The Auron MacIntyre Show - July 16, 2026


The Death of Lindsey Graham Is Complicated ｜ 7⧸16⧸26


Episode Stats


Length

7 minutes

Words per minute

165.23

Word count

1,296

Sentence count

78

Harmful content

Hate speech

1

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
00:00:00.800 The Hulu original series Furious is coming to Disney+.
00:00:04.880 Starring Emmy Rossum, Furious follows FBI agent Alice Black
00:00:09.440 on the hunt for a mysterious and calculating serial killer.
00:00:13.200 Both walk their own paths toward justice,
00:00:15.840 and as their lives start to intertwine,
00:00:18.160 the line between right and wrong begins to blur.
00:00:22.000 Don't miss the three-episode premiere of the Hulu original series Furious
00:00:26.240 on July 27th, only on Hulu on Disney+.
00:00:30.000 The internet has done an admirable job of hobbling the left-wing media's ability to
00:00:34.580 control the population through a single narrative, but that blessing comes with regrettable costs.
00:00:40.080 The speed of information and the incentive to push hot takes onto social media means
00:00:44.060 that when a public figure dies, there's an immediate race to decide which competing
00:00:48.240 narrative will define their legacy.
00:00:50.380 When Lindsey Graham died suddenly of a heart attack over the weekend, conspiracy theories
00:00:54.700 about foreign assassination plots immediately began to circulate.
00:00:58.280 Many leftists openly celebrated his death, and the reactionary impulse of conservatives
00:01:03.340 drove others to recast Graham as some stalwart crusader of MAGA.
00:01:07.760 The truth is far more complicated, but in the eternal battle for narrative supremacy,
00:01:12.160 there's little time for reflection, even in the response to death.
00:01:16.740 No one is above criticism, but in a healthy society, some space exists between a public
00:01:21.460 figure's passing and attacks on his legacy.
00:01:24.140 That standard now seems quaint, perhaps naive.
00:01:27.080 It's also better for the soul of the nation.
00:01:30.180 Unfortunately, wishing to live in that kind of society doesn't make it real.
00:01:33.980 The information war is relentless.
00:01:35.760 Abstaining from the fight really only means that someone else defines the truth.
00:01:39.940 The news cycle doesn't observe a respectable period of mourning.
00:01:43.500 The battle begins the moment the headline drops.
00:01:46.540 While conspiracy theories now seem obligatory whenever a prominent figure dies,
00:01:51.120 Anne Graham was no exception.
00:01:52.440 The senator toured a Ukrainian factory the day before his death and several figures speculated
00:01:57.720 that he was really killed in an attack on that facility or somehow the Russians poisoned him
00:02:02.240 while he was there. Russian philosopher Alexander Dugan suggested on social media that Graham was
00:02:07.420 likely killed by Israel, which is really bizarre because Graham was like one of its biggest
00:02:12.520 advocates. He basically fought for them non-stop. I want to be clear this isn't about denigrating 0.63
00:02:17.900 conspiracy theories in general. One thing we learned after COVID is that such theories can
00:02:22.600 often be proven correct, but the narrative around Graham's death was, well, bizarre.
00:02:28.300 Graham was a 71-year-old man with a family history of fatal heart conditions who didn't
00:02:33.280 really take good care of himself. His death is sad, but the cause is hardly mysterious.
00:02:38.860 Progressives reacted exactly as you'd expect. They were gloating, celebrating, mocking,
00:02:43.700 and even speculating about who should come next.
00:02:46.620 Graham's death was nowhere near as visceral or violent as Charlie Kirk's assassination,
00:02:51.360 but the left's response carried an unnerving echo.
00:02:54.180 It was a brutal reminder of a lesson conservatives have worked hard not to learn since Kirk's murder.
00:02:59.980 Even the average Democrat is emotionally unhinged.
00:03:02.240 Your progressive neighbor may not be willing to commit violence personally against you over your politics,
00:03:08.200 but many are happy to cheer those who do and dance on your grave once it's done.
00:03:12.600 The reaction on the right was strange in a different way.
00:03:16.100 Some conservatives rushed to construct a hagiography, transforming Graham into a MAGA saint, a lion who died fighting for the cause.
00:03:24.620 The impulse may have been understandable as a response to the left's disgusting vitriol, but it's not wise.
00:03:31.580 Graham served in the Senate for 31 years.
00:03:34.300 He supported every disastrous war during his tenure, including the war in Ukraine that Donald Trump ran on ending, and the war in Iran that's now costing the administration dearly.
00:03:45.960 Graham pushed for the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan.
00:03:49.500 He backed Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton during their military operations in Syria and Libya.
00:03:54.940 He pushed to send hundreds of billions of dollars to foreign governments while inflation was driving up costs of living for ordinary Americans.
00:04:03.960 After Graham's death, Benjamin Netanyahu claimed that when he told the senator Israel should pay for its own defense,
00:04:10.600 Graham was the one who insisted that American taxpayers should foot the bill.
00:04:15.520 On immigration, the core issue of the MAGA coalition, Graham was even worse.
00:04:20.240 He was part of the Gang of Eight and pushed for amnesty alongside men like Marco Rubio.
00:04:24.980 In 2006, Graham teamed up with John McCain to pursue a similar pathway to citizenship.
00:04:30.080 His attempts to secure amnesty for illegal aliens were so common that he earned the nickname Graham-nesty.
00:04:37.580 Lindsey Graham was, in almost every way imaginable, the essence of the Washington swamp that Trump was promising to drain.
00:04:44.820 He was also a savvy political operator.
00:04:48.160 Got PC Optimum points? Visit Shoppers Drug Mart for the bonus redemption event and get more for your points.
00:04:54.360 Friday, July 17th to Wednesday, July 22nd. Valid in-store and online.
00:05:00.080 Graham initially fought Trump tooth and nail.
00:05:06.260 Like many Republicans, he slowly changed his rhetoric.
00:05:09.220 Despite still pushing horrible foreign policy and endless war,
00:05:12.980 the senator did become a reliable vote for Trump on many domestic issues.
00:05:17.120 His work advancing the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and the Save Act deserve note.
00:05:23.180 Was Graham a true convert to MAGA and its values?
00:05:26.580 Very unlikely, but, you know, politics is not a contest about who believes harder.
00:05:31.940 It would have been unwise to trust Graham.
00:05:33.760 Many Republicans have discovered a new respect for Trump to get what they want,
00:05:37.480 only to betray him the moment he stops prioritizing their issues.
00:05:41.480 But Graham did deliver votes and support at key moments.
00:05:44.560 That made him politically useful in scenarios that can't be ignored.
00:05:48.880 Graham spent most of his career as an institutional,
00:05:51.800 neoconservative advancing policies that were disastrous for the country.
00:05:56.160 He eventually course-corrected on amnesty and delivered some key votes for the Trump
00:06:00.780 administration, yet his monomaniacal obsession with war made him one of the central proponents
00:06:06.580 for a foreign policy quagmire that still threatens to derail the MAGA agenda today.
00:06:12.420 Does his opportunistic support for Trump in the final years of his life make him a true
00:06:16.800 MAGA patriot?
00:06:17.940 No.
00:06:18.480 Come on, what are we doing here, guys?
00:06:20.300 Really?
00:06:21.280 But does the man deserve the vile hatred being poured on him as the left celebrates his death?
00:06:27.000 Also no.
00:06:28.340 That's not mercy for a political enemy.
00:06:30.800 It's the moral clarity that comes after refusing to lie about the man's record,
00:06:35.100 but also not requiring yourself to join the mob that cheers on his death.
00:06:39.960 Those are entirely separate moral sins.
00:06:42.580 In the rush to define the narrative, the complicated nature of Graham's legacy disappears.
00:06:47.320 The internet has made immediate judgment mandatory and thoughtful reflection almost impossible.
00:06:53.940 It turns public officials into either mascots, villains, saints, or demons before the body's even cold.
00:07:00.620 In the end, the internet makes fictional characters of us all.
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00:07:35.720 My book, The Total State, is out in its second printing.
00:07:38.180 It's in paperback with an extra chapter.
00:07:40.120 So if you were waiting for the paperback or that extra chapter,
00:07:42.540 now's the time to grab it.
00:07:43.740 and of course you can watch all of my videos and read all of my columns at The Blaze.
00:07:47.900 Thanks for watching and as always, I'll talk to you next time.