Episode 139 - Silicon Valley Plots Another Threat to Free Speech. Records Shattered with Rapid Vaccine Development. Devastating Stats on Suicides.
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
155.45026
Summary
Dr. Steven Fauci has a new vaccine that could shatter the timeline and shatter the records for vaccine development, but it s not ready for prime time yet. Hot Takes is a series of hot takes that focus on hot topics in the world of politics, economics, and culture.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
you ever watch this guy on television you all were not telling the truth and you should not
00:00:06.100
be trusted congressman matt gates thank you for what you did for your country today be offended
00:00:09.740
with the democratic whip not house republicans like a machine matt gates
00:00:13.940
welcome to hot takes i'm congressman matt gates let's talk about the news and there is big news
00:00:22.620
today on the vaccine front uh the reporting showing that moderna is going to be the second
00:00:28.880
company applying for emergency fda approval for their covid 19 vaccine 94 percent effective at
00:00:37.520
preventing the virus from a statement from the biotech company and a hundred percent effective
00:00:43.000
at preventing severe covid 19 cases dr paul offit a member of the fda's vaccine advisory committee
00:00:52.020
told cnn this is striking these are amazing data pfizer also have put has put in their request
00:01:01.060
for emergency fda approval they're claiming their vaccine is at least 95 percent effective this is
00:01:08.360
really remarkable when you think about what public health officials were telling us just months ago
00:01:13.540
take a listen to this interview on cbs 60 minutes with dr fauci eight months ago and what he said
00:01:22.220
about a vaccine timeline i said we would get it in two to three months i think we're going to go into
00:01:27.340
people closer to two months rather than three months and when you say go into people a trial which you've
00:01:32.020
said it'll take about a year or more before it could really be tested and find out the first the first
00:01:36.420
step in a trial is phase one to determine safety and does it induce the kind of response that you
00:01:42.640
would predict would be protective that's an important step with sars that took 20 months
00:01:48.960
if you get it down to two months that's pretty good but then you have a multi-step process and that's one
00:01:56.060
of the things we want to make sure the american public don't get confused about because it'll take
00:02:00.960
three or four months to see if it's safe and induces a good response then you go to the real proof
00:02:06.060
of the pudding which is the phase two and then the phase three but even with phase two you don't
00:02:11.340
only see a hundred to a thousand or more people that's phase two phase one is 45 people so when
00:02:19.640
you go to phase two that would take yet again another six to eight months in a environment in
00:02:25.160
which there are infections because you want to show it works you add all of that up and you're dealing
00:02:30.880
with a year to a year and a half at the earliest then you've got to scale up to make enough doses
00:02:37.280
to get to the american people so when i tell the vaccine story there's good news and there's sobering
00:02:44.080
news the good news is we did it more quickly than we've ever done it the sobering news is that it's
00:02:49.800
not ready for prime time for what we're going through now operation warp speed took this process
00:02:56.320
that dr fauci said would take you know 12 months 18 months and these were minimums that was if
00:03:03.140
everything went right but the operation warp speed took the resources of government and it lashed it to
00:03:10.120
the talent in the innovation sectors of our economy and the result is not one vaccine that shatters
00:03:17.920
the records that breaks the timeline the result is that we've got two such vaccine candidates right now
00:03:24.400
i'm grateful that president trump has indicated we will see initial distribution within weeks to
00:03:31.600
those frontline health care workers that are out there really taking the brunt of this virus
00:03:37.580
concern for their families they deserve to get this vaccine on the front end our first responders as well
00:03:44.480
need to have access to the vaccine vulnerable populations and then i'm sure we'll see broad distribution to
00:03:51.560
all those who want it i don't believe in vaccine mandates any more than i believe in lockdown or
00:03:58.700
mask mandates i think ultimately that picks a fight between government and the body politic rather than
00:04:06.240
encouraging cooperation between government and the body politic but it's really really remarkable to
00:04:13.080
see this announcement that today we're going to see moderna following right behind pfizer seeking that
00:04:19.800
approval shattering the records and frankly shattering the reality that dr fauci tried to set up for us many
00:04:27.440
months ago congratulations to the trump administration
00:04:30.360
the bipartisan coalition in favor of extended deployments forever wars nation building they're
00:04:43.940
concerned that president trump is taking strong action now to bring our troops home and put our country
00:04:49.560
first and in fact president trump has put a lot of folks over at the pentagon who can operationalize
00:04:57.400
the president's intent and that is very concerning to some of the so-called national security establishment
00:05:04.100
on meet the press yesterday admiral mullen offered his critique of president trump and the trump doctrine
00:05:10.340
take a listen well i think i'm actually very concerned about the trump loyalists who have now gone to work in the
00:05:16.320
pentagon i mean recently secretary esper was fired and a host of other people left the building and there are
00:05:23.600
some real trump loyalists there now in charge and it's pretty difficult to think that over the course of
00:05:31.600
50 or 60 days you can do something constructive but you can do something that's really destructive
00:05:36.960
uh and a week ago there were certain there many media reports that there was a debate about uh action
00:05:44.400
against iran specifically uh the president reportedly uh uh turned down uh but i would be concerned that
00:05:51.760
those issues continue to be raised you mentioned the troops in afghanistan coming out there uh there are
00:05:58.960
reports now of bringing troops home from somalia and just i guess generally trying to get as many troops
00:06:05.600
home before the inauguration as possible i just think we need to be very careful with that somalia
00:06:11.520
admiral mullen thinks that we need to stay in somalia forever and look i understand that in places like
00:06:17.440
somalia afghanistan yemen you have failed states you have a lack of security but the response
00:06:23.760
isn't to move into those countries for decades and potentially generations as admiral mullen and
00:06:30.960
others might have us do the right answer is to degrade the capability to attack our nation
00:06:37.440
and then come home and not to do nothing not to bring our troops home and do nothing but to bring our
00:06:42.960
troops home and make our nation more resilient use technology better use travel bans when appropriate
00:06:50.960
don't allow for some entities within these other countries to buy their way into the united states
00:06:56.480
or to slip across the southern border there are things america can do to make americans safer that
00:07:03.760
don't require extended deployments in places like somalia
00:07:11.520
there is a troubling trend of rising suicide numbers in japan we pick up the story from cbs news
00:07:19.040
suicide claimed more japanese lives in october than 10 months of covid far more japanese people
00:07:26.400
are dying of suicide likely exacerbated by the economic and social repercussions of the pandemic
00:07:33.120
more so than coven 19 diseases itself while japan has managed its coronavirus epidemic well keeping
00:07:41.040
deaths below 2 000 nationwide provisional statistics from the national police agency shows suicides
00:07:49.200
surging to 2 153 in october alone marking the fourth straight month of an increase to date more than 17 000
00:07:59.840
people have taken their own life in japan october these self-inflicted deaths were up 600 on the year
00:08:07.200
with female suicides about a third of the total surging 80 percent it is important to recognize that the
00:08:15.360
impact of covid cannot be measured in the impact of the disease itself we also have to look at the
00:08:22.800
consequence of these lockdowns the impact on people's lives and even the potential for lockdowns to cause the
00:08:30.480
end of life we have to watch these trends and we have to stop it from happening in our great country
00:08:36.880
there's a new call for aerial fumigation of coca plants in colombia i'm not sure it is the most
00:08:49.120
stabilizing action for the country we pick up the story from reuters colombia must restart aerial
00:08:55.680
fumigation to fight drug trafficking defense minister says and out of bogota the story comes that colombia
00:09:02.240
must restart the fumigation as soon as possible to reduce cocaine production for illegal armed
00:09:08.720
groups massacres and the killing of human rights activists the defense minister said the andean
00:09:15.520
country colombia is a top producer of cocaine still they suspended aerial fumigation in 2015
00:09:23.120
after various organizations said that it might cause cancer but it's not just cancer that aerial fumigation
00:09:31.200
causes it causes resentment and destabilization among some of the communities that aren't involved in coca
00:09:39.040
production here's how it works these cocaine fields in colombia in particular are not like massive plantations
00:09:47.200
it's more like side of the mountain bottom of the valley uh little plants little grows you know maybe
00:09:54.880
a few hundred plants and those are then gathered together from these various types of growers into a
00:10:02.320
processing facility that they've usually hidden somewhere near a river and that's how they process
00:10:07.920
the cocaine i've spent time in colombia i've met with the leadership there i've talked about their
00:10:12.960
strategies and when i speak to the people when i talk to a lot of community leaders they beg for the
00:10:20.080
fumigation not to resume because it hurts regular crops it makes it harder for the people of colombia
00:10:26.880
to work with the government to find the processing facilities and to attack the narco trafficking networks
00:10:34.080
i am concerned about this also because there's a certain detente that has developed in colombia where
00:10:40.240
violence has been reduced as production of cocaine has increased so if you then decrease that
00:10:46.000
production of cocaine it does put a certain economic strain on the populace that's going to make it
00:10:51.600
difficult for them i i think there are other ways to attack the narco trafficking business model
00:10:57.680
particularly in the movement of the drugs that may be an easier place to find the networks degrade
00:11:05.840
them and limit their capability to move the narcotics without having to destroy someone's tomato farm
00:11:13.920
without having to potentially drop a chemical on a family that has nothing to do with the cocaine
00:11:20.720
business but just by virtue of proximity and the lack of precision with the deployment of some of these
00:11:27.360
fumigation chemicals you know you do get that collateral damage and that could be a problem so we don't
00:11:32.640
want to see that happen in colombia it's interesting that this is the new position of the defense
00:11:37.040
minister we will follow the story closely last night on the next revolution with steve hilton i discussed
00:11:47.120
former president obama's critique of hispanics who support president trump and the obama critique of
00:11:54.640
hispanics is quite similar to his critique of folks in pennsylvania who didn't want to vote for him
00:12:00.320
uh his critique of those who cling to their bibles and their guns take a listen he blamed white people
00:12:06.960
in pennsylvania for clinging to their bibles and their guns he's blamed hispanics in this last election
00:12:12.800
for clinging to their views on family and their pro-life values and yet i think obama ignores both in
00:12:19.360
the book and his commentary on biden what really does make our country great and that's prosperity giving
00:12:24.720
everyone the opportunity to succeed and what we fear on the right is that joe biden is going to enact
00:12:30.160
these socialist policies through the trojan horse of coronavirus and it will indeed vanquish the
00:12:36.160
promise of our country and you could tell that obama doesn't think too much of america because
00:12:40.000
he calls it the promised land sort of saying that we have not lived up to a promise i think this is
00:12:45.440
the greatest country that's ever existed i feel so blessed to live here
00:12:48.560
socialism is doomed to fail it is trickle up poverty a disaster that's the message from
00:13:00.880
whole foods founder and ceo john mackie he delivered the address in a live streamed interview
00:13:07.200
to the american enterprise institute he co-authored the book consensus capitalism and said that socialism has
00:13:15.280
been tried 42 times in the last hundred years and it has 42 failures it doesn't work it's the wrong
00:13:23.040
way we have to keep capitalism and while he acknowledged critique of capitalism as a mechanism
00:13:31.200
at times captured by special interests who can be overly materialistic and appear indifferent to the
00:13:38.080
plight of others the alternative is far worse he makes the argument that capitalism needs to evolve
00:13:44.240
but that it is fundamentally the correct system and i agree socialism is not too far from florida's
00:13:51.760
borders where i live communism government control over production redistribution of wealth the draining
00:14:00.000
of resources we see it all we know people who are but a generation or two removed from that type of life and
00:14:08.640
in america we have this great promise that we can be the type of person we can achieve the heights that
00:14:16.320
our talents would deliver to us that the opportunity of our country delivers to us so it's good to see
00:14:22.400
at least some folks in corporate america step up for the notion that markets are important they're not
00:14:29.280
perfect there is obviously a way in which our country can execute on capitalism that
00:14:35.680
is always going to be better and more responsive and more productive and more innovative but capitalism
00:14:42.000
is the way to go and it's important that leaders in politics business and industry in societal life
00:14:49.920
in america stand up for the values that are so uniquely american twitter is making a change that
00:15:01.440
could result in even more censorship for conservatives we pick up the story from the daily mail twitter is
00:15:09.040
going to rewrite their verification policy as early as 2021 to remove blue check marks for users who violate
00:15:17.600
their rules while some government officials may be protected any voice out of line is subject to getting
00:15:24.480
the boot twitter will start accepting new blue check mark requests next year with guidelines that could
00:15:31.600
even put donald trump's verified status at risk if he loses his world leaders protection twitter is set to
00:15:39.760
ensure that they have maximum control over those who get verified and like the blue check mark is the
00:15:46.960
new mechanism by which they're going to try to hold leverage over people to try to cause people to self-censor
00:15:54.640
recently i was on david harris jr's podcast and we talked about the way in which these social media
00:16:00.560
platforms can cause content creators to self-censor he gave me quite the interesting admission that it's
00:16:07.760
even happened with him take a listen uh i've had to self-censor and i hate i mean especially can i just say
00:16:13.840
it especially as a black man i hate anybody telling me what to do or what i can and cannot do especially
00:16:18.960
when it's the man so to speak obviously zuckerberg not saying it has anything to do with race i'm just saying
00:16:23.840
me as a person period i don't like people telling me what to do uh and when and especially self-censoring
00:16:30.240
so i've i've already had to self-censor there's so many topics that are taboo climate change is one of
00:16:35.520
them for two years if i posted anything about climate change they would give me a fake news strike and they
00:16:41.360
would lower my reach just period that i even posted a video of of uh dan pena the billionaire hispanic
00:16:48.160
billionaire that supports the president and he was just sharing his opinion on it and they gave me two
00:16:52.800
strikes so yeah it's all about self-censoring silencing me to me it's lynching me it's lynching
00:16:58.800
my voice my ability to just say what i feel and what i believe on what should be an open and fair platform
00:17:04.080
in america we don't want people to have to self-censor we want you to be able to fly your
00:17:08.880
maga flag at full and not half mast we want you to be able to share your provocative thoughts and
00:17:15.040
ideas and the hope is that that will provoke others to exchange ideas to offer their reactions and
00:17:22.400
critique and criticism but when we surrender to this world where the silicon valley woketopians get to
00:17:29.440
be the arbiters of the truth we lose the essence of americanism we lose that opportunity to flood the
00:17:38.080
marketplace of ideas with good ideas bad ideas information that's true information that may have
00:17:44.880
developed from skeptical sources but that's what makes us inquisitive and curious the ability to decipher
00:17:53.840
information i don't want that job outsourced to silicon valley i want my family my community the
00:18:01.600
people i interact with to have the benefit of ideas and thoughts from a wide array of sources with a wide
00:18:09.200
array of values and it's my belief that the meritocracy of debate will ensure that the best ideas that the best
00:18:18.320
values emerge i don't think they're going to emerge from silicon valley alone i bet on the country and
00:18:25.200
that's why any changes to these digital platforms that allow these companies to ratchet down on the
00:18:32.320
speech or the information they don't like or to cause people to self-censor is very dangerous to
00:18:39.200
the public debate to the public sphere and to the country at large thanks for listening to hot takes
00:18:45.760
i'm congressman matt gates and there are a lot more of you who are listening these last few weeks our
00:18:51.200
listenership growing substantially and so if you're a new listener welcome to the show the best way you
00:18:57.440
can help us ensure that our content is spread and accessible and heard by the great people of this
00:19:03.280
country is to give us a rating or review on whatever your podcast listening platform is just take a
00:19:10.400
moment give us that five-star rating make sure you're subscribed and join us each and every weekday for