The Ben Shapiro Show - Celebrity Death Match: Trump vs. Pelosi | Ep. 788

00:00:00.000 President Trump and Speaker Pelosi snipe at each other, Julian Assange faces charges, and we check the mailbag.

00:00:05.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:00:06.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:00:12.000 Well, it's a busy Friday.

00:00:13.000 The president's also declassifying all sorts of material via his attorney general, William Barr.

00:00:17.000 We'll get to that.

00:00:18.000 Theresa May, the prime minister of Britain, stepping down.

00:00:20.000 We'll get to that as well.

00:00:21.000 We'll get to all these things.

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00:01:28.000 Alrighty, so we begin today with the crazy fight between President Trump and Nancy Pelosi. 0.90

00:01:33.000 So we, as we've been discussing for the past several days, Nancy Pelosi, the Democrat strategy for 2020 is to make Donald Trump appear to be a crazy person. 0.53

00:01:42.000 This is their chief strategy. 0.97

00:01:43.000 And Nancy Pelosi is basically a suicide bomber doing this. 1.00

00:01:48.000 I mean, I don't mean literally, obviously. 0.96

00:01:50.000 I mean, politically speaking, Nancy Pelosi is basically strapped on the crazy vest. 1.00

00:01:53.000 And she says, "If I act crazy, it will get Trump to act crazy.

00:01:57.000 I'm only elected by the people of San Francisco.

00:01:59.000 President Trump is elected by the people of the United States. 0.98

00:02:01.000 And that means people in San Francisco don't care if I'm crazy, but people broadly across the United States do care if Trump is crazy." So in a crazy fight, Trump is always going to lose because the referendum is gonna be on Trump as president of the United States. 0.74

00:02:14.000 Everybody understands what Nancy Pelosi is at this point. 0.86

00:02:18.000 And it doesn't matter because again, she's elected by crazy people in San Francisco. 0.94

00:02:22.000 Donald Trump has to win a majority of the voters of the United States, at least in the Electoral College.

00:02:27.000 It's hard to do that when people widely perceive you as being volatile.

00:02:30.000 Nancy Pelosi knows that, and that is why she has been basically jabbing at President Trump over and over and over again, saying that he's engaged in a cover-up, saying that he's unstable and all this sort of stuff.

00:02:41.000 President Trump, because he's a counterpuncher, has a natural tendency to then engage in precisely the reverse sort of behavior, which is to rip on his political opponents and also to get supremely defensive about his own mental status.

00:02:54.000 So, Nancy Pelosi said yesterday that President Trump wants us to impeach him. 0.95

00:02:59.000 This is what she says, that President Trump is a crazy person, he's getting nothing done, and he wants us to impeach him in order to save himself. 0.53

00:03:05.000 Here is the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, jabbing at Trump, deliberately, deliberately poking at Trump in an attempt to get Trump to fire back at her in the most volatile possible fashion. 0.91

00:03:15.000 You said in private, you suggested it today, that the president wants, on some level, to be impeached.

00:03:21.000 Oh, yes.

00:03:22.000 Oh, there's no question.

00:03:23.000 The White House is just crying out for impeachment.

00:03:26.000 That's why he flipped yesterday, because he was hoping, when he saw that... See, he's saying, oh, you called that meeting at 9 o'clock.

00:03:36.000 No, we have the meeting.

00:03:38.000 Mr. President, it's not about you.

00:03:41.000 That was what disappointed him, because he didn't see this rush to impeachment coming out of our caucus in our 9 o'clock meeting, which he thought was called specifically for him.

00:03:51.000 OK, so then President Trump fired back.

00:03:54.000 So with Nancy Pelosi jabbing at him over and over and over, President Trump fired back yesterday repeatedly.

00:04:00.000 So first, Trump ripped crying Chuck and crazy Nancy.

00:04:04.000 He did this in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, flanked by farmers who he was giving a sort of bailout to in the aftermath of his Chinese trade war.

00:04:13.000 Here's President Trump ripping into Crying Chuck and Crazy Nancy. 0.94

00:04:15.000 Again, as I've been saying for days, I have a lot of sympathy on an emotional level for President Trump, who's being slapped around by Democrats, who's being unfairly treated by Democrats.

00:04:25.000 I really do think that these investigations are not directed toward criminal activity.

00:04:29.000 They're directed toward getting under Trump's skin.

00:04:31.000 Democrats have successfully done that, and that's why the president should not allow them to do it.

00:04:34.000 Look, that's a hard job.

00:04:36.000 It's very rough.

00:04:36.000 I've been through it myself.

00:04:37.000 But the president, if he wants to win re-election, This is not the strategy for doing it.

00:04:42.000 Here's the president ripping into Cryin' Chuck and Crazy Nancy. 1.00

00:04:45.000 She said I walked into the room right next door yesterday and walked in and started screaming and yelling.

00:04:51.000 Just the opposite.

00:04:52.000 Just the opposite.

00:04:53.000 Because I know that they will always say that, even if it didn't happen, because this happened once before.

00:04:59.000 I walked out, I was so calm.

00:05:00.000 So I walked into the cabinet room.

00:05:02.000 You had the group.

00:05:04.000 Cryin' Chuck.

00:05:07.000 Crazy Nancy. 0.98

00:05:08.000 I tell you what, I've been watching her and I have been watching her for a long period of time.

00:05:13.000 She's not the same person.

00:05:15.000 She's lost it.

00:05:17.000 So he's firing back.

00:05:18.000 And listen, as a Republican, as a conservative, Nancy Pelosi has a lot of this coming. 0.61

00:05:23.000 But that's not really the question.

00:05:24.000 The question is, is this strategically smart for the president to get down in the mud with Nancy Pelosi and have a crazy fight when, again, he is the one who's going to be up for presidential re-election?

00:05:34.000 And then it gets worse because President Trump then calls up his own aides, people who work for him, to testify that he did not throw a tantrum.

00:05:41.000 Well, if you're trying not to appear volatile, probably the worst way to do that is to get your own employees.

00:05:46.000 Come on over here, Bob, and tell them I'm not volatile.

00:05:48.000 Come on over here.

00:05:49.000 Tell them I'm not crazy.

00:05:50.000 Jim, you work for me.

00:05:51.000 Tell them I'm not crazy.

00:05:52.000 This is not the way to do this.

00:05:54.000 There's the president doing this.

00:05:56.000 How was my temperament yesterday?

00:05:58.000 Mercedes, you're always a straight talker.

00:05:59.000 You were in that room yesterday?

00:06:01.000 What was my attitude when I walked in?

00:06:01.000 Yes, sir.

00:06:03.000 Did I ever scream?

00:06:04.000 cancer, rage, lost it, that's just a lie.

00:06:08.000 -Mercedes, you're always a straight talker.

00:06:10.000 You were in that room yesterday?

00:06:11.000 -Yes, sir.

00:06:12.000 -What was my attitude when I walked in?

00:06:13.000 Did I ever scream?

00:06:15.000 -No, you were very calm and you were very direct.

00:06:18.000 And you sent a very firm message to the Speaker and to the Democrats.

00:06:23.000 -What was my attitude yesterday at the meeting?

00:06:25.000 -Mercedes right, Callie Ann's right. You were very calm and you laid out the case. You had a lot of numbers.

00:06:33.000 Oh, no.

00:06:35.000 Do you laugh or do you cry?

00:06:40.000 I mean, really, Mr. President, if you do not want to appear volatile, if you don't want to appear like a crazy person, probably what you shouldn't do is appeal to all the people who work for you to testify as to what a great dude you are.

00:06:53.000 Let's say that somebody called me volatile.

00:06:54.000 You know what I probably wouldn't do is call in my producers.

00:06:58.000 I wouldn't call in Nick and both Mike's.

00:07:01.000 I wouldn't call in my producers and then say, guys, tell them I'm not volatile.

00:07:06.000 Tell them I'm a wonderful boss.

00:07:06.000 Tell them right now.

00:07:09.000 That just what?

00:07:11.000 Like, how is this in any way strategically smart?

00:07:11.000 What?

00:07:15.000 Again, I get it emotionally.

00:07:16.000 I do.

00:07:16.000 I'll say that a thousand times over.

00:07:17.000 I get where the president is coming from emotionally.

00:07:19.000 I get where Trump is coming from.

00:07:20.000 But if the rip on you is that you're volatile and then you proceed to show that you're volatile by calling on Mercedes Schlapp, who works for you, and Kellyanne Conway, who shills for you on television to testify as to your innate genius.

00:07:33.000 I don't know what.

00:07:34.000 How is that productive?

00:07:36.000 And then Trump keeps doubling down.

00:07:37.000 He says, you know, Nancy Pelosi is a mess. 0.99

00:07:39.000 Again, all of this may be true.

00:07:41.000 Nancy Pelosi is a mess. 1.00

00:07:43.000 Yesterday, I played a clip of her on my radio show in which she is utterly inarticulate. 0.99

00:07:47.000 It sounds like she's doing a Dadaist poem from the 1930s with some jazz music in the background.

00:07:53.000 She's not speaking complete sentences.

00:07:55.000 But I am a podcast and radio host.

00:07:57.000 I'm not the president who has to get reelected.

00:08:00.000 Here's President Trump going after Nancy Pelosi again.

00:08:03.000 Well, they're being very nice to her because they really, you know, she's a mess.

00:08:06.000 Look, let's face it.

00:08:07.000 She doesn't understand it.

00:08:09.000 And they sort of feel she's disintegrating before the rush.

00:08:12.000 She does not understand it.

00:08:13.000 They want to have her understand it before we... It's finished. 0.98

00:08:16.000 It's signed.

00:08:17.000 As you know, Mexico's approved the deal.

00:08:20.000 Canada's approved the deal.

00:08:22.000 And they're waiting to get a signal for her.

00:08:25.000 Pelosi does not understand the bill.

00:08:27.000 She doesn't understand it.

00:08:29.000 Even though unions are in favor of it, farmers, manufacturers, everybody just about is in favor of it.

00:08:34.000 Okay, so, and then he concludes this little riff, which went on for many, many minutes in the middle of this press conference with the farmers standing behind going, oh my god.

00:08:44.000 Trump concluded this.

00:08:45.000 I mean, this all goes under bad Trump, honestly.

00:08:47.000 There's good Trump and bad Trump in my good Trump, bad Trump matrix.

00:08:49.000 This is all bad Trump.

00:08:51.000 Not because it's morally evil or anything.

00:08:53.000 The president has said some very immoral things.

00:08:54.000 Nothing he's saying here is immoral.

00:08:56.000 But it is ill-advised at the extreme level of ill-advised.

00:09:00.000 And then Trump finishes with his favorite line.

00:09:02.000 He says he's an extremely stable genius.

00:09:05.000 This is like when people tell you they're exorbitantly wealthy or incredibly brilliant.

00:09:09.000 When people have to tell you They very often are not.

00:09:13.000 And when the president... When's the last time you told your friends that you were an extremely stable genius?

00:09:18.000 Here's the president of the United States doing that yesterday.

00:09:21.000 For whatever reason, you'll explain this to me, I always get a lot of publicity.

00:09:24.000 So if I said something, even as a private builder or whatever I was doing at the time, I would get a lot of publicity.

00:09:31.000 And without a lot of trying.

00:09:34.000 And I was against certain things, but if you look and you take a look back, you'll see all of the things that you're talking about and all of the things that you're asking about, I was against at that time.

00:09:45.000 And I'm still against.

00:09:46.000 I haven't changed very much.

00:09:48.000 Been very consistent.

00:09:49.000 I'm an extremely stable genius.

00:09:52.000 Okay, and obviously he's saying that a little bit tongue-in-cheek because the president is a stand-up comedian, but that then opens the door to Nancy Pelosi doing this.

00:09:59.000 So Nancy Pelosi then tweets at the president about the extremely stable genius line. 1.00

00:10:04.000 She says, Now, this is supremely cynical from Nancy Pelosi.

00:10:14.000 She's not interested in working with Trump on anything. 0.96

00:10:17.000 Her entire goal here is to drag Trump into this fight, to get under his skin, to make him crazy. 0.99

00:10:23.000 That's what she's trying to do here. 1.00

00:10:26.000 This move where she says, you know, I pray for him.

00:10:29.000 He needs an intervention.

00:10:30.000 He's engaged in a cover up.

00:10:31.000 And then as soon as Trump comes back at her and says that she's a mess, then it's, well, I was happy to work with him.

00:10:37.000 But then he decided that he wasn't going to work with me.

00:10:40.000 That routine from Nancy Pelosi, it's really galling and it's really perturbing.

00:10:44.000 But with all of that said, is it smart for President Trump to jump into a personal catfight with Nancy Pelosi?

00:10:52.000 Here's the thing, the image that he needs to propagate from now until Election Day is of, if not an extremely stable genius, an extremely stable person, or at least a stable person, right? 0.94

00:11:05.000 That would be, that would, that, the entire Democratic pitch is Trump is too crazy.

00:11:08.000 The economy is good right now.

00:11:10.000 On foreign policy, we're heading in the right direction. 0.99

00:11:12.000 Democrats must create the image that the president cannot be trusted with power because he's a crazy person. 0.96

00:11:18.000 And thus, you must hand it over to Old Joe. 0.98

00:11:21.000 Slow Old Joe.

00:11:22.000 You remember Old Joe.

00:11:23.000 That's really their campaign.

00:11:25.000 They should make their campaign slogan, Democratic Campaign Slogan 2020.

00:11:28.000 You remember Old Joe.

00:11:30.000 That's, that's the entire pitch.

00:11:33.000 I've been saying for years, the Democratic campaign was going to be the 1920 Warren G. Harding campaign, a return to normalcy.

00:11:40.000 That was Warren G. Harding, the Republican Party's pitch in 1920.

00:11:42.000 Woodrow Wilson had lost it.

00:11:44.000 He was senile at that point.

00:11:45.000 And the Democratic Party had followed him so far down the chute that Woodrow Wilson's wife effectively governed the country as president of the United States in the middle of Woodrow Wilson's senility as of 1919. 0.99

00:11:56.000 And so Republicans said, okay, we just want normal.

00:11:58.000 How about normal again?

00:11:59.000 That's what Democrats are trying to do. 0.99

00:12:00.000 In order to make that happen, they have to portray the president as abnormal.

00:12:04.000 The president should not be helping them out in this quest.

00:12:06.000 And yet, and yet, the president's counter-punching tendencies lead him to do the wrong thing.

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00:13:09.000 OK, so President Trump finishes his attacks on Pelosi.

00:13:13.000 Again, justified morally, not smart politically.

00:13:17.000 The president finishes attacks on Pelosi by tweeting out a video of her stumbling over her words.

00:13:24.000 And there was a lot of talk yesterday about a doctored video of Nancy Pelosi that made it look like she was slurring her words.

00:13:29.000 I don't know why you'd have to doctor a video of Nancy Pelosi in order to come up with that conclusion.

00:13:33.000 She stumbles over her words routinely.

00:13:34.000 She has odd pauses in her verbiage.

00:13:37.000 And this is one of the effects of being 1,000 years old.

00:13:40.000 And Nancy Pelosi has been doing this for a long time.

00:13:43.000 This is not a shock.

00:13:44.000 Well, the president then tweeted out a compendium of Nancy Pelosi stumbling over her words.

00:13:50.000 Now, all of that may be true.

00:13:52.000 It is also true that there are similar videos of the president stumbling over his words.

00:13:55.000 I will say that the media coverage of this is insane and insipid.

00:13:59.000 The media coverage was, how could President Trump do something like this?

00:14:02.000 So cruel, so terrible.

00:14:04.000 They even suggested that this video was doctored.

00:14:06.000 This video is not doctored.

00:14:07.000 These sorts of videos existed about Barack Obama.

00:14:09.000 I remember them.

00:14:10.000 There were these long montages of Barack Obama just saying, uh.

00:14:14.000 Like lots of, he'd be like, um, uh.

00:14:18.000 Huge montages of Obama saying that sort of thing.

00:14:20.000 There's the same thing with George W. Bush.

00:14:21.000 As long as video has existed, as long as the capability of cutting video has existed, these sorts of compendiums are put out.

00:14:28.000 Trump puts it out, and suddenly, it's the worst thing that has ever happened.

00:14:31.000 The president tweeted out, Pelosi stammers through news conference.

00:14:36.000 In all caps.

00:14:37.000 And then here is the actual video of Pelosi stammering through her news conference.

00:14:40.000 We had a little long, took a little longer on the floor custody, custody of the border, the border.

00:14:47.000 Everyone started making, sending signals to U.S., Mexico, Canada.

00:14:54.000 If that's not the accurate category.

00:14:57.000 Some people call it AFTA-NAFTA, some call it NAFTA 2.0.

00:15:00.000 We're working together to pass that.

00:15:05.000 There are three things.

00:15:11.000 There are three things.

00:15:12.000 We're very busy people.

00:15:14.000 Okay, that three things, thinks she's holding up two fingers at a time. 0.88

00:15:17.000 So Trump tweets that out, the media go crazy.

00:15:19.000 I will point out the media have been saying that Trump is a nutcase who can't speak English for years, and he's the president of the United States, whether they like it or not.

00:15:28.000 Is any of this wrong?

00:15:29.000 It's not wrong, but it is not strategically advisable.

00:15:33.000 I assume his comms team has told them this, but they cannot control him any more than you can control the wind.

00:15:38.000 That is just not the way this works.

00:15:39.000 Meanwhile, the president is fighting back against the Allegations that have been made that the FBI and CIA and the Obama administration were targeting him.

00:15:48.000 He is now attempting to declassify a bevy of materials.

00:15:51.000 Now, I've been saying for years that the president should declassify as much as humanly possible.

00:15:55.000 I'm amazed by Democrats who today are claiming that it's a cover up when the president declassifies material.

00:16:01.000 So just to review, when the president says that William Barr, the attorney general, has to keep certain things classified because the federal rules of criminal evidence require that grand jury information not be released into the public, That's a cover-up.

00:16:13.000 So if the president uses classification properly, that's a cover-up.

00:16:16.000 Also, if the president declassifies, that is a cover-up.

00:16:20.000 Now, the argument from the left is, well, he's only selectively declassifying.

00:16:23.000 Yeah, except he made the entire Mueller report, which he could have remained classified.

00:16:26.000 He made that entire thing public.

00:16:28.000 He made the entire thing public.

00:16:30.000 So I don't get the argument.

00:16:31.000 This is what Adam Schiff has been saying.

00:16:32.000 So Adam Schiff, who a moment ago was saying that William Barr was ugly.

00:16:37.000 He literally said that on stage yesterday.

00:16:38.000 Really classy Adam Schiff.

00:16:40.000 I defended Adam Schiff against allegations he was a pencil neck. 0.98

00:16:43.000 But Adam Schiff is out there ripping on William Barr and saying that he's an ugly human being. 0.94

00:16:48.000 Adam Schiff ain't no Brad Pitt. 0.71

00:16:49.000 Adam Schiff tweeted out, So what exactly is so un-American?

00:16:52.000 Trump has now given Barr the power to declassify intelligence related to the Russia probe.

00:16:54.000 Trump and Barr conspire to weaponize law enforcement and classified information against their political enemies.

00:17:00.000 The coverup has entered a new and dangerous phase.

00:17:02.000 This is un-American. 0.73

00:17:04.000 So what exactly is so un-American?

00:17:06.000 Trump has now given Barr the power to declassify intelligence related to the Russia probe.

00:17:10.000 So just to get this straight, Schiff is accusing Barr and Trump of using classified information against their political enemies.

00:17:17.000 But this information is not classified anymore.

00:17:21.000 Trump is declassifying information.

00:17:23.000 So is the complaint that Trump is keeping things secret or that he is making things open?

00:17:27.000 The Washington Post reports today, President Trump has granted Attorney General William Barr full and complete authority to declassify government secrets, issuing a memorandum late on Thursday that orders U.S.

00:17:37.000 intelligence agencies to cooperate promptly with Barr's audit of the investigation into Russia's election interference in 2016.

00:17:43.000 Now, the reason that Trump is issuing that order is because Trump suspects And it may be right that there are members of the FBI and the CIA who are going to attempt not to comply with his orders, not to comply with Attorney General Barr, and to throw stonewalls in the, to stonewall Barr in this particular investigation.

00:18:01.000 The president has long suspected that there are institutional forces working against him inside the intelligence community, the so-called deep state.

00:18:08.000 And there were, in fact, those forces working against him during the 2016 campaign.

00:18:11.000 I mean, this is not under controversy.

00:18:12.000 Peter Strzok was openly texting his mistress, Lisa Page, about setting up insurance programs against Trump being elected and talking about how Trump would never become president and all of the rest of this.

00:18:21.000 I mean, it was so bad that the inspector general of the DOJ, Michael Horowitz, chided Strzok and Strzok ended up being fired.

00:18:28.000 According to the Post, the president's move gives Barr broad powers to unveil carefully guarded intelligence secrets about the Russia investigation.

00:18:35.000 Now again, I think this is a good strategy.

00:18:36.000 General requested to allow him to quickly carry out his review, according to the memo.

00:18:40.000 The White House said today's action will ensure that all Americans learn the truth about the events that occurred and the actions that were taken during the last presidential election and will restore confidence in our public institutions.

00:18:50.000 Now, again, I think this is a good strategy.

00:18:53.000 I think the president should have done this a long time ago.

00:18:55.000 There were a lot of complaints that the FISA warrant against Carter Page was unjustified, that it was based solely on the Steele dossier, that it was basically concocted by Trump's enemies to go after people who worked with Trump And I've been saying for years on this program, OK, so why doesn't the president just declassify that?

00:19:12.000 If that's true, just declassify it.

00:19:14.000 I am for more information in the public view.

00:19:17.000 By the way, I was for the Mueller report becoming public.

00:19:19.000 I'm still for as much of the Mueller report becoming public as is legally permissible.

00:19:23.000 I'm not in favor of any sort of cover-up.

00:19:25.000 I want more in the public eye, not less in the public eye.

00:19:28.000 And I am happy with the president's decision to declassify a lot of this stuff and to leave Barr to do it.

00:19:33.000 I don't think that Barr is a political hack in the way that Democrats are claiming he is a political hack.

00:19:38.000 I think the president has legit questions.

00:19:40.000 I think Trump has legit questions.

00:19:42.000 About what exactly went down during the Trump-Russia investigation.

00:19:46.000 And those questions are not illegitimate in the way that so many Democrats seem to be suggesting that they are.

00:19:55.000 Conservative lawmakers have insisted to friends in the administration that declassifying documents will help Trump protect his presidency and further distance himself from any political fallout from the Russia investigation.

00:20:04.000 The move is likely to further anger Democrats who have said that Barr is using his position as the nation's top law enforcement official to aggressively protect the president and attack his critics.

00:20:12.000 Again, declassifying material that we've been talking about for three years seems to me a much better strategy than allowing selective leaks of those materials from Congress From members of the intelligence community.

00:20:25.000 Remember, Andrew McCabe, for example, lost his pension and his job with the FBI because he was leaking material to, I believe it was the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post.

00:20:36.000 That material happened to be about Hillary Clinton and the FBI's ongoing investigation.

00:20:40.000 Nonetheless, if it comes to selective leaks being made by so-called members of the deep state versus broad declassification of materials that we've been talking about for years, I'm very much in favor of Trump declassifying a lot of this stuff.

00:20:55.000 Now, is Trump right to be suspicious about the handling of the Trump-Russia collusion case?

00:21:01.000 I think there are certainly questions to be asked at this point.

00:21:03.000 Aaron Klein has a really interesting piece over at Breitbart.

00:21:06.000 Aaron is a good reporter, and he has a piece talking about William Barr's statements last week.

00:21:11.000 So last week, William Barr appeared on TV, and there he explained that what was interesting is that this investigation was handled at the very senior level of these various departments.

00:21:22.000 It wasn't handled sort of in ordinary fashion.

00:21:25.000 The thing that's interesting about this is that this was handled at a very senior level of these departments.

00:21:31.000 It wasn't handled in the ordinary way that investigations or counterintelligence activities are conducted.

00:21:38.000 It was sort of an ad hoc small group and most of these people are no longer with the FBI or the CIA or the other agencies involved.

00:21:46.000 I think there's a misconception out there that we know a lot about what happened.

00:21:51.000 The fact of the matter is Bob Mueller did not look As Aaron Klein points out, there was a report from the Washington Post back in June of 2017 specifically talking about how this investigation was carried out.

00:22:05.000 In a second, I want to talk a little bit about some of the questions that are legit about the investigation, the Trump-Russia investigation.

00:22:10.000 Again, I am skeptical of the claims that this thing was initiated totally in bad faith.

00:22:14.000 My considered take, based on the evidence at this point, is that it may have been initiated in good faith, and then it quickly morphed into a bad faith effort that may not have been completely conscious.

00:22:23.000 It was people who were simply looking for evidence that confirmed their prior biases against President Trump, and that's how that investigation seemed to proceed.

00:22:31.000 We'll get to that in just a second.

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00:23:50.000 So why exactly would President Trump and William Barr be suspicious of the way in which the Trump-Mueller investigation was pursued?

00:23:58.000 I think one of the reasons they'd be suspicious is because, as Barr says, this thing was pursued at the top levels of the Obama administration.

00:24:06.000 Aaron Klein over at the Washington, over at Breitbart, points out a Washington Post article published in June 2017.

00:24:13.000 According to that report, CIA Director John Brennan convened a secret task force at CIA headquarters composed of several dozen analysts and officers from the CIA, the NSA, and the FBI.

00:24:23.000 Apparently the unit was so secretive it functioned as a quote-unquote sealed compartment, hidden even from the rest of the U.S.

00:24:28.000 Intelligence Committee.

00:24:30.000 The unit reported to top officials, the newspaper documented.

00:24:33.000 They worked exclusively for two groups of customers, officials said.

00:24:36.000 The first was Obama and fewer than 14 senior officials in government.

00:24:39.000 The second was a team of operations specialists at the CIA, NSA, and FBI who took direction from the task force on where to aim their subsequent efforts to collect more intelligence on Russia.

00:24:49.000 The number of Obama administration officials, says Aaron Klein, who are allowed access to the Russian intelligence was also highly limited.

00:24:55.000 At first, only four senior officials were involved.

00:24:57.000 John Brennan, the Director of Intelligence James Clapper, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, and then FBI Director James Comey.

00:25:04.000 Their aides were all barred from attending the initial meetings and gradually that circle widened to include Biden.

00:25:10.000 Agendas were sent to cabinet secretaries and they arrived in envelopes that subordinates were not supposed to open.

00:25:15.000 This is not according to Breitbart, this is according to the Washington Post.

00:25:18.000 Does all of this make you at least a little suspicious?

00:25:20.000 I think it's not unreasonable to be suspicious.

00:25:21.000 That's why declassification would be useful.

00:25:23.000 The more we see, the better at this point.

00:25:24.000 during meetings so that aides were not able to see what exactly was going on behind closed doors.

00:25:29.000 Does all of this make you at least a little suspicious?

00:25:32.000 I think it's not unreasonable to be suspicious.

00:25:33.000 That's why declassification would be useful.

00:25:35.000 The more we see, the better at this point.

00:25:38.000 And meanwhile, in other news, Theresa May, the prime minister of Britain, is now officially making it clear that she has resigned.

00:25:47.000 She's making way for a new prime minister after she failed to shepherd through Brexit. 0.96

00:25:53.000 For folks who don't remember the whole Brexit controversy, basically, the people of Great Britain voted that they no longer wish to be part of the European Union.

00:25:59.000 They were sick of the regulations from unelected bureaucrats at the EU level.

00:26:02.000 They were sick of all of the industrial regulations, the immigration regulations that were coming down from Brussels.

00:26:08.000 These were people they had not voted for.

00:26:09.000 And basically, They kicked back.

00:26:11.000 They said, we're not interested in this.

00:26:12.000 They voted for Brexit.

00:26:13.000 And then the politicians in Britain got scared of the EU because the EU said, OK, well, if you leave, we're not going to make a deal with you on trade.

00:26:21.000 If you leave, then we are basically going to blackmail you.

00:26:23.000 And the politicians in Britain said, well, we're scared of that, so we're not going to leave, basically.

00:26:29.000 And they kept proposing deal after deal after deal.

00:26:31.000 They kept being rejected deal after deal after deal.

00:26:34.000 May finally turned in the keys to the car. 1.00

00:26:36.000 She basically said, "I can't do this anymore. 0.98

00:26:38.000 I don't have any deals on the table.

00:26:40.000 I am capable of pushing at this point." Here she was today explaining why she's leaving. - It is and will always remain a matter of deep regret to me that I have not been able to deliver Brexit.

00:26:51.000 It will be for my successor to seek a way forward that honors the result of the referendum.

00:26:58.000 I will shortly leave the job that it has been the honour of my life to hold.

00:27:04.000 The second female Prime Minister, but certainly not the last. 0.98

00:27:09.000 I do so with no ill will, but with enormous and enduring gratitude to have had the opportunity to serve the country I love.

00:27:21.000 Yes, obviously she's pretty upset about everything that's been going on.

00:27:24.000 She was trying to negotiate a deal, like in her defense, she was trying to negotiate a deal that allowed Britain to keep a lot of the trade benefits of being part of the EU without keeping some of the regulations.

00:27:33.000 And she presented a deal that was insufficient.

00:27:36.000 She kept presenting it over and over.

00:27:38.000 People kept voting it down.

00:27:39.000 The people of Britain want out.

00:27:41.000 How do we know they want out?

00:27:42.000 Because in new polls, the Brexit party, which did not exist until five minutes ago, led by Nigel Farage, has become sort of an American fixture in media, thanks to the popularity of Brexit.

00:27:51.000 Nigel Farage is now leading in the polls.

00:27:53.000 His party is getting more voters combined than Conservative and Labour.

00:27:57.000 Which is an amazing, amazing statement right now.

00:28:00.000 Now, is he going to end up being prime minister?

00:28:02.000 Probably not.

00:28:02.000 Probably the Conservative Party is now going to nominate somebody to put forward somebody at the top of their list, like Boris Johnson, the former mayor of London, who is this very colorful figure, almost a Trump-like figure at the head of their party, who will likely be the next prime minister.

00:28:16.000 He's the Anzan favorite in betting markets to be the next prime minister of Britain.

00:28:20.000 His sole job will be to deliver Brexit.

00:28:23.000 If that's a clean Brexit, it's a so-called no-deal Brexit, then it's a no-deal Brexit, meaning they don't make a pre-existing arrangement with the EU, they just say we're out.

00:28:30.000 Now I think that what May was trying to mitigate against was leaving, and then there were some economic consequences to that because the EU tries to punish the UK for leaving.

00:28:40.000 And at that point, the Conservative Party pays the price for having implemented Brexit.

00:28:44.000 But it's obvious that her own party wants it. 0.87

00:28:47.000 She can't stand up to her own party.

00:28:49.000 The people of Britain want this, and they are sick of being told by their political class not to move forward with this.

00:28:54.000 We spoke yesterday on our radio show with Douglas Carswell, who is the founder of Vote Leave and a former member of the UK Independent Party, and he discussed the fact That all of this was eventually going to lead to the people of Britain getting what they wanted.

00:29:05.000 There was a referendum.

00:29:06.000 That referendum remains popular.

00:29:07.000 That referendum was to leave the EU.

00:29:09.000 And the Remainers, who are much of the political class, are simply not up for it.

00:29:13.000 Carswell, by the way, is not a trade restrictionist.

00:29:15.000 So there's been a lot of lying press about what exactly Brexit is designed to do.

00:29:19.000 That Brexit is designed to basically erect a wall around Britain or something like that.

00:29:23.000 I know many of the leaders of the Brexit movement, including people like Daniel Hannan, who was pushing to eliminate his own job.

00:29:30.000 He was a member of the EU Parliament and he was pushing to eliminate his own job.

00:29:34.000 And he's been saying for a long time he's a free trader.

00:29:37.000 But having a free trade relationship with the EU does not require you to accept Brussels' determination on who gets to live in Britain, for example.

00:29:48.000 May said she said that she said, quote, I believe it was right to persevere even when the odds against success seemed high.

00:29:53.000 It is and will always be a matter of deep regret.

00:29:56.000 I have not been able to deliver Brexit.

00:29:59.000 So she now joins a series of conservative prime ministers who have fallen over the question of Britain's relationship with Europe.

00:30:04.000 David Cameron, John Major, Margaret Thatcher.

00:30:06.000 All of them were ousted in part because they could not get their party to agree on how closely tied Britain and the continent should be, according to the Washington Post.

00:30:13.000 May had spent two years negotiating in secret a Brexit withdrawal deal with the EU, only to see it rejected three times by the House of Commons.

00:30:20.000 Many of her own conservatives refused to support her.

00:30:22.000 Earlier this week, she was still vowing to push on, offering a tweaked version of her Brexit plan.

00:30:26.000 It was rejected so swiftly and resoundingly by so many lawmakers, including members of her own cabinet, it became clear that she was going to be ushered out Very, very soon.

00:30:35.000 Now, there are a bunch of people who are jockeying for position inside the, inside the Conservative Party.

00:30:40.000 As I say, Boris Johnson, who once said that his chances of being Prime Minister are about as good as the chances of finding Elvis on Mars, is the current favorite in opinion polls and betting markets to become the next British Prime Minister.

00:30:51.000 On Friday, Johnson came forward and complimented May on a very dignified statement.

00:30:55.000 He tweeted his thanks to her for her stoical service and said it was now time to follow her dreams to come together and deliver Brexit. 0.95

00:31:03.000 Nicola Sturgeon is a leader of the Scottish National Party and added that Johnson was some form of hypocrite. 0.59

00:31:11.000 Johnson is popular with the conservative grassroots.

00:31:12.000 He served two terms as mayor of London, which traditionally votes Labour, proving he has some cross-party appeal.

00:31:17.000 He lost support in some circles after the 2016 referendum.

00:31:21.000 He put himself forward as the face of the Brexit campaign.

00:31:23.000 He served as foreign secretary under May, but he had already left.

00:31:26.000 Anybody who is still basically in this cabinet is not going to be prime minister anymore.

00:31:29.000 Other possible contenders, former Brexit secretary Dominic Raab, environmental secretary Michael Gove.

00:31:35.000 Raab is sort of the outsider pick to be prime minister if it is not Boris Johnson.

00:31:39.000 Any lawmaker can put their name forward as long as they have the backing of two conservative members of parliament.

00:31:45.000 So it'll be interesting to see where they go from here.

00:31:47.000 It is obvious, though, that the people of Britain have effectively rejected and conservative party members have effectively rejected the idea of some sort of soft deal with the EU, which hopes to govern them from above.

00:31:58.000 And frankly, good for them.

00:31:59.000 Good for them.

00:32:00.000 I was in favor, as much as I followed it, I was in favor of Brexit and the British people voted for what they want and they should get it.

00:32:06.000 Alrighty.

00:32:07.000 So in a second, we're going to get to The news that Julian Assange is now being prosecuted under the Espionage Act, we'll talk about the complications inherent in that sort of prosecution first.

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00:33:24.000 Okay, in a second we'll get to Julian Assange, the Prosecution against him on espionage charges.

00:33:29.000 We'll get to that.

00:33:30.000 Plus, we'll get to the mailbag.

00:33:32.000 First, you're gonna have to go over and subscribe.

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00:34:30.000 All righty.

00:34:37.000 So, meanwhile, in other news, the DOJ is now accusing Julian Assange of violating the Espionage Act, According to Politico, the Justice Department has hit WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange with Espionage Act charges, escalating a legal fight against the high-profile activist, alarming press freedom activists.

00:34:51.000 The DOJ had previously only indicted Assange on a single count of conspiracy to commit computer intrusion.

00:34:57.000 Thursday's revelation of the additional 18 charges filed in the Eastern District of Virginia means that Assange could face significantly more prison time if found guilty.

00:35:05.000 The alleged Espionage Act violations relate to Assange's complicity with Chelsea Manning, Bradley Manning, a former U.S.

00:35:11.000 Army soldier who was convicted in July 2013 of violating the Espionage Act after she, He shuttled troves of classified government information to Wikileaks.

00:35:21.000 Officials said that Assange solicited the information from and then brazenly published details that put the government's human sources at risk.

00:35:26.000 Now, the original charges suggested that Assange was working with Manning to actually hack the government.

00:35:34.000 That was the original charge.

00:35:35.000 And that charge may or may not have been sustainable.

00:35:38.000 Now they are charging him under the Espionage Act.

00:35:40.000 Now traditionally the Espionage Act has been used against government officials like Manning because if you are a traitor to the United States who decides to hack into classified information and then reveal it to the public, you're violating public trust.

00:35:52.000 You're not allowed to treat classified material that way unless you happen to be Hillary Clinton.

00:35:55.000 But Under the Espionage Act, it's been pretty controversial whether you can prosecute a quote-unquote journalist for publishing that material.

00:36:02.000 So, for example, in the Pentagon Papers case, the Pentagon Papers case surrounded the release of the Pentagon Papers, which were these secret studies about Vietnam, by the New York Times.

00:36:12.000 The Supreme Court rejected the government's attempts to prevent the New York Times and the Washington Post from publishing a leaked copy of a top-secret study of the Vietnam War.

00:36:20.000 The court had an opinion.

00:36:22.000 It simply said that the government had not met its heavy burden of justifying a prior restraint on publication.

00:36:26.000 So in other words, they couldn't say preemptively that the New York Times and Washington Post could not publish.

00:36:31.000 However, the court did say that you might be able to punish somebody after the fact for having published.

00:36:37.000 Prior restraints require a greater burden of proof than punishment after the fact.

00:36:41.000 Also, you have to ask, what kind of classified material is being published?

00:36:46.000 Is it classified material that does damage to the United States in terms of PR, or does it actually put human beings at risk?

00:36:54.000 So, for example, Justice Potter Stewart, who wrote a concurring opinion in that case, he said he was convinced that the executive is correct with respect to some of the documents involved, but I cannot say that disclosure of any of them will surely result in direct, immediate, and irreparable damage to our nation or its people.

00:37:07.000 Well, that's not the case with a lot of the documents that were promoted by WikiLeaks.

00:37:10.000 They included actual material sources of intelligence, the names of people who are cooperating with Americans in Afghanistan, in Iraq.

00:37:17.000 They put people's lives at risk.

00:37:19.000 The State Department begged Assange not to release that stuff.

00:37:21.000 Assange went ahead and released that stuff anyway.

00:37:24.000 Now, one thing that's always been very fuzzy is, does this mean that the press have some sort of different rights than any other normal human being?

00:37:31.000 Like, freedom of the press under the First Amendment is not a suggestion that you get a badge that says journalist on it and now you have extra rights.

00:37:39.000 Freedom of the press means that the government cannot stop you from printing things.

00:37:42.000 However, can the government stop you from revealing classified information that endangers American soldiers overseas?

00:37:49.000 The answer there is probably yes.

00:37:52.000 Otherwise, they couldn't really prosecute anybody for even hacking into America's documents and then revealing them.

00:37:57.000 Why there should be a journalistic exception to this rule is beyond me.

00:38:03.000 The government should in fact have to prove that the material that they seek to restrict is presenting a serious danger because otherwise you can't have any government oversight at all.

00:38:14.000 You can't have whistleblowers, you can't have leakers, you can't have any of that stuff.

00:38:17.000 So this does present a serious constitutional issue.

00:38:20.000 One of the issues also is whether Julian Assange is entitled to those protections given the fact that Julian Assange may in fact be basically a Russian front.

00:38:26.000 If Julian Assange is a Russian front, then this is not just a matter of a quote-unquote journalist revealing information, then it's a matter of an enemy party revealing information about the United States directed at damaging the United States.

00:38:39.000 It raises all sorts of kind of fascinating legal issues.

00:38:42.000 There's a really interesting piece from a few years back from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press about WikiLeaks.

00:38:48.000 And in that piece, they basically suggest that journalists have never been successfully prosecuted under the Espionage Act.

00:38:54.000 So the question is going to be whether Assange changes that precedent.

00:38:58.000 Whether he can be successfully prosecuted under the act.

00:39:02.000 Barack Obama, by the way, repeatedly invoked the Espionage Act in order to prosecute people.

00:39:06.000 He prosecuted something like seven people under the Espionage Act.

00:39:09.000 They weren't journalists.

00:39:10.000 It was people leaking to journalists.

00:39:11.000 So the question is, is Assange a journalist?

00:39:14.000 Is Assange a leaker?

00:39:15.000 Was he participating in the hack?

00:39:17.000 That's the real question here.

00:39:19.000 But it's kind of fascinating because obviously Assange raises serious press freedom issues.

00:39:26.000 And as I say, I don't think this is unique to the Trump administration.

00:39:29.000 The attempt by the press to play this as Trump cracking down on the press because he doesn't like Julian Assange.

00:39:33.000 I was there like five minutes ago.

00:39:35.000 when President Trump was praising WikiLeaks.

00:39:37.000 So this is not personal animus that Trump has against Julian Assange or anything like that, or personal animus for the DOJ against WikiLeaks.

00:39:43.000 WikiLeaks has been an extraordinarily dangerous player in this space for a decade at this point.

00:39:49.000 Alrighty, it's time for some mailbag because it is a Friday, so let's jump.

00:39:53.000 Right in.

00:39:54.000 Javi says, Hi, Ben.

00:39:55.000 I'm a 17-year-old high school student at a school that is about 99% leftist, not liberal, in Los Angeles.

00:40:01.000 I've been listening to you almost every day for about a year and wanted to say thank you for everything you do.

00:40:04.000 My question is, I just gave a full pro-life statement to my high school newspaper, and I'm wondering if you have any advice on how I can weather the storm I'm sure to receive from classmates, friends, and even teachers that will call me all sorts of names and attack my character.

00:40:14.000 Thank you.

00:40:15.000 Well, I mean, this is a character-building exercise, dude.

00:40:17.000 I gotta say, you know, as somebody who's been in the public eye since I was basically 17 years old your age, You think that you've grown a thick skin, and then you realize every five minutes that you need to grow another layer of skin.

00:40:29.000 I mean, at this point, I basically look like The Thing, in terms of personality, from The Fantastic Four.

00:40:35.000 I mean, you just grow layers and layers of thicker and thicker skin until you look like a rock human.

00:40:40.000 That's effectively what you have to do here.

00:40:42.000 You're gonna take hits, but that is what being in the arena is all about.

00:40:46.000 Just stand strong.

00:40:47.000 I would say don't go out of your way to insult anybody.

00:40:50.000 It's not a rule that I've always kept myself, but Most of my regrets happen to be insulting people that I look back and I say, well, that's probably not something I should have done.

00:40:57.000 It's something I've been trying to work on myself.

00:40:59.000 So if I have advice to young people, it is only speak when you are particularly sure of what you are saying.

00:41:05.000 Make sure that you are double sure of what you are saying, because the fact is that we now live in a media environment where anything you say publicly when you are 16, or privately as it turns out, when you are 16 or 17 years old, can be used against you by your political opponents.

00:41:17.000 So you just have to be extraordinarily careful.

00:41:19.000 And also, try to cultivate a level of character that you wish that your opponents had.

00:41:23.000 So, try not to engage in character attacks.

00:41:26.000 Instead, debunk arguments. 0.99

00:41:27.000 And if they engage in a character attack, then you are fully justified in saying that they are being a jerk. 0.99

00:41:33.000 That you are fully justified in saying. 0.99

00:41:34.000 As I've said for years, and I continue to maintain.

00:41:37.000 If somebody attacks your character, you have no obligation to sit there and take it.

00:41:40.000 You are fully justified in responding by saying that they are badly motivated. 0.99

00:41:44.000 You are fully justified in saying that they are acting like a jackass. 0.88

00:41:46.000 You are fully justified in doing all of those things when somebody attacks your character.

00:41:50.000 Don't be the first person to attack character.

00:41:52.000 Attack political point of view instead.

00:41:55.000 Rohan's has been.

00:41:56.000 New subscriber here, I have a question regarding your recent book.

00:41:58.000 In the book, you argue that Judeo-Christian morality and Greek natural law built the foundation for scientific progress in the West.

00:42:03.000 If this is true, what about other civilizations such as ancient China and India?

00:42:07.000 These civilizations made important discoveries as well, but did not have the same foundation as the West.

00:42:12.000 Also, the Roman Empire made great technological advances before Judeo-Christian influence.

00:42:16.000 Thank you for all you do, best Rohan.

00:42:18.000 Well, the truth is that the vision of modern science, the idea of hypothesis and hypothesis being rejected by evidence, that sort of science, experimental science, is unique to the West.

00:42:28.000 There's a difference between technological progress, which does exist in a vast number of civilizations, and that technological progress is generally linked to the human need to overcome the environment around them.

00:42:39.000 There's a difference between that and the pure idea of exploring science for its own sake, which then has technical applications later.

00:42:45.000 That is something that seems fairly unique to the West, which is why you see thinkers in the West, like Isaac Newton, who are trying to figure out general rules of the universe.

00:42:56.000 In a way that very few people were doing in other civilizations.

00:42:59.000 That doesn't mean that every other person in every other civilization was incapable of doing this.

00:43:03.000 Obviously, there were strides in science and mathematics particularly in the Indian world, as in like India, in the Indian world in the first millennium.

00:43:13.000 But, in the first millennium.

00:43:14.000 But the great expanse of science was deeply wedded to, historically speaking, the Judeo-Christian belief that in order to investigate God, you had to investigate God's universe.

00:43:27.000 And that was tied to a Greek natural law evidentiary-based position that the way to discover natural rules was to look at the evidence.

00:43:32.000 I mean, that's an Aristotelian idea.

00:43:35.000 So, as I say, this is not to discount any of the discoveries of other civilizations.

00:43:39.000 The question is why the West did it best.

00:43:41.000 And the answer is that the West did it best not just because they were making technological advances.

00:43:45.000 Again, technological advances.

00:43:47.000 exist throughout history.

00:43:49.000 The question is, why is it that the West came up with this idea of science, this generalized idea of science, which was then used to create tremendous technological change far beyond what you get if you were just in a field and you needed to figure out how to make a plow work better, for example.

00:44:04.000 There is a difference between generalized science and technological and kind of incremental technological change.

00:44:10.000 Eli says, hi Ben, it's my birthday.

00:44:12.000 Can I get a shout out?

00:44:13.000 You just did, my friend.

00:44:14.000 Michael says, Ben, what do you think of the post-Keynesian argument that says government deficit spending, as long as we're not at full employment, is a net positive on the economy?

00:44:22.000 That it's putting more money into the economy than it's taking out, while surpluses are a net drain, since the government is taxing more out than it is spending back in.

00:44:29.000 Well, I don't believe in government surpluses as a general rule.

00:44:31.000 I don't think that the government should be taking in money unless they intend on using that surplus for something useful.

00:44:37.000 A government surplus is effectively the government confiscating wealth from people that they do not use, and that seems to me a confiscation that is unjustified.

00:44:47.000 As far as the post-Keynesian argument, the general argument that government deficit spending is inherently a good, that widespread government deficit spending is inherently a good, it's good until it's not.

00:44:57.000 It's just like credit card spending is good until it's not.

00:45:00.000 It's great, you can buy all sorts of stuff, and then the credit card bill comes in, and then things go to hell in a handbasket.

00:45:05.000 Right now, the United States is riding on the fact that we are the most powerful economy in the world and in world history, that there are no near rivals for it, and thus the dollar remains strong, people continue to invest in our bonds, and all of the rest.

00:45:17.000 That's true, so long as we don't radically regulate our economy, raise taxes, engage in Green New Deal-type silliness. 0.63

00:45:24.000 But there will come a point where people are going to recognize that $21 trillion in debt ain't getting paid off anytime soon.

00:45:29.000 And when that happens, then we're cruising for a bruising.

00:45:31.000 Joshua says, First of all, thank you so much for your service.

00:45:38.000 You're doing something I didn't do.

00:45:39.000 I have nothing but admiration and really respect for that.

00:45:43.000 Law has been something I've always been interested in.

00:45:44.000 I was wondering what law books you could recommend to learn the basics of constitutional law and or criminal law.

00:45:49.000 Thanks.

00:45:50.000 Well, criminal law, I mean, there are some pretty good criminal law textbooks that are out there.

00:45:54.000 I would say in terms of constitutional law, some of my favorite books on constitutional law include A Matter of Interpretation by Justice Scalia, a very slim volume that sort of explains constitutional theory.

00:46:03.000 I disagree with him about stare decisis, but his general take on how to read constitutional text is correct.

00:46:09.000 I think that you should check out Robert Bork's The Tempting of America, which is a really nice history of the court and what exactly the court has done throughout American history.

00:46:18.000 Mark Levin has a really good simplified version, I think, of Bork's book called Men in Black from maybe 15 or 20 years ago that's a pretty good synopsis of court All that stuff is pretty good and then obviously read the basics, the Federalist Papers, read the Constitution itself.

00:46:33.000 The Heritage Foundation has a wonderful guide to the Constitution with case references and everything.

00:46:40.000 I'd recommend going and picking that up from Amazon.

00:46:43.000 Why isn't making adoption more affordable at the top of most Republican policies?

00:46:46.000 I know Alabama, where I live, is kicking butt at adoption in the state right now.

00:46:49.000 My wife and I have looked into ourselves a few times.

00:46:51.000 The financial side can be pretty daunting.

00:46:53.000 Generally, I'm in favor of government being involved in it as little as possible, but can it be considered conservative to think that tax dollars should go toward taking care of orphans and putting them in a loving home?

00:47:01.000 Trying to reconcile my feelings on adoption with my small government feelings.

00:47:05.000 Shapiro Haley 2024.

00:47:05.000 2024.

00:47:06.000 So as far as making adoption simpler, yes, regulations on adoption should be largely relieved.

00:47:13.000 It should be easier for people to adopt.

00:47:17.000 As far as tax incentives being driven toward adoption, I think that tax rates generally should be lowered.

00:47:26.000 As far as tax incentives being driven toward adoption, As a libertarian, I'm not generally in favor of the government quote-unquote promoting policy via tax dollars.

00:47:32.000 With that said, you know, we do have a tax system that right now has to care for people who cannot take care of themselves.

00:47:38.000 And that going toward the taking care of orphans and then shifting them toward adoptive homes seems like a not terrible idea to me.

00:47:43.000 I mean, that is all the bar exam is.

00:47:44.000 I just graduated from law school last weekend.

00:47:46.000 Any stories or tips you can share on how to study for the bar exam?

00:47:49.000 Memorize, memorize, memorize.

00:47:51.000 I mean, that is all the bar exam is.

00:47:52.000 It is just an enormous amount of memorization.

00:47:55.000 So sit down with your text, with, I always use flashcards, Make a bunch of flashcards and then just drill yourself on the flashcards.

00:48:03.000 Ryan says, Hey Ben, I was wondering your opinion on Edward Snowden.

00:48:06.000 Is he a hero or an enemy to the United States?

00:48:07.000 Do you think he should be pardoned?

00:48:09.000 Also, do you think if Edward Snowden changed his name and sex like Manning's, you think he would have gotten a pardon from Obama too?

00:48:13.000 Well, apparently that was the pattern because there was no reason for Chelsea Manning to actually be pardoned. 1.00

00:48:17.000 Chelsea Manning was not in any way contrite about having hacked U.S. 1.00

00:48:22.000 classified materials and then exposed it to WikiLeaks.

00:48:24.000 Chelsea Manning should still be sitting in jail, obviously. 1.00

00:48:27.000 When it comes to Edward Snowden, I think two things can be true at once.

00:48:31.000 One, some of the information we got from Edward Snowden was important for the public to know.

00:48:35.000 And two, Edward Snowden is not a hero.

00:48:37.000 Edward Snowden was pretty obviously working with the Russian government, and Edward Snowden Which is why he tried to take refuge in Russia.

00:48:44.000 And Edward Snowden, I do not think is a good guy.

00:48:46.000 So, good people can sometimes, bad people can sometimes give you material that you need.

00:48:50.000 This does not make you a hero.

00:48:52.000 It means that you did something that is wrong, but it revealed good information to the public.

00:48:56.000 This does happen on occasion.

00:48:58.000 So the answer is sort of both.

00:49:00.000 I don't think it's heroism to hack America's classified documents and hand them over in bulk to people who do not care about America's national security.

00:49:08.000 At the same time, I'm glad some of that stuff is available to the American public so we know the extent of the government's surveillance upon us.

00:49:13.000 Okay, time for some things I like and then some things that I hate.

00:49:16.000 So, things that I like today. 0.99

00:49:18.000 So, this is a stupid, wonderful movie. 0.99

00:49:20.000 The movie is Olympus Has Fallen. 1.00

00:49:22.000 I know it's old.

00:49:23.000 I was only made aware of this recently.

00:49:25.000 Sonny Bunch, who I will admit is my favorite movie reviewer, he said that Olympus Has Fallen was a great movie, which is to say that it was going to be retrograde and politically incorrect and all the rest.

00:49:37.000 And the movie basically is.

00:49:40.000 Effectively, the movie is just diehard in the White House, except without half the clever dialogue.

00:49:48.000 That's all the movie is.

00:49:50.000 And it's fun.

00:49:51.000 It's really fun.

00:49:52.000 Also, I happen to really like Gerard Butler.

00:49:54.000 I like Aaron Eckhart.

00:49:55.000 So here's a little bit of the trailer.

00:49:58.000 Mr. President, five minutes, sir.

00:50:00.000 Evening, ma'am.

00:50:01.000 Merry Christmas, Mike.

00:50:02.000 Mustang, this is Big Top, bringing out the full package.

00:50:06.000 Where'd that come from?

00:50:11.000 It's a camera!

00:50:18.000 Everybody knows you did the right thing on that bridge.

00:50:28.000 Even the president knows. 0.85

00:50:29.000 Okay, so the film is so silly, and yet it's so kind of great. 0.54

00:50:35.000 It's basically, if Bruce Willis didn't have anything witty to say in Die Hard, this is the film.

00:50:40.000 But it's kind of clever and fun.

00:50:42.000 You can go check out Olympus Has Fallen.

00:50:44.000 I haven't seen London Has Fallen yet.

00:50:45.000 I've heard it's even more reactionary, so that means that I'll probably have to watch it.

00:50:49.000 Okay, time for some things that I hate.

00:50:54.000 OK, thing that I hate, number one.

00:50:56.000 So Stacey Abrams continues to trot around claiming that she's the actual governor of Georgia. 1.00

00:51:00.000 I mean, this is just this is just crazy towns at this point.

00:51:04.000 At a certain point, you do have to accept the reality that you lost the Georgia election by some 55,000 votes.

00:51:09.000 That's not supremely close.

00:51:10.000 That's 55.

00:51:11.000 That's a lot of votes.

00:51:12.000 She still is walking around like she is governor of Georgia. 0.75

00:51:15.000 It's astonishing.

00:51:17.000 I mean, it really is.

00:51:18.000 This has now reached the delusional.

00:51:20.000 What she's about to say right here is delusional on so many levels.

00:51:23.000 It's like an onion of delusion.

00:51:25.000 It's like you just continue to carve into the onion and there are more layers of delusion beneath the layers of delusion.

00:51:29.000 Here's Stacey Abrams, a woman who is being thought of as a possible VP contender on the basis of losing a Georgia gubernatorial race, talking about how she's the actual governor of Georgia and how she won.

00:51:41.000 For those of us who are in this coalition of new and engaged, who are in this pursuit of progress, we have to recognize that the internal threat we face is a fear of who we are.

00:51:52.000 The notion of identity politics has been peddled for the last 10 years and it's been used as a dog whistle to say that we shouldn't pay too much attention to the new voices coming into progress.

00:52:03.000 I would argue that identity politics is exactly who we are, and it's exactly how we won.

00:52:08.000 By centering communities in Georgia, we not only increased voter participation, we brought new folks to the process.

00:52:15.000 Identity politics isn't just who we are, it's how we won?

00:52:19.000 One, you didn't.

00:52:20.000 You lost.

00:52:21.000 Second of all, identity politics is not who we are.

00:52:24.000 If you're a rational human being, you try to get beyond the identity politics, you try to get beyond the notion that you are just what your group identity says that you are, that you are not merely a person who is quote-unquote Born a Jew, ethnically, or born black, in the case of Stacey Abrams, then instead you're supposed to find a set of ideas that you wish to espouse and then have discussions about those ideas with others.

00:52:47.000 This is the basis of a republic, particularly a multi-ethnic republic.

00:52:51.000 If you're going to have a multi-ethnic republic in which everybody sort of reverts back to their own innate genetic identity, and that's the only argument that you can make, you can't have a republic. 0.97

00:53:01.000 So, layers of delusion from Stacey Abrams.

00:53:03.000 The fact that she's been so widely praised by the media is Absolutely astonishing to me.

00:53:07.000 She may be a good speaker, but she is also at this point engaged in tremendous levels of delusion.

00:53:13.000 Okay, other things that I hate.

00:53:15.000 John Walker Lynn, the American Taliban, is out. 0.73

00:53:17.000 So that's great.

00:53:18.000 So John Walker Lynn, you'll remember all the way back from the beginning of the war on terror.

00:53:22.000 He was 17.

00:53:23.000 He left his home in California in 1998 to study Arabic in Yemen.

00:53:27.000 He then went to Pakistan in 2000, and then he went to Afghanistan, and he served as a Taliban volunteer in Al-Qaeda training camp.

00:53:33.000 And then, he was held at a prison near Mazar-e-Sharif in Afghanistan, where an uprising claimed the first U.S.

00:53:39.000 casualty of war, a 32-year-old CIA officer named Johnny Michael Spann.

00:53:43.000 Spann was killed after questioning Lind, although the government didn't offer evidence that Lind had participated in the revolted trial.

00:53:48.000 He pled guilty to charges of providing support to the Taliban and carrying a rifle and a grenade.

00:53:53.000 Now, in days past, this person would have been put up against a wall and shot for treason.

00:53:58.000 Now, he gets put in jail, taken care of for 20 years, and then let out despite the fact that according to the National Counterterrorism Center, Lind had quote, continued to advocate for global jihad and to write and translate violent extremist texts.

00:54:11.000 That's as of 2017.

00:54:14.000 Another 2017 assessment from the Bureau of Prisons said he had made supportive statements about the Islamic State.

00:54:19.000 Yeah, that is not good U.S.

00:54:21.000 policy to be letting people, I mean, he hasn't even served his full sentence.

00:54:23.000 The sentence was 20, he served 17.

00:54:26.000 This is madness.

00:54:28.000 The good news is that eventually he'll end up as a professor at a major American university, because that's pretty much all it takes these days is to hate America with a deep and abiding passion.

00:54:36.000 Alrighty, we'll be back here later today with two additional hours of Ben Shapiro Show, or we'll see you here on Monday, and have a wonderful weekend.

00:54:42.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:54:42.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:54:44.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:54:50.000 Executive producer, Jeremy Boring.

00:54:52.000 Senior producer, Jonathan Hay.

00:54:54.000 Our supervising producer is Mathis Glover.

00:54:56.000 And our technical producer is Austin Stevens.

00:54:58.000 Edited by Adam Sajovic.

00:54:59.000 Audio is mixed by Mike Karamina.

00:55:01.000 Hair and makeup is by Jesua Olvera.

00:55:02.000 Production assistant, Nick Sheehan.

00:55:04.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is a Daily Wire production.

The Ben Shapiro Show - May 24, 2019

Celebrity Death Match: Trump vs. Pelosi | Ep. 788

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