On this week's episode of Sunday Uncensored, we have a call from a listener named Brett. Brett is concerned about the lack of support for a constitutional amendment that would raise the voting age to 18 in order to encourage young people to vote.
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00:02:10.000I worry that there's no incentive for young voters to see the civic duty amendment you propose as a positive for this country, and that leads me to think on solutions.
00:02:20.000Vivek, would it be feasible to entertain a future where underage workers, that is under 18, could be income tax exempt at least on the federal level?
00:02:29.000That way when they become legal adults and start to see the affect on their paychecks with taxes added, they may feel compelled to take action through service or civic testing.
00:02:39.000What do you think of an idea such as this, or do you have other proposals that might encourage young people voting or pre-voting age to support delaying their own suffrage?
00:02:49.000Yeah, so I love the spirit of creativity in that question.
00:02:55.000I hadn't thought of that specific idea, but I love the spirit of it because you experience something and then you see what the government taketh, you know, at a certain point, and then you wake up to that reality in a way you otherwise wouldn't have.
00:03:07.000So I love the spirit and character of it.
00:03:10.000I think part of my job as a leader is to recognize that we human beings are subject to something that animals are not, which is persuasion.
00:03:20.000And I think that young people, it's like, you know, it's like my son, you know, he'll get cranky and say he wants his pacifier when he really just wants real food, right?
00:03:30.000My one son's three, another one's one year old.
00:03:34.000And so it's not just about the creation of incentives alone.
00:03:38.000I think part of this is you give people what they need.
00:03:43.000You know, there's an old saying, it goes, if you care about somebody, you tell them the truth.
00:03:47.000If you care about yourself, you tell them what they want to hear.
00:03:52.000And I think the same thing could be true in words as in giving them what they need too.
00:03:56.000And so what I've seen so far that does leave me pretty hopeful is that initially a lot of the young people I've encountered at college campuses Take a big step back.
00:04:09.000When in fact, very few young people already vote as it is.
00:04:13.000So in many ways, even without even passing this constitutional amendment that I have in mind, just the act of talking about it is going to say, wait, wait, wait.
00:04:19.000You're about to take something away from me that I thought I had.
00:06:13.000If you were to lose the RNC nomination for president, would you be open to either a VP or cabinet position in the Trump or DeSantis if they were to take the nomination?
00:06:22.000Or would you prefer to pursue a third-party run and continue your goal to run for president?
00:06:28.000I think that, look, I'm very focused on winning this election.
00:06:32.000And to be honest with you, when I started in February or in March, I couldn't have told you what my chances were.
00:06:40.000I'm now a third in most of the national polls, and we still haven't had the first debate.
00:06:44.000And so I'm laser focused on not only winning this election, But on the path to January, 2033, when I leave office, what do I actually want to say we did over two terms in this country?
00:06:55.000So that's the purpose that's guiding me.
00:06:58.000I was, we, Seamus, we briefly talked about this at the end of the other session is, I think that my skillset is best used in a leadership role, not a number two reporting in role.
00:07:10.000It's not because there's something lesser or bad about that.
00:07:13.000It's just how we're each wired, right?
00:07:14.000And so, For most of my career, nearly all of it, I've never reported it to somebody.
00:07:20.000I've been an author, which is a different kind of thought leadership role.
00:07:24.000And so I believe I would be best making my contributions if I weren't the U.S.
00:07:28.000President through the private sector, where I've been doing it already, both through my books as well as through the businesses that I've built and can continue to build.
00:07:39.000But I truly do believe, and I believe it now in a way that I couldn't have told you with conviction four months ago, I think I'm going to be your next president.
00:07:47.000And I think that, more importantly, I'm the best positioned person in either party to reach the next generation and revive national pride in this country that we've missed for a long time.
00:09:28.000And I just would like to say a year ago, I didn't hear about you.
00:09:30.000And now I see you everywhere and I see your message and it's good.
00:09:35.000So, I think you knocked it out of the park at the Blaze Summit, so just keep doing what you're doing.
00:09:40.000And I would hope that if you don't actually receive the RNC nomination, if somebody offered you a position within their government, that you would take it, because I think we need more people like you in our government who are aware of the issues.
00:10:17.000Hey y'all, thanks for taking questions.
00:10:21.000What would you say to potential voters who feel hopeless right now, like their vote doesn't matter or nothing's going to change with this corrupt bureaucracy that you touched on?
00:10:31.000Even people like Ronald McDonald or McDaniel in the GOP has been ignoring people like Scott Pressler who have desired to help the GOP game plan.
00:10:41.000We see a lot of this corruption and it's easy for those of us to feel discouraged and like our vote doesn't matter.
00:12:06.000And I know that's just rhetoric and verbiage, but it's also an honest statement of how I feel about the country.
00:12:11.000And if that helps other young people around the country that have hard facts that would tell them they have no reason to hope, say that, hey, if you take a step back, it would make sense that 250 years in to an experiment that's going to last a lot longer than that.
00:12:24.000We have to go through our adolescence.
00:15:05.000So our RNC chairwoman, Ronna McDaniel, said it would be a mistake for Trump to skip the debates, if you guys follow this at all.
00:15:13.000Trump made a statement on Truth Social back in April saying, why would I do the debates?
00:15:18.000Why would I be a part of that libelous standard?
00:15:21.000And what do I have for benefit when all of the moderators that they would pull are anti-MAGA?
00:15:27.000I'm summarizing here, this isn't a perfect quote.
00:15:30.000And I think it's an interesting question.
00:15:31.000You know, Seamus and I, when we were talking about the story earlier today, we're saying, do the presidential debates actually serve a purpose?
00:15:41.000And, you know, just jumping in the conversation, I'll say back in the day when there were limited access to national stage, when we didn't have anything like social media and we had very few TV channels, I could understand where debates on radio, debates on television were.
00:15:58.000uh an important chance for the nation to see the candidates but today i do not think that is the case i think ultimately We can all agree, nothing very productive comes out of the debates, although I will say we've gotten some beautiful Trump moments in the debates in the past.
00:16:14.000I just don't know how you guys feel about it.
00:16:15.000What was the most entertaining thing about the Trump debates, and part of why they were so productive, is because they were so unlike all of the other ones that we had seen.
00:16:23.000And people in the media would complain about his performance because they'd say, he's making a mockery out of the discourse.
00:16:29.000No, you've made a mockery out of the discourse.
00:16:32.000You're going to give us press conferences where everyone's stating their party lines and tell us it's a debate.
00:16:39.000So I think you're correct, Hannah Clare.
00:16:41.000There was a point in time where it made sense to have these political leaders get together and then state their party platform.
00:16:46.000But people know the party platform now.
00:16:48.000If you're gonna get together, you should actually have a debate.
00:16:50.000You should have a conversation about the merit of the ideas that you're espousing, and not make personal, like, look, there's nothing wrong with making a quote-unquote personal attack about another political leader because a politician isn't just a set of ideas, they're supposed to be a leader, and we as the people should be concerned about the substance of their moral character.
00:17:06.000I reject this idea that we shouldn't scrutinize politicians, that it's wrong for one political leader to bring up baggage that another political leader has as a person, and not just as a set of policies.
00:17:34.000Like the way they don't even look at each other a lot of times.
00:17:36.000They'll be looking straight forward out at the audience.
00:17:38.000They'll say, you know, they'll ask a question and the guy will turn and look out at the audience and answer it, but I need them out to make eye contact.
00:17:44.000I think that the internet's changed everything.
00:17:45.000I mean, not everything, that's hyperbolic, but the internet has completely It's been revolutionary to the way we live our lives.
00:17:57.000Like when you see a politician going, well this show, or I was going to say Rogan, but like this show, like two hours of listening to Vivek explain himself That's better than any piece by six minute clip or four minute clip.
00:18:21.000As long as his audience is able to find him, it's revolutionary.
00:18:24.000The Internet is in some ways this double-edged sword.
00:18:27.000Of course, at times it is extremely dangerous.
00:18:29.000Other times it's obviously incredibly important.
00:18:32.000For me, I find that I want to hear different pairings speak up.
00:18:37.000So if you have, you know, a crowd, I can't even remember how many people are running off the top of my head right now, but if we have eight people who are seeking the presidency and they all cluster onto stage, how effective are you really going, what message are you going to get there?
00:18:49.000One person might be able to dominate, we might be able to get through one slightly interesting conversation, but are we actually as a party advancing a platform?
00:18:57.000If you have 12 Democrats on stage, do they at the end of the debate say, Okay, so we've reached a consensus and here's how we're moving forward.
00:19:03.000No, it's just about dominating the conversation and possibly making someone else look bad and now that you have the internet to make a clip go viral and I think that that is sort of a crime to the voter.
00:19:13.000I understand why people think it's a system because it feels traditional but maybe we don't need this anymore or maybe it needs a very strong restructuring.
00:19:23.000It would be interesting if they actually were like, you know, let's talk, and if you're better than me, I want you to be president kind of thing.
00:19:29.000Like, I'm running, you're running, but if you're better than me, I want you to win because you're better than me and I care about the country.
00:19:35.000That would be hard for them to like, they have all these donors who spent millions of dollars on them.
00:19:40.000Who want a return on their investment.
00:19:41.000Yeah, if I was like donating money to someone and they were like, you know what, I've changed my mind, I might be a little bit like offended by that.
00:19:49.000So maybe they wouldn't overtly say, like, I hope you win or any of that bullshit, but if they're in their mind, like, this guy actually is better, is a more reliable, should be the president.
00:19:57.000Like, I could see that humility would be a great part of it.
00:20:00.000And I keep thinking about the 2008 Democratic cycle where there was, like, literally, like, 10 to 12 people standing up at a podium.
00:20:07.000Everyone got to speak for, like, 5, 10, 12 seconds.
00:20:10.000They'd, like, throw an insult down the line.
00:20:12.000But they wouldn't even look at each other.
00:20:13.000It was only, like, Mike Gravel that really, like, confronted everybody on stage and was like, You war hawks, look at them all on stage, a bunch of old... You, Joe, you... And this is why, like, well, you know, he's not here, let's compliment him behind his back, but Vivek is someone who I would like to see on stage with some of these other people, so I think there's validity there.
00:20:31.000As mentioned earlier, part of why Trump made those debates so entertaining and impactful and even meaningful was because he was outside of the establishment and he was standing there criticizing these people in ways that they hadn't been criticized before.
00:20:44.000And I think this is what's at the center of all of this, in my humble opinion as the host of ShimCast IRL.
00:20:52.000When these politicians go on stage with one another, you have one slimy establishment politician talking to another slimy establishment politician.
00:21:00.000Uh, who represent different values, but values that are acceptable to the slimy establishment.
00:21:04.000So they'll call each other out on things that are outside of their status quo, but they won't call each other out for the establishment nonsense.
00:21:11.000Or, if they do, that other, they'll, they'll go lighter on it and they won't mention the thing that person is doing, which they are also doing.
00:21:36.000These are the incentives you've created.
00:21:38.000You've made these incentives, and now you're trying to criticize me for following them.
00:21:43.000That was the beauty of him being in the debates.
00:21:48.000The rest of the debates are literally just, again, two people throwing softballs to each other, because like, right, if you're a Democrat, Ian, right, and I'm a Republican, And I say to you... Why'd you say that?
00:21:59.000Just to play role, because he's an actor.
00:22:02.000So you're the Democrat and I'm the Republican.
00:22:05.000And as a Republican, I say something to you like, I don't like your socialist agenda that will force the American people to give up more of their income.
00:22:14.000And then what do you say to that as a Democrat?
00:22:17.000This guy doesn't know what he's talking about.
00:22:21.000This guy slept with his friend's wife!
00:22:25.000I was thinking that might be a more Trump answer, to be honest.
00:22:33.000Alright, so the Republican says, this socialist wants to raise your taxes, and the Democrat says, you know, maybe if he's more civil, but though I agree with you, that does sometimes happen.
00:22:42.000The Democrat maybe goes, He doesn't realize that we should care for each other.
00:22:47.000Like, every criticism leveled by your opponent becomes a softball for you to just hit out of the park because the country's so polarized that any criticism they make of you is a criticism a Democrat wants to be made of them or that a Republican wants to be made about them.
00:23:04.000People are fine being criticized for ideological reasons.
00:23:07.000People are fine when their opponents say something to them like, You're a fascist, that's like, no I'm not, but I know you're only calling me that because I believe in law and order.
00:23:19.000What they don't want to hear is, hey, who are you taking money from?
00:23:25.000Those are the things that are always avoided on stage, and it's not because they like each other so much, it's because if I point out what you're doing, you're going to point out what I'm doing.
00:23:33.000I do not hear them talk a lot about the pharmaceutical cartels.
00:23:40.000I haven't in the past heard them talk.
00:23:42.000I do now that we have shows like this, which makes it much more entertaining, especially being able to interface directly with the candidates.
00:23:48.000I believe he had, he has some, uh, he was in pharma, like in pharmacy.
00:24:18.000I mean, I think part of the privilege of having a job like this is the fact that we, you know, especially because thanks to our members, you know, we've had so much support and we've grown so much through word of mouth that we're able to sit in a room with a presidential candidate, right?
00:24:36.000And so the question is, how do we get the average voter to have accessible information And a true chance to hear about the ideas from the candidate is a debate, a nationally televised debate with, you know, five to eight speakers at a time, the most effective way.
00:24:55.000And I think in the spirit of innovation, there has to be something better.
00:24:59.000So when Ron McDonald was making this comment, she said, you know, We give access to 20 million viewers and that's important.
00:25:05.000Well, if Donald Trump just gets back on Twitter, he has 85 million followers.
00:25:10.000We have progressed past a point of needing the mainstream media and televised debates to be the only way.
00:25:17.000So unless there is a new model, I really don't see why the American voters would live or die by it.
00:25:24.000I think there has to be more to offer them.
00:25:27.000I also think it's interesting because, you know, right now we're talking about primary season, so it'll be Republican v. Republican, Democrat v. Democrat, although this time we won't necessarily have it because Joe Biden's an incumbent and he doesn't have to debate.
00:25:37.000Of course, I would love to see him debate RFK, no one get me wrong.
00:25:42.000When I was at, I went to SMU in Dallas, and I had a professor, Ben Voth, who did a study on debates.
00:25:48.000He would analyze them, look for different markers, so the amount of time each candidate got to speak, how often the moderator interrupted them, fact-checking, words for a minute, things like that, and he found that Consistently, for years, Democrats get more time to speak.
00:26:05.000They are less likely to be interrupted by the moderator.
00:26:07.000Republicans are more likely to be interrupted by the moderator.
00:26:09.000But, seemingly subconsciously, all of them say more words per minute.
00:26:14.000It's as if, on some level, you know, perhaps over the years they pick this up, they learn to speak more quickly.
00:26:19.000On the other hand, maybe they're aware of the environment they're in.
00:26:22.000And to that end, as we saw with this town hall, the fact that CNN pulled it after, you know, not that long, We can't trust the media that is putting on the debate, you know?
00:26:33.000So even if we had candidates who were going up there and really saying informed and interesting things, would the moderators allow those conversations to go forward or would they interrupt them?
00:26:42.000Would we actually get effective conversation?
00:26:45.000Beyond just the cheap shots that candidates take from each other, do we have any structure that allows for information and a true dialogue about the ideals of each party to be really debated, not just sort of spat at one another?
00:26:59.000Did you say that CNN pulled off the offline or something?
00:27:20.000It was, uh, something about, oh, well, one thing that I've been thinking is, I mean, it's a little crazy.
00:27:27.000But, uh, you think there's any value to, like, a presidential candidate strapping on a neural net and allowing people to read their thoughts?
00:28:08.000So we were talking, saying goodbye to Vivek while you were reading in the story.
00:28:12.000So Ronald McDaniel is encouraging Trump to go to a debate.
00:28:17.000She's saying that he shouldn't skip the debate, he should take part in the RNC's debate, so any candidate.
00:28:23.000You have to have 40,000 individual donors, so it's not that you have to make a certain amount of money, you have to have a certain amount of people who have donated to your campaign to qualify to get on stage.
00:28:31.000The other controversy with this was that the RNC for a while was saying that they, you need
00:28:35.000to take a loyalty pledge to be on the debate stage, so if you got enough donors on top of that
00:28:39.000you'd have to pledge to support whoever would be, whoever ends up being the party's candidate,
00:28:46.000which you know, famously Trump was not so willing to do the last time around. Yeah, well wait,
00:28:52.000They would have to support... Okay, this is huge, but this is so huge.
00:28:56.000This is yet another observation I'm gonna steal from Dave Smith here, who I always credit when I steal from him, by the way.
00:29:02.000And he's yet to credit me for stealing my intro about how we need to roll back the state and how we're spying on all of our own citizens and our prisons are flooded with non-violent drug offenders, but that's fine, he can have it.
00:29:12.000Everyone knows I came up with it first.
00:29:14.000Point is, a point that Dave Smith made on his podcast was, One of the main differences between Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump as outsider political leaders is that when asked if he would endorse Hillary Clinton, Bernie said he would.
00:29:29.000Okay, if you're the outsider, the establishment is going to do everything they can to ensure you don't get the nomination, and the only leverage you have against them is, I won't endorse your person, I'll run third party, and then you guys are going to lose.
00:29:42.000And Bernie went, of course I will endorse whoever gets nominated.
00:29:45.000And they're like, Trump, will you endorse whoever gets nominated?
00:29:50.000Yes, why, these people are my friends.
00:29:52.000You can't get on stage and say the people you're running against are horrible establishment shills who want to make life harder for your average person and then say, but just whoever gets nominated here, you know, I'll support them.
00:30:05.000We're ultimately part of the same corrupt machine.
00:30:07.000And I think that's an excellent point.
00:30:10.000I think that's sort of a good summary of the whole system.
00:30:13.000If you really believe in things you believe, why would you then turn around and be like, just kidding, I'm going to support whoever.
00:30:19.000I could understand where people argue for party loyalty, and I think there are times when that is necessary.
00:30:24.000On the other hand, making a loyalty pledge a contingency for being on a debate stage seems like a violation of free
00:30:32.000speech. Yeah I mean Vivek's already claimed he's not going to run he's not going to do anything
00:30:35.000other than lead the country he's going to be a CEO or he's just going to go back to the
00:30:38.000private sector and run the country you know from the through the economy um so that would mean he's not
00:30:42.000going to do the debate either if they're going to force him to say he's going to subjugate well I
00:30:46.000guess support the candidate without having to actually run it yeah.
00:30:49.000And I appreciate that he was saying, Vivek was saying, he would not be anything other than the president.
00:30:55.000I mean, I don't want to put words in his mouth, but in any way, I think he was pretty much saying that.
00:30:58.000Because even if he would, Well, I'm not saying to lie, but if I go up there and I'm running for president, I'm like, yeah, but I'll totally be VP.
00:31:06.000If I don't get it, then they'll be like, oh, OK, then we don't have to vote for him because he'll be VP anyway.
00:31:37.000And also that president would be like, please reign it in.
00:31:39.000I picked you because everyone likes you, but I don't actually want you to do anything.
00:31:41.000It would just be a nightmarish for everyone involved.
00:31:44.000But I think part of it is This is the cycle where I am actually hopeful that there is a third party candidate with RFK because I think he's so interesting.
00:31:52.000Again, I don't think I actually line up a lot in his camp, but I think he brings up interesting concepts.
00:31:57.000I think he is one of the people really controlling narrative on policy in our country right now, and I think that's so important in political leaders.
00:32:05.000Even if I don't agree with them, it is interesting to see what you're bringing up.
00:32:08.000Um, and I think, you know, that is actually something, that's one of the reasons that the left attacks him so hard, because if he runs third party, he will hemorrhage votes.
00:32:18.000It's not that he will necessarily win as a third party candidate, it's that he will be damaging to the Democrat vote base.
00:32:46.000And it can become easy to become infatuated with these anti-establishment figures, but we've got to remember their values are not our values.
00:32:52.000That said, he's a step in the right direction for the Democratic Party.
00:32:57.000And I'll say this, even though I disagree with him on a lot, I commend him for being an original thinker, for not just getting in line and obeying what the party tells him.
00:33:05.000So I think a democratic party which embraces him is a party which is going to do less evil, and I will also say that even though I don't want the Democrats to win any elections, What Trump did in the Republican Party by making it clear that there was a massive hunger for anti-establishment, anti-war candidates is exactly what I think RFK has the potential to do to the Democratic Party.
00:33:34.000Maybe not in the exact same way, you know, we compare the two of them because they're both anti-establishment, but the truth is it's very difficult to compare anyone in politics to Trump.
00:33:50.000So, in that sense, he has some of the benefits of being an insider, at least in terms of his quote-unquote brand name.
00:33:57.000However, he actually is an outsider in terms of thought, and I think it actually gives him even more credibility, the fact that he is part of this political family in our country, and yet he's willing to stand up to the political establishment.
00:34:08.000That costs him more than somebody who's an ideological outsider Who isn't related to people who are pushing the agenda.
00:34:36.000I was just gonna say, like, Vivek and RFK being here on Culture War in a more moderate setting, I think you would get higher quality information than you would with a traditional debate, you know?
00:34:48.000I just think that overcrowded stage, you know, we ultimately don't get very much.
00:34:52.000I mean, as a journalist it's kind of nice because you get like a bunch of people all together and you can get a bunch of short quotes, but do you want people to have meaningful information?
00:35:01.000I was wondering what you guys think about if, okay, so Trump yesterday said he was, I believe he was going to be arrested for his connection to January 6th.
00:35:08.000Would that preclude, preclude, is that the right word?
00:35:10.000Would that remove him from being able to run for office?
00:35:24.000But that also means that one of the problems is like if they bring him to trial, you know, if you spend all the time in court, you can't spend time outside campaigning, right?
00:35:33.000So there are some other burdens there.
00:35:34.000I think part of it is that they think if they can get him convicted, then like enough people will be like, we can't have a felon as a president.
00:35:44.000But there's actually nothing that would legally preclude him from being president.
00:35:48.000It's interesting because on a state level, I was talking to, I did a story a couple months ago.
00:35:53.000Oh my gosh, I've worked here for longer than I can remember.
00:35:56.000I did a story for Timcast about some libertarians who had won local level in Pennsylvania and one of the people had been convicted of a felony and she was being told she couldn't hold office when at the state, at the local level, you couldn't like, these things become very challenging.
00:36:46.000This the Spoongate stuff is crazy and I will say I think I'm being framed.
00:36:50.000There's a picture circulating on Twitter of a spoon on my desk that says Seamus's Spoon underneath and you know, I find this to be a crazy violation of my personal space.
00:38:50.000I think that if RFK is a representative of a coalition forming the Democratic Party at all, it's a sign of maybe we are going to win the overall culture war in a positive way.
00:39:03.000Because I've met a lot of Democrats that are fans of him, and again, if they pull the votes and they make this vote a little less, you know, I don't know.
00:39:13.000If they affect the Democratic nominee in a negative way, I think we should be supporting it.
00:39:19.000Like you just said, but I think people forget, if it's showing anything, it's showing that there are people in the Democratic Party that are It seems like if Biden is gonna run, Michelle Obama won't.
00:39:27.000And then if Michelle Obama doesn't run, RFK could easily strip the votes away.
00:39:29.000good sign. That's a good indicator that we're doing something good here. It seems
00:39:33.000like if Biden is gonna run, Michelle Obama won't. And then if Michelle Obama
00:39:37.000doesn't run, RFK could easily strip the votes away. So Biden should step out and
00:39:43.000let Michelle Obama come in if they want to win the Democratic, the presidency.
00:39:48.000But he's already said he's gonna run, right?
00:39:49.000Barring some medical emergency, Biden believes he is going to run for second term.
00:39:54.000He's going to beat his own record as our oldest president.
00:39:57.000That's to point out the fact that he is not doing so well.
00:40:00.000So there's obviously some turmoil within the structure of the Democratic establishment.
00:40:05.000You would get Biden saying, I'm going to run again.
00:40:07.000And then his press secretary is being like, oh, he's still talking to his family about it.
00:40:11.000Like, I think his own administration didn't want to run, but he wanted to.
00:40:16.000You know, we'll see what happens but I think, you know, obviously I fall, I lean more conservative so I tend to vote for conservative candidates and I will vote Republican most likely because there's a couple issues that are the biggest deal to me that Democrats never take the opinion I like on.
00:40:31.000So that's okay, that's how that works.
00:40:33.000But I think it's easy for us to then say, like, oh, look at all this turmoil in the Republican Party, when there's actually lots of turmoil in the DNC as well.
00:40:40.000And RFK is in a unique position to really do something with that, even if it's not a victory.
00:40:45.000Even if he doesn't get the White House, he is influential in a way that is just fun to see because it makes politics less boring.