The Ben Shapiro Show - Ep. 59 - How Much Must Republicans Lie To Get Elected?

00:00:00.000 Is Donald Trump our density?

00:00:03.000 Or rather, is he our destiny?

00:00:04.000 We'll get to that.

00:00:05.000 We'll also get to Trump vs. Cruz, plus an extra heaping helping of The Ben Shapiro Show's second week mailbag, and it is really, really chock-full, so we'll save some extra time for that.

00:00:14.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:00:15.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:00:24.000 So, you know, one of the things on the show that I like to say is that I told you so.

00:00:27.000 It's one of my favorite things to say.

00:00:29.000 And I get to say it all the time because I did tell you so because I'm right so often.

00:00:32.000 Which is why you listen to the show.

00:00:33.000 And it turns out that...

00:00:35.000 I told you so.

00:00:36.000 I'm right.

00:00:37.000 Nate Silver, who is a very, very, very good statistical analyst for FiveThirtyEight.com, he has a piece today about how Donald Trump is favored by the establishment.

00:00:50.000 I mean, it's not like I've been saying this for a week now, that in a fight between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, the establishment favors Donald Trump.

00:00:56.000 But Nate Silver, who used to write for the New York Times and now runs FiveThirtyEight, he says, in the last election, he called all 50 states correctly.

00:01:03.000 As far as Obama vs. Romney, he said, quote,

00:01:31.000 So far, the party isn't doing much to stop Trump.

00:01:33.000 Instead, it's making such an effort against Ted Cruz.

00:01:38.000 Which is what I have been saying.

00:01:39.000 The establishment does not fear Donald Trump.

00:01:41.000 Donald Trump is a creature of the moment.

00:01:43.000 Donald Trump is a creature of Trump.

00:01:45.000 Trump is... All that Trump is about, all Donald Trump is about is Donald Trump.

00:01:49.000 And all I have to do is read you some headlines from today.

00:01:53.000 Donald Trump today said... You remember a couple of days ago, Donald Trump was speaking at Liberty University, and he tried to quote the Bible, and instead of saying second Corinthians, he said two Corinthians.

00:02:02.000 You remember this?

00:02:04.000 So today, Donald Trump came out and he said, oh, that wasn't my fault, that was Tony Perkins' fault.

00:02:09.000 Right, the head of the Christian group, Tony Perkins.

00:02:11.000 Tony Perkins, when he sent me an email, he wrote 2 Corinthians.

00:02:15.000 Right, he wrote that to you assuming that you would know that meant 2 Corinthians, but he blamed Tony Perkins for that.

00:02:20.000 And then Donald Trump tweeted out that Ted Cruz is obviously worried about him.

00:02:24.000 And then Donald Trump, also today, suggested that it was he who urged Sarah Palin to address her son's problem with assault in Alaska.

00:02:32.000 Everything in the world is about Donald Trump.

00:02:34.000 There are zero things that are not about Donald Trump.

00:02:37.000 And the establishment can deal with that.

00:02:38.000 The establishment is okay with that.

00:02:40.000 They can deal with egoists.

00:02:41.000 What they can't deal with is conservative hardline ideologues.

00:02:44.000 Those are the people who scare them.

00:02:47.000 Which is why Bob Dole has now endorsed Donald Trump over Ted Cruz.

00:02:51.000 Bob Dole, you know, you like it, I like it, the American people like it.

00:02:56.000 That Bob Dole.

00:02:57.000 So he endorsed Donald Trump before falling off the stage.

00:03:00.000 I thought that the best take on Bob Dole, who was trending on Twitter, came from IowaHawk, who tweeted, Little harsh, but very true.

00:03:09.000 So Donald Trump,

00:03:19.000 He's been endorsed by Bob Dole now.

00:03:20.000 So Bob Dole, he said, quote, The party would suffer cataclysmic wholesale losses if Cruz was the nominee.

00:03:26.000 Donald Trump would fare better.

00:03:28.000 He said, I question his allegiance to the party.

00:03:30.000 He said this about Cruz.

00:03:31.000 I don't know how often you've heard him say the word Republican.

00:03:33.000 Not very often.

00:03:34.000 Instead, he says conservative.

00:03:36.000 Which is a bad thing, according to Bob Dole.

00:03:39.000 I also don't say Republican.

00:03:40.000 I like to say conservative because Republican is a mechanism and conservatism is an ideology.

00:03:45.000 If I'm a Republican, that's just the party that I use to get where I want to go.

00:03:49.000 It is not, in fact, an ideology.

00:03:51.000 It's just a name for a group of people who band behind it.

00:03:56.000 Dole said about Cruz, he's an extremist, he said, I don't know how he's going to deal with Congress.

00:04:00.000 Nobody likes him.

00:04:01.000 He said Trump could probably work with Congress because he's got the right kind of personality and he's a deal maker.

00:04:07.000 Right, so in the end, they support Trump over Cruz, as I have been saying.

00:04:11.000 And by the way, Donald Trump is now making the perfectly establishment case.

00:04:14.000 So for all the Trump supporters, I'm gonna get to the Trump can win argument in a minute and why I think that that's flawed and problematic in terms of the general election.

00:04:22.000 But there are two arguments for supporting Donald Trump. 1.00

00:04:25.000 One of them is at least passable, and one of them is deeply stupid. 0.99

00:04:28.000 The passable one is Donald Trump's a better fighter, he has more blue-collar appeal, he's more electable than Ted Cruz. 0.98

00:04:34.000 I actually think there's a case for this, although his unpopular numbers are very high.

00:04:39.000 The other argument is that Donald Trump is more conservative than Ted Cruz.

00:04:42.000 If you believe this,

00:04:43.000 Then you are, as Sarah Palin might put it, on opium. 1.00

00:04:46.000 If you believe this, you are out of your damn mind. 1.00

00:04:48.000 There is no measure by which Donald Trump is more conservative than Ted Cruz, and even Trump is basically admitting this now. 1.00

00:04:55.000 Donald Trump, yesterday, he came out and he said, the problem with Washington is that we don't make enough deals.

00:05:01.000 I thought that Trump's whole pitch is that he was tough and he was going to stand up to people, but now the problem in Washington, they don't make enough deals, says Donald Trump.

00:05:08.000 Well, I've been making deals all my life, and that's why I'm worth many billions of dollars, more than $10 billion, because that's what I do.

00:05:15.000 I make deals, and you get it done.

00:05:17.000 And the problem with Washington, they don't make deals.

00:05:19.000 It's all gridlock.

00:05:20.000 And then you have a president that signs executive orders because he can't get anything done.

00:05:24.000 I'll get everybody together.

00:05:26.000 We'll make great deals for the country.

00:05:27.000 We'll take back our trade.

00:05:29.000 We'll strengthen our military.

00:05:31.000 We'll take care of our vets.

00:05:32.000 The vets are a huge problem.

00:05:34.000 They're being taken care of so badly.

00:05:36.000 So badly.

00:05:37.000 We'll strengthen up the borders.

00:05:38.000 Yeah, we're gonna make deals.

00:05:39.000 We're gonna make great deals.

00:05:40.000 And politicians don't know how to make great deals like a guy like Ted.

00:05:44.000 You know, he borrows money from Goldman Sachs.

00:05:46.000 He borrows money from Citibank.

00:05:48.000 He doesn't report it on his forms where you have to report it.

00:05:51.000 It's, you know, a violation at a very significant portion.

00:05:55.000 He doesn't report things like that.

00:05:56.000 You can't just say that.

00:05:57.000 I mean, it's very sad to see it.

00:05:59.000 Okay, so number one, it's not true.

00:06:01.000 Cruz did report those donations.

00:06:02.000 He reported them on the wrong form.

00:06:04.000 Number two, if you want to say that somebody is beholden to the bank because they have a loan from that bank, every person in America has a mortgage.

00:06:11.000 You know, everyone has taken student loans. 0.99

00:06:13.000 This idea that this makes you enthrall to the bank from which you have the loan is idiocy. 0.95

00:06:17.000 I mean, Donald Trump has hundreds of millions of dollars in loans from various entities. 0.96

00:06:22.000 Does that mean that he's beholden to those various banks? 0.93

00:06:24.000 Of course not, it's silly.

00:06:25.000 But, the bigger problem here is that Trump is saying that he's going to be a dealmaker, and this is why the establishment likes him.

00:06:31.000 And Cruz is noting this.

00:06:31.000 Right now, Cruz is saying, it's pretty clear the Washington establishment is behind Donald Trump.

00:06:36.000 Here's Cruz.

00:06:37.000 You know, Sean, I think it very much is becoming a two-man race between me and Donald.

00:06:41.000 And, you know, one of the really strong signs of that is you're seeing the Washington establishment dumping their candidates.

00:06:48.000 So, for example, a lot of the establishment had been behind Marco Rubio.

00:06:52.000 They've decided now he doesn't have a path to victory.

00:06:54.000 They're moving to Donald Trump.

00:06:56.000 And we're seeing that more and more.

00:06:58.000 And, you know, it's kind of curious.

00:06:59.000 Donald is publicly bragging about how all the big establishment

00:07:03.000 Players are getting behind him.

00:07:05.000 And his criticism of me is he said, I went to Washington and actually stood up and fought in Washington and Donald has said, well, the problem he has with me is that I won't go along to get along in Washington.

00:07:19.000 I won't cut deals.

00:07:21.000 And Donald has promised he'll go to Washington.

00:07:23.000 He'll cut deals.

00:07:24.000 He'll go along to get along.

00:07:26.000 I got to tell you, Sean, you know the conservatives across this country.

00:07:29.000 I don't think the problem with Washington

00:07:31.000 Is that we haven't had enough Republicans willing to cut deals with the Democrats.

00:07:35.000 The problem is Republican leadership cuts deals every day with the Democrats like this horrible omnibus bill that funded a trillion dollars funded all of Obama's big government priorities and and the establishment seems to have made a determination Donald Trump's a guy they can make a deal with who will continue the cronyism and corporate welfare and bailouts for big banks and and and I think that we're seeing conservatives

00:08:00.000 And this is exactly right.

00:08:05.000 Now, what's amazing about all of this is that, meanwhile, at Jeb Bush, there's a big article in Politico today that Jeb Bush's campaign is toast.

00:08:12.000 Well, welcome to the party, gang.

00:08:13.000 We've been saying this from basically

00:08:15.000 Day one that Jeb Bush was going to be toast.

00:08:17.000 Jeb Bush made Donald Trump.

00:08:18.000 People should understand this.

00:08:19.000 Jeb Bush made him, okay?

00:08:21.000 Jeb Bush announced on June 15th, if you remember, the very next day Donald Trump announced for the presidency and name-checked Bush three separate times in his announcement ramblings and at that point said the establishment supports Jeb Bush, that's who's behind Jeb Bush,

00:08:37.000 And then Jeb's people, not content to boost Trump that way, decided to have Jeb attack Trump in the debates, at which point Trump stomped him repeatedly, as we've covered on the podcast, which boosted Trump in the polls.

00:08:48.000 And then still not content, the Jeb people have now spent tens of millions of dollars knocking down Marco Rubio to try and clear the establishment lane for Jeb Bush, came out today.

00:08:57.000 $22 million have been spent in the last month against Marco Rubio in attack ads.

00:09:01.000 $20 million of those dollars came from Jeb Bush's super PAC.

00:09:04.000 So, we've had Jeb Bush clear the field, basically, for Donald Trump.

00:09:08.000 But Jeb is right about one thing.

00:09:09.000 He says, if Donald Trump is the nominee, Hillary Clinton wins.

00:09:12.000 I think this is probably correct.

00:09:13.000 Here is Jeb Bush.

00:09:15.000 Look, Trump's an entertainer.

00:09:17.000 He's not going to be commander-in-chief or leader of the free world.

00:09:19.000 He's not going to lead us to a safer and secure and freer America.

00:09:25.000 And so I'm going to stay the course.

00:09:26.000 The reason why he attacks me is he's scared of me.

00:09:30.000 He's insecure.

00:09:31.000 He doesn't believe that he can take me on.

00:09:34.000 And while I'm doing worse than him in the polls, the simple fact is, why would he spend his time tearing down someone who's so low compared to him?

00:09:42.000 This is because we're moving up.

00:09:44.000 And I believe that he believes that we're the real challenge for his winning the nomination.

00:09:49.000 And the tragedy of this is, we have a Democratic nominee, likely nominee, who's under investigation by the FBI.

00:09:55.000 The only chance that she could become president is if we nominate a guy like Trump.

00:09:59.000 Okay, so I want to talk about the electoral chance of Trump in a minute, but I just want to point out one thing.

00:10:03.000 When you watch this clip, it makes you pro-Trump.

00:10:06.000 Right?

00:10:06.000 It does.

00:10:06.000 I mean, I think Trump is terrible.

00:10:08.000 I think that Trump is a demagogue. 0.92

00:10:09.000 I think that Trump is bad in a variety of ways.

00:10:11.000 Every time I watch Jeb Bush talk about Trump, I want to vote for Trump.

00:10:14.000 And it's because, if you watch Jeb Bush talk about how Trump is- I mean, he's so disconnected.

00:10:19.000 The reason Trump is attacking him, obviously, is because Jeb Bush is a name.

00:10:23.000 Bush is connected with the Bush family.

00:10:25.000 He is the establishment.

00:10:26.000 The reason he's punching Jeb Bush is because it benefits him.

00:10:29.000 Not because he's afraid of...

00:10:31.000 Jeb Bush, give me a break. 0.97

00:10:32.000 What silliness.

00:10:33.000 By the way, before I move to the real substance of the discussion here, which is, is Trump electable?

00:10:38.000 Because I think it's almost a waste of time at this point to talk, is Trump conservative?

00:10:42.000 He's not.

00:10:43.000 We've spent a lot of time this week going over his positions on various issues.

00:10:46.000 He is not conservative.

00:10:48.000 But there's an argument still to be made that he's the most conservative guy who can win.

00:10:52.000 I want to talk about that.

00:10:53.000 Before we do that, a bit of comic relief from John Kasich.

00:10:57.000 Oh God, no.

00:10:58.000 Not John Kasich.

00:10:59.000 Yes, John Kasich.

00:11:00.000 John Kasich was on Hugh Hewitt's show the other day, and he explained how he wants to be viewed.

00:11:07.000 Well, I think it's some things.

00:11:08.000 I think, first of all, I have the experience, and I've had success, and I've been a reformer all of my life.

00:11:13.000 You can't come from McKee's Rocks, as you know, Hugh, and not be a reformer.

00:11:17.000 And I have a message that, you know, look, we have a lot of candidates that are like the Prince of Darkness.

00:11:23.000 You know, I consider myself the Prince of Light and Hope.

00:11:27.000 And I don't spend all my time getting people riled up about how bad everything is.

00:11:31.000 I acknowledge the challenges, but then I say, look, come together, the Americans first.

00:11:36.000 We can solve these problems, and people are hungry for that.

00:11:39.000 People do not want to live in the lane of depression.

00:11:43.000 They want to believe that in America, it can all work.

00:11:49.000 And I think it's working, but look, I've been doing this for a long, long time.

00:11:53.000 People weren't paying attention.

00:11:57.000 Okay, so it turns out his father apparently was not a mailman.

00:12:00.000 His father was God, which is exciting.

00:12:02.000 I mean, who knew, right?

00:12:04.000 So the Prince of Light and Hope over here.

00:12:06.000 By the way, the Prince of Light and Hope is now running second in New Hampshire according to a couple of polls, which means the end of the road for Marco Rubio.

00:12:12.000 Okay, I want to get to the real point of what I want to talk about today, which is really not reiterating how right I was about Trump versus Cruz.

00:12:18.000 Obviously, I'm right.

00:12:19.000 You all know it.

00:12:20.000 That's why you listen.

00:12:21.000 So, here's what I really want to talk about.

00:12:23.000 Rush Limbaugh.

00:12:24.000 Who is, I think, the best expositor of conservatism in America for the past 30 years.

00:12:31.000 He was the guy who made the 1994 Republican Revolution happen.

00:12:34.000 He was probably the guy who pushed George W. Bush over the top in 2000.

00:12:38.000 He's probably one of the main reasons Republicans did so well in 2010 and 2014.

00:12:41.000 He's a force.

00:12:42.000 There's no question.

00:12:45.000 He made a statement yesterday that I think is worthy of note.

00:12:47.000 He's talking about the rise of Trump.

00:12:49.000 And he, like a lot of conservatives, understands the anti-establishment appeal of Trump, but is concerned that Trump is not actually conservative.

00:12:57.000 And so he's trying to explain why Trump is so surefire popular, why he's so all-fired popular, and here is what Rush Limbaugh had to say about it.

00:13:05.000 So what's happening here?

00:13:07.000 Nationalism?

00:13:08.000 Dirty word.

00:13:09.000 Ooh, people hate it. 0.94

00:13:10.000 Populism?

00:13:10.000 Even dirtier word.

00:13:12.000 Nationalism and populism.

00:13:14.000 have overtaken conservatism in terms of appeal.

00:13:18.000 When this has happened and when it exposes what people in Washington are afraid of, and that is, you know, all this money we've asked people to send us and all these donations people have made, this movement, promote that, well, where is conservatism in Washington?

00:13:33.000 They're asking.

00:13:34.000 Where is it?

00:13:35.000 The Republican Party isn't conservative.

00:13:37.000 Where is all these conservative people that are

00:13:42.000 Contributing to policy being implemented in Congress or in the Senate?

00:13:47.000 They don't see it!

00:13:48.000 So, the case Rush is making is at least partially right.

00:13:52.000 What he's saying is that conservatism has been outflanked by populism and nationalism.

00:13:57.000 That because conservatives in Congress, people who pledged to be conservative, were not, it waned in popularity and now it's being replaced by Donald Trump's brand of nationalism and populism.

00:14:06.000 Now, I think it's important to define terms for a second because these are words that get thrown around a lot.

00:14:10.000 Nationalism and populism are not actual coherent ideologies.

00:14:14.000 Nationalism just says, I want whatever is best for the country, but it doesn't define what's best for the country.

00:14:19.000 So you could be a nationalist like Hugo Chavez, right?

00:14:21.000 And you could be thinking that leftism is the best thing for your country, and you're a nationalist, right?

00:14:26.000 Hitler was a nationalist. 0.81

00:14:27.000 He's a national socialist.

00:14:29.000 Nationalism doesn't imply right-wing.

00:14:32.000 And populism also doesn't imply right-wing.

00:14:35.000 Populism just means that you're anti an ensconced group of elites who you think control things, and so you're fighting against those people.

00:14:44.000 That's what populism is. 0.67

00:14:46.000 And there are leftist populists like Bernie Sanders, and there are right-wing populists like Donald Trump.

00:14:50.000 What's been happening is because conservatism has become a notion of the elite, or it's at least perceived to be a notion of the elite, it's falling away in popularity.

00:15:00.000 And there are a couple of reasons for this.

00:15:02.000 One is that all the people who have campaigned as conservatives were basically lying.

00:15:06.000 And then they got to Washington, and they didn't do any of the things they said they were going to do.

00:15:09.000 They didn't stand up for the little guy.

00:15:11.000 They didn't stand up to the big guy.

00:15:13.000 But there's something deeper here than just the malfeasance of people in Washington, D.C.

00:15:18.000 and the inability of conservatives to stand up for principle.

00:15:20.000 There's something else.

00:15:21.000 That would be too easy an answer.

00:15:23.000 I want to talk a little bit about something I talked a little bit about yesterday, and I think it's problematic.

00:15:29.000 Andrew Klavan and I, just before the show, were having this conversation.

00:15:32.000 Drew has been putting a heavy, heavy emphasis on his podcast on the fact that Trump supporters are blue-collar people who may be losing their jobs to China or may at least feel they're losing their jobs to China in free trade or technological advancement.

00:15:46.000 That there's a group of people out there who feel like they're being left behind in the economy and that the Republican Party, that conservatism more specifically, isn't doing enough for these people.

00:15:55.000 And so these people are embracing Trump because Trump says he'll do something for them.

00:15:59.000 David French at National Review says the same thing.

00:16:01.000 He says that nationalism, you know, the reason that Trump's putting together this coalition is because there is a sort of three-legged stool for Trump supporters.

00:16:10.000 That is, nationalism, they don't feel like they want to be in second place anymore, right?

00:16:13.000 They're winning.

00:16:15.000 Two, is a sort of

00:16:17.000 Abhorrence of the hardcore left extreme social issues pushing.

00:16:22.000 So they don't like the political correctness, right?

00:16:23.000 That's point number two.

00:16:25.000 And number three is economic opportunity, but economic opportunity defined in very personal terms.

00:16:30.000 So not an even playing field, not a free economy.

00:16:33.000 More like, what will you provide me so that I have what I believe on a personal level is a fair shot?

00:16:40.000 So that mirrors Clavin's point about the blue collar workers.

00:16:44.000 And one of the problems is... So what do Republicans do about this?

00:16:48.000 Because here's the truth.

00:16:50.000 The Republican Party was, basically from the end of the Civil War all the way until FDR, a protectionist, isolationist, anti-immigrant party.

00:17:00.000 The Republican Party voted- I mean, Calvin Coolidge had the single greatest immigration shutdown of the 20th century.

00:17:06.000 He shut down basically all immigration in the 1920s because he was afraid of the rabble coming in. 0.99

00:17:11.000 Who were the rabble? 1.00

00:17:12.000 I mean, Coolidge was a good president, but who were the rabble? 1.00

00:17:14.000 The rabble were Jews and Irishmen and Germans and Italians. 0.97

00:17:16.000 Those were the rabble. 1.00

00:17:18.000 It wasn't Mexicans, it was Jews. 0.96

00:17:20.000 It was a bunch of people who are now considered white in the United States, right?

00:17:23.000 They're now considered part of the white majority.

00:17:25.000 And if you look back at the economic policies of the time, Teddy Roosevelt and William Howard Taft, everybody was pushing this idea that the government has to get in there and bust up the big businesses.

00:17:34.000 They have to break up the big businesses.

00:17:36.000 So regulations on banks, going after the big guy in favor of the little guy.

00:17:41.000 These were people who were in favor of protectionism, higher tariffs on foreign goods.

00:17:46.000 The United States gradually integrated into the world economy, but we had pretty significant tariffs all the way through FDR, which is why the Smoot-Hawley tariffs were a thing.

00:17:54.000 That's why Herbert Hoover, who was a Republican, infamously pushed the Smoot-Hawley tariffs as a response to the drop in the stock market, which helped create the Great Depression.

00:18:04.000 So, populism, the draw of protectionism, has always been great.

00:18:09.000 Here's the problem with politics in general.

00:18:10.000 Here's the problem with politics in general.

00:18:12.000 The problem with politics in general is that things that you get from the government typically are things people don't want to give up.

00:18:18.000 Even conservatives, or people who consider themselves conservatives.

00:18:21.000 Most people, and when you look at a government program like social security,

00:18:25.000 Social security is a disaster area.

00:18:27.000 It's in the red.

00:18:28.000 It's going to bankrupt the country.

00:18:29.000 It really is a problem.

00:18:30.000 Most people who are on social security, however, are not going to give it up.

00:18:33.000 And politicians know that by campaigning against social security, they're signing their own death warrant.

00:18:38.000 Why?

00:18:39.000 Because you come to somebody like me, I'm 32 years old, right?

00:18:42.000 You say to me, I'm going to reform social security.

00:18:44.000 I think two things.

00:18:45.000 Great.

00:18:46.000 That means I get 7% more on my paychecks.

00:18:48.000 And it also means that I may have a shot at keeping some of my money.

00:18:53.000 But then you go to somebody like my grandmother, right, who's actually living off of Social Security, and you say to her, we're taking away from you 90% of your monthly income.

00:19:01.000 Right?

00:19:01.000 It's going away.

00:19:02.000 Now, nobody's actually making the case Social Security should go away, but this is why, right?

00:19:05.000 This is the reason why.

00:19:07.000 The reason why is because Social Security, like every other government program, has a very specific set of beneficiaries, and a very diffuse set of people who are harmed by it.

00:19:17.000 So I pay a little bit of money into Social Security every month, but my grandmother takes a lot of money out of Social Security every month, which is, of course, why it's bankrupt.

00:19:24.000 But that means it's politically unpopular to go after Social Security, because, honestly, Social Security is not number one on my list of priorities, but for my grandma, it is number one on her list of priorities.

00:19:35.000 And the same thing is true of Medicare.

00:19:36.000 This is why Donald Trump says, I'm not gonna touch Social Security, I'm not gonna touch Medicare.

00:19:40.000 It's why Democrats say that.

00:19:43.000 Think about immigration.

00:19:44.000 Legal immigration is very good for the economy.

00:19:47.000 Legal immigration is good for the economy so long as people aren't taking welfare, obviously, because if you have a skilled set of people coming in and bringing their skill sets to bear, they're bringing better work for cheaper.

00:19:58.000 Better for cheaper is always good for the consumer.

00:20:00.000 Now, you come to me and you say, okay, is legal immigration good?

00:20:03.000 I say, yeah, it's great.

00:20:04.000 It means that I've got a bunch of talented people who are coming in, producing great product I can buy for cheap.

00:20:09.000 Sounds awesome.

00:20:09.000 As a consumer, it's great.

00:20:10.000 It means I get better stuff.

00:20:12.000 Now you go to the person who's just let out of a job because of the legal immigrant who was brought in. 1.00

00:20:18.000 So for me, I may have gotten a slightly better iPhone, but for that guy, he lost his job.

00:20:23.000 So when Donald Trump campaigns against legal immigration, what he's really saying is, I'm campaigning for the guy whose number one priority is keeping his job as against that legal immigrant, 0.59

00:20:33.000 And, you know, all of the diffuse benefits, nobody's voting, that's not their number one issue.

00:20:37.000 In other words, everyone is basically a single-issue voter and their single issue is, what's good for me?

00:20:42.000 And what's good for me is almost invariably something that is not good for society as a whole.

00:20:46.000 Which is why morality matters, folks.

00:20:48.000 This is why religion matters.

00:20:50.000 If we were all self-interested voters, then, in the end, we would end up with a socialist, communist regime.

00:20:57.000 Which is what the founders always said.

00:20:58.000 The founders always said, if you can vote other people... This is why we have a Bill of Rights, to prevent government from doing this.

00:21:03.000 The founders always believed, if you could vote yourself other people's property, you would probably do it.

00:21:08.000 If you could vote yourself other people's money, you could probably do it.

00:21:12.000 And they were right.

00:21:13.000 And that's what's happening.

00:21:14.000 And so that becomes a problem.

00:21:15.000 Because if we were to get rid of, if we were to get rid of a lot of the policies that hurt the country, we're hurting a specific group of people and helping a broad group of people, but we're helping that broad group of people this much, and we're hurting that specific group of people this much.

00:21:33.000 Okay, that's a problem.

00:21:34.000 So, then the question becomes, okay, what do you do to get elected?

00:21:37.000 Because there's no question that if you lie to people, you can get elected.

00:21:40.000 Right?

00:21:40.000 If you're a Democrat, you can just lie to people.

00:21:42.000 I'm gonna make your life better.

00:21:43.000 I'm gonna give you free education.

00:21:45.000 No such thing.

00:21:45.000 I'm gonna give you free healthcare.

00:21:47.000 No such thing.

00:21:48.000 I'm going to give you free this and free that.

00:21:50.000 I mean, basically, the Democratic debates have been going like this.

00:21:52.000 Hillary Clinton says, free education for everybody!

00:21:54.000 And then Bernie Sanders says, free healthcare for everybody! 0.99

00:21:57.000 And then Hillary Clinton says, free crap for everybody! 0.99

00:22:00.000 And then Hillary Clinton says, free crap for everybody infinity! 0.99

00:22:03.000 And that's their pitch. 0.99

00:22:05.000 And that's a good pitch.

00:22:06.000 It's a good pitch.

00:22:07.000 And down in our gut, we know it's not true.

00:22:10.000 But it's appealing.

00:22:11.000 And Donald Trump is making sort of the same pitch.

00:22:14.000 So what Andrew Klavan has suggested is if you want to appeal to those blue-collar voters, the reason Donald Trump is getting people jazzed up is because he may be wrong on legal immigration.

00:22:23.000 He may be wrong on free trade.

00:22:25.000 He may be wrong on government crony capitalism, but he's appealing to that group of people.

00:22:30.000 So what Klavan says is, well, instead of arguing sort of the Donald Trump protectionism spiel, what if we start to argue for job training programs?

00:22:39.000 And I said to Klavan, well, there's only one problem.

00:22:42.000 There's not a government job training program in the world that actually works.

00:22:44.000 They're all failures.

00:22:46.000 That's not the way the economy works.

00:22:48.000 When somebody loses their job at GM,

00:22:51.000 They don't get another job because they went to a government-funded job training program.

00:22:54.000 Hell, the people in government don't even know how to do jobs.

00:22:56.000 It's why they work for the government.

00:22:58.000 The way people get jobs is they look through the classifieds and they find a job.

00:23:02.000 Or they go drive for Uber.

00:23:03.000 They find private industry.

00:23:05.000 That's not a pitch.

00:23:06.000 So the question becomes, what lies are you willing to tell in order to get elected?

00:23:10.000 What lies are you willing to tell in order to get elected?

00:23:14.000 Because anytime you say that the government is going to be able to help you,

00:23:18.000 You are basically lying.

00:23:19.000 The government is not capable of helping individuals without stealing money from other individuals.

00:23:26.000 And when it does steal money from other individuals, that's immoral.

00:23:29.000 So, what compromises are you willing to make in order to get elected?

00:23:34.000 This is a serious question, and it's a serious moral question that we should all consider.

00:23:38.000 Now, my way of dealing with this, I think, in political terms,

00:23:42.000 is that Republicans ought to single out, they should understand how elections actually work.

00:23:47.000 Elections don't take place on the basis of policy, they take place on the basis of story.

00:23:54.000 And so, it's not about the story of the guy who's blue collar living in Ohio, it's whether you are better for that guy than Hillary Clinton.

00:24:03.000 And that guy's priorities are not only the priorities of, I need to keep my job.

00:24:07.000 That guy's priorities include, I don't want my kid indoctrinated by the government to believe in gay marriage.

00:24:11.000 I don't want Hillary Clinton coming in here and mandating that a man go into my daughter's restroom. 1.00

00:24:15.000 I don't want Hillary Clinton coming in here and forcing her priorities and values down on me. 1.00

00:24:21.000 In other words, you don't have to bribe people with government.

00:24:23.000 You just have to focus on the fact that the Democrats want to oppress.

00:24:28.000 There's an issue of emphasis here.

00:24:31.000 I don't think that the way Republicans end up winning blue-collar voters back is to lie to them about the glories of protectionism.

00:24:37.000 A lot of people on the right seem to think it is.

00:24:39.000 I think the problem is that once you give people the go-ahead on the premise, once you give people the go-ahead on the premise that you can steal other people's money in order to enrich yourself, then you're basically a Democrat.

00:24:51.000 It's just a matter of time until you get there.

00:24:53.000 It may take longer, but it's only a matter of time until you get there.

00:24:57.000 So I'm not offering no hope.

00:24:58.000 I'm not saying Republicans can never win because Clavin and I, Clavin was saying freedom is unpopular.

00:25:04.000 I don't think freedom is quite as unpopular. 0.97

00:25:07.000 You know, I think freedom is unpopular in the sense that people want free crap. 0.96

00:25:10.000 I do think people want free crap. 0.98

00:25:12.000 But I think that there are certain aspects of freedom that, for everyone, trump their desire for free crap. 0.98

00:25:17.000 Otherwise, this wouldn't be a free country.

00:25:19.000 So you have to find out what are those aspects of freedom for each individual and tailor your message of freedom to that individual.

00:25:24.000 So it's a mistake to go into a blue-collar area and start talking about the glories of free trade. 1.00

00:25:30.000 It's stupid. 0.99

00:25:31.000 Just like it would be a mistake to go into Iowa and make your central pitch how you're going to get rid of ethanol subsidies. 1.00

00:25:36.000 But, you can go into Iowa and you can say, Hillary Clinton wants to take your money, and she wants to spend it on stupid garbage, and she wants to restrict your religious practice, and she wants to destroy your livelihood. 0.99

00:25:46.000 In other words, you have to campaign on all the things that the establishment doesn't want you to campaign on. 0.98

00:25:52.000 The reason we're in the situation we're in, the reason blue-collar workers have been left aside, is because the establishment insists that Republicans not talk about social policy.

00:26:00.000 That Republicans not talk about

00:26:03.000 Basic issues of religious freedom, for example.

00:26:06.000 That Republicans not talk too much about foreign policy and national security.

00:26:10.000 The reality is, the only reason America went free trade in the first place is because after World War II, we had to be free trade for national security reasons with all of the other countries the Soviet Union was trying to woo.

00:26:22.000 Our idea was that if we trade with them, they'll become rich, they'll become democratic, and they won't want to deal with the Soviet Union. 0.59

00:26:27.000 But that was a pitch on foreign policy grounds, not on prosperity grounds.

00:26:30.000 The prosperity just came afterward.

00:26:33.000 Republicans need to understand the message of freedom is the right message.

00:26:37.000 The message of bribery isn't.

00:26:39.000 And so, you know, compromising with populism is just a recognition that you don't emphasize the parts of the economic conservative agenda that are actually problematic for people who are in that small minority of people who are hurt by good economic policy.

00:26:55.000 Okay.

00:26:56.000 Time for some things that I like, and time for some things that I hate.

00:26:59.000 There's a great book called Tragedy and Comedy by Walter Kerr.

00:27:02.000 It's really good.

00:27:03.000 One of the great questions in drama is what's the difference between a tragedy and a comedy?

00:27:06.000 What's the difference between a tragedy and a comedy?

00:27:09.000 Because what makes you laugh and what makes you cry are very often very similar things.

00:27:14.000 Walter Kerr's theory in a great book called Tragedy and Comedy is basically that life is both tragedy and comedy, and the reason is because tragedy is Hamlet aiming for the stars, but understanding that he's going to end up like Yorick, right?

00:27:26.000 It's the fact that we are capable of reaching out to God and reaching out to the stars, but that we're always going to fall short, that we're always going to die.

00:27:34.000 And comedy is, we reach out to the stars, but we fart. 0.59

00:27:38.000 Right, and so it's the same argument, it's just that one sees it as, okay, it's kind of hilarious that we've got this immortal spirit trapped in this ridiculous body, and tragedy is, isn't it horrible that we have this immortal spirit and it's trapped in this ridiculous body?

00:27:54.000 So it's just two ways of viewing the same coin.

00:27:56.000 So that's interesting.

00:27:57.000 And I was going to talk a little bit of Sondheim, but we'll save Sondheim for things that I like next time.

00:28:02.000 Actually, I'll do Sondheim on Monday as a thing I like and a thing I hate, and I'll explain why.

00:28:06.000 Just remind me.

00:28:07.000 Alright, so.

00:28:08.000 Now, I promised some letters from the mailbag, and thank you for your letters.

00:28:12.000 Got lots and lots of mail this time, so we'll go through as many as we can.

00:28:16.000 If I don't get to it, folks, that's just because we literally got hundreds of inputs.

00:28:21.000 I mean, I'm blown away, actually.

00:28:23.000 So, Chris writes, Good morning, Ben.

00:28:26.000 First of all, I want to say I love your show.

00:28:27.000 Listen to it daily.

00:28:28.000 Daily Wire has become a must-read.

00:28:29.000 So, a couple of questions about Bernie Sanders.

00:28:31.000 One, if Bernie wins the Democratic nomination, how do you think that affects the GOP chances?

00:28:37.000 Also, I think we're seeing Bernie swing the Democratic Party further to the left, but if he wins the election, that will move Democrats further to the left.

00:28:46.000 How would it affect blue states?

00:28:48.000 Let some areas swing to red because they can't go that far left.

00:28:51.000 Okay, number one, I think Bernie Sanders is actually a more dangerous candidate than Hillary Clinton because Hillary is gravity-bound, right?

00:28:59.000 Bernie is off in the air somewhere. 0.99

00:29:00.000 I mean, Bernie's a nutjob.

00:29:01.000 Bernie's just flying up in the air and- and- and mention- I mean, yesterday he actually proposed that the post office should open a bank.

00:29:08.000 Okay, the most bankrupt institution in American government should do banking.

00:29:12.000 Yes, this is a grand idea, Bernie Sanders.

00:29:15.000 But because of that, he's got ideological purity, he's got passion. 1.00

00:29:18.000 Hillary is tired, she's an old crone, no one likes her, she's nasty. 1.00

00:29:23.000 Bernie Sanders is a slightly scarier candidate than Hillary because at least he appears sincere. 0.99

00:29:28.000 As far as him pushing people to the right, if I thought that he would push people to the right, I'd be in favor of his nomination.

00:29:33.000 I think he'd push people to the left because he at least is ideologically coherent.

00:29:38.000 I think that we have yet to see how far the American left is willing to push, and I think that they're willing to push even further.

00:29:43.000 Alright.

00:29:45.000 Letter number two.

00:29:45.000 This is from a guy named Dom.

00:29:47.000 He said he wrote to me a while back.

00:29:48.000 Today, something happened to him that was kind of surprising.

00:29:51.000 He wanted some advice.

00:29:52.000 So he says, Some friends and I were talking about one of the black kids at our school.

00:29:55.000 He's well known for being a white black kid.

00:29:57.000 By this I mean he does things that are typically associated with what white people do. 0.97

00:30:01.000 The kid has a gold membership to Starbucks, for God's sakes.

00:30:04.000 Anyway, he's proud to say he's a white black kid, so by calling him, it's not a negative connotation. 0.85

00:30:09.000 We were talking about we said he's the whitest black kid you'll ever seen, you've ever met, and at this comment, one of the black girls who sits at my table snapped at me and started calling me a racist.

00:30:18.000 The girl is a wild advocate, to say the least, for the rights of black people.

00:30:21.000 Did she have a right to be upset with me?

00:30:23.000 Am I the one in the wrong?

00:30:24.000 Okay, so, number one, I don't believe, obviously, a joke is a joke.

00:30:28.000 People say this kind of stuff all the time.

00:30:31.000 And by the way, people on the left usually say it when they mean that a black person isn't liberal enough, they'll say that he's white.

00:30:35.000 Right, so Stacey Dash yesterday made a comment about Black History Month, and leftists said she's not black enough. 0.99

00:30:40.000 So, no, they have no ground to stand on there.

00:30:43.000 As far as using that kind of language... 0.97

00:30:45.000 It's silly language. 0.99

00:30:46.000 They're rich black people? 0.99

00:30:48.000 Is Colin Powell more white because he's rich? 0.98

00:30:50.000 No, he's a black guy. 0.97

00:30:52.000 Is Condi Rice any less black than she was when she was a girl growing up in Birmingham while white people were bombing churches? 0.99

00:30:57.000 No, she's just as black. 0.96

00:30:58.000 So saying somebody is a white black kid is really just a way of saying they're a rich black kid, and it goes to a pathetic thing that's happened in our society, which is the assumption, really not even by white people, but by black people largely, that it is not black to be prosperous and successful in American society. 0.97

00:31:15.000 For all the evil things that Bill Cosby has done personally, one of the nice things about The Cosby Show is it actually set out the vision that black people can be middle class, they can be doctors, they can be lawyers, they can be dentists, they can do all sorts of wonderful things. 0.97

00:31:28.000 And I think it's a mistake to say that somebody is a white black kid because he goes to Starbucks. 0.75

00:31:32.000 He's just a black guy who goes to Starbucks.

00:31:34.000 I know white people who are, you know, who don't go to Starbucks. 0.69

00:31:39.000 Race has nothing to do with behavior, and this is one of the things we have to explode. 1.00

00:31:43.000 Alright, another letter here.

00:31:45.000 Somebody asks,

00:31:52.000 Because I've talked very often about how you talk to people on the left who are not.

00:31:54.000 If you want to destroy leftists in debate, there are easy ways to do it.

00:31:57.000 You can go pick up my pamphlet online at Amazon.

00:31:59.000 It's called 11 Ways to Talk to a Leftist or How to Destroy a Leftist in Debate.

00:32:03.000 There are a bunch of pamphlets I've written on this.

00:32:06.000 How to Destroy a Leftist in Debate is probably the easiest one.

00:32:10.000 The question, and I get this one a lot, is I have several family members that subscribe to leftism, including my wife.

00:32:16.000 Good luck to you, my friend.

00:32:17.000 I'm looking for a softer way to argue the facts with them, but it's difficult since they're close to me.

00:32:21.000 Okay, so there's my preliminary answer, and then there's my actual answer.

00:32:27.000 My preliminary answer is you should not associate with people on the left because they're generally terrible.

00:32:32.000 And what I mean by this is not... Look, I have family members who are on the left.

00:32:37.000 I have acquaintances who are on the left.

00:32:39.000 I don't like to surround myself with people with whom I have wildly differing values, and this doesn't mean people who just happen to be on the left.

00:32:46.000 I'm talking about ardent leftists, people who really believe this stuff.

00:32:49.000 Most people on the left are just sort of there by pro- they're just there by habit.

00:32:54.000 So let's talk about those people.

00:32:56.000 So if you're talking to those people, the number one thing you have to do is you have to make clear that you understand their position. 1.00

00:33:01.000 Even if you don't and their position is really stupid. 0.99

00:33:03.000 You have to make clear that you understand their position. 1.00

00:33:06.000 That you understand where they're coming from.

00:33:08.000 They just don't have their facts straight.

00:33:10.000 You have to get into the wrestling circle with them.

00:33:12.000 I understand where you're coming from, but have you considered that this may not actually benefit this person, or that may not actually be a moral point of view?

00:33:19.000 You have to gauge your level of argument to the level of argument on the other side.

00:33:22.000 So if they come in and they say, you know, I've been having real trouble understanding Ted Cruz's tax proposal.

00:33:27.000 Isn't it more beneficial for the wealthy?

00:33:29.000 Right?

00:33:30.000 That's a different question than, Ted Cruz hates poor people.

00:33:34.000 Right, if the person comes in at level 3, you can come in at level 3 and you can say, well, you know, I think that you're misconstruing Cruz's tax proposal, and I think that, you know, we should really talk about how the economy works for you on a personal level.

00:33:45.000 Right? 0.99

00:33:45.000 If they come in and they say Ted Cruz hates poor people, you say, well, you're a jackass. 0.99

00:33:49.000 And you don't know how economics works because you're ignorant. 1.00

00:33:53.000 Right? 0.99

00:33:53.000 So it depends on the level at which the conversation is initiated. 0.99

00:33:57.000 And, buddy, if you married the latter, good luck to you.

00:34:00.000 I mean, that was a personal choice that you made.

00:34:05.000 Unsolicited dating advice for everyone.

00:34:06.000 Don't date people of opposite values.

00:34:08.000 It's always a mistake.

00:34:11.000 But if you're already in the relationship, do your best.

00:34:12.000 Alright.

00:34:14.000 So, okay.

00:34:15.000 Dylan writes, Hey Ben, big fan for the last couple years.

00:34:18.000 I'm curious about your thoughts on the RNC cancelling the debates hosted by NBC.

00:34:22.000 So there was a debate that was supposed to be hosted by NBC, and the RNC cancelled it.

00:34:27.000 So there are two things happening.

00:34:29.000 One, good, I'm glad. 0.94

00:34:29.000 CNBC ran a crap show of a debate. 0.94

00:34:31.000 It's good that that debate didn't go forward. 0.93

00:34:34.000 Two, the RNC really canceled, they didn't just cancel the NBC debate, they also canceled the second debate, and this is why I don't trust the RNC.

00:34:42.000 The RNC canceled the second debate that was supposed to be moderated by Sean Hannity, and it was supposed to be a conservatives-only debate.

00:34:48.000 We were gonna have a bunch of conservatives asking questions to these candidates, and they canceled it. 1.00

00:34:53.000 Because that's how the RNC rolls.

00:34:55.000 So, I can both like their decision on NBC and not trust them.

00:34:58.000 Okay.

00:35:00.000 I have, let's see, let's do...

00:35:04.000 Let's do some comic book stuff.

00:35:05.000 I got a lot of blowback on comics, because earlier this week I critiqued comics and I said that backstory is overemphasized in the comic books and that most backstories of comics are crappy.

00:35:15.000 And I made the audacious statement that the only two good backstories in comics are Superman and Batman.

00:35:21.000 And Batman, because his angst is an interior part of him, that's who he is, and so you have to explain where the angst comes from.

00:35:28.000 And Superman, because he's legitimately an alien.

00:35:31.000 So you have to explain, you know, how he got here, and what makes him want to be a representative of the American way while he has unlimited powers, right?

00:35:39.000 Okay, so... Someone says that they want me to marry them, and not like actually marry to them, like perform their marriage ceremony, but secondly,

00:35:51.000 He says Spider-Man and its origins are pretty lame.

00:35:53.000 Daredevil happens to be solid.

00:35:55.000 I got this a lot.

00:35:55.000 I got a lot of Daredevil.

00:35:56.000 A lot of people saying they like the Daredevil backstory.

00:35:59.000 So, let me talk about the Daredevil backstory for a second.

00:36:02.000 So, the Daredevil backstory... First of all, how he got his powers is a completely ridiculous, again, just... It's a ridiculous intervention by the author, right?

00:36:14.000 He gets hit by toxic waste, which is, like, the easiest way to get superpowers ever. 0.95

00:36:18.000 In reality, you die of cancer.

00:36:20.000 In the comic books, you end up with superpowers that are not cancerous.

00:36:23.000 So, the real Daredevil backstory, the part that's fun, is that he had a dad who was killed because his dad was a boxer and didn't give in to the mob, right?

00:36:33.000 That's the story.

00:36:34.000 So basically, he's Batman in the Marvel Universe.

00:36:37.000 So yeah, he's got a good backstory because he copied Batman's backstory.

00:36:40.000 I mean, that's cool.

00:36:41.000 I mean, I can also copy Batman's backstory.

00:36:43.000 Wow, he had a parent killed and now he has angst about fighting crime.

00:36:49.000 It's fine.

00:36:50.000 I mean, it's okay.

00:36:52.000 I'm not deeply in love with it.

00:36:54.000 Okay, another question from Ben.

00:37:06.000 This is a pretty good question.

00:37:07.000 I mean, honestly, I have friends.

00:37:11.000 There's a guy who I deal with every single day.

00:37:13.000 Every morning, actually.

00:37:14.000 And he is constantly saying that he's very overweight and not healthy, and he's constantly saying that he doesn't understand why anyone would want to live forever.

00:37:23.000 And I get this from people.

00:37:25.000 You hear this a lot, right?

00:37:25.000 People say, oh, I wouldn't want to live forever.

00:37:28.000 For some religious people, it's their way of explaining death. 1.00

00:37:31.000 For some non-religious people, it's their way of explaining why they act like idiots. 1.00

00:37:34.000 But there are people who say, you know, I don't want to live forever. 1.00

00:37:37.000 There's so much cool stuff in the world.

00:37:38.000 There's so much stuff that I want to learn.

00:37:40.000 There's so much stuff, there's just not enough time in the day.

00:37:43.000 I mean, honestly, I love learning.

00:37:45.000 It's my favorite thing in the entire, reading is my favorite thing to the point where my wife has to make sure that she has my attention when she's talking to me.

00:37:52.000 You know, she's, she's, I have a book everywhere.

00:37:55.000 I don't think, like, right now I have two books in my backpack.

00:37:57.000 I don't go anywhere without books.

00:37:58.000 I mean, if I, if I had unlimited time and unlimited energy to study,

00:38:04.000 Everything but math, and then even then probably math.

00:38:06.000 I mean, it's just I love learning so much.

00:38:08.000 So, you know, I've never understood the people who say that they wouldn't want to live forever.

00:38:12.000 If I could be healthy forever, I would want to live forever.

00:38:14.000 There's just too much to learn.

00:38:15.000 There's too much cool stuff that God put here.

00:38:18.000 I'm lucky.

00:38:25.000 I get to study the stuff I like every single day.

00:38:27.000 I get to study politics and human behavior.

00:38:29.000 I'm fascinated by social science.

00:38:31.000 I think human beings are fascinating.

00:38:32.000 I do.

00:38:32.000 And I think that studying human beings, there can't be something more interesting than that.

00:38:36.000 The human mind is just utterly riveting.

00:38:38.000 Alright.

00:38:39.000 This one...

00:38:40.000 It was about Islam.

00:38:42.000 And the question is, what rhetorical bombshell should I have dropped when somebody said in class, members of groups like ISIS and Al-Qaeda have little to no understanding of Islam.

00:38:51.000 If they understood Islam, they wouldn't be terrorists.

00:38:54.000 The rhetorical bombshell you should have dropped is, okay, who knows more about the Quran, you or Bin Laden?

00:38:59.000 Right, that's the rhetorical bombshell you should have dropped.

00:39:00.000 Who knows more about the Quran, you or al-Baghdadi?

00:39:03.000 You don't know anything.

00:39:04.000 Everybody, invariably, people who say that ISIS and Al-Qaeda don't understand Islam know nothing about Islam.

00:39:10.000 Like, legitimately nothing about Islam.

00:39:12.000 It's always like Barack Obama, who studied the Quran briefly when he was in Indonesia.

00:39:16.000 Or George Bush used to say this, and it was like, George Bush... I mean...

00:39:21.000 There were questions as to whether George Bush could read English, let alone Arabic.

00:39:24.000 Like, the idea that George Bush was some sort of Quranic expert is absolutely absurd.

00:39:30.000 It's absolutely absurd.

00:39:31.000 Alright, so that's the line you should drop.

00:39:32.000 Will writes, and I'm trying to move through these quickly, folks.

00:39:36.000 Will writes,

00:39:37.000 When it comes to your political stances, and one often found on the right, you're arguing from a set of morals from a Judeo-Christian thought.

00:39:43.000 When you talk about abortion, you refer to it as baby killing, which I agree with you on, but what about defending marriage? 1.00

00:39:48.000 Politicians like Ted Cruz believe in defining traditional marriage on a federal level, but isn't that discrimination to the gay community?

00:39:54.000 How would you go about the marriage issue?

00:39:56.000 Well, as I've said on the program, I don't think government should be involved in marriage at all.

00:40:00.000 No, I think actually that there is a... I believe in traditional marriage not because of Judeo-Christian values, but because I'm a sane and rational human being.

00:40:08.000 You know, the fact is that heterosexual marriage has benefits for society.

00:40:12.000 Homosexual marriage has no benefits for society. 1.00

00:40:14.000 It has benefits for the people involved, but how does anybody else benefit from two dudes schtuping each other?

00:40:20.000 No one has yet discovered this.

00:40:22.000 Right, the fact is that marriage benefits a male-female schtuping each other, because if they schtup each other and they happen to get pregnant, which up until birth control became prevalent was the way things were done, right, if that happened, if people happened to get pregnant, it was good that the kid be raised in a stable two-parent family where the people were bound to each other. 0.58

00:40:40.000 That was the purpose of marriage and it was good for society, and the breakdown of marriage has destroyed society.

00:40:44.000 Single motherhood has been an absolute disaster area for both the black and the white community, for every community, non-racially speaking. 0.82

00:40:53.000 So, you know, I don't think you have to be a Judeo-Christian advocate to be in favor of traditional marriage.

00:40:59.000 Alrighty, let's see what else we have here.

00:41:02.000 Oh, okay, another comic book one.

00:41:03.000 We'll do a couple more, and then we'll be done.

00:41:05.000 And these are both—three comic book ones?

00:41:08.000 Okay, we'll do a couple more comic book ones, but we'll summarize them.

00:41:11.000 Okay.

00:41:11.000 Mitchell writes, Mr. Shapiro, your representation of comics was a little off.

00:41:16.000 Superman is obviously a Moses rip, not Jesus.

00:41:18.000 His creators were Jews, after all. 0.99

00:41:20.000 Batman, the master race, is actually right-wing, if you read into the dialogue and narration.

00:41:24.000 Frank Miller is very right-wing and has written the best Batman comics, period.

00:41:28.000 Aquaman has a great origin story.

00:41:30.000 Wonder Woman's origin is completely intertwined with Greek mythology.

00:41:33.000 Green Arrow, beside the fact he is a loving liberal on par with Bernie Sanders, has a great origin story. 0.52

00:41:38.000 Marvel is going to have crap origins because of the time period its characters were created, so cut them some slack.

00:41:47.000 He says that I should stop criticizing Batman and I should criticize Green Arrow. 0.94

00:41:51.000 Yeah, Green Arrow in the comics, they actually made into basically a communist.

00:41:54.000 The show Green Arrow, he's not a communist.

00:41:56.000 So much.

00:41:57.000 At least, not as much as he is in the comics.

00:41:59.000 As far as Superman being a Moses rip, not a Jesus rip... 0.55

00:42:02.000 So, obviously the idea of the parents being under assault and then having to put their kid into a basket and float him down the river, right?

00:42:09.000 That is the beginning of the Superman origin story.

00:42:12.000 But once he gets here, he's Jesus.

00:42:14.000 Once Superman gets here, he is Superman suffering on the cross.

00:42:19.000 I mean, there's no way to read it otherwise.

00:42:21.000 He's a god in human form, right?

00:42:23.000 That's what he is.

00:42:24.000 So, I disagree on that.

00:42:26.000 Batman as a right-wing figure, yes.

00:42:27.000 The original Batman is a right-wing figure.

00:42:29.000 Frank Miller's Batman is a deeply right-wing figure.

00:42:31.000 And then, Frank Miller sort of went off the rails recently in his second Batman installment.

00:42:36.000 He turns Batman into like a full-fledged fascist who basically says, democracy doesn't work.

00:42:39.000 Superman, you're a good guy.

00:42:41.000 You run all this stuff.

00:42:43.000 It's kind of entertaining.

00:42:44.000 Wonder Woman's origin story is not good.

00:42:46.000 I disagree.

00:42:48.000 And Aquaman does have an okay origin story, but you don't really need it.

00:42:52.000 I mean, you need it because he's actually a Greek god.

00:42:55.000 I mean, Aquaman is a Greek god.

00:42:56.000 So, as I mentioned last time, comics are pagan, and so if you're in the pagan universe, you're just retelling Greek myths with pictures.

00:43:04.000 Okay, one last question.

00:43:05.000 When is your next book coming out, and any word, what it will be about?

00:43:10.000 Okay, so I have two books that are coming out, actually.

00:43:13.000 I have one that's going to be about political correctness.

00:43:15.000 I'm in conversations with publishers right now.

00:43:17.000 That'll probably come out early next year.

00:43:19.000 And I have a fiction book, actually, that is going to be coming out a little bit later this year, probably in September.

00:43:24.000 And it is an Ayn Rand-esque action thriller about the collapse of the United States and what that's going to look like.

00:43:33.000 I wrote it like a year and a half ago, and as always, my favorite four words, I told you so.

00:43:39.000 Like, everything that I wrote in this a year ago is now happening.

00:43:41.000 It's pretty amazing.

00:43:42.000 So, it's a really good, fast-paced novel.

00:43:44.000 It's the beginning of a series, so I'm looking forward to talking with you more about that as that happens.

00:43:48.000 Also, sorry, last question.

00:43:50.000 Spider-Man Peter Parker doesn't have a good backstory.

00:43:53.000 Right, that's what I said.

00:43:54.000 He doesn't have a good backstory.

00:43:55.000 He was bit by a spider.

00:43:56.000 And his uncle died.

00:43:57.000 Yeah.

00:43:58.000 Good.

00:43:58.000 Nice.

00:43:59.000 Okay, we're done.

00:44:00.000 I hope that you have a wonderful weekend.

00:44:02.000 I hope that you can sleep through some more of the Trump cruise debate.

00:44:07.000 And we will be back here next Monday with more Things I Like.

00:44:09.000 Plus, I promise, we will talk about Stephen Sondheim for you few diehard right-wingers who love musical theater.

00:44:15.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:44:16.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

The Ben Shapiro Show - January 21, 2016

Ep. 59 - How Much Must Republicans Lie To Get Elected?

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript