Joe Biden calls Putin's incursion into Ukraine an invasion, and announces a slate of sanctions. Canada's Parliament introduces a continued emergency order invocation, and Nancy Pelosi is monitoring American truckers headed for Washington, D.C. I'm Ben Shapiro, and this is the Ben Shapiro Show. It's time to stand up against Big Tech, protect your data, and stand up to the man in charge of it all: Vladimir Putin! Subscribe to my new podcast, The Alt-Right's Next Chapter, wherever you get your podcasts, and get 20% off your first month with discount code: "ELISSA" at checkout. If you haven't yet, you're making a large mistake. You can trust Birchgold to help you diversify your 401k and IRAs into gold. When you buy, Birchgold will send you a signed copy of my brand new book, The Authoritarian Moment: A Meme of a Time in which I explain why Vladimir Putin is a weak man, and why he doesn't need a strong man to take on the world like the world he really does have it all, like the rest of us do. And for a limited time, you can get a free information kit on gold! Text BERNARD to 989898 to get your FREE information kit right now. Ben Shapiro's show is sponsored by Birchgold! It s all about protecting your data and your best chance at a secure, secure, and secure future. -Ben Shapiro's new book on the future of the internet and your privacy, coming soon! Download your copy of the book on Amazon Prime Day! Subscribe on Audible.co and watch it on the Audible, wherever else you get it's best listening and you'll get the most authentic, affordable and affordable, affordable, and most of the best listening experience in the best of the greatest listening experience on the best places in the service you can be on the most of it is going to be the best in the cheapest and most authentic and most affordable in the most affordable and authentic, and the best place in the fastest and authenticest and the fastest and most effective in the podcast on the podcast is the best and the most at your choice, and he gets it all that you will be on the highest and most genuine, is the most authentically authentic and richest and most profound, and has it is having it all right , so you can viably up to it, right and he s not going to have it anywhere else, and I am watching it, he s truly having it anywhere and having it at it is it , and he has it truly has it, and I really has it right, right has it and he is truly to be it, and so much more, right is it really is it is truly, right and he's really and really really at it and so he s really truly and that s really really right, and really is that really , right really, right really is it, really is , really really is he really is so much, right right, really really, really really is really, really so really, so really to really is, right at it really finally, right?
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00:01:28.000The simple fact of the matter is that these inflationary policies are really devastating nearly everything right now.
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00:01:47.000Alrighty, so there's a lot of movement on the Ukraine front.
00:01:50.000The big move yesterday is that Joe Biden, the President of the United States, announced a new slate of sanctions against the Russian regime, including against some of the oligarchs who are in Russia, against Vladimir Putin personally.
00:02:02.000Now, does Vladimir Putin care very much about that?
00:02:04.000Not really, considering he has some $200 billion worth of stuff just hanging out.
00:02:10.000He's got it in Russia, he's got it in Switzerland, he's got it pretty much everywhere.
00:02:14.000So Vladimir Putin isn't going to be On the unemployment line anytime soon.
00:02:18.000But the question is whether this slate of sanctions is actually going to do anything because here is the simple fact.
00:02:23.000The West has spent the last several decades basically attempting to shift away from natural gas and oil based energy to its own discredit.
00:02:33.000That move toward green energy has basically made Europe extraordinarily dependent on Russian natural gas and oil.
00:02:39.000And this means that they can't keep up these sanctions for very long.
00:02:42.000And this is what the Russian regime knows.
00:02:44.000So when Joe Biden goes out there and he says he's going to levy these sanctions in a wide way, the real question that Putin is asking himself is not whether there are going to be a slate of sanctions that arrive at a moment's notice and that are quite broad.
00:02:56.000I think he's assuming that there will be some of that.
00:02:58.000The question is, how long can they hold on to this before they sort of let go?
00:03:02.000And Putin believes, based on prior experience, that it won't be all that long.
00:03:06.000After all, there was talk of sanctions after Putin invaded Georgia in 2008.
00:03:08.000There was talk of sanctions after Putin invaded Ukraine in 2014.
00:03:12.000And none of it lasted more than about 37 seconds because Vladimir Putin was in control of the natural gas flow into Europe.
00:03:19.000And so when we look at what Joe Biden had to say yesterday, the question is not really what Joe Biden is doing in the here and now.
00:03:24.000The question is, how long is that going to last?
00:03:43.000And Vladimir Putin does have that on his mind.
00:03:44.000He believes that Joe Biden is a weak horse.
00:03:46.000He believes that Joe Biden is not somebody who actually is capable of standing up to him.
00:03:50.000Whether that is right or wrong remains to be seen.
00:03:53.000Although, of course, when Joe Biden was vice president of the United States under Barack Obama, he and Barack Obama didn't do anything to stand up to Putin.
00:03:59.000Anyway, Joe Biden gets up yesterday and he makes this big speech.
00:04:02.000He says that Putin has now announced that he is carving a chunk out of Ukraine.
00:04:06.000Yesterday, Vladimir Putin recognized two regions of Ukraine as independent states.
00:04:11.000And he bizarrely asserted that these regions are no longer part of Ukraine and their sovereign territory.
00:04:18.000To put it simply, Russia just announced that it is carving out a big chunk of Ukraine.
00:04:27.000I mean, essentially, Russia had announced that it was carving out a big chunk of Ukraine a while ago when it allowed pro-Russian separatists to start wars in Donetsk and Luhansk.
00:04:36.000Biden continued, this is the beginning of a Russian invasion of Ukraine.
00:04:38.000Now, this is the first time that Biden has used the term invasion to refer Do Russian troops crossing the border between Russia and Ukraine?
00:04:45.000There have been a serious question as to whether it would just be called a sort of minor incursion in the way that Joe Biden had suggested a few weeks ago would not be punishable under international law.
00:04:53.000And the reason that that was questionable is because the separatist regions of Ukraine, which again are sort of run as proxy forces by Russia, again, that's what they are.
00:05:02.000I mean, they are just proxy states for Russia.
00:05:04.000So Russian troops entering those regions is sort of a Reinforcement of the facts already on the ground.
00:05:10.000But Joe Biden did the right thing yesterday.
00:05:12.000He did say that this was an invasion because it is.
00:05:15.000It turns out that when the troops of one country cross the border of another sovereign country, that is called an invasion by the dictionary definition.
00:05:21.000Last night, Putin authorized Russian forces to deploy into the region, these regions.
00:05:27.000Today, he asserted that these regions are actually extend deeper than the two areas he recognized, claiming large areas currently under the jurisdiction of the Ukraine government.
00:05:40.000He's setting up a rationale to take more territory by force, in my view.
00:05:45.000And if we listened to his speech last night, and many of you did, I know, he's setting up a rationale to go much further.
00:05:53.000This is the beginning of a Russian invasion of Ukraine, as he indicated and asked permission to be able to do from his Duma.
00:06:00.000Okay, then Joe Biden announced that the United States and its allies were going to begin He said, if they'll go further, then we will ratchet it up.
00:06:08.000So he's not going to hit him with the full slate.
00:06:11.000So this was always the question, was whether there was going to be some sort of trigger.
00:06:33.000And if, again, Europe had not been stupid enough to cut itself off from its own energy supply, then they would not be reliant on Russian natural gas and oil.
00:06:41.000Russia has an economy about the size of South Korea's.
00:06:44.000Russia's GDP per capita is extremely low.
00:06:48.000This is a country that is a second rate power with nuclear weapons.
00:06:52.000Which isn't to say they're not a threat because secondary power with nuclear weapons is still a threat.
00:06:55.000But the question was going to be whether the West was going to hit Putin with harsh sanctions or whether they were going to sort of dip their toe in the water.
00:07:01.000It seems like the Biden administration is doing the dip the toe in the water routine.
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00:09:39.000Okay, so these are the slate of sanctions.
00:09:41.000In a second, we'll discuss how far these sanctions actually go, because the answer is not all that far.
00:09:47.000He sounds like he's talking a bigger game than he actually is, which is why, by the way, the Russian ruble actually strengthened against the dollar yesterday after the announcement of the sanctions, because people who are watching the markets are like, well, this isn't as bad as we sort of thought it was going to be.
00:10:00.000He suggested that there was no reason why Putin thought that he had the right to who Who in the Lord's name does Putin think gives him the right?
00:10:07.000And the answer, of course, is that Putin doesn't care who quote unquote gives him the right.
00:10:09.000He doesn't think that anybody gives him the right.
00:10:12.000He just does as much as he can until somebody stops him, because this is the history of Russian leadership.
00:10:18.000Who in the Lord's name does Putin think gives him the right to declare new so-called countries on territory that belong to his neighbors?
00:10:28.000This is a flagrant violation of international law and demands a firm response from the international community.
00:10:35.000Over the last few months, we've coordinated closely with our NATO allies and partners in Europe and around the world to prepare that response.
00:10:44.000We've said all along, and I've told Putin to his face more than a month ago, that we would act together.
00:10:51.000And the moment Russia moved against Ukraine, Russia has now undeniably moved against Ukraine by declaring these independent states.
00:11:02.000So what exactly are the sanctions that the United States and its allies are levying against Putin and Russia?
00:11:07.000The answer is they're pretty darn weak.
00:11:09.000And you heard Biden said that this is the beginning.
00:11:23.000The basic idea was if we gradually increase the amount of pressure that we are exerting against the North Vietnamese, eventually they will realize that we can do this indefinitely, and then they will stop what they are doing.
00:11:32.000And of course, instead, what they took this to mean is, okay, well, they're not overwhelming us, so I guess we can continue to up the ante, and they will lose their will before we do.
00:11:40.000And Putin believes the same thing, that if this is just graduated Escalation, graduated equilibrium, is the other thing I used to call it.
00:11:46.000If that's what this is, then I can survive this.
00:11:50.000The actual way that you want to fight a war or impose sanctions is with shock and awe.
00:11:54.000You want to go in, full scale, with as harsh a regime as you can muster, and demonstrate that they cannot last under this sort of pressure.
00:12:04.000Not that you can keep ratcheting up the pressure if they go further, but that what they've done is already a violation so grave that you will essentially sanction them into the Stone Age.
00:13:15.000Johnson says these are only the first tranche, the first barrage.
00:13:19.000But every name on the Navalny 35, a list of Russian elites compiled by a dissident Alexei Navalny's anti-corruption organization, ought to face sanctions.
00:13:27.000Germany said it was halting the certification for Russia's Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.
00:13:32.000But Russia immediately responded by saying, OK, fine, well, then get ready for your prices to go up.
00:13:38.000Dmitry Medvedev, the Russian foreign minister and a person to whom Barack Obama once pledged actual flexibility, he tweeted out, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has issued an order to halt the process of certifying the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.
00:13:49.000Well, welcome to the brave new world where Europeans are very soon going to pay two euros for one cubic meters of natural gas.
00:13:56.000So he's basically just saying, OK, well, you know, we can handle it.
00:14:04.000The sanctions could hurt Russia's economy, but Moscow has taken steps to buffer itself against exactly these sorts of sanctions, according to The Wall Street Journal.
00:14:12.000The bulk of Russia's export revenue comes from mineral products such as oil, natural gas and coal.
00:14:16.000This dependent makes energy exports an attractive target for sanctions.
00:14:19.000But the EU is reliant on Russia for more than one third of its natural gas imports.
00:14:24.000As of January, the US and Europe weren't weighing sanctions against Russian exports of oil and natural gas directly, given the concern that doing so could already increase the high energy costs in Europe.
00:14:34.000Also, Russia has started diversifying its trade efforts with China.
00:14:38.000Those efforts include opening a major gas pipeline to the country in 2019.
00:14:40.000To this point, that is still not a huge percentage of the oil and natural gas that it is exporting.
00:14:48.000Most of that oil and natural gas, or a huge chunk of that, goes to Germany.
00:14:52.000But the question is, how long can Germany actually last with those high oil and natural gas prices?
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00:16:11.000As has been made clear, by the way, the West has been studiously avoiding actually cracking down on the oil and natural gas.
00:16:20.000Again, according to the Wall Street Journal, the Biden administration will take steps to ensure its sanctions against Russia over Ukraine don't lead to a jump in energy prices and will act to lower prices if they do, according to a senior State Department official.
00:16:30.000sanctions stop short of measures that could curtail oil and gas exports out of Russia, the official said, as the U.S.
00:16:36.000seeks to dent the Russian economy while avoiding collateral damage to the U.S.
00:16:39.000The official said the sanctions that are being imposed today and that could be imposed in the near future are not targeting and will not target oil flows and natural gas flows.
00:16:47.000What do you think Russia's chief export is?
00:16:50.000They don't make anything over there except for natural gas and oil.
00:16:54.000The official said doing anything that affects or halts energy transactions would have a great impact on the United States, American citizens, and our allies.
00:17:01.000So our intention here is to impose the hardest sanctions we can while trying to safeguard the American public and the rest of the world from those measures.
00:17:25.000officials are working closely with other countries to ensure more supply gets on the market if prices do rise.
00:17:29.000That could include releasing government-owned oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, but that won't happen as long as prices stay stable.
00:17:36.000Saudi Arabia and other OPEC countries have told U.S.
00:17:38.000officials they understand the need to keep markets stable considering the ongoing international crisis.
00:17:45.000The question is how much they're going to follow through the longer this lasts.
00:17:51.000So again, these sanctions don't really look like they are strong enough to force Russia into doing anything at this point.
00:17:57.000Biden, for his part, says that, yeah, I understand the oil and natural gas prices are going to go up.
00:18:00.000He says defending freedom will have its costs.
00:18:04.000As we respond, my administration is using every tool at our disposal to protect American businesses and consumers from rising prices at the pump.
00:18:13.000As I said last week, defending freedom will have costs for us as well and here at home.
00:18:45.000Last year, they had their Secretary of Energy, Jennifer Granholm, going around talking about why high gas prices were a good thing.
00:18:50.000They were material good because they would encourage people to get off of natural gas and oil.
00:18:54.000And then the price of gas at the pump rose.
00:18:57.000And then this administration decided they were going to consider lowering the gas tax.
00:19:00.000They decided that they were going to consider some sort of strategic petroleum reserve release. And now they're saying, okay, well, you know, we'll do sanctions on Russia, just not the ones that actually will work. So here is Jen Psaki saying we should probably expect some higher energy prices.
00:19:12.000You mean specifically Americans should expect higher gasoline?
00:19:18.000Yeah, energy prices. Exactly. That's that's what we want the American public to be aware is a possibility. Now, hilariously enough, hilariously enough, this administration also says that they've never been a fan of Nord Stream 2.
00:19:30.000That's the Russian pipeline into Germany that made Germany more dependent in the future on Russian natural gas and oil.
00:19:37.000Russia knows that's not going to be shut down indefinitely.
00:19:39.000Because again, there is only one cost effective measure for garnering energy in Europe and that is listening to the Russians.
00:19:46.000So now, I love that this administration is trying to backfill the history and trying to rewrite it in real time.
00:19:52.000Oh, we never liked Nord Stream 2, really, because the first thing you did when you entered office was you greenlit Nord Stream 2 and you shut down Keystone XL.
00:19:58.000So theoretically, you could reopen Keystone XL, but they're not going to do that.
00:20:00.000They're not going to increase domestic natural gas and oil production, because that would cut against their green base.
00:20:06.000Here's Jen Psaki trying to pretend that this administration has never been a fan of Nord Stream 2, despite, by the way, the fact that a few weeks ago, the Republicans Foreseeing that the Russians were probably going to invade Ukraine, started talking about putting sanctions on Nord Stream 2, and this administration killed that effort.
00:20:23.000Here is Jen Psaki trying to rewrite history.
00:20:26.000The president has never been a supporter of Nord Stream 2.
00:20:29.000We've always criticized it as a project that we didn't support. We took a range of steps and sanctions, including sanctions, to make that very clear. What the announcement made by the German chancellor today was not by accident.
00:20:45.000It was at the conclusion of a range of diplomatic engagement and efforts by the president and members of our national security team and unity from the Europeans about the fact that this could could not move forward.
00:21:00.000Again, I keep saying for how long, because Putin, China, America's enemies, they have long-range vision.
00:21:07.000For American politicians, because we switch presidents every four years, or maybe every eight years, and because we switch Congress people every two years, and switch senators every six years in this country, because there's an enormous amount of turnover, people's long-term vision really does not exist.
00:21:20.000Instead, people attempt to move the ball forward incrementally.
00:21:23.000When it comes to foreign policy, you have to have long-term vision, otherwise you lose.
00:21:27.000Putin has long-term vision because he's dictator for life.
00:21:29.000Xi Jinping has long-term vision because he's dictator for life.
00:21:32.000This is not an advocacy of dictatorship for life.
00:21:34.000I'm not Thomas Friedman praising the Chinese system because you can get things done.
00:21:38.000The only point that I'm making is that it requires politicians to say the hard things and then do the hard things for long periods of time on foreign policy in order to effectuate change.
00:21:47.000Putin looks at the West and feels that that's not going to happen.
00:22:30.000So the real question in all of this is, is this going to accomplish its goal?
00:22:35.000Now, I'm not saying that the Biden administration is making all the wrong moves here.
00:22:37.000I'm just saying that if you're going to hit with sanctions, you hit with all of them.
00:22:41.000If you're going to go after the Russian economy, you go after the Russian economy.
00:22:44.000Because Putin, living in a country with a $10,000 GDP per person per capita income, Living in a country where he is a full-scale dictator, he's not particularly vulnerable to these sorts of threats.
00:22:57.000He's living in his palatial estates, not really caring.
00:23:11.000I'd be very surprised if these sanctions are effective in achieving their desired result.
00:23:16.000All righty, coming up, Secretary of State Tony Blinken has now canceled his meeting with Sergei Lavrov, the foreign minister over in Russia.
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00:24:20.000Meanwhile, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, he canceled his meeting with Sergei Lavrov, the foreign minister over in Russia.
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00:24:43.000I agreed to meet Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov this week on February 24th to discuss our country's respective concerns about European security.
00:24:55.000But only if Russia did not invade Ukraine.
00:24:59.000Now that we see the invasion is beginning, and Russia has made clear its wholesale rejection of diplomacy, it does not make sense to go forward with that meeting at this time.
00:25:11.000Okay, now again, just like with the sanctions, this sort of thing, it looks good, but the question is how practical is it really?
00:25:17.000And the answer is not particularly practical, because simultaneously, according to Politico, foreign ministers are likely to meet in Vienna in the coming days with the hopes of sealing a return to an Iran nuclear deal, according to two people with knowledge of the situation.
00:25:28.000The two people said the meeting may involve the Iranian foreign minister and foreign ministers from three European countries involved in the talks, Britain, Germany, and France.
00:25:36.000Those officials are seeking to resurrect a 2015 deal that would limit Tehran's nuclear ambitions in exchange for broad sanctions relief.
00:25:43.000The foreign ministers from China and Russia could possibly join online.
00:25:54.000Also, if Russia could join us here at this table where we're about to make a bunch of concessions to the Iranians who are backed by Russia, that'd be great.
00:26:01.000So your diplomatic freeze isn't actually a diplomatic freeze, is it?
00:26:06.000Diplomats from Britain, France, Germany, Iran, Russia, China, and the United States have been negotiating in the Austrian capital since last April.
00:26:12.000The negotiations are mediated and coordinated by the European Union.
00:26:16.000U.S., European, and Russian negotiators have warned in recent months Iran is only weeks away from having enough fissile material for one nuclear weapon, arguing time is running out.
00:26:23.000So, in other words, while we are saying publicly that we are cutting off relations with the Russians, we're in the back room here trying to cut a deal with the Russians to hand money to the Iranians.
00:26:34.000So why exactly would Putin be scared at this point?
00:26:36.000Why would he think that this is going to last in any way?
00:26:40.000The perspective of this administration on Russia is completely discombobulated.
00:26:44.000On the one hand, we definitely have to sanction them.
00:26:54.000On the other, I will see you tomorrow at the bar where we will be discussing how we can back your favorite proxy in the Middle East, Iran.
00:27:01.000I mean, if you're Vladimir Putin, you gotta be laughing into your sleeve at this point.
00:27:06.000Because you know that the West does not have a unified response, and you know that they don't even have a unified response even when they do have a unified response.
00:27:11.000They may be unified in being upset about Ukraine, but they're not unified around a broad range of other issues where they seem to want your help.
00:27:18.000China knows the same thing, by the way.
00:27:20.000This is why I'm sending our climate envoy, John Kerry, to China.
00:27:23.000While we're simultaneously trying to crack down on China over the Wuhan virus, over the Olympics, over their human rights violations, over the threats to Taiwan, meanwhile, you got John Kerry over there going, well, you know what?
00:27:33.000If they're holding a million Muslims in Shenzhen in abject servitude, that's okay.
00:27:36.000I mean, we do have to work with them on climate change.
00:27:49.000And I'll tell you that the biggest indicator to Vladimir Putin that the rest is not going to last on this is, again, the West's willingness to subsume its own foreign policy beliefs, to subsume its own values, to the green boondoggle.
00:28:05.000Bjorn Longberg has a good piece over at the New York Post today talking about the costs of green energy policy, which, by the way, is the reason why energy is so unbelievably expensive in Europe.
00:28:15.000The reason that the Europeans require the help of the Russians is because they decided they were going to take offline all of the things that allow them to produce energy.
00:28:39.000Fossil fuels still deliver the vast majority of energy.
00:28:42.000The European Union puts climate at the top of its political agenda, yet more than 80% of its primary energy needs are met by fossil fuels, according to the International Energy Agency.
00:28:51.000Despite endless environmental talk, solar and wind contribute only about 3% of Europe's total energy.
00:28:58.000So, they've sunk billions and billions and billions of dollars into solar and wind, and it contributes 3% of Europe's total energy, and meanwhile, Russia's just shipping them gas.
00:29:07.000So Putin looks at that and he goes, yeah, I mean, they're literally tweeting that out.
00:29:10.000As I said before, they're literally tweeting out that you guys are not going to last the test of time because your gas is going to be too expensive.
00:29:18.000As Bjorn Lomborg writes, making a transition from fossil fuels to green energy is costly.
00:29:22.000Solar and wind can only deliver electricity, which accounts for less than a fifth of total energy consumption.
00:29:27.000Moreover, as Europe is learning, leaning on unreliable sources like wind that leaves households vulnerable.
00:29:31.000Wind speeds were unusually low for most of 2021, causing most of Europe's current energy pain.
00:29:38.000When the sun doesn't shine or the wind doesn't blow, prices rise quickly.
00:29:41.000We have to revert to fossil fuels for backup.
00:29:42.000Batteries are inadequate and expensive, easily quadrupling solar electricity costs and failing to provide much power.
00:29:48.000In 2021, Europe had only battery capacity to backup less than one and a half minutes of its average electricity usage.
00:29:55.000By 2030, with 10 times the stock of batteries and somewhat more usage needed, they will have enough for 12 minutes of coverage.
00:30:02.000And as countries move to net zero carbon emissions, the target endorsed by Biden and the EU, costs will escalate much higher again.
00:30:09.000And then the dirty little secret will be that Russia will continue to ship the actual power that is necessary for Europe to continue to function.
00:30:15.000Research published in Nature Magazine finds that reducing emissions 80% will cost the United States $2.1 trillion every year from 2050, or more than $5,000 per person per year.
00:30:22.000year from 2050 or more than $5,000 per person per year.
00:30:27.000To get to 100%, that would be far higher.
00:30:29.000To put that in context, the annual US.
00:30:31.000cost of World War II is estimated at $1 trillion in today's money.
00:30:35.000Every year by 2050, climate policy could cost Americans more than twice what they paid during the Second World War, and energy policy will turbocharge inflation.
00:30:43.000Bank of America estimates it'll lead to an additional 3% of greenflation, which will reduce growth dramatically.
00:30:50.000So, in other words, we decided to pursue goals that were impractical and expensive, And Russia, meanwhile, continued to be the dirty little secret in the other room, providing all sorts of energy to Europe.
00:31:02.000No wonder they think they can outlast the West.
00:31:04.000Because why would, again, what are the indicators they can't outlast the West?
00:31:07.000They've done this twice before in the last 15 years alone.
00:31:10.000Why would they think they can't outlast the West?
00:31:12.000And what's the evidence that they won't?
00:31:15.000That's why what Biden is doing here is pretty good evidence that he has no intent of outlasting Vladimir Putin on this.
00:31:20.000So I suggested yesterday on the show that I think there's a good shot that Putin just consolidates his gains in eastern Ukraine and does nothing else.
00:31:26.000And he's like, OK, I'll just sit here and then you guys will relent.
00:31:30.000And I'll just get to keep these places as independent republics.
00:31:33.000And I'll keep my Russian troops here in this part of Ukraine for the possibility of a future move.
00:31:40.000Or, theoretically, he could decide to go whole hog and say, OK, I still don't think that you guys are going to crack down with the full force of sanctions beyond the next five minutes.
00:32:35.000What he actually said is that it was a politically genius and savvy move for Putin to do this because the West is not going to stand up to him.
00:32:43.000So if you ignore the last part of that, then sure, he's rooting for Putin, except for the part where he says that Biden is being weak and it's pathetic and sad.
00:32:50.000Here is Donald Trump yesterday, the left, of course, looking for a headline to try and suggest that this is Trump's fault, when the simple fact of the matter is, and you don't have to be a historical revisionist to see this, Vladimir Putin invaded during George W. Bush's time in office, he invaded during Barack Obama's time in office, and he invaded during Joe Biden's time in office.
00:33:06.000There's one president missing from that list.
00:34:13.000OK, so it never would have happened if I'm president.
00:34:15.000Then he went on and he suggested that it was, quote unquote, very sad.
00:34:18.000That Biden had allowed this to happen.
00:34:20.000Naturally, this led to the White House jumping on this and suggesting, oh, well, you know, the real story here is that Trump is pro-Russia.
00:34:37.000Would you take advice from a former president who, let's say, had pledged Vladimir Putin flexibility and then allowed him to essentially take over all peacekeeping operations in, say, Syria and also invade Ukraine and take over Crimea?
00:34:49.000Because that would be Barack Obama, a different form of president.
00:34:51.000Here is Jen Psaki going after Trump, of course.
00:34:55.000Does the White House have any reaction to former President Trump calling Putin's move yesterday genius and smart?
00:35:02.000Well, as a matter of policy, we try not to take advice from anyone who praises President Putin and his military strategy, which I believe is what happened there, expresses an openness to lifting sanctions about the seizing of territory in Crimea, or at any point in time told leaders of the G7 that Crimea is a part of Russia, regardless if they are a former president.
00:35:26.000Okay, so, you know, the real story here is that Trump was so kind to Russia.
00:35:29.000Okay, guys, I noticed that he is invading Ukraine under your watch.
00:35:36.000Well, you know, no analysis of Ukraine and Russia would be complete without the simple fact that Cardi B sounded off on it.
00:35:41.000Because, after all, we're a very serious country filled with very serious people.
00:35:44.000Here is Cardi B sounding off on Ukraine and Russia.
00:35:47.000And suffice it to say, she is a Shakespeare for our time.
00:35:50.000She is just, as we all know from her massive hit, WAP, I did a better cover than she did, then we know that her thoughts on issues like this are vital.
00:36:00.000And thank God Cardi B has now sounded off.
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00:37:52.000Alrighty, we'll get to what's going on in Canada in just one second.
00:37:54.000First, I really believe there is no better place for a grand meeting of the minds than sitting down over a cup of coffee and letting the conversation just happen.
00:38:02.000I've had so many of the most important conversations in my life over a cup of coffee with one of my closest friends.
00:38:07.000And normally we don't put this sort of stuff on screen.
00:38:11.000In my new show, The Search, I will be taking you to my favorite local spots where you get to see the conversation that you normally don't get to see.
00:38:18.000When I'm off camera with my friends, normally that's the stuff that we don't put on camera.
00:38:21.000Now we're putting it on camera so that you can see what those conversations actually look and sound like.
00:38:25.000The second episode of The Search features my very good friend, highly lauded historian, Neil Ferguson.
00:38:30.000It's an excellent, fascinating conversation.
00:38:32.000Neil is one of the most interesting minds around on everything from cryptocurrency to world history to war.
00:38:37.000I cannot wait to share all of it with you.
00:38:54.000It's a bunch of people with 160 IQs sitting around and talking about life and history and all the important things within.
00:38:59.000Go check it out, dailywire.com slash subscribe, so you can have access to it.
00:39:03.000Also, The Daily Wire, we're way bigger than you think, and we are only getting bigger.
00:39:07.000See for yourself with our binge-worthy new docuseries, The Enemy Within, featuring acclaimed journalist and expert in national threats, Lee Smith.
00:39:13.000Smith uncovers a political coup orchestrated by America's ruling elites to generate their own wealth and power at the expense of the American people's safety and freedom.
00:39:21.000The second episode goes deep into the Biden family's ties to Chinese business and how Joe Biden, his administration, and his family have used their positions of power for personal gain at the expense of American security.
00:39:50.000However, the most significant threat comes from within.
00:39:54.000You're trying to obscure responsibility for four million people dying around the world.
00:39:59.000Okay, Senator Paul, you do not know what you are talking about.
00:40:03.000We've already seen evidence of how the elites want to run the United States.
00:40:07.000They're modeling themselves after Chinese autocracy.
00:40:11.000For over a decade, the People's Republic of China has stood publicly accused of acts of cruelty and wickedness that match the cruelty and wickedness of many evil torturers and executioners.
00:42:05.000Reserve Johnny the Walrus now on Amazon.
00:42:08.000They're listening to the largest, fastest growing conservative podcast and radio show in the nation.
00:42:11.000Meanwhile, in our neighbor to the north, the Canadian parliament has now greenlit Justin Trudeau, who is definitely not, definitely not Fidel Castro's son.
00:42:48.000And what Trudeau, who leads minority government, implied he could consider a confidence vote.
00:42:52.000Several opposition parties criticized the use of the powers as overreach, but the left-leaning New Democratic Party reluctantly supported the motion, ensuring that it passed.
00:42:58.000So well done once again for the workers' parties completely cracking down on the workers.
00:43:04.000Because it's not like governments of the left have ever cracked down on workers before.
00:43:08.000Ottawa was largely cleared this past weekend of the protests against the government and pandemic health restrictions that clogged the capital streets and frayed residents' nerves.
00:43:15.000And blockades at major U.S.-Canada trade routes have been removed.
00:43:19.000But speaking to reporters, Trudeau said he still required the powers because he said that he had real concerns over new demonstrations cropping up and the presence of demonstrators at several satellite hubs in rural towns outside of Ottawa.
00:43:30.000Well, I mean, if they're rural towns outside of Ottawa, First of all, Ottawa is not exactly, you know, a thriving metropolis.
00:43:36.000The total population of Ottawa is like... I don't know.
00:43:41.000I'm gonna look it up now because now I'm curious.
00:43:43.000The total population of Ottawa is one million.
00:43:45.000Okay, that is not exactly like a huge major city.
00:43:50.000It is by Canadian standards, but like the rural areas outside of Ottawa being a little clogged with traffic?
00:43:58.000He needs the Emergencies Act for that?
00:44:00.000For the first time in its history, passed in 1988.
00:44:02.000And so, meanwhile, the Canadian protest leader who started all of this, a woman named Tamara Lich, she is now being held without bail.
00:44:14.000A judge in Canada, according to the Associated Press, denied bail to Tamara Lyche.
00:44:18.000Ontario Court Justice Julie Bourgeois denied the organizer bail, saying there was substantial reason to believe that Lyche would repeat her offenses, according to the Associated Press.
00:44:28.000Lyche was a leader in the protest, which disrupted traffic in Ottawa for weeks.
00:44:31.000On Thursday, Lyche, who is formerly a member of the far-right Maverick Party, which calls for the independence of Western Canada, was arrested and charged with counseling to commit mischief.
00:44:40.000She had promised to return to Alberta and stop her support of the protest during a bail hearing.
00:44:44.000By the way, I think that we should have a charge like that.
00:46:03.000How much vitriol do we have to see of Honk Honk, which is an acronym for Hail Hitler, do we need to see by these protesters on social media?
00:46:18.000So that's why it's probably okay for us to just, you know, completely freeze financial accounts for people who donated 50 bucks.
00:46:25.000The Wall Street Journal is now reporting that Canada has told banks to unlock financial accounts belonging to individuals involved in weeks-long COVID-19 protests.
00:46:32.000Isabel Jacques, a senior official in Canada's finance department, said they started Monday to unfreeze accounts.
00:46:38.000The step marks a reversal for the Liberal government, which has argued that they needed sweeping power to freeze bank accounts.
00:46:43.000That power became available a week ago when Justin Trudeau invoked rarely used emergency measures.
00:46:48.000A representative from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police did not respond Tuesday evening to a request for comment about why officials started unlocking financial accounts.
00:46:56.000On Monday, Canadian Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland defended the freezings, which some financial law experts warned could affect people unaffiliated with the protests.
00:47:03.000She said the measures were put in place to disrupt illegal activity in Canada.
00:47:07.000We were very clear we would be following the money.
00:47:10.000that we would be using financial tools to disrupt illegal blockades and occupations.
00:47:13.000The focus absolutely has been on leaders and on vehicles that were such an important part of the illegal blockades and occupations. The way to get your accounts unfrozen is to stop being a part of the blockade and occupation. The organizers of the Ottawa protest said in a statement that the freezing of bank accounts has shocked Canadians.
00:47:30.000Quote, the more severe implication is that by using emergency powers as financial warfare, it will sow mistrust in both the banking system and the government, and the repercussions will be felt for years to come.
00:47:41.000If you think there's not going to be a rush to things like cryptocurrency and trying to find a way to shield your account from the government, think again.
00:47:49.000Because even the notion that the government can shut down your bank account for giving 50 bucks to a protest is absolutely crazy.
00:47:57.000And here in the United States, by the way, we had an organization called Black Lives Matter, you may have heard of them, that took in almost $100 million, and at no point were their accounts shut down, despite the fact that they're obviously a corrupt front organization.
00:48:07.000I mean, that organization does not have any sort of executive board, apparently.
00:48:12.000They just have this slush fund of cash.
00:48:15.000And at no point did the banks shut down the actual accounts or freeze them.
00:48:20.000It just kept taking in cash the entire time, and nobody who donated.
00:48:22.000I mean, we're not even talking about the organizations.
00:48:25.000We're talking about people who donated to the organizations.
00:48:30.000It therefore comes as a not particularly large shock that Chrystia Freeland has a side gig with the World Economic Forum.
00:48:37.000According to the National Post, a columnist named Rupa Subramanya, the World Economic Forum, which has met at the Swiss ski resort of Davos every year since its creation in 1971 by German academic and entrepreneur Klaus Schwab, was forced to convert its annual Schmoozefest into a virtual event this past year due to COVID-19.
00:48:54.000Of note on the main agenda was a stakeholder capitalism panel, including Canada's Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister, Chrystia Freeland.
00:49:01.000The former journalist-turned-politician has been a fixture at the WEF for years.
00:49:06.000Indeed, in her book, Freeland notes that an invitation to Davos marks an aspiring plutocrat's arrival on the international scene.
00:49:13.000Indeed, the one-time critic has enjoyed an apotheosis of sorts and since 2019 has sat on the board of trustees of the WEF itself.
00:49:20.000Now, understand that the WEF does push an agenda that they themselves, Klaus Schwab wrote a book called The Great Reset.
00:49:27.000The basic idea is that these elites need to control how all economies work.
00:49:31.000And those economies need to work on behalf of their favored, cherished left-wing causes.
00:49:35.000And if they do not, then the economies need to be restructured.
00:49:40.000Writing in the New York Times in 2011, Freeland described Schwab as a rather traditional European social democrat who aims to encourage among participants a kind of noblesse oblige, or its modern equivalent, stakeholder capitalism.
00:49:52.000The political tradition Freeland is describing originated with the reaction of privileged liberal elites rebelling against Europe's feudal past, a world away from contemporary Canada.
00:50:00.000Yet as a member of the board of trustees of Schwab's Outfit, Freeland is implicitly or explicitly committed to importing this brand of European social democracy into a Canadian ethos originally founded on individual rights and free market capitalism, which is in turn premised on maximizing shareholder value.
00:50:14.000Not a particular surprise that the elites in our society have combined to use the powers granted to them, and emergency powers not granted to them, in order to reshape the world around them.
00:50:28.000Also not a particular surprise that according to polls, a majority of Democrats support Justin Trudeau cracking down on the protesters.
00:50:36.000A survey from Trafalgar said, do you approve or disapprove of Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's handling of the trucker protests in his country?
00:50:42.000Overall, apparently according to Trafalgar, some 55% disapproved compared to 35% approving.
00:50:48.000But 65.7% of Democrats approved of that sort of crackdown.
00:51:04.000Pelosi's deputy chief of staff, Drew Hamill, said in a statement on Tuesday, quote, We are monitoring the situation closely, but we have deferred to the U.S.
00:51:11.000Capitol Police, which is in charge of security.
00:51:13.000That trucker convoy is slated to arrive in D.C.
00:51:15.000ahead of Joe Biden's State of the Union address on March 1.
00:51:18.000Right by news reports, Kyle Sefchik, organizer and leader of the Freedom Convoy USA, told WUSA-CBS he is scheduled to leave LA on Friday and drive to DC.
00:51:26.000The peaceful convoy will be composed of trucks and motorcycles and does not intend to gather at the Capitol.
00:51:31.000Instead, they will protest near the White House and the National Mall with Christian bands and preachers.
00:51:36.000Now listen, I'm not a fan of blocking off roads.
00:51:38.000disrupt major corridors of greater Maryland and northern Virginia area and roads that serve as a commuting passageway and route for commercial deliveries into the district. Now listen, I'm not a fan of blocking off roads. I'm not a fan of violating the law.
00:51:49.000But that is not a principle for the Democrats.
00:51:52.000It only depends on what your cause is.
00:51:54.000And Nancy Pelosi will monitor that one very, very quickly and very severely.
00:51:58.000Of course, she would not monitor that if people were just blocking traffic to protest phantom systemic police racism.
00:52:05.000All righty, we'll be back here later today with an additional hour of content.
00:52:07.000In the meantime, go check out The Michael Molls Show that's available right now.
00:52:42.000Kyle Rittenhouse launches a new organization to take down dishonest media companies.
00:52:47.000And a new poll, a terrifying poll, shows that the majority of American Democrats support the brutal crackdown on political dissent in Canada on the Freedom Convoy.