Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 576 ｜ The Secret Deal that Made Biden President & Wrecked America ｜ Guest： Victor Davis Hanson

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, happy Thursday. Welcome to Relatable. This episode, as all episodes, is brought to you

00:00:05.960 by Good Ranchers. Better than organic chicken, craft beef, sit right to your front door. That's

00:00:11.520 American meat delivered. Go to GoodRanchers.com slash Allie. That's GoodRanchers.com slash Allie.

00:00:18.180 Okay, guys, today we are talking to one of my favorite people on the planet and definitely

00:00:33.600 one of my favorite guests, and that is Victor Davis Hanson. He is a historian. He has been on

00:00:41.420 this podcast several times giving us his incredible political insight. Today, we're going to talk about

00:00:47.480 a few things. We are going to talk a little bit more about the State of the Union. We're going to

00:00:51.160 spend some time talking about Kamala Harris, like what the heck is she even saying or doing? And we

00:00:56.680 are also going to talk about Ukraine and Russia. He's just got a lot of interesting things to say.

00:01:02.760 I think he provides insight like no one else. I don't think that you can get the kind of wisdom

00:01:08.260 that you get from Victor Davis Hanson, from any other political commentator. And so I'm super

00:01:14.520 excited for what you are going to gain from this conversation because it's a lot.

00:01:18.480 But I'm going to talk about at least one thing, maybe a couple things before we actually get into

00:01:23.140 that conversation. It's a fairly quick conversation, about 30 minutes. Then I'll have some things to say

00:01:27.360 after it as well. But I saw this clip circulating that I wanted to show you guys from Ron DeSantis,

00:01:33.860 Republican governor of Florida. I know a lot of you guys really love him, as do I. He has really

00:01:39.480 been leading the way against the anti-scientific COVID hysteria. He, his attorney, or not his

00:01:47.380 attorney general, but his surgeon general in Florida have really been trying to push the actual

00:01:54.820 science when it comes to vaccination and when it comes to masks and mask mandates. They have really

00:02:02.580 been pushing against mandatory masking in schools because they know the data just doesn't support that

00:02:08.940 nonsense. And so he was at an event yesterday and there were kids behind him for this event where

00:02:15.780 he was giving a speech and they were wearing masks and he says, just stop it. So let me play you that

00:02:21.840 clip. You do not have to wear those masks. I mean, please take it off. Honestly, it's not doing

00:02:27.620 anything and we got to stop with this COVID theater. So if you want to wear it, fine, but this is

00:02:32.260 this is ridiculous. All right. Well, it's good to be at USF. So he was obviously genuinely frustrated 0.92

00:02:41.500 there. And I actually love that. I love that the frustration with the COVID theater is genuine. That

00:02:46.600 means he feels like you and I do. Like we feel the same frustration about that. When we see kids

00:02:51.740 wearing masks, we want to say the same thing. A lot of times we don't. I actually know some people who do

00:02:57.060 say something. I think one of you guys messaged me that you said something to someone in a grocery

00:03:01.880 store who's like three year old child was wearing a mask. And then when you saw them again, they

00:03:05.680 weren't wearing a mask. And so I'm not saying that we need to like pry into people's lives. I believe in

00:03:11.080 the people having the option to do what they want to do. I completely disagree with you masking your

00:03:15.440 child. And I don't think the mask over your mouth and nose is doing anything either. But I liked that he

00:03:21.700 was this frustrated. I saw some people saying, you know, this is the kind of nagging tone that

00:03:27.340 conservatives don't like from the left when it comes from the other direction, you know, nagging

00:03:32.440 people, finger wagging, saying you need to wear masks. And Ron DeSantis is kind of doing that too,

00:03:36.680 except for on the other side. And I just I don't see it that way. I think that he is on the correct

00:03:43.140 side, obviously. And he's on the scientific side. And he's tired of seeing these meaningless virtue

00:03:49.040 signals when it comes to kids. And it also just to be fair, it's not necessarily a great look

00:03:55.000 because he has fought against the the masking of children. And then he's at this event and children

00:04:00.920 are being masked behind him or teenagers rather. Some of these kids, when he says this, they take

00:04:06.580 off the masks and they kind of smile at the camera. And I'm like, I love it. And then you have other kids

00:04:12.160 who I think are like dutifully standing there and they have their masks on and they're not going to

00:04:16.920 take their mask off. And what's sad is I've heard from several of you that your child, not your child,

00:04:24.380 but kids in maybe your child's class, even after masks have become optional, that they are continuing

00:04:30.380 to wear them. Yes, because there has been psychological damage that has been inflicted on kids for the

00:04:37.880 past couple of years where they're paranoid, they're scared, even though their little flimsy cloth

00:04:43.000 Spider-Man mask isn't doing anything. Their parent has told them this is how you protect yourself from

00:04:48.800 dying. This is how you protect mommy and daddy and grandma and grandpa from dying. This is how you be

00:04:53.840 a good person. The people who don't wear a mask are bad people. And this is a virus out there that could

00:05:00.220 kill you if you don't wear this mask. And so, of course, that's just going to go away. Kids can't even

00:05:05.580 process how all of a sudden the science changed to where they don't have to wear this apparently

00:05:11.680 life-saving device that is indicative of their love for people. And so, you're going to see kids,

00:05:18.620 teenagers, unfortunately, wear these masks for a long time. We've talked about many times the

00:05:23.540 consequences of covering your mouth when you're trying to communicate and understand people's

00:05:29.100 emotions. I don't even think we can quantify the negative ramifications that this will have on kids

00:05:34.480 for years to come. I say good for Ron DeSantis. I like this attitude about masking kids from him.

00:05:41.540 This, to me, was a point in his favor. I don't care what people say that they didn't like the tone.

00:05:46.820 You know what? This has been going on for too long. It's about time someone took it seriously and,

00:05:52.400 again, reflected the frustrations that we have. So, you know what? Good for Ron DeSantis. I like Ron

00:05:59.760 DeSantis. We were just talking before the camera turned on whether or not we think that Ron DeSantis

00:06:03.760 is going to run for president. Look, I think Trump has made it pretty clear that he is going to run.

00:06:10.660 I think he made it clear on this show. He basically said, you know, I can't announce anything because

00:06:17.180 of different rules, but I think you're going to be very happy. That's what he told us when I

00:06:21.980 interviewed him. If you haven't listened to that, you definitely should. It's a very intriguing,

00:06:25.760 very Trump interview, if you know what I mean. So, I think that he is going to run.

00:06:31.720 If I am Ron DeSantis, I probably don't want to run against Donald Trump. Look,

00:06:36.700 Donald Trump is going to play dirty. It doesn't matter how much he may have liked you before.

00:06:39.980 If you are his opponent, he is going to get down into the mud. And that could possibly hurt a person's

00:06:45.340 political career forever. Maybe not, but it possibly could. And Ron DeSantis probably doesn't

00:06:50.680 want to pit supporters of him against supporters of Donald Trump or himself against supporters of

00:06:57.020 Donald Trump. And he's doing really well as the governor of Florida. I'm thinking that he might

00:07:03.200 be thinking, I have no idea. I don't have any special insight into this, but he might be thinking,

00:07:06.620 you know what? I'm going to give Florida four more years. I'm going to get overwhelmingly reelected,

00:07:10.780 which I think he absolutely will. So, why don't I just stay here and we'll see what happens? I mean,

00:07:16.300 he's young. He's in his early 40s. That is several lifetimes younger than Joe Biden,

00:07:23.700 who was alive during the Civil War. So, I think that, you know, he might have some cushion.

00:07:28.660 On the other hand, maybe he should take advantage of the momentum that he has right now. And maybe

00:07:34.160 he should just go for it. I don't know. Thank goodness I'm not a political advisor. I just know

00:07:38.980 that I like the guy. He seems like a fighter to me. He has been on the right side of every issue that

00:07:46.000 I've seen so far as Florida governor. I don't think we ever put too much hope and too much stock in

00:07:51.180 any politician. But I like what I see so far. I do hope that one day we see him as president of

00:07:57.300 the United States. I think that would be a huge blessing. As of right now, that's my vantage point.

00:08:02.500 That's what I see. And I just liked, I liked this clip. I liked his frustration because I feel the

00:08:07.040 same way, Ron DeSantis. Thank you so much for joining us again. I am curious about your reaction,

00:08:15.760 your response to what seemed to me as an appeal to the center or center right during Biden's

00:08:23.380 State of the Union when he talked about funding the police, securing the border, buying American, 0.92

00:08:30.120 opening the schools, all these things that I think you and I agree with, but he doesn't actually seem

00:08:35.320 to agree with when you look at his policies. Why do you think that he decided on that approach when

00:08:40.460 it came to the State of the Union? Well, I mean, he just threw out, it would be as if as conservatives

00:08:47.920 and we were up for, we were politicians and we were up for reelection in the sense of our party was in

00:08:55.200 the midterms. And we knew the conservatives are going to be wiped out because then nobody liked our

00:08:59.820 agenda. And yet we wouldn't change it. We would say we want to raise taxes. I agree with that. Or we

00:09:06.500 would say things like, we've got to embrace the new Green Deal. But we wouldn't give any details and

00:09:13.080 we wouldn't mean it. They were just fill up, just throw out lines. And that's what he was doing.

00:09:17.440 Because if he really meant that, he would have given a systemic analysis. He could have said,

00:09:23.660 like the German chancellor, we've got to produce more nuclear power. We've got to open up ANWR. We've

00:09:29.500 got to open new leases on federal lands for gas and oil fracking. He could have said, we need the

00:09:36.460 Keystone pipeline to be completed. We need more liquid natural gas terminals to help Europe out.

00:09:43.440 We can OK the East Med pipeline with Israel Cyprus. In Greece, it'll bring billions of cubic feet of 0.73

00:09:50.300 natural gas to Italy. He didn't do any of that because he doesn't believe it. He doesn't want to.

00:09:55.660 And he knows even if he wanted to, he couldn't because he made a devil's bargain in 2020 with

00:10:02.760 a hard left. And the deal was that Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren or Cory Booker or Kamala Harris

00:10:10.440 could not be elected. And he had a veneer of moderation that they didn't. And then they went

00:10:16.120 to him and said, you can't win without us. And so you carry us over the finish line. You get to be

00:10:22.180 president. We get the agenda. And I think that's where we are. Yeah. You know, that actually leads

00:10:27.040 perfectly to my next question, because I've heard you talk about this before, this kind of Faustian

00:10:31.400 bargain that got Biden elected. And just from the outside, I looked at the primary and I said,

00:10:39.180 I'm not sure how it's possible how you come in fourth in the Iowa caucus and then somehow you become

00:10:43.400 the nominee. Can you talk a little bit more about that? I know you said that, OK, it was kind of the

00:10:50.140 hard left saying we know that we can't get elected. You can. So basically, they said you

00:10:55.160 have to kind of represent the issues that we represent. We just kind of need your face and

00:11:00.420 good old trustworthy Joe to win the election. And then you can kind of govern from the left in

00:11:06.820 in your estimation. That's kind of why he has governed the way that he has. Right.

00:11:11.680 Yeah, I think when he went into South Carolina and was going to lose the nomination,

00:11:16.100 probably. And then Nevada after then, James Clyburn pretty much told him, we're going to get

00:11:21.920 a monolithic African-American vote, 30 or 40 percent of the electorate.

00:11:26.640 And they were not going to vote for Pete Buttigieg. They were not going to vote for

00:11:31.660 Beto had dropped out. So they told Joe Biden, you're going to be the minority back candidate,

00:11:38.880 but we expect certain things of you. And you're not going to go back to the old Joe Biden from

00:11:44.360 Scranton that used to talk about tough on crime or your mother was endangered by criminal predators

00:11:51.520 or drug addict. None of that anymore. And so that's what I you know, when we're talking about

00:11:57.800 Joe Biden, it's kind of cruel to say, but that's kind of a construct. Joe Biden is 79. He's a very

00:12:03.820 old 79. Some people, 79 or 59 and some are 99. And Joe happens to be one that's 99.

00:12:09.580 Right. And so to the degree that he knows exactly what predicament he's in, I think it's overseen or

00:12:17.420 arranged by Jill, Jill Biden, his wife, and Ron Klain, his chief of staff. I think the Obamas play a

00:12:24.020 prominent role as well. Yeah. I'm curious kind of what Kamala thinks of all of this, because if you

00:12:30.160 watch her, even during the State of the Union, there was one point, I don't know if everyone who's

00:12:34.640 listening to this caught this when he said something about the spirit of the Iranian people.

00:12:39.200 Yes. And he meant to say Ukraine and she was behind him. And she just kind of mouthed Ukrainian.

00:12:45.360 And it seems to me, at least behind the mask that she's typically wearing, that she is really biting

00:12:51.140 her tongue when Joe Biden says stuff like this. There was after his Supreme Court nominee, she gave

00:12:57.360 a speech the other day. And Joe Biden got up and he said, Oh, I forgot to introduce the second

00:13:02.760 gentleman. And it feels really strange saying that. I mean, he said that publicly, which is just kind

00:13:07.500 of awkward. And you could just see Kamala Harris kind of gritting her teeth, trying not to say 0.97

00:13:12.660 anything. I don't know if you have any special insight. But what do you think that she's thinking

00:13:16.280 as she sees this person who is basically a puppet trying to lead the free world?

00:13:21.420 Well, I think she's saying that she feels that she is playing a very important role. Because remember,

00:13:29.480 he did with her what he did with our latest chief Supreme Court justice nomination, he said it was

00:13:36.460 going to have a black woman. And when you survey the landscape of prominent senators or governors that

00:13:43.020 usually are nominated for vice presidents, that she was the only person available, really. And she feels

00:13:49.900 that she's done him a great favor. And she feels also that he's an embarrassment. But he also she's angry 0.97

00:14:00.440 at him because she's kind of playing the role. Remember Susan Rice? And during the Benghazi, just to take

00:14:07.020 one example, whenever there was a mess, Hillary didn't go out there. And Obama himself didn't go out

00:14:14.400 there. And they would get Susan Rice, and she would go out and lie about Benghazi five times in one day,

00:14:21.380 she would, you know, she would tell everybody that, oh, this was a, you know, it was not Al Qaeda. It

00:14:31.380 was not it was just a spontaneous riot, etc, etc. Mad about a video rather than a hit. And she lied and

00:14:39.620 downplayed. And then when it was about Syria, she said, you know, all the WMD are out, they weren't,

00:14:47.260 she knew that, and etc, etc. So the in Kamala Harris's frame of mind, she's a black woman, and they use 0.93

00:14:56.700 her to do the dirty work to damage her. And that means they send her to the border, or they know that 0.97

00:15:03.340 she knows nothing about foreign affairs. So they send her over to bulk up NATO, or they have her 0.86

00:15:09.420 explained to children almost, you know, kind of like a infantile fashion. This is a Ukraine, it's a 0.98

00:15:16.060 country in Europe. And it's not as big. And then there's Russia. And it makes her look foolish. And

00:15:24.100 so I think they get back, I have, they have a very sick relationship. I think she is, her staff hints

00:15:30.160 that Joe is not capable cognitively, and his staff says that she is, but she doesn't know anything.

00:15:37.020 Hmm. And it's, and she's done him a great favor in a way that's kind of perverse in the sense that

00:15:43.360 she's playing the role of, when I was younger, Spiro Agnew, and that everybody thought Nixon should

00:15:49.720 resign. But until Spiro Agnew suddenly was indicted for all this fraud, when he was involved in Baltimore

00:15:57.220 politics, nobody wanted to have Nixon resign that year, because they thought Agnew just couldn't and

00:16:03.140 shouldn't, and would never conceivably be president. And they kind of thought that Nixon was smirking

00:16:08.140 and had appointed him for that reason, in case he ever got in trouble, they would, you don't want a

00:16:13.840 good, strong vice president. And of course, when Nixon had to go, then all of a sudden, there were

00:16:20.260 federal attorneys that came out of nowhere and said, Oh, by the way, I remember that way, way back when,

00:16:26.080 uh, Spiro Agnew was a cook. And I, we just found out new information. So we're going to try him.

00:16:31.920 And then he had to resign. As soon as he resigned, they could impeach Nixon. Uh, and they got a new

00:16:37.300 vice president that was suitable, Jerry Ford. But, uh, I think that's, she does him a great favor. If,

00:16:44.040 if you had a mainstream democratic mainstream, I don't know who that would be. I'm not fond of very

00:16:52.120 many of them, but say somebody like Chuck Schumer was vice president right now, there would be a lot

00:16:57.200 of calls for Biden within the party to step down. Right. But they, but they know that Kamala Harris

00:17:03.640 is an electoral disaster. She didn't get one vote, not one vote in the primaries, not one delegate, 0.93

00:17:10.400 not one delegate. And they know that. And there's a reason why she's off putting, she's socially inept. 1.00

00:17:16.040 She, she has no frame of knowledge or reference to, to, to seem experienced or, or detailed or 0.84

00:17:24.400 knowledgeable. It's sad, but here in California, anybody who watched her career knew that she never

00:17:30.200 really had to go out into the arena, so to speak, and debate people and, and show, and be judged on

00:17:37.160 her marriage. She was either a consort of Willie Brown and got appointed to all these, uh, state boards.

00:17:42.540 And then she got the San Francisco elite to get her financer to be city or then county attorney and

00:17:48.880 then attorney general. So it was always handed to her. Yeah. Right. I've heard a lot of people that

00:17:54.600 know a lot about California politics, just express their shock. Even Democrats say that they were

00:17:59.940 shocked when she was appointed to this position. Um, not that they were surprised that Joe Biden would

00:18:06.120 make this pick, but just looking at her career, how she got to where she is, it's just kind of crazy,

00:18:11.060 but unfortunately to be expected. Uh, she recently was giving a speech and we don't have the clip

00:18:16.460 right now, um, where she amazingly said, I'm sure Republicans are going to use this in their campaign

00:18:22.400 ads who said, you know, uh, when you vote, you order for something. And right now the American people

00:18:29.120 are getting what they ordered in voting for Joe Biden. Now, of course that means, okay, they ordered

00:18:35.140 inflation, uh, inflation, they ordered unrest. They ordered to pay more, uh, at the gas pump and

00:18:42.020 having a harder time feeding their family. And so I guess they ordered all of those things and they

00:18:46.020 got it. Um, what do you, what do you think of that? Is this just another example of her just kind 0.99

00:18:52.420 of being politically incompetent? I mean, what was going through her mind? Do you think when she

00:18:57.220 actually said that out loud? Well, I think she, I think you're, you're right that she's politically

00:19:03.700 incompetent, but there's a side of all of us who think, well, she's not that politically incompetent.

00:19:09.640 In other words, when Joe Biden gives these addresses, how great everything is going and she knows

00:19:15.720 that they're not, then she says, well, you got everything you wanted and he's, he's not going to

00:19:22.140 go say to her, what do you mean? And she's going to say to him, well, you just went through all the

00:19:26.740 things you've done. You're great inflation, you're great energy spikes, you're great Afghanistan 1.00

00:19:30.860 flight, you're, you're great open border. So I'm just doing what you do, supporting you. And she knows

00:19:36.320 that when she says it, it's an indirect criticism, sarcastic of him, but yeah, there's some part of

00:19:43.120 that. I think, I think it's going to get, if the midterms come out as they are and that, and if Joe Biden,

00:19:51.120 he seems to be, I don't want to be too cruel, but he seems to be declining geometrically rather than

00:19:57.500 arithmetically. And by that, I mean every two week period, he seems more flustered than he was the two

00:20:03.920 week period before and before. And if that coincides in November and they lose 60 seats, say, or five or

00:20:11.040 six sentence, there's going to be a big call in that democratic party to do something because they

00:20:17.340 have a, they have a, they're going to look at something that could be like 1932, where they,

00:20:22.640 they don't just lose the house and Senate in 2022, but they lose them in 2024 with super majorities

00:20:31.800 in the Senate and huge margins in the house and a Republican president that could do almost anything

00:20:38.540 they wanted. There'd be no way to stop them. And they know that. And so they're going to have to

00:20:43.160 take measures. And I don't know, they're not to that point yet. They don't turn on the squad that

00:20:47.800 got them in this trouble. They won't question Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, or those people. But

00:20:52.580 I think in the midterm, it's going to be pretty clear what these people have done to them.

00:20:58.020 Yeah. I think that's probably part of the reason, at least in my opinion, why

00:21:01.320 a lot of these democratic states are rolling back on the mask mandates and the restrictions. They say

00:21:06.680 we're rooted in science. I guess the science has changed in a matter of a week or so. The science on

00:21:11.540 masks changed the day before the State of the Union and Congress, of course. It seems to be

00:21:16.920 all kind of playing into that, that they know a lot of the things that they have done are deeply

00:21:20.400 unpopular. They want to be able to win the midterms. The State of the Union, to me, he was,

00:21:25.500 it was a fake appeal to the center right, just like his campaign. He wanted them to believe that

00:21:29.960 he's moderate. It also showed me that he understands that the majority of Americans are still

00:21:36.780 pretty conservative. I mean, you don't give a State of the Union where you talk about funding the

00:21:41.240 police and securing the border and buying American, unless you think a large portion of your audience

00:21:46.780 is going to get on board with that and be excited about that. My fear is that we have a lot of

00:21:51.960 Americans who are going to be duped yet again into thinking Democrats are moderate, that this is the

00:21:57.240 only way to save democracy, and that they are going to forget the heck that we've been through over the

00:22:02.360 past few years, largely because of democratic policies. I mean, what are the chances,

00:22:07.480 do you think, are of people kind of forgetting the blunder that is Joe Biden in the Democratic Party

00:22:15.640 and come midterm say, you know what, life is pretty good now. Things are back to normal. I think I am

00:22:21.520 going to continue to vote Democrat and support Joe Biden. Well, you know, I can only, as a historian,

00:22:26.980 I just look at what Bill Clinton did. He got wiped out in the 92 midterms. Terrible.

00:22:32.240 Almost as bad as Barack Obama. And it was largely because of Hillary care. And then he triangulated.

00:22:38.160 He had Dick Morris sneak in the back of the White House every day. And he came out in his State of

00:22:45.200 the Union after that election and said that, you know, the era of big government is over. We're going

00:22:50.920 to have 1000, 100,000 police officers on the street. We're going to pay for school uniforms. These

00:22:58.240 were all, you know, just fluff stuff. But he did. He did ban the hard left for a while. And then he

00:23:07.120 got over. He overwhelmingly reelected. Same thing happened to Barack Obama. He got wiped out even more

00:23:12.960 so in the midterms over the way he rammed in Obamacare. And while he didn't quite triangulate, he did do

00:23:21.200 it. He didn't open the border like Biden did. And he railed and railed about, you know, fossil fuels,

00:23:30.400 but he didn't cut back on leases to the same degree. And so what I'm getting at is that

00:23:37.920 two things. One, Biden is not going to do what they did in any material way. He's going to steal. He's a

00:23:45.360 cat. They weren't a captive. They ran. At that time, there was something called a centrist base

00:23:51.040 in the Democratic Party. Obama was afraid of it. Clinton counted on it. And that doesn't exist anymore.

00:23:58.240 And so I think Biden, there's no there's no reason for him to actually go through with all of these

00:24:04.640 little talking points that he thinks appeals to independence. He won't do it. They won't let him

00:24:08.960 do it in the way that Clinton did. The other thing is, the media is very different today.

00:24:14.880 During 1994 and five, there was no internet like we know it. Even in 2010, there wasn't,

00:24:23.280 I mean, there wasn't a Joe Rogan or there wasn't all of these what we're doing now. And so I think

00:24:29.360 there's so many outlets now that are not network news or PBS or New York Times or NPR that they can't

00:24:36.960 control. And so the word gets out just how phony Joe Biden is. And before you couldn't really,

00:24:44.640 you know, there wasn't a way the general public didn't have access to the same amount of conservative

00:24:49.920 thought that they do now. And so I think I don't think anybody's going to be there's a third thing

00:24:56.000 to whatever we think of the politics of Bill Clinton or Barack Obama when they're every one of their

00:25:04.400 issues was underwater. And they were and for the first two years, they had a youthful, charismatic

00:25:10.880 presence. And they were mellifilous on this on the teleprompter. And so they could nullify

00:25:19.280 the downside by their, you know, they always if you look at the polls, they always personally

00:25:24.080 pulled higher than their issues. And the exact opposite is true of Joe Biden. He is a

00:25:30.400 force multiplier of his unpopular issues, people see him. And he has, I'm 68. So I want to be very

00:25:38.960 careful. But he has this old man angry look, where it's sort of like, you know, when I was a little

00:25:44.400 boy, that's kind of a stereotype, we go into town, and we'd all ride bikes and cut across the lawn,

00:25:49.680 we shouldn't have done it of a retired couple. And this guy would come out. And he would just get off

00:25:54.560 my ground. You know, just yell. Yes. And he would grimace. And I felt bad for him. But that's what

00:26:00.960 Joe Biden does. He, he squints, he yells, and he gets angry, and he has the wrong intonations.

00:26:07.600 And then he tries to, he just makes everybody think, well, I don't like the issues. But I really

00:26:13.600 don't like him. Right. And before it was, well, I don't like the issues. But Barack Obama's our first

00:26:19.040 African American president, he's young, and he cuts a good figure on the national stage. Or 1.00

00:26:24.480 Clinton's a good old boy from Arkansas, kind of a nasty, naughty little guy, but he's ours. And 0.97

00:26:29.280 you know, that kind of stuff. But you don't get any of that with Joe Biden. It's entirely negative.

00:26:34.640 And that's not just because of his age and cognitive challenges. He was never that way. I think a lot of

00:26:40.640 people think, well, I remember the good old Joe. I don't. I remember the plagiarist in the 1988

00:26:47.360 campaign. I remember the guy who said to Obama, you're the first clean, articulate black that

00:26:52.400 ran for office. I remember, put you all in change. I remember the corn pop stories. I remember him

00:26:59.360 defaming the person in that tragic accident where his first wife was killed. I remember him blaming

00:27:04.240 the truck driver and telling the nation the guy was drunk when he wasn't, and it wasn't his fault.

00:27:09.200 He did a lot of nasty, bad things. And that's aside from the whole Hunter Biden,

00:27:13.760 Tara Reid, all the personal problems. So I just don't think that he's going to, by force of his

00:27:20.480 person, be able to nullify the unpopularity of his policies.

00:27:24.960 And even Barack Obama said, never underestimate Joe Biden's ability to F things up. And I think

00:27:31.920 we've seen that. And strangely enough, Jen Psaki seems to be kind of admitting that. I want to play

00:27:37.760 you this clip and get your reaction to it. I was at the State Department. The president was the

00:27:43.280 vice president the last time Russia invaded Ukraine. This is a pattern of horror from this

00:27:48.560 president from President Putin and from the cronies around him. Okay, so we've got a pattern here.

00:27:54.720 Apparently, Putin only invades when Joe Biden is in office. And she thought that that was a good point 0.85

00:27:59.680 to make. Yeah, I think the Democrats, I mean, they've been the conservatives have been relentless,

00:28:05.600 even that they even include 2008, because they're not fond of George W. Bush. But they say, look,

00:28:12.080 2008, oil prices were high, we were bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan, Putin goes into Georgia.

00:28:19.920 And then 2014, oil prices are high. Obama has the hot mic, he appeases, but brings the Russians into 0.93

00:28:30.880 the Middle East for the first time to 40 years, promises to dismantle missile defense. And he goes

00:28:37.120 into Ukraine and Crimea. And then he does it in 2022. And the oil prices are high. And we did,

00:28:45.440 we talk loud with a little twig. So we say, please don't hack 16 companies or something.

00:28:50.800 That's what Biden did in January. Or please, please, please, Vladimir, pump more oil. And then

00:28:56.880 they look at that four year period with Trump. And they've told the nation that he colluded. I think

00:29:02.880 John Brennan called him treasonous. James Clapper said he was a Russian asset. And then lo and behold,

00:29:07.760 they look at it and they think, wow, how do we spend this? He didn't go in for four years anywhere.

00:29:13.680 And was it possible that it was because Trump killed a bunch of mercenaries in Syria or got

00:29:19.760 out of an asymmetrical missile deal? Or he pumped a lot of oil and he crashed the price or he upped

00:29:26.240 the defense budget or jawboned NATO into spending $100 million or kept the sanctions on the oligarchs

00:29:34.240 or sold offensive javelin missiles to Ukraine? And it just drives them crazy. So now they've come up

00:29:41.360 with a really bizarre if you've seen it. Well, yeah, he didn't invade during the four years of

00:29:46.000 Trump, but we know why. It was because he got everything he wanted from Trump. So there was

00:29:50.960 no reason to invade. Whereas he didn't get anything. And I'm thinking, what did he get? He was so happy

00:29:56.800 that we got a bigger defense budget. He was delighted that NATO spent 100 extra million

00:30:03.200 dollars. He was tickled to death that we got out of a missile treaty that favored Putin.

00:30:08.960 He really wanted more javelins in Ukraine. I mean, it's absurd.

00:30:12.160 Can you, I know this is a big question and you could probably spend hours explaining all of this

00:30:23.280 to us, but just in the next few minutes, can you kind of summarize your thoughts about what

00:30:29.680 is going on in Ukraine and Joe Biden's response to it? There are so many mixed messages, competing

00:30:36.320 narratives, a lot of skepticism, I think, from the right about the messages that we are hearing about

00:30:41.920 Ukraine and kind of how involved in this we need to be, how focused on this as an American people

00:30:48.640 we need to be, how significant is what's going on between Ukraine and Russia? And what do you

00:30:54.720 think about America's response to it so far? See, I think conservatives have to be really careful

00:31:01.200 because the left is watching what they say and the left wants to get out of their jam. And their jam

00:31:07.200 is that they appeased Putin and they gave him everything that he wanted. And as we just said,

00:31:13.600 he moved. Okay. So if you say, well, that's not our business in Ukraine or Putin has historical ties

00:31:25.440 with Ukraine in a way that we don't quite understand, or the Ukrainians are corrupt. That's all true. 1.00

00:31:32.560 And they've interfered with our politics. Lieutenant Colonel Vindman was offered the Ministry of Defense

00:31:37.440 and the phone call impeachment. And at least Putin is strong. If you do that, what you're doing is

00:31:45.280 you're building up a sympathetic case for someone who's a thug and a killer. And so I think the better

00:31:51.760 way of if you're a conservative is to say, we didn't create this mess. We wanted to pump oil.

00:32:00.640 We believe in deterrence. We wouldn't have got into the mess in Afghanistan as you did. 1.00

00:32:05.840 We would not have ever had a hot mic exchange and try to make a deal about our reelection the way 0.70

00:32:12.640 Obama did. We would have never allowed him to continue to hack the way he did. And Obama,

00:32:18.400 we wouldn't beg anybody to pump oil because we would pump oil. And we are the quiet ones that

00:32:23.280 carry a big stick. We're not the loud ones that don't have deterrence. And then I think we should

00:32:28.800 say Putin is the irredentist. That's a fancy words you remember for what Mussolini was doing in the 0.67

00:32:35.120 thirties or Hitler. And the idea that you have lost territories that no matter how they've evolved,

00:32:41.920 they're all going to come back into the center. And it never works. It didn't work with Milosevic in

00:32:48.000 Serbia. It didn't work with Mussolini. It won't work with Putin. But that's what he wants to do. And

00:32:53.680 he's an opportunist. And every time he sees oil prices high, where he gets money and people need

00:32:59.360 energy, or the president is weak, and he talks tough in lieu of having real power or metal, or NATO is

00:33:07.600 squabbling, they're not meeting their 2%, or Germany's cutting an energy. He moves 2008,

00:33:13.760 2014, and now. And it was predictable what he's going to do. And so I think that's what we have to

00:33:19.920 say. And we were very interested in this, because he's got nuclear weapons. And he's trying to feign,

00:33:27.920 I think he's feigning that he's crazy, and he could use them if anybody supplies Ukraine,

00:33:33.680 the NATO countries, etc. So we have to be very careful to deter him. And there's people who are

00:33:40.720 watching this arena. And they are the Iranians that are wondering, hmm, we're about a year away

00:33:46.720 from a bomb. And we once we get that bomb, we're probably thinking about using it against Israel. 0.90

00:33:52.320 But what's the reaction to the world to Ukraine? And then there's the Chinese, and they're thinking,

00:33:57.840 well, this was supposed to be a five day invasion. He was supposed to go in like he did with 0.61

00:34:02.560 Crimea or Eastern Ukraine or Georgia, decapitate Zelensky's government, take over the country, 0.54

00:34:12.480 present the world with a fait accompli, get a lot of pride and patriotism in Russia,

00:34:19.920 scare the hell out of NATO, tell Germany, do you want me to cut off your oil? Because I can do it. And 0.70

00:34:26.880 now I'm right next to NATO. I got Ukraine. That's what was supposed to happen. 0.98

00:34:31.520 And it may happen. And if it happens in a year from now, he won't care how many people he kills or

00:34:36.800 is killed. He will just tell the world, Ukraine is mine. I'm the first Russian to get it back since 0.97

00:34:42.160 the Cold War. And I can do this again and again and again, and maybe messy. But you better be very

00:34:48.240 careful, NATO. And that that's what he's thinking. And he's right about that. That will have a that all

00:34:54.480 these great speeches we see today in Europe. If he gets away with this a year from now and he owns

00:35:01.760 that whole 44 million person country, people in Europe are going to be saying, OK, OK, we'll buy

00:35:07.280 oil from you. OK, we'll be careful. Well, we won't do this with NATO. And so that's what he's counting

00:35:14.160 on. And the Chinese are looking at this and they're saying, hmm, we were going to go into Taiwan. But if

00:35:20.320 what if the Taiwanese fought with like the Ukrainians and what if the Americans or the

00:35:25.440 Australians or the South Koreans or the Japanese flooded that country with javelins and stingers 1.00

00:35:31.040 like they're trying to in Ukraine? And what do we got? We got bogged down for five or six days.

00:35:36.880 And what if the world sanctioned us like they're sanctioning Russia? And what if they went out of

00:35:42.880 expatriate Chinese billionaires all over the world like they're going after the oligarchs? And what if they 0.85

00:35:48.720 deported all of our students? So maybe we better just sit back a little bit and watch what happens

00:35:54.240 because we expected like the Russians that the West would continue to appease us and Putin. So 0.96

00:36:00.880 there's a lot at stake. And I think in the next week or so, we'll find out what's going on. It's

00:36:06.400 a very strange war because usually every journalist in the world, whether it's in the Middle East or

00:36:11.360 whether it's in Afghanistan, Iraq or Libya or the Balkan Wars, they flocked there and we would get

00:36:17.280 these, you know, correspondents on the front lines, but we're not getting any news.

00:36:21.680 And then we just get this picture of this long corridor and we're told that, you know,

00:36:26.640 it's going to encircle Kiev, but it hasn't yet. And we're told that this is the product,

00:36:31.840 this would be an ideal target for these javelins with a two and a half mile range. And what I'm

00:36:37.040 getting at is on the one hand, we're told that 15,000 javelins are pouring in, but obviously they're

00:36:42.480 not there or they be used. So something's going on. And I think what's going on is it's very

00:36:48.960 difficult for that country who that was surprised. It did not have stockpiles of weapons. We didn't

00:36:54.560 send them very much at all after Trump left office. And just now they're, they're scrambling to get

00:37:01.280 anti-tank and anti-aircraft weaponry to stop this. But I don't, and the question will be,

00:37:06.400 do they, will they have enough in the next three days and will they have enough skilled people to

00:37:11.920 use them to make a difference? If they don't, Putin's going to win and let's hope he doesn't.

00:37:17.760 But I think it's very important for conservatives to see that for all the left's contortions,

00:37:25.520 they are scrambling to turn it back on conservatives. They were the ones that created

00:37:31.120 the landscape and the environment that allowed Putin to go in there. They were the ones that both

00:37:36.880 cooked up the Russian collusion hopes, the Alpha Banka, the Steele dossier that enraged him,

00:37:41.760 and then they were the ones that appeased him and gave him the oil revenue that made him powerful.

00:37:48.480 So they created an angry, powerful dictator. And because that dictator

00:37:55.120 criticizes the excess of the West sometimes, or seems like the left really hates him, that should 1.00

00:38:07.040 not allow conservatives to get fooled and go in in some way, say something that can be interpreted that

00:38:13.760 they're pro-Putin. That is disastrous for the conservatives' cause if they do that.

00:38:17.840 Yes. And unfortunately, I've seen a little bit of that, but I do think-

00:38:21.360 I have. I have too.

00:38:22.480 Yes. I do think the majority of conservatives, though, see

00:38:27.200 exactly what you're saying, or at least they, their instincts are in the direction of what

00:38:32.480 you're articulating. So I appreciate your insight so much today, as always. Thank you very much for

00:38:38.640 taking the time to come on. Thank you for having me.

00:38:46.080 All right. So there was so much more that I wanted to talk to him about. He's got a really

00:38:50.560 interesting podcast, The Victor Davis Hanson Show, that I recommend to you. And I was listening to it,

00:38:55.280 and he was saying a lot of really interesting things. And one thing that I didn't get to ask him about,

00:39:00.880 that I've heard him say before, is that President Putin actually has donated, has funneled money into

00:39:08.960 environmental causes in the United States. And this ties back to kind of what we were talking about in there,

00:39:14.800 about the Faustian bargain that Joe Biden made with the far left so that he could become the nominee,

00:39:21.680 and he could then represent their policies so that he could look like he was going to be a moderate guy

00:39:26.960 during the election, get elected, you know, win the nomination, then win the general election. But then

00:39:32.480 he was going to actually govern to the left, which is exactly what he has done. And one of the issues that

00:39:38.160 is important to the progressive left in the Democratic Party is climate change and also the various

00:39:44.160 corporations and organizations that are funding the Democratic Party. This is one of their main priorities,

00:39:50.240 countries, which is why I believe on the first day, if not the first week of Joe Biden's presidency,

00:39:55.520 he shut down the Keystone XL pipeline, which of course helped us and was going to help us remain

00:40:02.160 energy independent. We were energy independent under Donald Trump. We were relying on ourselves for oil,

00:40:07.700 and Joe Biden ensured that we would become energy dependent. So we would be relying on Russia for oil,

00:40:14.860 and more on the Middle East for our oil that is ethically problematic for a variety of reasons.

00:40:21.220 But also it puts us in this situation right now where we are trying to deter Russia, but we are 0.95

00:40:27.140 unwilling to sanction their oil industry, which is actually lining their pockets in funding the

00:40:31.980 invasion of Ukraine, because we are afraid of how that will affect our allies in Europe and also how

00:40:38.700 that will affect the United States. Well, if we were energy independent, and we were the ones not

00:40:44.060 just relying on our own oil, but also exporting the oil to these European countries, we wouldn't be

00:40:48.220 in the mess that we're in. So he, because of environmentalism, and I would say the facade of

00:40:55.240 environmentalism, Joe Biden has made the choice that he has made in shutting down the gas pipelines

00:41:00.960 in the United States, much of the gas pipelines in the United States, and ending the federal sales of

00:41:06.540 oil and gas, as we talked about a few days ago with Josh Hammer. So a lot of you have been asking,

00:41:14.020 though, why do this? If you say that you care about climate change, and you say that fracking

00:41:20.220 and these pipelines are bad for the climate, how does it make any sense to then just rely even more

00:41:26.460 on these foreign regimes and these foreign powers for our oil? Isn't that even worse for the climate

00:41:33.340 because they're having to ship the oil a longer way to the United States in order to get it here?

00:41:39.220 Because the demand for gas remains the same. It's not like there's now less oil. It's just that we

00:41:45.320 are depending on these other countries for our oil. And doesn't that increase like our carbon footprint

00:41:49.460 even more that we're relying on this foreign oil? And of course, the answer is yes. And if you're

00:41:55.060 wondering why, why is that? If you say you care about the climate, then why are you doing that?

00:41:59.100 That's because climate policy in the United States is largely fake. It's all it's a facade. It's not

00:42:04.440 real. They say that they care about the climate. John Kerry cares about the climate. They're always

00:42:08.780 flying private. They don't care about their own carbon footprint in the same way that all of the

00:42:14.320 rich people who say that they care about, you know, the penguins in Antarctica. They have a huge

00:42:18.700 carbon footprint because they live in these mansions. They all fly private. They all do these things

00:42:23.380 that, you know, take up a lot of space and use a lot of resources and energy. But they want you to

00:42:30.120 believe that you, the, you know, stay at home mom that lives on the farm because you have too many

00:42:35.840 kids, that you're the one that's actually damaging the climate. And they want to try to control your

00:42:41.620 life and they want to make your life harder saying that it is in the name of trying to, you know,

00:42:47.900 deter climate change, but they're not willing to make any changes in their life. It's all fake.

00:42:52.500 We rely on foreign oil, not because that actually helps the climate in any way, but so we can look

00:42:59.300 like we are helping the climate by shutting down our own pipelines. But as we've seen, that leads to

00:43:04.780 all kinds of problems, not just domestically, but also in our foreign affairs. And so it's just,

00:43:13.740 I don't know how else to explain it. Climate policy in the United States is a fraud. It's a fake.

00:43:19.360 And it actually ends up hurting you. It is actually hurting your bank account right now. And that is

00:43:24.700 why Putin, at least in the Obama administration, actually said that he supported America's

00:43:31.420 commitment to environmentalism. Of course, of course he does, because that means that we rely

00:43:35.800 and the world relies on Russia for oil. And that makes sure that he has more money. Again, that is

00:43:41.040 funding the invasion that he is conducting right now. So it all comes back to if America really

00:43:48.840 wants to be strong. One, I think a strong America is better for the world. Then we need to be self

00:43:53.720 reliant. And Joe Biden has actively worked against that self reliance. And this also ties into our

00:43:59.700 reliance on China. There's a lot there. But just realize that when Joe Biden says that he has committed

00:44:06.940 to all of these things that he thinks is going to make America stronger, he and his party and even

00:44:12.800 some people in the Republican Party, we can tie this all into the World Economic Forum and the Great

00:44:16.900 Reset as well, are actually committed to a weak America. A weak America is actually necessary, 0.93

00:44:23.520 I believe, for the new world order that the World Economic Forum is set on. And I will link some past

00:44:29.140 episodes on that. I wish that was just some giant conspiracy theory and that I had no idea what I was

00:44:33.720 talking about. Unfortunately, it's not. I think this president is certainly committed to that.

00:44:41.120 And then there was even more that I wanted to talk about with him. But I just wanted to mention that

00:44:44.520 at the end, because a lot of you guys have been asking me how it makes sense the decisions that Joe

00:44:49.520 Biden has been making when it comes to not sanctioning Russia's oil industry and also not relying on our own

00:44:55.180 oil. That's the answer that I have for you. All right. If you could please leave the show a five star

00:45:00.800 review wherever you listen, that would mean so much to us. Thank you guys for listening and for

00:45:06.580 watching on YouTube. I hope you have a great, wonderful weekend and we will be back here on Monday.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - March 03, 2022

Ep 576 ｜ The Secret Deal that Made Biden President & Wrecked America ｜ Guest： Victor Davis Hanson

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript