Ep 486 | EMERGENCY EPISODE: They've Pushed Too Far. Resist.
Episode Stats
Summary
An emergency episode about Joe Biden's speech and the new anti-vaccination mandates he announced, and what we should do about it. Today's episode also features a special guest, Brian Birdwell, who was seriously injured in the attack on the Pentagon on 9/11.
Transcript
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Hey, guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Friday. All right. Needed to do an emergency episode
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today to talk about Joe Biden's speech from yesterday afternoon, the mandates he announced
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and what we should do about it. As you guys know, tomorrow is the 20th anniversary of 9-11.
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If you haven't listened to yesterday's episode, I highly recommend you do that. I talked to
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state senator from Texas, Brian Birdwell, who suffered very serious injuries from the attack
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on the Pentagon on 9-11. And he has such a gripping, such a compelling story, but also such a hopeful
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story. And on a day when I'm sure you don't feel very hopeful about the state of the country and
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the future of our nation, that is a great episode to listen to. Get ready to maybe get a little
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emotional, but also be comforted and be encouraged by what I believe this nation still is. Now,
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in this particular episode, it's not the same emotion that I am going to evoke here. And
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that's because the emotion that I'm feeling right now, as we say in the South, is riled up. Also,
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I just had my coffee. And so I am going to be maybe even more passionate than usual because
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I'm very angry about what I heard from the president yesterday. And what I'm hoping from this episode and
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what I'm praying comes from this is that the scales will fall from some people's eyes in that
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they see that all of this is not for their well-being. None of this is really, truly about
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health and safety. It is about politics at best and total and complete control and destruction of
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political enemies at worst. And truly, I wish I were exaggerating. And why is this all happening
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right now? Why is he making the announcements that he is, which I'm going to play some of in just a
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second? It's a distraction. 20 years after 9-11, he knows that people are focused on Afghanistan.
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That was a disaster. It was a disaster of leadership. It was a crisis that was manufactured by
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incompetence. And by worse than that, I think malintent, he wants to distract from the fact that
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there are Americans that we have abandoned in Afghanistan. And so he is turning our sights here
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and he is declaring a different enemy than the Taliban. And that enemy that he wants you to know
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is more dangerous than ISIS-K and more dangerous than any foreign terrorist regime. That enemy is
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your fellow American who has not gotten vaccinated. So yesterday, about five Eastern time, President
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Biden delivered a speech outlining his plan to combat COVID. Now, mind you, he promised to have a plan
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to defeat COVID before he became president. That was one of his campaign pitches. And now,
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over eight months later, we are just now hearing that plan. And that plan includes division. It
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includes resentment. It includes coercion. Yesterday's speech was by far the most hate-mongering,
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fear-mongering, truly terrifying speech that I've ever heard from a U.S. president. Nothing Trump ever
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said, nothing Obama ever said came close to what we heard yesterday in the way of authoritarianism.
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So let me play you a few clips from that speech.
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We can and we will turn the tide on COVID-19. It'll take a lot of hard work. It's going to take some
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time. Many of us are frustrated with the nearly 80 million Americans who are still not vaccinated,
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even though the vaccine is safe, effective, and free. You might be confused about what is true
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and what is false about COVID-19. We read about and hear about and we see the stories of hospitalized
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people, people on their deathbeds, among the unvaccinated over the past few weeks.
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This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated. What makes it incredibly more frustrating
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is that we have the tools to combat COVID-19, and a distinct minority of Americans,
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supported by a distinct minority of elected officials, are keeping us from turning the
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corner. This is not about freedom or personal choice. It's about protecting yourself and those
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around you. We've been patient, but our patience is wearing thin, and your refusal has cost all of us.
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These governors won't help us beat the pandemic. I'll use my power as president to get them out of
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the way. The Transportation Safety Administration, the TSA, will double the fines on travelers that
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refuse to mask. If you break the rules, be prepared to pay. We've had record job creation for a new
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administration. Economic growth unmatched in 40 years. We cannot let unvaccinated do this progress.
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Undo it. Communities of color are disproportionately impacted by this virus. And as we continue to battle
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COVID-19, we will ensure that equity continues to be at the center of our response. Get vaccinated.
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That whisper, it just kills me. Surely, there's no one in his administration that has told him
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to do that. He does that. Every speech, it seems. There's no one in his administration that's like,
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hey, Joe, you know that little whisper thing you do? You know when you're giving a speech and you
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lean into the mic and you narrow your little beady eyes and you whisper at people and you look straight
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into the camera, yeah, that's super effective. You should probably keep doing that. It's like,
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it's like that thing that you're like very old, decrepit, kind of creepy uncle does. And you go to
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your parents and you're like, you know, like, why does Uncle Joe do this? Like, why does he lean in
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and whisper? And your parents are like, you know, honey, I don't, I don't know. We've tried to talk to
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him about it. That's just at this stage. That's just kind of what he does. And we all just are
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expected to, to accept that. I'm not accepting it. I think it's really weird. And again, I think
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it's just a sign that unfortunately, the president of the United States, the supposed leader of the
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free world, our commander in chief is on the decline and has been for a very long time. In some
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ways, while I don't really feel bad for him at this point, I feel bad that his family put him in this
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position. But I can't say I feel bad for him because he is willingly now a deliberate vessel
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for division and for hate. And you'll notice a few things about what he said. You'll notice
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how often he pits the vaccinated against the unvaccinated. This is a pandemic of the unvaccinated,
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the unvaccinated or a threat to the vaccinated. We hear the unvaccinated or taking up hospital space.
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And if you go on Twitter, you'll see that this kind of animosity, truly just animalistic animosity
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is normal among the media and activist class on the left. And maybe the left in general, I can't speak
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for every single person on the left, and I'm sure it doesn't describe every person on the left. But
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certainly we see this kind of attitude on Twitter over and over again. I see the suggestion from
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liberal blue checkmarks that unvaccinated people should not get ICU beds, that they shouldn't get
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medical care, that they should just be left to die. I think Jimmy Kimmel actually said that the
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other day and his crowd, you know, roared with laughter and clapped. And none of this, of course,
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makes any logical sense. Because as I and many others have asked, how are the unvaccinated
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threatening the vaccinated if the vaccine works to lessen the symptoms and the likelihood of death,
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but those with the vaccine can still get and spread the virus? No one has been able to answer that for
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me. Here's what the Evening Standard reported at the end of August, quote, researchers from the
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University of Oxford found the viral load reduction can be wiped out by the Delta variant, which is now
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dominant in the UK. While evidence demonstrates the vaccine significantly reduced hospitalizations and
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deaths, scientists now believe those infected by the Delta variant can still harbor similar levels
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of virus to those who are unvaccinated. Okay, so apparently you carry the same viral load, which means
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if you get what's called a breakthrough infection after being vaccinated, you are just as likely to
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pass it on to someone else as an unvaccinated infected person. Now, maybe you would say you're less
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likely to get the infection in the first place if you have the vaccine. And yes, that's what the CDC says.
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And certainly that is how the vaccine is supposed to work. But I think it's worth looking at a few things
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here. So according to Johns Hopkins University data, the COVID case rate is three times higher than it was
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last Labor Day in the United States. So three times higher than it was last year, despite having more than half
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the country fully vaccinated. We didn't have a vaccine this time last year. And with a vaccine that the CDC
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says is very effective against the Delta variant, how does that make sense? Let's look at Cornell
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University, where 95% of the campus faculty and staff are fully vaccinated. The college fixed reports,
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quote, Cornell University has more than five times the amount of confirmed positive cases during its
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first week of this academic year than it did during its first week of the 2020 to 2021 academic year,
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according to the Cornell COVID dashboard. By the numbers, during the first week of school that
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ran from August 27th to September 2nd of this academic year, Cornell reported 322 positive COVID-19
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cases. In comparison, during the first week of school last year, which ran from September 3rd
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through September 9th of 2020, Cornell reported 59 positive COVID-19 cases. Now, maybe you could say
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that there are multiple factors coming into play. Maybe last year there, you know, some people were
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staying inside more. And so that's why there were fewer cases. But truly, if 95% of the campus is
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fully vaccinated, how can it be that the virus is spreading this much? We saw something similar at
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Duke University this year, where 29 medical students and seven members of the women's field hockey team got
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infected and all of them were vaccinated as Duke requires. This is even as Duke has a very
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strict indoor mask mandate as well. Singapore has the second highest vaccination rate in the world.
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According to the New York Times, 79% of the population is fully vaccinated. And according to Bloomberg News,
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they're seeing case numbers higher than what they saw at the height of the pandemic last year when no
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one was vaccinated. OK, and then if you look at the CDC's website at a map of the United States that
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shows vaccination rates and case rates by county. And I'll put this up, I'll put up the picture on
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YouTube. I'll include a link to this page in the description of this episode so you can go
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explore this for yourself. You'll see on this picture that there's a lot of dark red and a lot
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of purple. And what the dark red and the purple represent on this map are counties that have high
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vaccination rates and high case rates. What you don't see is a lot of teal or aqua counties. Teal
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represents the counties that have high vaccination rates and low case numbers. In fact, in all of the
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U.S. that reports their numbers, which is everywhere except for Texas, Hawaii, and a couple other counties
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elsewhere for some reason, you find fewer than 10 of those teal slash aqua counties. You see far more
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counties with high vaccination rates and high case numbers than you do counties with high vaccination
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rates and low case numbers. Now, you do see low vaccination rates and high case numbers, too,
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represented by the bright red that you see on the map if you're watching. And you see a lot of counties
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who have mid-level vaccination rates with mid-level case rates. That probably actually makes up the
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majority of the country. Maine, in particular, is an interesting example. It's an example of a state
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with a high case rate and also a high vaccination rate. In Maine, the third most vaccinated state in
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the country, with 64 percent of its population fully vaccinated, it's suffering through the largest
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surge in New England, with more cases per day than they've seen in months. According to Bangor Daily
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News, quote, a record 74 COVID-19 patients were in intensive care units across Maine on Thursday as
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virus cases continue to surge across the state, testing hospital resources. 38 patients also required
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ventilators, surpassing the record set in mid-January, while overall COVID-19 hospitals surged to 193,
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the highest single-day total since the winter. The record number of critical COVID-19 patients comes as
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cases have continued to climb in Maine, which is now seeing the highest case rate of any New England
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state. Another 620 cases were reported Thursday. Now, it goes on to say, the vast majority of
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hospitalized COVID-19 patients continue to be unvaccinated. At Northern Light Health, Maine's
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second-largest hospital system, 35 out of 42 hospitalized patients with COVID-19 had not had any vaccine doses as
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of Wednesday. All but one of the hospital system's 21 critical care patients were unvaccinated, as were 10
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out of 11 patients on ventilators. So what do I think this story and the other stories that I listed
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tell us? I think that the data is pretty good that vaccines reduce the risk of serious illness and death.
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Non-political medical professional friends that I have spoken to tell me this is true and what they are
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seeing in hospitals right now, that the majority of people in the hospital in intensive care with
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COVID are unvaccinated. There are people who are vaccinated who get serious illness and die. But
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for the most part, the people who do get seriously ill, which is still very rare, are unvaccinated. I
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think that that is true. Here's what I don't think that we can say based on the data that we have. I don't
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think that the data indicates that the vaccines are mitigating the spread all that much, if at all.
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I don't think it's preventing many people from getting the virus and then spreading the virus,
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which means all of this means that the most you could argue against unvaccinated people is that
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they're coming down with most of the serious cases and thus taking up hospital resources by
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not getting the vaccine and putting themselves at risk unnecessarily and therefore are taking up beds
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that need to be used by people with other illnesses. Okay, that argument makes logical sense to me.
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If you want to use that line of reasoning to try to get people to take the vaccine, that's fine. The
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line of reasoning that really says this is for your own health and this is for the sake of hospital
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resources. But still, my response to that would be, number one, lots of people do lots of things
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that they shouldn't do that land them in the hospital taking up resources and we don't punish those
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people by not caring for them. People eat themselves into obesity. People drink themselves into alcohol
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poisoning. People ride motorcycles. People don't wear seatbelts. People smoke. People bed tan. Should
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these people not get health care? I've heard people say to that, well, that's different because
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those aren't spreadable diseases. Well, so? That's not the point, is it? That's not the point of the
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argument. The point that you are making if you're saying that unvaccinated people shouldn't get
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health care, the point that you're making is that they're being irresponsible. And that's why they
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don't deserve health care because they made a decision that landed them in the hospital.
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And I'm saying, OK, well, if that's your point, then people who ride their motorcycle without a
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helmet or get into a gang fight are also making bad choices that are forcing them to go to the
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hospital and take up resources. And yet we provide them with health care because that's what health care
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workers do. You absolute sociopaths. Really? I mean, I'm really glad that you guys didn't have
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Twitter during the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, by the way. I guess you'd be making the same argument.
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And also, like, you're the same people who want to run our health care. No, thank you. No,
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thank you. The number two response that I would say to to that line of argumentation,
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the rate of COVID-associated hospitalization for people under the age of 50 is still extremely low.
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It's really low, honestly, across the board. You have a way better chance of not going to the
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hospital than going to the hospital. It's still rare to go to the hospital with COVID. I know people
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who have gone to the hospital with COVID. I'm not saying that it doesn't happen. I know people who
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have parents who have died from it. So I certainly understand that it can really affect people and it
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can very seriously impact people. But looking at the numbers as we have to do, if we want to be able
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to think and act rationally, people under the age of 50 still only have a 0.005% chance, according to
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the CDC, of being hospitalized. For people under the age of 18, the hospitalization rate is about
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0.001% to 0.002%. For older Americans, the chances are higher. And of course, when the older you get,
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the higher the chance is, especially over the age of 85, whether you're vaccinated or not.
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But it's still very low for most people. Also, as of last year, nearly 90% of all hospitalized COVID
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patients had one or more underlying conditions. Again, this is according to the CDC. We have to just
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take them at their word, even though I think we have plenty of reasons not to. It's the reporting that
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we've got. So you've got a far lower than 1% chance of being hospitalized with COVID, for the
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most part, depending on your age. I probably don't have a whole lot of 85-year-olds listening to the
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podcast, but thank you if you're here. You have a far, far less than 1% chance of dying from COVID,
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especially if you don't have any kind of underlying condition, vaccinated or not, even with the Delta
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variant, even with the fear-mongering, even with the propaganda. What we are seeing, at least on the
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pediatric front, and we've talked about this before, is a surge in RSV among kids that's putting
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them in the hospital. This was actually reported by Time Magazine a few weeks ago. RSV is much more
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dangerous for babies than COVID is. Babies can die from RSV, even though that is rare. But I have
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friends. I know plenty of people whose babies have had to go to the hospital, at least for
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breathing treatments this summer for RSV. And by the way, babies have been getting serious cases and
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dying from RSV for a very long time. And I'm wondering why there hasn't been a rush for a vaccine
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until the last few months. Just kind of strange. But some of these pediatric patients are also testing
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positive for COVID and are being recorded as COVID cases because all patients are being tested for
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the virus. Kids are not, from everything that we know, they are not at serious risk for COVID. That
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doesn't mean that the kids that have died with COVID, again, with COVID is the CDC's language, so not
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of COVID. Of course, their lives matter. Of course, that matters. But they're not at serious risk for
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serious illness from COVID. They just aren't. A reminder from data put together by the Financial
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Times that we've shared before that the unvaccinated person under the age of 18 is far less likely to die
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from COVID than the fully vaccinated 40-year-old. And what are those chances? 0.0002%. 0.0002%. That is the
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chance of a person under 18 dying from COVID. Guys, you take a bigger chance driving with your kid
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every day in the backseat than you do in exposing them to COVID. There's no reason statistically for
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kids to wear masks. We've gone through many times. The data on that. We'll link my post on that in this
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description. We've gone through it in episodes multiple times. There is no reason for kids to be
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taking really any measures whatsoever when they're in school besides just washing their hands. There's
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no reason at all for us to be talking about giving kids the vaccine anytime soon. So this fear-mongering
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about the virus, this pitting one side against the other, this cry to get vaccinated for the sake of
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the children and to get your 12-year-old vaccinated, that's something that Joe Biden said, encouraging
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people to get their teenagers and their 12-year-old vaccinated. When a new study has just found out that
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boys ages 12 to 15 have a 3.7 to 6.1 times higher chance of an adverse cardiac event than their
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chance of being hospitalized with COVID. So you are hearing that you have to take this particular
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calculation and you have to get your 12-year-old son vaccinated even though he is at higher risk of an
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adverse cardiac event because of the vaccine than he is getting a serious case of COVID that would
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put him in the hospital. That doesn't make any sense. Like this push for children as young as two
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years old to wear masks in the United States, even though no other country is doing that, even though
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the WHO recommends against it, there is no data at all to back it up. Plenty of common sense that tells
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us it's stupid and even data telling us that it's dumb. None of that is about your health. It can't be.
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It's not about safety. And you'll notice that the American Academy of Pediatrics and the CDC don't
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actually provide you with any evidence with any hard numbers or data backing up the idea that
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little tiny kids need to be wearing masks. We also know none of this is about the science because
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where's the talk of natural immunity in all of this? There was a preprint study out of Israel
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that found that you get longer lasting and stronger immunity from previous infection than you do the
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vaccine, which makes sense. That's true of many illnesses. And of course, there have been people
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trying to refute that and saying it's not true, but clearly it is. And just anecdotally, of the people
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I know who have had COVID, they only had that one infection. And even though they have been exposed
00:23:06.120
several times since then, they haven't gotten it again. But I know at least three people just off
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the top of my head who were fully vaccinated and then got COVID. They had mild cases. Maybe they would
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have had mild cases anyway, but they did get that so-called breakthrough infection. We know that
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antibodies protect you probably for a long time, as well as, if not significantly better than the
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vaccine. So why can't the people who have had COVID but haven't been vaccinated go about their
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business? I mean, I think everyone should be able to go about their business. But if we're trying to
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find some kind of logical and scientific consistency here, like why shouldn't they be treated the same way
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as vaccinated people? And why can't that number, the number of people who have not been vaccinated,
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but who have had COVID and have the antibodies, be added to the number of vaccinated people to let
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us know if we have achieved any kind of so-called herd immunity? Because look, we're not going to get
00:24:05.680
to zero cases ever. That's just not how these kinds of viruses work. Countries like Australia and Japan
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have had to abandon that goal. They wanted to get to, you know, zero COVID cases. It's just not,
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it's not going to happen. It's not going to happen right now. Probably not going to happen anytime soon
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in the same way that we still get the flu every year. It mutates and it mutates among vaccinated
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people too, because it finds more, it becomes more resistant to vaccines. Unfortunately, that's just what
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happens. And so again, this idea that the unvaccinated are what are causing, that they're
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the ones causing the virus to mutate and get stronger. That again, just doesn't make any scientific
00:24:48.360
sense. And for a virus with an over 99% survival rate for most people, 99.99% survival rate. Like
00:24:58.000
if you are given a 99.99% chance of surviving, say you're diagnosed with an illness, diagnosed with
00:25:06.340
cancer, that's pretty much a hundred percent. And again, I'm not saying that no one dies from COVID,
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but if you are hearing, hey, like your chance of surviving this particular thing, or your chance of
00:25:16.560
this thing going well is 99.99%, the vast majority of people are going to take that risk. And with a
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survival rate that is this high for COVID, like we're going to have to all accept that risk at some
00:25:31.320
point to move on. If you don't want to accept that risk, then you can get your 12 booster shots,
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go for it. Like maybe you should, maybe you should get your 12 booster shots and maybe you should wear
00:25:41.240
three masks and maybe you should do that for you and the people around you. That's, that's fine. I
00:25:47.480
don't have anything against all of that, but like at some point we've got to accept that not every
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single person will or can get the vaccine and you got to be okay with it. And, and guys, again,
00:26:01.340
if the vaccine works to prevent serious illness and death, and if you can still get and spread the
00:26:09.100
virus as a vaccinated person, then you have no reason to say that the unvaccinated are a threat.
00:26:15.940
It makes no sense. I tried to get someone who told me I was wrong in asking that question,
00:26:21.180
who she said that I just don't understand how vaccines and, and herd immunity work. So I asked
00:26:26.800
her nicely to explain this to me. She, uh, messaged me. She said that she had a medical background.
00:26:33.000
Um, and you know, she's a super nice person and I'm sure that she means well and is super smart,
00:26:37.340
but in our conversation, I was actually like ready. I've been ready for someone to answer this
00:26:42.300
question for me. And all you ever get when you ask this question is, well, you just don't understand
00:26:46.640
how vaccines work. Okay. I'm, I am willing to accept that. Explain it to me then explain it to me.
00:26:52.500
I'm not pretending to be a medical professional, but this person who says she is a medical professional,
00:26:57.280
she never actually addressed what I said. She said something about hospital capacity.
00:27:02.940
Okay. Again, you can make that argument. I understand the logic there. I think the data
00:27:08.620
backs that up. Maybe. I don't, I don't know though. I mean, I, I do believe that unvaccinated
00:27:14.760
people are more likely to get serious illness and die from the virus. The idea though, that all the
00:27:21.560
hospitals are at capacity and that they're bursting at the seams. I do have some questions about that
00:27:27.740
because I also know many healthcare workers have been laid off for the past, over the past year.
00:27:32.720
I also know many healthcare workers have quit. I also know that hospitals always operate at capacity
00:27:38.060
because that's how hospital administrators make sure they're making money. And plus we've been hearing
00:27:43.160
for the past year that all hospitals are bursting at the seams and sometimes that hasn't turned out
00:27:47.480
to be true. And so I do have some skepticism. I do have some skepticism about that. But again,
00:27:56.440
if that's the only argument that you want to make that look, unvaccinated people are putting an unfair
00:28:02.000
burden on the healthcare system. All right. But the idea that the vaccinated are threatened by the
00:28:08.820
unvaccinated, knowing everything that I've just explained, that's not sane. That's not sane.
00:28:15.980
If you believe that. I mean, you people have truly lost it. Fox News reports that the largest
00:28:20.720
teachers union, the National Education Association, you guys know how I feel about teachers unions,
00:28:25.520
and now published emails threatened the White House and the CDC, intimidating them into recommending
00:28:31.760
universal masking in schools. Oh my gosh. If I ever were in charge of this operation,
00:28:39.820
this whole, this whole operation, this country, teachers unions, day one, gone. They're truly a
00:28:47.300
scourge on society. They don't care about your kids. They don't. And I honestly, I don't think
00:28:52.900
they really care about teachers either. I think that they care about power. I think that they care
00:28:56.860
about bureaucracy. And the fact that the CDC, who is supposed to be a scientific institution in the
00:29:02.200
White House, who is supposed to, you know, be a scientific White House and trusting the science is
00:29:06.800
listening to a political entity. This shows, again, it's about politics. The NEA is a political
00:29:12.980
left-wing entity. That means these policies are at best fearful reflexes, not based on science.
00:29:20.680
And at worst, they're being purposely used for control and division. And the longer this goes on,
00:29:27.580
guys, the harder it is to deny that it's the latter. Australia beating peaceful protesters,
00:29:35.800
building, quote, well camps, well camps, more like Orwellian camps, like truly, I mean, that is some
00:29:43.780
like ministry of peace, ministry of love type stuff. Well camps to forcibly quarantine people
00:29:52.560
away from their families who get infected, forcing Australians in at least one state in Australia to
00:29:58.140
download an app that tells the government where they are at all times. And then we have Biden here
00:30:03.540
unconstitutionally forcing companies to force their employees to get vaccinated. It's authoritarian.
00:30:09.220
And look, I'm not saying that it is the same level of authoritarianism as people are enduring in North
00:30:15.480
Korea and China. I am not unfortunate. Unfortunately, we've got some people on the left who truly think
00:30:21.940
that, for example, Texas trying to ban abortions after six weeks is the exact same as the Taliban.
00:30:26.460
I'm not making some kind of stupid point like that, that here in America, we live in the same kind of
00:30:33.500
dictatorship as the people in Afghanistan. I am actually saying, but things, actions, policies can
00:30:41.860
be authoritarian in nature. The same people who cried about Trump being authoritarian, even though
00:30:49.260
no policy that he ever proposed or implemented came anywhere close to what Biden is doing and flagrantly
00:30:55.480
and unabashedly ignoring the Constitution. They have nothing to say about this because most people on the
00:31:00.420
left, I've learned, like authoritarianism when it comes to things that they like. And they just see it as,
00:31:06.860
well, this is for the best, so it's OK. So they call everything they don't like, like abortion restrictions,
00:31:11.620
fascism and authoritarianism, without a single thought to what those words actually mean. And what they what they
00:31:17.420
really mean is that they just don't like those things. But they don't care when Biden ignores the
00:31:21.620
Constitution and, for example, enforces an eviction moratorium or when he ignores the Constitution and
00:31:27.860
and dictates what companies can do because they like it. They like it. And so that's not
00:31:33.860
authoritarianism, apparently. And then on abortion, we have Kamala Harris, the most pro-abortion senator
00:31:39.680
when she was in the Senate. She even voted against a bill proposed to protect babies who survive abortion.
00:31:45.880
So babies outside the womb, she said, nope, no, thanks. Don't have any interest in protecting those
00:31:50.700
babies. She recently said in a clip over and over again, this myth that a woman has a right to an
00:31:57.960
abortion because it's her body, blah, blah, blah. So when it comes to a procedure that literally and
00:32:02.600
directly and deliberately kills a defenseless human being, it's a constitutional right and bodily
00:32:07.820
autonomy and my body, my choice. But when it comes to a mask and a vaccine without which
00:32:12.920
someone only may get an illness and may pass it on to someone who may get a serious case
00:32:20.080
and may die from it, that's not included in bodily autonomy. And then we have Biden's Department
00:32:27.060
of Justice now announcing that they are suing Texas over their abortion law. I mean, talk about
00:32:32.440
authoritarianism again. Like, do you trust people who are so rabidly pro-abortion, so rabidly anti-freedom
00:32:40.380
when they say that they're doing what they're doing for your health? You want to talk about
00:32:45.320
vaccine hesitancy and why some people are hesitant? Let's talk about distrust in our
00:32:51.120
institutions, the media and a political party, along with big tech and big business who have used this
00:32:57.600
virus and mitigation measures relentlessly as political tools against Trump and Republicans
00:33:02.600
who totally depart from science when it comes to public health measures, even while flouting the
00:33:07.400
rules themselves, who hold up this leader in Dr. Fauci, who very likely lied about his indirect
00:33:12.920
involvement with data function research that may have led to the spread of COVID globally.
00:33:20.460
They censored talk of the Wuhan lab origins in the beginning of this whole thing, took down people's
00:33:26.640
Twitter accounts, kicked them off YouTube. They censor and demonize on-the-ground doctors talking about
00:33:32.740
treatments, in particular treatment that has been used on millions of people for years and reduce it
00:33:38.840
to an award-winning drug to horse paste. They talk about the other half of the country as if they're
00:33:46.820
not people and talk about taking their health care away. They suggest mandates and passports that make
00:33:52.760
it impossible for some people to engage with polite society without making a particular health care
00:33:59.320
decision that they don't want or don't need to make. And by the way, this all disproportionately
00:34:05.040
affects one Black Americans. Black Americans have the largest population of unvaccinated. Among Black
00:34:15.380
Americans, I think it's only not even 30 percent of Black Americans have been vaccinated, which that's
00:34:21.720
fine. Like they're making their own decisions. They have had everyone, no matter your background,
00:34:26.220
no matter your race, has had every opportunity to get the vaccine at this point. So clearly there is
00:34:30.920
probably some hesitancy there. So when we're talking about blocking out people from society and
00:34:36.760
refusing health care and making people get fired because they're not choosing to get the vaccine,
00:34:42.360
you're talking about disproportionately affecting Black Americans. And so this is also how we know that
00:34:48.820
they're not serious when they talk about systemic racism, when they talk about disparities being proof of
00:34:53.860
discrimination and anti-racism and equity. You heard Biden talk about equity. He had to sprinkle in some
00:35:02.180
critical race theory there. They're not serious about they're not serious about that, obviously. I mean,
00:35:07.440
that's who they're demonizing and dehumanizing when they're talking about all of this. It's not
00:35:11.700
it's not mostly white Americans. And so again, we don't have to take them seriously when it comes to that.
00:35:20.580
And also, we don't take them seriously when it comes to them decrying racism and systemic racism
00:35:25.720
anyway, because they don't have anything to say when their political opponents are treated in a
00:35:31.080
racist way. When Larry Elder gets a woman in a monkey mask throwing an egg at him, and no one wants to
00:35:38.720
cover it, and you don't have any statements from Al Sharpton or Ibram X. Kendi or any of your favorite
00:35:45.100
social justice evangelicals, none of them are coming out and saying, see, this is proof that
00:35:49.820
systemic racism is still alive and well. Yeah, we see you. We see your silence. We see that you only
00:35:56.480
speak up when it's a half-baked narrative about a white cop and a black suspect, and you use that to
00:36:03.240
try to push a political narrative. We see you. It's all about politics and power. It's not about social
00:36:07.920
and so-called racial justice. Yeah, we get it. So you want to know why people are hesitant in listening to
00:36:14.160
our institutions when maybe there's a little bit of distrust. Like, again, when you've got big
00:36:20.380
government and big tech and big business and big pharma and big media in each other's pockets,
00:36:26.760
silencing legitimate voices, belittling questions, doing nothing to try to gain people's trust and doing
00:36:34.640
a lot to lose people's trust. I mean, it's your fault. It's your fault, those of you who are in those
00:36:40.280
institutions and have parroted the contradictory propaganda from those institutions. You are the
00:36:45.460
ones who have sown vaccine hesitancy. If you are on the left and you honestly think at this point
00:36:52.560
that the authoritarian threat is coming from the right, I just got to say the call is coming from
00:36:58.480
inside the house, my friend. Now is the time. Take the red pill. Open up your eyes. See what's really
00:37:05.680
going on. And get ready, by the way. It pains me to say that I don't think what's coming is going to
00:37:14.380
be good. Like, I think that people are getting pushed too far because the right is eventually
00:37:20.420
going to take back power. Of course, we'll see what crisis Democrats manufacture next year. That's
00:37:26.260
definitely coming a year from now, right before the midterms. Mark my words. They'll create something
00:37:31.180
to make sure enough people are scared into voting for them and that everyone's forgotten what a
00:37:35.760
disaster Afghanistan was. But I hope you'll remember because this new right that is coming up
00:37:43.820
and running for office really isn't like the neoconservatives of years past. The feckless
00:37:50.800
do-nothings who complain about precedents. They are watching this new group of conservatives that are
00:37:58.920
running for office. I truly think that they are watching how the left wields power
00:38:02.880
relentlessly and unapologetically while dehumanizing millions of Americans who don't make the choices
00:38:09.700
that they want them to make, gaslighting half the country into thinking that somehow, despite leftists
00:38:13.920
dominating every single national and global institution, that they, the 80 million Americans,
00:38:20.040
are the real authoritarian threats. And they're realizing this new batch of conservatives. I think
00:38:27.740
they're realizing that they don't need to be afraid to use the power of the government to accomplish
00:38:32.780
their goals in the same way that the left does so unabashedly. Leftists, you're pushing people too
00:38:39.600
far. You are. I hate to see it. I love this country. I want unity. I want peace. I want us to go along to
00:38:48.800
get along. I want us to, you know, be where we were patriotically 20 years ago. That's not where we are.
00:38:57.660
And when you have a president who is purposely stoking the flames, in a way, truly, I know that
00:39:04.000
if you're on the left, you're going to laugh at this, truly in a way that Trump never did. Like,
00:39:08.880
you can say that Trump was crass. You can say that you didn't like his rhetoric. That's fine. I didn't like
00:39:14.740
all his rhetoric. I didn't like his tweets. I could definitely see how a lot of those things
00:39:18.340
were divisive, but purposely dehumanizing and demonizing millions and millions of Americans,
00:39:26.500
mostly really because of their politics, but saying it's somehow because of public health and the
00:39:32.120
vaccine. You're just, you're pushing people too far. People don't like to be bullied. They don't like
00:39:39.000
to feel like they're being coerced. And actually, I think the coercion shows a lot more distrust
00:39:43.220
in the vaccine and creates a lot more vaccine hesitancy than anything else.
00:39:47.220
There are probably people who were considering, who were about to get the vaccine. And then they
00:39:51.600
heard that speech and they're like, yeah, right. Because honestly, the creepier you guys get about
00:39:57.400
it, the more coercive you get about it, the more there are going to be people who dig their heels in.
00:40:02.520
So for all of you sane people that exist out there, you are always asking me, what do we do?
00:40:09.100
Those of you who actually oppose this government overreach, because that's what it is.
00:40:14.360
Well, I think it's time to peacefully resist. I am not talking about resisting by not getting
00:40:23.620
the vaccine. Honestly, that's irrelevant. Do that if you want to or don't. What I'm saying is it is
00:40:28.840
time for you, if you own a company that has a hundred or more employees to do whatever you can
00:40:34.540
to loudly resist and say, no, even if a hundred percent of your employees are vaccinated, even
00:40:40.920
if you are a vaccinated person, you need to be standing up and saying, no, this is too far.
00:40:46.840
This is too authoritarianism. We're not living in this kind of country. I'm not, I choose not
00:40:51.700
to demonize and dehumanize people who make a different healthcare choice than me.
00:40:55.540
It's time for corporations to sue. It's big corporations, which I have my doubts, but that
00:41:01.560
would really change things. If the major corporation stood up and said, no, we're not going to do this.
00:41:06.160
It's time for employees to band together with other like-minded employees, again, vaccinated or not,
00:41:11.400
to approach your bosses and say, no, this is unscientific. This is unethical. We oppose this.
00:41:17.280
Now, there are several states that are already saying that they are going to defy this, that
00:41:25.440
their attorneys general are pushing back against that. So you've got pretty much all of the
00:41:32.960
Republican states, not all of them, but a lot of the Republican states like Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas,
00:41:38.980
Florida, all of the South. And then you've also got like Montana and Wyoming, North and South Dakota.
00:41:44.120
There's several that I didn't list who are going to be pushing back against this and who are going to
00:41:50.220
do their best to ensure that their companies and individuals have freedom. So it is time to push
00:41:57.340
back using every lawful and civil means that you possibly can, because in this country, I know
00:42:03.680
people are going to bring up Romans 13, that apparently we're just supposed to lie down and
00:42:07.160
be doormats, but that is not the Christian tradition. It's not. If you believe John Knox,
00:42:12.100
that resistance to tyranny is obedience to God, the great Scottish reformer, that it is simply not true
00:42:18.640
that Romans 13 means that we conform to all authoritarian measures. Again, like look back,
00:42:26.340
read the Gulag Archipelago, even just a little bit, even just a few pages of it, and you will see what
00:42:31.980
happens when Christians wade into complacency in the name of just, I don't know, abiding by Romans 13.
00:42:41.440
Here's the deal. In this country, our government is of the people for the people by the people.
00:42:46.640
The people in charge, our representatives, our elected officials work for us. They are in
00:42:52.600
subservience to the law of the land, which is the constitution. Their powers are bound by the
00:42:57.800
constitution. And when they act outside of those bounds, it is they who are disobeying our nation's
00:43:03.200
authority, not us, who are trying to abide by and preserve the constitution. Lex rex means law.
00:43:11.640
The law is king. That has been a part of the Christian tradition and understanding of how
00:43:16.780
governments should work for a long time, that we are not ruled under a monarch, but actually,
00:43:22.760
even the people in charge, our elected officials, our public servants, are actually bound by the law
00:43:29.520
of the land. And that, that is what we are supposed to abide by. And so those who are actually
00:43:36.640
violating Romans 13 are those who are trying to violate the constitution, those of us who are
00:43:42.900
trying to abide by the constitution and are saying, whoa, whoa, whoa, executive branch, you don't,
00:43:49.360
you don't have the power, federal government, you don't have the power to tell states what to do in
00:43:53.360
this way. You don't have the power to tell companies what to do in this way. We are actually trying to
00:43:59.980
obey the authority in the land, which is the constitution. And so I simply do not think that
00:44:07.340
Romans 13, which also says that the people in power are supposed to be servants of God. I do not
00:44:13.340
think that means that we just have to accept tyranny. Again, you can look at the 20th century and see what
00:44:19.340
happens when Christians become complacent about this kind of stuff. I think that you have to wake up at
00:44:28.700
some point. And maybe this isn't the time for you. Maybe you're not waking up yet. Maybe you still
00:44:33.260
have, you think that the intentions of this administration and the people in charge are
00:44:38.120
good. Maybe you truly think it's for public health. I think that you should probably just
00:44:41.920
spend some time asking like, what will be too far? What will be too far? So when they start to say,
00:44:47.760
hey, you got to get your kids under 12 vaccinated, and they don't tell you what the possible risks are,
00:44:54.180
and we don't look at the numbers, I guarantee you the teachers unions will be pushing hard for
00:44:58.540
that, no matter what the side effects of the vaccine may be for kids. And they threaten you
00:45:03.560
with the power of the state. And they say, for example, the Department of Education somehow coerces
00:45:09.540
all of the public school districts, or tries to coerce the public school districts to require
00:45:14.920
COVID vaccination for all kids as young as kindergarten or as young as preschool. And they say,
00:45:23.820
okay, if you don't abide by this, there will be some sort of punishment, either for the school
00:45:30.220
district, and maybe even in some more liberal states, maybe there will be individual punishment.
00:45:34.900
If they start taking, I'm not saying that this is going to happen. I'm not saying that this is going
00:45:38.760
to come down the pipeline. I'm just saying, you need to think about how far is too far. If they say,
00:45:44.760
okay, if you don't get your two year old vaccinated, CPS is going to show up at your house,
00:45:49.320
again, in a liberal state, that wouldn't happen probably in a Republican state. Will that be too
00:45:55.380
far? Will you see then that maybe this isn't all about loving your neighbor? Will you see then that
00:46:00.840
maybe this isn't really about public health? I don't know. Just consider that. Just consider how
00:46:06.660
far will be too far for you before you realize, oh, hey, maybe I shouldn't just trust the state
00:46:14.500
with our well-being. Maybe rights matter. Maybe freedom does actually matter.
00:46:22.040
And look, I understand. I was naive about all of this in the beginning. I was one of those people
00:46:27.340
who was saying, oh my gosh, if you don't stay inside, then you're not loving your neighbor back
00:46:31.960
when we thought that this had like a 20% death rate. I said some things that now looking back make
00:46:38.320
me cringe. It took me a little bit to realize, okay, yes, it's still a real virus. And yes,
00:46:44.060
the threat is real, but so is the threat of tyranny. And so is illogical public policy that is being used
00:46:51.640
to control people and wreck the economy. And I've got to have some balance here. So if you're still one
00:46:57.840
of those people, I've been there. I understand. Okay. I am a germaphobe. I am a hypochondriac. I don't
00:47:03.500
want to get sick. I don't want anyone that I love to get seriously ill. And so I totally understand
00:47:10.140
that fear, but you have to understand there are other risks in life. There are other risks in life.
00:47:15.780
We have come a long way from Patrick Henry's give me liberty or give me death and a long way,
00:47:22.560
not in a good way, unfortunately. I do want to, I'm going to end with a couple of things. I'm going to
00:47:29.920
end with some encouragement, but I'm also going to speak to one thing about the mark of the beast.
00:47:35.500
We've talked about before how I don't believe in my reading of scripture that the mark of the beast
00:47:39.740
is the vaccine, obviously, and I don't believe it's the vaccine passport. Now, I am a post-trib
00:47:48.340
pre-millennial, so that means that I believe that Christians who are alive in the Great Tribulation
00:47:53.320
will live through the Great Tribulation. I think Jesus will come back after the Great Tribulation.
00:47:59.920
But I believe things are going, it's like the worst eschatology, the saddest eschatology that
00:48:05.320
you can have, because I believe things are getting worse and worse. And I also believe that Christians
00:48:09.340
are not going to be raptured before the Tribulation. Now, I feel like I function as a post-mill
00:48:18.340
person. And if you don't know what I mean, that's totally fine. I will link, I've done three episodes
00:48:24.340
on this. I've done three episodes on eschatology, on what the end times kind of look like. And so
00:48:28.860
I will link those three past episodes in the description, and you can listen to that.
00:48:34.540
But so mark of the beast, I don't think either of those things are the mark of the beast. But
00:48:39.540
what this whole thing has shown me is how easy it will be to get people to take the mark of the beast.
00:48:46.500
So this will be a mark that you have to have that will show your allegiance to the Antichrist.
00:48:51.000
You can't take the mark of the beast and also be a Christian, as far as my understanding of
00:48:56.900
Scripture goes, and you will need this mark to buy or to sell. That's what Revelation tells us.
00:49:03.180
And what I'm seeing is that it's going to be so easy to manipulate people into getting this. I guess
00:49:11.780
I always just imagined that it would be so obvious that we would be able to see, oh, see, that's the
00:49:16.820
mark. I'm not taking that. And we would just be able to kind of stand off to the side and, I don't
00:49:21.700
know, do our thing. But now I'm realizing there will be people who are professing Christians who
00:49:27.500
will be used as a mouthpiece for the mark of the beast, and that we are going to be told that taking
00:49:32.400
the mark is just loving your neighbor. And if you don't take the mark, you're a threat to public
00:49:35.780
health, and you're a threat to safety, and that you are going to be demonized and dehumanized as
00:49:41.100
other, trying to push to the margin of societies, and your health care is going to be threatened,
00:49:45.800
your family is going to be threatened, and it's going to seem a heck of a whole lot easier
00:49:50.580
if you just take the mark. And you might even start to question, well, am I a threat to public
00:49:55.840
health? Am I a threat to society if I don't take this mark? Again, I'm not saying that either of
00:50:00.280
these things are the mark of the beast. I don't think that they are. I'm just saying that this is
00:50:04.540
a good lesson for all of us for when that day comes, if it comes in our lifetimes, that we can
00:50:11.680
remember. We can think back, and maybe we should be asking. Maybe we should be asking the Lord
00:50:16.480
to help us remember this, and maybe this is actually a blessing. Maybe we are actually,
00:50:24.120
He is giving us something to be thankful for that we are seeing, oh, so this is how it's going to go
00:50:29.280
down. There's going to be articles, and there's going to be videos from our favorite Christian
00:50:34.620
writers and pastors talking about how taking the mark is actually just loving our neighbor, how it's
00:50:41.160
actually the righteous thing to do, how we actually don't love God and don't love Christ if we are not
00:50:46.320
taking the mark of the beast. So that's something to keep in mind. I will say the people today who
00:50:51.120
are saying that getting the vaccine or wearing three masks or whatever it is is loving your neighbor.
00:50:57.540
So Jesus says that the most important commands are to love God and love your neighbor. Those are the
00:51:02.480
marks of a Christian, and love doesn't just mean feel-good vibes. Love doesn't just mean having
00:51:09.380
affection towards your neighbor. It actually doesn't mean that at all. It means seeking their
00:51:13.620
best interest according to what God says is their best interest. It means speaking the truth in love.
00:51:18.900
It means trying to share the gospel with them, trying to meet their actual needs. It doesn't just mean
00:51:24.200
endless acceptance and affirmation because that's not what we see in Scripture. But the people who are
00:51:31.220
saying basically then that in order to really be a Christian, in order to fulfill the greatest
00:51:36.500
commandments that Jesus tells us we have to follow in order to be his disciples, you have to get the
00:51:41.340
vaccine, when Scripture is very clear that stewardship of our bodies as a dwelling place for the Holy Spirit,
00:51:48.820
as 1 Corinthians says, is our responsibility, they are just like the Pharisees. They are putting
00:51:58.420
burdens on people to try to tell them that this is how you have to be holy. This is how you have to
00:52:04.740
follow Christ. You have to take these particular public health measures, even if you've had
00:52:09.580
COVID before, even if you have done the calculations and you don't think it makes sense to you, even if
00:52:15.760
you have some kind of underlying condition that makes getting the vaccine unsafe, you have Christians
00:52:20.360
professing Christians saying that in order to truly be a Christian and follow Christ, you have to do that.
00:52:25.080
You're a Pharisee. That's exactly, exactly what the Pharisees did. They raised the standard of
00:52:31.340
righteousness and holiness to an impossible place. And the people who were trying to follow those
00:52:39.320
standards to meet the higher and higher standards could never reach them. They were demoralized.
00:52:43.800
They were oppressed by these outward standards of righteousness that actually had nothing to do
00:52:50.020
with a heart that really loved God. And that's what Jesus said when he came along. He said,
00:52:54.820
you are whitewashed tombs. You are a brood of vipers. You are hypocrites. You look good on the
00:53:00.940
outside, but inside you are decaying. You are doing all of these public demonstrations of supposed
00:53:06.300
righteousness, but your hearts are far from God. Jesus came to fulfill the law and to say,
00:53:11.640
no, true sin starts on the inside. True righteousness starts on the inside. It starts with faith. And so,
00:53:19.240
um, you're a Pharisee. You are, it's, it's very, uh, brood of vipers energy. It's very like whitewashed
00:53:25.800
tomb vibes. The people who are saying that in order to be a true Christian, you have to take
00:53:31.200
the vaccine chapter and verse chapter and verse, my friend. All right. Uh, let me give you some
00:53:38.300
comfort. Okay. Let me give you some comfort. Yesterday I spoke to a bunch of pregnancy center,
00:53:42.600
um, directors, and they've got, uh, a lot of work that they are handling right now as they have,
00:53:48.000
um, just maybe an unprecedented number of women coming in, in crisis who are trying to figure out
00:53:55.280
what to do. They have an unwanted pregnancy. They have a surprise pregnancy and they need help.
00:53:59.780
Pregnancy directors, people who volunteer at pregnancy centers, truly just like a selfless,
00:54:06.160
selfless, uh, ambassadors for Christ, the most loving and selfless and sacrificial people in the
00:54:12.100
world. You need to look up your local pro-life pregnancy center and you need to donate and you need to,
00:54:17.160
um, you need to volunteer by the way, but I was talking to them just about the moment that we're
00:54:22.220
in, um, and how being on the front lines of compassion and serving the least of these and
00:54:28.620
sharing the gospel and providing hope for people. Like that is why God placed us here when and where
00:54:34.740
he did. I know that a lot of you are scared right now. I know a lot of you are scared for your kids.
00:54:39.100
I know a lot of you are scared for the future. You don't like where this country is headed and you
00:54:43.640
don't know how you're going to be able to hang on and you're, you're worried. You're anxious.
00:54:48.200
I understand. But when Jesus tells us in Matthew 6, in Matthew 10, that we're not to be anxious,
00:54:54.160
that God takes care of us, that not a hair, uh, from our heads is going to fall apart from the
00:55:00.840
knowledge and will of the father, that not a sparrow can fall from the sky apart from the will of the
00:55:04.700
father, that we are going to have all of our needs met, that all we have to do is seek first his
00:55:10.180
kingdom and his righteousness. And all of these things are going to be added unto us. When he
00:55:13.620
tells us those things, uh, he knew everything that was going to happen. He knew everything that
00:55:19.120
we were going to endure. When he decided, um, that I was going to be born on February 18th,
00:55:24.400
1992, when he decided that you were going to be born whenever you were born, he knew exactly what
00:55:29.820
you would endure. He knew exactly what your kids would have to endure. He knew exactly what was coming.
00:55:34.240
He's sovereign over all of it. And he did not place you when and where he did by mistake.
00:55:39.260
He didn't make your kids born when and where he did by mistake. It's not serendipitous. It's not
00:55:45.840
coincidental. It's not accidental. He is sovereign over all of it. He is in control of all of it. He
00:55:51.980
doesn't come in and clean up the mess after. He doesn't, um, look down and say, how did you guys
00:55:57.420
get yourself into this mess? Or I didn't see that coming. He is not shocked. He is not surprised.
00:56:02.120
Nothing takes God off his throne. He is totally and completely in charge. And he's not just waiting
00:56:07.300
around to see what's going to happen. But Psalm 37 says that one day evildoers will be no more,
00:56:13.420
that we shouldn't fret, that we shouldn't be worried that he is going to take care of it.
00:56:16.860
We know that he is going to trample the enemy and all of his enemies under his feet, that one day he
00:56:24.080
is going to rule finally, totally, completely in perfect peace and perfect righteousness. And all we
00:56:30.300
have to do until then is trust and obey. We have to speak the truth in love. We have to be bold and
00:56:37.320
standing for what is good and what is right and what is true. Politics doesn't become our idol. It
00:56:43.540
doesn't get us down. It doesn't steal our joy. It doesn't depress or oppress us. Yes, we stay in the
00:56:49.920
know in what's going on. Yes, we use every peaceful means possible, um, for the sake of not just ourselves,
00:56:56.300
but also our children and our neighbors to try to preserve personal liberty. I actually do think
00:57:00.800
that is a way, a way to be loving to our neighbors. Um, and we have to trust that he is totally and
00:57:11.940
completely in charge. And that's what gives us our joy. And like, let's be a little motivated. Like
00:57:16.720
let's have a little fire inside of us to share the gospel, um, knowing that he is coming back. I don't
00:57:22.780
know if it's soon. I don't know if it's in a thousand years, but knowing that all we have to
00:57:27.580
do today, as Elizabeth Elliott said, the thing that gives her peace or gave her peace when she
00:57:32.240
woke up every day was all you have to do today is the will of God. Everything that is before you,
00:57:38.400
you do in obedience and you do in joy and you do in courage. We need courage and clarity right now.
00:57:44.060
Now is not a time for waffling. Now is not a time for cowardice. Now is a time if you're a pastor,
00:57:48.980
if you're a professor, if you are just a person, uh, now is the time for clarity and courage.
00:57:55.600
Know what you believe, know why you believe it, be willing to say it and come what may.
00:58:00.840
You were made for this. You were made for this time. Your kids were made for this time. I'm excited
00:58:05.280
about it. I hate what's happening in a lot of ways, but I believe that God was providential,
00:58:10.620
that he was very specific when he put us when and where he did. It's not an accident. That means
00:58:17.480
that we were made for this time, for this day, for a specific reason, and in all things to glorify
00:58:22.940
him. Let me read you a little bit, uh, from the Heidelberg Catechism to finish up. What is your
00:58:28.800
only comfort in life and in death? By the way, we should be catechizing ourselves and our children,
00:58:34.660
making them memorize this stuff too. What is your only comfort in life and in death? That I am not my own,
00:58:40.180
but I belong body and soul in life and in death to my faithful savior, Jesus Christ. He has fully
00:58:47.620
paid for all my sins with his precious blood and has set me free from the tyranny of the devil.
00:58:53.620
He also watches over me in such a way that not a hair can fall from my head without the will of
00:58:58.380
my father in heaven. In fact, all things must work together for my salvation because I belong to him.
00:59:05.120
Christ, by his Holy Spirit, assures me of eternal life and makes me wholeheartedly willing and ready
00:59:12.360
from now on to live for him. Yes and amen. That is our only comfort in life and in death. So all we have
00:59:20.860
to do is trust and obey. He's got us. He's got it. I don't know how this all turns out, but I do know
00:59:28.080
that God is ruling in perfect justice and righteousness, and I can trust him completely.
00:59:33.080
All right. That's all I've got time for today. We'll be back here on Monday. I hope that you
00:59:40.260
have a meaningful time with your family, honoring the lives that were lost, the sacrifices that were
00:59:44.960
made on 9-11 20 years ago, that you take the time to remind your kids of what happened and why freedom
00:59:51.000
matters so much and is always one generation away from extinction. All right. See you guys back here next week.