Show notes
Mamdani's grocery stores get an answer from a man who stood in communist Romania's bread lines. New York's Mayor Mamdani has promised city-run grocery stores, and Ovidiu Frusina, born in Bucharest in 1967 under Nicolae Ceausescu, tells Jenny Beth Martin what state-run food actually looked like from the inside: four hours in line for a loaf, retirees up at 2 AM in a line of 500 for two pounds of meat, ration tickets for oil and sugar, and shelves that were full in 1965 and empty by 1985.He lived the free health care: no toilet paper in the hospital, no pain medicine unless the family paid the nurses, and a free appendix surgery that cost a month's pay. He lived the free education: the state decided how many doctors it wanted each year, and the boys who lost went to the army. At 21 the police pulled him out of work and beat him. His crime was writing to his high school sweetheart after she defected to America. His university stood him up in front of 120 classmates and called him a traitor, and a math teacher failed him so he would never become an engineer.He reached America in 1990 and built a life in Houston. The girl he wrote to is his wife and plays violin with the Houston Symphony.Guest: Ovidiu Frusina, born in Bucharest, Romania; computer science graduate, former consulting business owner and father of four, Houston, Texas.Learn more at teapartypatriots.org and jennybethshow.com.

