US economic growth hit a new record high of 3. Inflation hits a new all-time high of 2.8%, and the Dow and S&P 500 hit new records as well. Meanwhile, the unemployment rate hit an all time low of 1.9% and consumer spending hit a record high.
00:20:04.420Ambassador, can you tell us what's going on at the Kennedy Center?
00:20:07.580We could have played hours of Meltdown last night on MSNBC and CNN about the event yesterday.
00:20:14.100Can you put this in perspective for us, sir?
00:20:17.240Well, I kind of love the fact that the New York Times elitist Maggie Haberman doesn't like
00:20:23.060Gloria Gaynor, the black woman who is a celebrated hero to not only the disco movement, but to music.
00:20:33.340And the fact that she, Maggie Haberman, decides to just go after Gloria Gaynor, I think says
00:20:39.600a whole lot about who the elites at the New York Times are targeting.
00:20:45.520They don't like people to speak out of turn.
00:20:49.540They certainly attack a whole bunch of female Republicans or pro-life Republicans or gay Republicans or people of color Republicans.
00:21:01.660They want this whole situation to be controlled.
00:21:06.660And so when they're losing control, they somehow say, oh, the other side is taking control.
00:21:11.820But, Steve, let's just be really clear.
00:21:13.980We have a list of Kennedy Center honorees who the public has been asking for.
00:21:20.360If you looked at the Kennedy Center website and the comment section, these are individuals that have been—the public has been asking to win the awards for years.
00:21:37.720But we need to take back places like the Kennedy Center from the woke left who took it and strangled it.
00:21:47.320And what we're trying to do is bring it back to life, financially bring it back to life, have common sense programming that appeals to everyone.
00:21:55.280Remember, this is a fact, and I would remind Maggie Haberman about this.
00:22:00.500We have never canceled a single thing at the Kennedy Center.
00:22:04.380The people who left are the ones who ran out of the room because they couldn't perform for conservatives.
00:22:10.740We are proud of the fact that we haven't canceled anyone.
00:22:14.860We've made one simple change to the programming, which is if you can't sell enough seats for your program to pay the bills, then you need to find a sponsor so that we don't go in debt with all of the programming.
00:22:30.900Now, I actually do love niche programming in the arts.
00:22:34.660I'm willing to do it when I have some money, but we have just been in a situation, financial situation, that we're trying to dig ourselves out of here at the Kennedy Center, and we're doing a good job.
00:22:47.500We have balanced the budget for this year and for next year.
00:22:50.460We've made some very hard cuts, and we've made demands that the programming needs to be revenue neutral.
00:23:01.800What we're trying to do is spend the money wisely and appeal to everyone.
00:23:07.360Again, we're not the crowd that's booing people when they show up at a program at the Kennedy Center because we don't agree with someone's politics.
00:23:16.940It's the woke left that ran out of the room with Hamilton.
00:23:20.960It's the woke left that boos people when they enter the room because they don't like their beliefs and the issues that they stand for.
00:23:29.280And so I just want everyone to be welcome.
00:23:33.560You need to come to the Kennedy Center, buy a ticket, enjoy being entertained by Broadway shows like Les Mis, which had an outstanding run, more than 30 percent above projections.
00:23:50.720You know, when I went over for the Amadeus, which was spectacular with the Coral Society, the National Symphony, the film, Pact House, I was impressed by the staff that came up to me.
00:24:06.160And we're so thankful the president actually come with you and done a complete tour, not just the operations, but the building itself and made recommendations.
00:24:14.540I think a lot of us knew that President Trump being a builder and, you know, his focus on rejuvenating the beauty, as he said yesterday, the great bones of the Kennedy Center, knew, Ambassador, that you had him very involved in that.
00:24:27.780I think what surprised a lot of us pleasantly was how involved on the content side – correct me if I'm wrong.
00:24:34.960Is the president – is he going to actually host the Kennedy Center Awards and was he actively involved in the selection here?
00:24:41.940Because I think yesterday seemed so personal from him.
00:24:45.220It took a lot of us by – pleasantly by surprise.
00:24:49.100Look, we've had multiple committees of people who have been nominating different people to win the awards, right?
00:24:57.380We probably had 300 different people that we considered, people that were not on the list before.
00:25:04.920One of the rules that we have is if you won it once, you don't get to win it twice.
00:25:09.040And so these would all be brand new people from a whole bunch of different genres.
00:25:13.640And then the system that we have in place here at the Kennedy Center began to narrow it down.
00:25:23.140So we've had multiple committees, the board of which President Trump is the chairman, and he's had an opinion on all of this as well.
00:25:31.500And so it's been an incredibly collaborative process.
00:25:35.440And what we decided is to really make this the best honors that it could be.
00:25:42.340Let's have the president of the United States come out, welcome people.
00:25:47.400Let's have the president of the United States talk about each of these five people.
00:25:52.240I can't think of a better honor for the five honorees than to have the president of the United States, no matter who it is, talk about their life career.
00:26:02.500Talk about all of the great things that they've done.
00:26:05.000This is the most honored moment I could think of is to have the president fully involved.
00:26:13.020Luckily, we have a president right now who can come out and do live television, who can do audience, you know, content.
00:26:24.460And we haven't had a president in the past that's been able to do that.
00:26:27.960So I think that this is a fantastic moment for the Kennedy Center, a fantastic moment for the five honorees to have the president of the United States give us the time and attention to honor these individuals.
00:26:43.020Ambassador, what's your social media handle?
00:26:45.500You're wearing about 10 caps right now, doing great work around the world, whether in Eurasia and Latin America and in our own beloved nation's capital for the president of the United States.
00:26:55.160Where do people go to keep up with you?
00:27:39.180I know that there were hundreds considered.
00:27:43.500I might actually have thrown in a couple of names myself as recommendations.
00:27:46.860An incredibly complicated process, collaborative, all the way to the board, different subcommittees, and selected.
00:27:56.820And I got to tell you, I think he hit it dead spot on.
00:27:59.660This is going to be the biggest award ceremony of the season, finally, to put the Kennedy Center Awards, the nominees, and have the president of the United States intimately involved.
00:28:12.320Seize the institutions from Washington, D.C.
00:28:17.760Next, the repository of our history, the Smithsonian Institute with Roger Kimball.
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00:30:27.240The letter that was sent was by the domestic policy advisor.
00:30:29.840The domestic policy advisor is involved in education, health care, every single facet of the American public.
00:30:34.960If that person is involved in revising Smithsonian history, we're in some deep doo-doo.
00:30:41.100Yeah, Stephen, he'd be talking about Stephen Miller and Vince Haley, the head of the Domestic Policy Council, and the deputy chief of staff and Vince Haley, right?
00:31:44.120If you are woke, by definition, you are not serious.
00:31:49.660And I am just amazed at what President Trump is doing.
00:31:55.720From the moment he took office, one of his first acts, of course, was to eradicate the racist practice of DEI, diversity, equity, and inclusion in universities and throughout the federal government.
00:32:17.900But issuing an executive order is one thing.
00:32:22.920Actually making it come true is something else again.
00:32:27.440And this last March, he issued another executive order about bringing truth and sanity back to our cultural institutions.
00:32:36.480And he mentions by name the Smithsonian.
00:32:39.500But it was only with the letter of just a couple days ago sent by the head of the domestic policy project and Russell Voight, head of office budget,
00:32:53.880and one other person that said, we know, this is to the director of the Smithsonian, we're going to conduct an internal review.
00:33:05.460We're going to look at your exhibitions.
00:33:08.180We're going to look at your curatorial practices.
00:33:11.880We're going to look at your criteria for selection.
00:33:14.780And we're going to look at the wall labels, all the texts, the accompanying social media, everything that you do in order to be sure that the Smithsonian,
00:33:31.380all these hundred or so museums and related activities,
00:33:36.820to make sure that they are aligning with the president's vision of making America great again,
00:36:44.760It's how the cultural revolution of the 1960s changed America.
00:36:48.680It is about the long march to the institutions.
00:36:51.760Why do we have Zoran Mandami leading in New York City?
00:36:56.800It's because of the long march to the institutions and public schools.
00:37:00.600We have to – the Trump revolution will mean nothing if we don't deconstruct the administrative state and destroy the deep state in the process and seize the cultural institutions in this country and get them back to American greatness.
00:37:17.440Make them – make those institutions great again.
00:37:21.120That's what this is about, Roger Kimball.
00:37:22.600Well, you laid out the blueprint 25 years ago of how the left had done it.
00:37:26.580Tell us how they did it and how Trump is reversing this by seizing these institutions.
00:37:31.380And from Maggie Haberman to MSNBC, they are beyond throwing their toys out of the pram.
00:37:36.860They're infuriated that the populist movement has seized control here, sir.
00:37:41.760Yes, well, the little clip you showed at the beginning of the person who described what's going on at the Smithsonian as Stalinist, I think that tells you a lot of what you need to know.
00:37:57.540They were right to be panicked by the prospect of the return of Donald Trump because they knew that his populist counter-revolution would change everything.
00:38:11.880It would change not just the political texture of Washington, D.C.
00:38:16.820It would also change the institutional footprint and the institutional identity of this country.
00:38:23.680And it's this that Trump is doing right now with places like the Kennedy Center and the Smithsonian that distinguishes him from other great presidents, even Ronald Reagan.
00:38:34.300Reagan, for all of his greatness, and I'm a fan of Ronald Reagan's, he ended the Cold War and so on, unleashed the greatest accumulation of wealth in history.
00:38:47.180But the important thing that he didn't do, that Donald Trump is doing, is he made nary a dent in the institutional life of the country, those institutions that are occupied by the self-appointed elite.
00:39:08.420Because it is those institutions, the universities and places like the Smithsonian and the Kennedy Center, those institutions that transmit the identity of the culture.
00:39:21.900And if you have those institutions captive by the left, by people who hate America, who hate normality, who hate the good, the true, and the beautiful,
00:39:35.560and who seek to transform the identity of the country into something that celebrates, for example, George Floyd, an exhibition, a film at the Smithsonian, it says George Floyd is comparable, his death was comparable to the death of Jesus Christ.
00:40:03.620At the Smithsonian, when they celebrate women, they're careful also to celebrate so-called trans women, that is to say, men pretending to be women.
00:40:18.220And it's Trump's genius to be able to change those institutions.
00:40:23.280Okay, we want to change the institutions.
00:40:25.600The engine room of the worm is on fire right now, because I'm making a point.
00:40:29.180Trump and Grinnell went over to Kennedy Center, and they blew out the board, put new board members in, many people we know, some just amazing people culturally, made Trump the head of it.
00:40:40.540Next thing you know, you've got a complete change in programming yet, but, you know, they're making money.
00:40:45.520Everything's going to sit on its own bottom.
00:40:47.280You've got to sell tickets or just everything, right?
00:41:38.280Kimball, would you, if so, if the president came to you with some ideas or Grinnell came to you and said, hey, we want some ideas about this board.
00:41:47.580Would you serve on the board of the Smithsonian Institute and help the president redirect this institution, sir?
00:43:23.660A former CIA, Pentagon, and White House advisor with an unmatched grasp of geopolitics and capital markets, Jim predicted Trump's Electoral College victory exactly 312 to 226, down to the actual number itself.
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00:44:05.600This is Jim's flagship financial newsletter, Strategic Intelligence.
00:44:25.460He's making more radical changes to the country and to the White House that will live well beyond his presidency.
00:44:32.480And I think part of it is because he now knows how government works.
00:44:35.720I think one of the things that really is the key difference between the first term and the second term is that he had a whole host of characters in the government that were trying to stymie his efforts to radically change the country.
00:44:47.000He's now surrounded by people that are fully supportive of his agenda and helping him do it.
00:44:51.280He is way more effective at accomplishing his agenda with having that time out of office because a lot of his A's, Russ Vo, those sorts of officials, spent their time out of government planning for this term.
00:45:02.820And so what they've done is an onslaught of executive orders in the first six months that accomplished a lot of their goals very quickly because he knew what they wanted to do.
00:45:10.940The difference in the first and the second is that we took those four years and people went to work, particularly on seizing the institutions.
00:45:19.140He's got deals. He's breaking the universities, the arrogance of the universities.
00:45:24.880He's breaking the media. He's now taking on the cultural institutions.
00:45:28.500But all three of those, the universities, the media and the cultural institutions, they think they're going to wait us out.
00:45:37.900This is why everything's urgent. We should have a recess appointments.
00:45:41.820We have to have a sense of urgency on this.
00:45:43.720The MAGA-Gromsey, Roger Kimball joins us. Roger, your thoughts.
00:45:51.140Well, I think you're absolutely right, Steve.
00:45:53.860It was an act of providence that Donald Trump was not seated after he won the 2020 election
00:46:02.780because that gave him time to reflect on what went wrong.
00:46:08.300And it gave his team time to understand what had to be done if he was really going to be able to make America great again.
00:46:18.560And it's not just the executive orders are great.