanced and draw a little bit of a spotlight on this up and coming phenomenon of propositions, ballot initiatives, and especially, also the online tools that are available to help you navigate this process. And I thought it was good discussion, actually, yeah. Even Even if through the lens boomers.

Vince Kern  
And it will continue to change. So good luck with that. Everybody have a great election cycle.

Joe Luther  
Well done. Vincent. So are you done with your ballot now or

Vince Kern  
to mail it? Although I'm a little, you know, now I'm now I'm like, Oh, what am I should I drive it to the clerk

Joe Luther  
gets a vote. You drive it there. But you know, your vote is your vote you can do with it as you please.

Vince Kern  
Yeah. Well, thanks for everybody for listening. Joe, it's been great to be with you and look forward to another episode next week,

Joe Luther  
as always, events.

Vince Kern  
Well, so ends another episode of Friends in wonder. We want to thank you for listening. If you'd like to listen to more episodes provide feedback questions or topics you'd like us to wonder about in future episodes. Be sure to check us out at friends in wonder.com. We'd be grateful if you subscribe, like or share this podcast. Until next time, I'm Joe and I'm Vince and we're friends in wonder.