The Ben Shapiro Show - New York City’s Forever Pandemic | Ep. 1390

00:00:00.000 Outgoing New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio announces vaccine mandates for all private employees and kids 5+.

00:00:06.000 Plus, Joe Biden faces down several simultaneous foreign policy crises.

00:00:11.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:00:11.000 This is the Ben Shapiro Show.

00:00:18.000 Today's show is sponsored by ExpressVPN.

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00:01:30.000 All righty, so.

00:01:32.000 Omicron!

00:01:34.000 Are you scared?

00:01:35.000 Are you scared?

00:01:36.000 Because, um, apparently Democrats just want you to be scared, but for no actual reason.

00:01:41.000 So, some of us have been saying ever since the news broke of Omicron that Omicron was not super scary.

00:01:48.000 And the reason I said that Omicron was not super scary is because we had no data that it was particularly scary.

00:01:53.000 You kept seeing headlines like, 30 different mutations!

00:01:55.000 Ooh! 0.96

00:01:56.000 Ah!

00:01:56.000 It's like they were selling you a brand new hoverboard or something.

00:01:59.000 No, that was not the thing about Omicron that was supposed to scare you.

00:02:03.000 Then it was, it spread super fast in the population.

00:02:05.000 You're like, well, yeah, but Delta also spread super fast in the population.

00:02:08.000 At no point did they ever say that Omicron was more virulent, meaning more deadly, meaning more damaging.

00:02:14.000 Instead, the early data seemed to suggest that it was very infectious and not particularly virulent, sort of like a cold, that it was like a really, really mild case of the flu, actually.

00:02:23.000 In fact, to date, I'm unaware of a single report anywhere that anyone has died of Omicron.

00:02:29.000 Anywhere!

00:02:30.000 And now, I can name you, like, almost 800,000 Americans who died of COVID, and some 5 million people worldwide, which is a low-end estimate, who have died of COVID, but if no one has died of Omicron, and it's spreading really fast, and it's crowding out Delta, that's a good thing.

00:02:45.000 It is a good thing if people are getting Omicron versus Delta if Omicron is milder, because then they get natural immunity via a much milder infection.

00:02:54.000 And yet, and yet, the Democrats have decided that they are going to go absolutely ballistic ape bleep over Omicron.

00:03:01.000 It's not just Democrats and liberals here in the United States.

00:03:04.000 It's people in Europe.

00:03:05.000 It's people in Israel. 1.00

00:03:06.000 The entire world, which has been incentivized over the past year and a half to push the lie that they can control the spread of Delta and spread of COVID generally, they continue to double down on stupid. 0.99

00:03:17.000 And now the data continues to drip out. 0.93

00:03:21.000 The New York Times today, quote, Oh, Macron is fast moving, but perhaps less severe.

00:03:27.000 Early reports suggest.

00:03:29.000 Oh, you think?

00:03:31.000 Oh, like you mean like all the data said at the very beginning, like the South African doctor who discovered Oh, Macron said at the very beginning, but we all ignored her because we were too addicted to panic.

00:03:41.000 According to the New York Times, the COVID-19 virus is spreading faster than ever in South Africa, the country's president said on Monday, an indication of how the new Omicron variant is driving the pandemic.

00:03:52.000 But there are early indications that Omicron may cause less serious illness than other forms of the virus.

00:03:59.000 Researchers at a major hospital complex in Pretoria reported their patients with COVID are much less sick than those they've treated before, and that other hospitals are seeing the same trends.

00:04:08.000 In fact, they said, most of their infected patients were admitted for other reasons.

00:04:12.000 They have no COVID symptoms at all.

00:04:14.000 The New York Times has to hedge its bets.

00:04:16.000 They say, scientists cautioned against placing too much stock in either the potential good news of less severity or the bad news, like early evidence that prior coronavirus infection offers little immunity to Omicron.

00:04:26.000 The variant was discovered just last month.

00:04:28.000 More study is needed before experts can say much about it with confidence.

00:04:31.000 Beyond that, the true impact of the coronavirus is not always felt immediately.

00:04:34.000 There could be hospitalizations and deaths that lag.

00:04:36.000 Yes, but normally the hospitalizations and deaths lag by like two to four weeks.

00:04:40.000 They don't lag by months.

00:04:43.000 In the absence of more hard information, says the New York Times, governments have reacted to Omicron with sharp restrictions on international travel and new vaccination requirements.

00:04:51.000 And herein lies the point.

00:04:53.000 The government has lied to all of us by telling us that they can control this thing.

00:04:56.000 Now, here's the thing.

00:04:58.000 You can control it for yourself.

00:05:00.000 You can get vaccinated.

00:05:01.000 I'm pushing vaccination since the beginning.

00:05:03.000 I think vaccination is a good idea.

00:05:04.000 Now, that doesn't mean you're not going to get a breakthrough case.

00:05:06.000 But it does mean if you do get a breakthrough case, you're very unlikely to get hospitalized or die.

00:05:10.000 Now, here's the reality when it comes to COVID generally.

00:05:12.000 If you're young and you get COVID under any circumstances, you are very unlikely to end up hospitalized or dead.

00:05:17.000 You are less likely than that to end up hospitalized or dead if you are vaccinated.

00:05:22.000 And if you're boosted, then you're probably even less likely than that.

00:05:24.000 Okay, so there are some questions as to whether you actually need the booster if you're young and healthy.

00:05:30.000 If you're older, you probably should have the booster if you're above the age of 60.

00:05:33.000 But here's the bottom line.

00:05:35.000 The outsized panic that we are now seeing from Omicron makes no sense whatsoever.

00:05:40.000 None.

00:05:40.000 Zero.

00:05:41.000 Zip.

00:05:42.000 Zilch.

00:05:43.000 And yet, there's a competition, a race now, a frenetic race of people throwing up their hands like Kermit the Frog, racing to try and lock things down.

00:05:53.000 So New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, who for some odd reason, this big, giant, weird-ass, Frankenstein-like communist, thinks that he's going to run for governor of New York.

00:06:01.000 Good luck to him after his failed presidential campaign. 0.80

00:06:03.000 I mean, they can barely stand him in the city of New York.

00:06:06.000 So he announced on Monday that he would be requiring on-site employees at all private businesses, all of them, from bodegas to multinational banks to get vaccinated in order to work inside the city.

00:06:19.000 The mandate would apply to about 184,000 businesses.

00:06:23.000 De Blasio said this is a pre-emptive strike designed to stall another wave of virus cases amid rising concerns about Omicron.

00:06:31.000 By the way, this thing is set to take effect December 27th.

00:06:34.000 That's like four days before Bill De Blasio is no longer mayor of New York.

00:06:39.000 So on his way out, he's just leaving you a sweet goodbye cookie, New York City.

00:06:43.000 And it'll be fun to see whether Eric Adams, the incoming mayor, decides to double down on that and just continue with such policies or whether to the cheers of the throngs, he decides to repeal Bill de Blasio's insane order.

00:06:54.000 I would bet that he decides to maintain it because he can always say that de Blasio put it in place and he didn't actually have to do anything.

00:07:00.000 And the way that it works apparently in blue areas is the more crazy you are about COVID, the more you are rewarded.

00:07:05.000 This is why people on the left made Jacinda Ardern the Prime Minister of New Zealand into some sort of heroine for locking down the island completely.

00:07:14.000 This is why people on the left seem okay with Australia welding people in their houses, essentially.

00:07:19.000 It seems like you are rewarded by the political calculus of the moment by the left, the more harshly you crack down.

00:07:25.000 And what starts in one of the big blue cities never ends up there.

00:07:28.000 Eventually, you'll see it in San Francisco, you'll see it in New York, you'll see it in Chicago.

00:07:32.000 And this will exacerbate the population separation we've seen in the United States, because I promise you, if you're a business in New York, and let's say that 10% of your iBankers don't actually want to get vaxxed, are you just going to sit there and fire them all?

00:07:44.000 Or are you just going to move your headquarters outside the city?

00:07:48.000 Real estate in Florida ain't going down, guys.

00:07:51.000 We'll get to more of this in just one second.

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00:09:02.000 Alrighty, so.

00:09:03.000 Bill de Blasio announces on his way out that he is going to be putting down these new mandates.

00:09:08.000 Here was Bill de Blasio yesterday on MSNBC.

00:09:12.000 We in New York City have decided to use a preemptive strike to really do something bold to stop the further growth of COVID and the dangers it's causing to all of us.

00:09:23.000 So, as of today, we're going to announce a first-in-the-nation measure.

00:09:27.000 Our health commissioner will announce a vaccine mandate for private sector employers across the board.

00:09:34.000 All private sector employers in New York City will be covered by this vaccine mandate as of December 27th.

00:09:40.000 We're going to have some other measures as well to really focus on maximizing vaccination quickly so we can get ahead of Omicron and all the other challenges we're facing right now with COVID.

00:09:54.000 And then de Blasio decides that he is going to extend this.

00:09:54.000 How exciting.

00:09:58.000 So it's not just that he's going to make sure that all of these employees are vaccinated.

00:10:02.000 He says that if you want to take a 5-year-old to a restaurant, your 5-year-old has to be vaccinated.

00:10:06.000 Your 5-year-old.

00:10:07.000 Now, your 5-year-old wasn't going to die of COVID.

00:10:10.000 Statistically speaking, the number of children under the age of 18 who have died of COVID being perfectly healthy beforehand is vanishingly low.

00:10:19.000 But according to Bill de Blasio, if your kid is 5 to 11, they now must vax in order to go to a Broadway show with you.

00:10:24.000 This is insane.

00:10:25.000 Remember how, it's incredible how fast, remember there were people at the beginning of this thing who said it's a slippery slope.

00:10:30.000 And I sort of resisted that idea, to be honest with you, that this was a slippery slope.

00:10:33.000 I thought, okay, well, you know, we can still make policies that are geared towards saving lives and geared toward protecting the elderly.

00:10:41.000 We can do all of that in a rational way based on the data.

00:10:44.000 And there were people from the very beginning who expected the worst and who started arguing this was going to be a slippery slope to full authoritarian tyranny from people like Bill de Blasio.

00:10:53.000 And I thought, okay, maybe.

00:10:54.000 But would the population actually stand for it?

00:10:56.000 And now the answer seems to be yes.

00:10:58.000 It seems to be that populations, large swaths of people, will not only stand for this, they will cheer for this.

00:11:04.000 How else could you have a mayor of the biggest city in America making the argument that five-year-olds must be vaccinated in order to go to a bodega with you?

00:11:13.000 I mean, this is nuts.

00:11:14.000 This is crazy stuff.

00:11:16.000 Here is six-foot-nine groundhog murderer Bill de Blasio explaining on the streets of New York last night.

00:11:22.000 Here in New York City, we were the epicenter of the COVID crisis.

00:11:26.000 We lost so many people in this neighborhood and neighborhoods all over the city.

00:11:30.000 We didn't have PPE.

00:11:30.000 We didn't have ventilators.

00:11:32.000 We were alone.

00:11:34.000 And then we started to fight back, and vaccines came, and we focused on vaccination.

00:11:38.000 It made all the difference.

00:11:39.000 We're now the safest place in this country, but we gotta go even farther.

00:11:43.000 Omicron's here.

00:11:44.000 Winter's coming.

00:11:45.000 We gotta go even farther.

00:11:46.000 Today in New York City, we announced a mandate.

00:11:49.000 All private sector employers must have their employees vaccinated by December 27th.

00:11:53.000 This is what's gonna keep us safe.

00:11:55.000 This is the kind of thing we need to do now, not just here, but everywhere, so we can leave COVID behind once and for all.

00:12:02.000 You keep saying so you can leave COVID behind, but I don't think you guys ever want to leave COVID behind.

00:12:06.000 I think you're addicted to this kind of control.

00:12:07.000 I think you love the power because, again, it underscores the notion that you guys even have the capacity to actually control this thing.

00:12:14.000 You can't.

00:12:15.000 You can't.

00:12:16.000 By the way, I'm looking right now at the vaccination by demographic group in the city of New York.

00:12:21.000 So right now in the city of New York, about 55 percent, this is according to New York City's government website, About 55% of black New York City residents have one dose of the vaccine.

00:12:34.000 Only 49% of black New York City residents, 49%, less than half, are double-vaxxed for COVID.

00:12:42.000 None of them will be able to work in the city if Bill de Blasio has his way, if they work in the private sector.

00:12:48.000 Only 62% of Latinos living in the city of New York, or Latinxs, as Bill de Blasio might put it, Only 62% are fully vaccinated in the city of New York.

00:12:59.000 By the way, only 56% of white people in the city of New York are double-vaxxed.

00:13:05.000 So, like, a huge percentage of people in the city of New York are apparently not double-vaxxed.

00:13:10.000 I mean, that's pretty wild.

00:13:13.000 And among children, the numbers are even worse.

00:13:16.000 Okay, among children between the ages of 5 and 12, only 15% of kids in the city of New York, 15, 1-5%, are double-vaxxed.

00:13:26.000 In the city of New York.

00:13:28.000 Which means, effectively speaking, he's closing the city to half the population of the city.

00:13:34.000 And this is seen as some sort of godsend, apparently, by some people on the left.

00:13:38.000 At least there hasn't been a significant amount of blowback.

00:13:39.000 I haven't seen a lot of New Yorkers saying, this is nuts.

00:13:42.000 Aside from sort of the Republicans who have been left behind over there, and who are eagerly eyeing Zillow for places in South Florida.

00:13:52.000 Where's the uprising there?

00:13:54.000 Where are New Yorkers saying, hold up a second.

00:13:57.000 Why can't we go back to our normal lives?

00:13:58.000 Why?

00:13:59.000 To prevent us from getting Omicron?

00:14:00.000 Where we get mildly ill?

00:14:02.000 Which is called winter in New York.

00:14:03.000 Because everyone in New York has a cold during the winter.

00:14:05.000 Everyone.

00:14:06.000 If you've ever been to New York, everybody's blowing their nose all the time.

00:14:09.000 All winter long.

00:14:11.000 But I guess the idea is that no one must ever blow their nose again.

00:14:15.000 The Wall Street Journal went after Bill de Blasio this morning.

00:14:18.000 He says this will yield diminishing public health benefits while making it harder for the city to recover economically from his and former New York Governor's Andrew Cuomo's destructive lockdowns.

00:14:28.000 De Blasio has already required vaccines for city government workers, teachers, anyone who wants to eat at a restaurant, use a gym, or see a show.

00:14:34.000 This has harmed small business and tourism.

00:14:36.000 And apparently these mandates are not coercive enough for his honor.

00:14:38.000 So now he's giving the unvaccinated an ultimatum. 0.98

00:14:40.000 Get one shot by December 27th, leave the city, or stay unemployed.

00:14:44.000 New York City still has a 9.4% unemployment rate in October, and businesses can't find enough workers.

00:14:52.000 Okay, this is wild.

00:14:55.000 And a huge number of New Yorkers, by the way, are not getting vaxxed because they already had COVID.

00:15:00.000 Remember, New York was the epicenter.

00:15:02.000 New York got slammed.

00:15:04.000 So, well done, Bill de Blasio.

00:15:06.000 Like, truly astonishing stuff here from Bill de Blasio.

00:15:10.000 It's not just Bill de Blasio.

00:15:12.000 Letitia James, who wants to run for governor, right? 1.00

00:15:15.000 She put out the hit report on Andrew Cuomo to get him thrown off his seat as governor.

00:15:19.000 Now she wants to fill it. 0.86

00:15:21.000 Well, she issued a statement on New York City's announcement, quote, I support a vaccine mandate with a testing option, but why are we still doing this piecemeal?

00:15:27.000 A mandate alone won't get us out of the crisis, particularly when it's implemented without input from employees and employers.

00:15:33.000 Science tells us we need everyone to wear masks in public settings, accessible at-home testing, and real public health outreach to our communities.

00:15:40.000 This cannot be done municipality by municipality.

00:15:42.000 New York State must finally lead.

00:15:44.000 They are stampeding to the left in that New York governor's race.

00:15:47.000 The reason Kathy Hochul is getting wildly restrictive is because she's hoping to outflank Letitia James, who's hoping to outflank Bill de Blasio, who's hoping to outflank both. 1.00

00:15:57.000 The authoritarianism is no longer the bug.

00:16:00.000 It is the feature.

00:16:01.000 We sure move fast from mask up to protect grandma when there are no vaccines available to make sure that you get your five-year-old double vaxxed so you can see a Broadway show.

00:16:11.000 By the way, in Oregon, they're doing the same thing.

00:16:13.000 Oregon has now begun drafting forever rules for masking.

00:16:17.000 According to KGW8, in Oregon, quote, the Oregon Health Authority's Rules Advisory Committee met last Thursday to begin the process of drafting a permanent set of rules for the state's indoor mask requirement.

00:16:28.000 OHA lifted Oregon's outdoor mask mandate last week.

00:16:31.000 Outdoor mask mandate?

00:16:33.000 What century are they living in?

00:16:35.000 We've known since the beginning of the pandemic you don't need to wear a mask outdoors.

00:16:35.000 Outdoor mask mandate?

00:16:38.000 But separate mask rules for indoor spaces, schools, and healthcare settings all remain in place.

00:16:43.000 Oregon's first mask mandate was imposed May 2020, lifted in June 2021.

00:16:46.000 The more virulent Delta variant arrived in late July, and health leaders reimposed the mask mandate in August.

00:16:53.000 The current indoor mask mandate is temporary.

00:16:55.000 It's set to expire in February, so Oregon health leaders want to be able to switch to a permanent rule.

00:17:01.000 The permanent rule could still be ended once COVID-19 recedes to a safe level, but it could remain in place indefinitely.

00:17:07.000 And it won't expire prematurely while case numbers are still dangerously high.

00:17:11.000 So in Oregon, they are now talking about a draft permanent rule that allows the state to mask you up at will under all circumstances.

00:17:20.000 Meanwhile, by the way, if you're the Oregon governor, you're good to go.

00:17:22.000 If you're the Oregon governor, no need to worry.

00:17:24.000 You can just go to public places and take your mask off.

00:17:27.000 Because after all, you are one of the specials.

00:17:30.000 According to the Daily Wire, John Rigalizzo reporting.

00:17:33.000 Democratic Oregon Governor Kate Brown was spotted maskless at a gala event in Washington, D.C., even as she pushes for permanent mask mandates in her state.

00:17:40.000 She was the featured guest at the LGBTQ plus IA, greater than sign, less than sign, question mark, backslash, double quotation mark, semicolon, 30th anniversary gala in Washington, D.C.

00:17:51.000 on Saturday.

00:17:52.000 Brown was also one of the four LGBTQ, at sign, hashtag, dollar sign, percentage sign, caret.

00:17:59.000 Victory Hall of Fame inductees, from a pro-LGBTQ, open parenthesis, closed parenthesis, open bracket, closed bracket, colon, PAC.

00:18:10.000 A Twitter user posted a photo of himself standing with Brown and David Gins, Deputy Director of Operations for Vice President Kamala Harris, who by the way has been making a lot of appearances recently in the media.

00:18:20.000 You'll remember that it was yesterday that David Gins, the Deputy Director of Operations for Vice President Harris, put out a photo of himself, very excited about his job, staring Desperately into nothingness.

00:18:31.000 With a tweet saying how much he loved Kamala Harris.

00:18:33.000 So that guy's having himself a week.

00:18:36.000 Thank you both for evening you do for advancing our communities.

00:18:38.000 Said the user.

00:18:39.000 So there she was, unmasked.

00:18:40.000 Good times.

00:18:41.000 Again, the elites are not bound by the rules.

00:18:41.000 Good times.

00:18:43.000 David Gins, thank you both for evening you do for advancing our communities, said the user.

00:18:50.000 So there she was unmasked.

00:18:51.000 Good times.

00:18:52.000 Good times.

00:18:53.000 Again, the elites are not bound by the rules.

00:18:57.000 But that's the whole point.

00:18:59.000 For the left, COVID has basically become a pagan god.

00:19:02.000 And if you appease the pagan god by pushing mask mandates, you can do whatever you want.

00:19:05.000 You have bought yourself an indulgence.

00:19:08.000 If you believe in government top-down control, you don't have to wear a mask.

00:19:10.000 If you believe in government top-down control, you can come vacation in Florida.

00:19:14.000 If you believe in government top-down control and lockdowns, then you get to be as reckless as you want to be, and no one will ever blame you because you have come out and you have said all of the right things.

00:19:24.000 In the media, by the way, they are mirroring this perspective.

00:19:26.000 Mehdi Hassan, the terrible host on MSNBC, he yesterday was saying, we need harsher measures on COVID.

00:19:30.000 Of course, of course, of course.

00:19:33.000 I just don't get it.

00:19:34.000 We are more than a year and a half and more than three quarter of a million deaths into this pandemic here in the United States.

00:19:40.000 And we're still not taking it seriously enough.

00:19:42.000 Still not doing what needs to be done.

00:19:44.000 Still coddling the COVID conspiracists and the anti-vaxxers.

00:19:49.000 We should be escalating, not de-escalating vaccine mandates.

00:19:52.000 I mean, why on earth do we still not have a federal vaccine mandate for all domestic flights?

00:19:58.000 Why?

00:20:01.000 Because there's no data to back a federal vaccine mandate on all domestic flights.

00:20:01.000 Why?

00:20:05.000 Flights have HEPA filters.

00:20:06.000 They've not been a source of transmission this entire time.

00:20:08.000 The answer is because you are utterly disconnected from the data.

00:20:12.000 By the way, it is amazing the career trajectory for some of these people.

00:20:14.000 Mehdi Hassan, of course, used to work for Qatar's Al Jazeera propaganda network before moving on over to MSNBC.

00:20:20.000 Meanwhile, Sunny Hostin, representing the high IQ women of The View, she was blatantly un-vaxxed for Omicron. 1.00

00:20:28.000 Which is a unique take, since the vaxxed are also passing Omicron.

00:20:32.000 In fact, there's a study out of Norway, and it showed one of the major super spreader events for Omicron was a completely vaxxed event.

00:20:38.000 Half the people ended up with Omicron.

00:20:39.000 Now, none of them died.

00:20:41.000 Again, I'm pro-vax.

00:20:42.000 I think you should get the vaccine, because it is not great at this point.

00:20:45.000 It's not super amazing at preventing transmission, but it is still great at preventing hospitalization and death.

00:20:50.000 But the vaccinated are passing this thing.

00:20:51.000 It is not just the unvaccinated.

00:20:53.000 So here's Sunny Hostin, well behind the times and also unable to pronounce the name of this particular variant of the virus.

00:20:59.000 Well, you know, it was interesting to me that the argument was being made, if you're vaccinated, why do you care about me being vaccinated?

00:21:06.000 You're protected.

00:21:07.000 And that's why we are at the Omarion Omicron variant, right?

00:21:13.000 That's why We are where we are because it's mutating.

00:21:18.000 It's becoming this crazy super bug inside of the people that aren't vaccinated.

00:21:24.000 And now it's affecting us.

00:21:26.000 I don't know why they were not understanding that.

00:21:29.000 We've got like 80 million people that are not vaccinated.

00:21:32.000 They understand.

00:21:34.000 They don't want to.

00:21:36.000 They understand.

00:21:36.000 They don't want to.

00:21:37.000 They understand they're going to all give us Omicron.

00:21:39.000 You guys are fine.

00:21:40.000 You're vaccinated.

00:21:40.000 You're all fine.

00:21:42.000 So am I. Some of us are going to leave our... At a certain point, people who want to be miserable are just going to be miserable.

00:21:48.000 And then those of us who want to be happy are just going to be happy.

00:21:50.000 Let me just tell you, my Hanukkah was great.

00:21:52.000 I went to like five concerts.

00:21:53.000 I hung out with a lot of people.

00:21:55.000 And if some people got COVID, they were fine because everybody had the choice to get vaccinated already.

00:21:59.000 Or they were small children, so no one cares.

00:22:02.000 If you choose to be miserable, in the misery lies the happiness.

00:22:06.000 It really is not that they think that if we do X, Y, and Z, we'll get out of the pandemic.

00:22:09.000 It's that they kind of revel in the pandemic. 0.99

00:22:11.000 The people who revel in this stuff most are the white-collar idiots who are sitting up there in their air-conditioned offices with their laptops or on camera all day, telling you how terrible Omicron is. 1.00

00:22:20.000 Everybody else in the country is like, eh. 1.00

00:22:23.000 And all these guys are like, oh my God, I'm so worried.

00:22:25.000 I'm so deeply worried that I'm going to die.

00:22:27.000 You're not going to die.

00:22:28.000 You're fine.

00:22:29.000 Will you stop already?

00:22:31.000 If I have to hear one more person who makes $500,000 a year complain about how their two-year-old might get sick from Omicron when there's no evidence that your two-year-old was ever going to die of COVID, it's just sick-making. 0.98

00:22:44.000 It's ridiculous.

00:22:45.000 The most risk-averse people on planet Earth are now controlling the entire discourse and celebrating themselves as moral actors for it while they put a bunch of low-income people who already had COVID out of jobs for not getting vaxxed. 0.86

00:22:57.000 It's unbelievable.

00:22:59.000 We'll get some more on this in just one second.

00:23:01.000 First, it is the holidays, and that means it is time for you to get yourself a gift.

00:23:06.000 So you're at the office, many hours a day, got that backache, sitting in one of those uncomfortable office chairs that you inherited from the guy who had the job before you.

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00:23:23.000 We actually have actual fight club fist fights in the break room to see who gets to sit in the X-chair each day.

00:23:28.000 It's the most entertaining part of the day.

00:23:30.000 Not only is X-chair the world's greatest office chair, with its patented Elemax technology, it doubles as a massage chair and It can either cool or warm your back.

00:23:37.000 Can your office chair do that?

00:23:39.000 I don't think so, because this office chair was built by the angels that sit before the throne of God.

00:23:44.000 Now is the perfect time for you to purchase an X chair.

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00:24:00.000 Go to xChairShapiro.com and save xChairShapiro.com.

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00:24:09.000 Go check it out right now.

00:24:10.000 xChairShapiro.com.

00:24:12.000 All right, so our cultural thought leaders have now embedded the COVID lifestyle.

00:24:17.000 It's a lifestyle.

00:24:18.000 It's an actual lifestyle.

00:24:20.000 You're a good person if you believe in the innate power of COVID.

00:24:24.000 So, you know, those of us who are actually religious, we talk about two aspects of worship of God.

00:24:30.000 If you're a Jew, there are two things particularly you talk about when it comes to attitude toward God.

00:24:34.000 There's Yiras Shemaim, which is fear of God, and then there is Ahavas Shemaim, right?

00:24:38.000 Then there's love of God.

00:24:39.000 Shemaim in this case being sort of a stand- Shemaim means heaven literally, but we use it as a stand-in for God's name.

00:24:44.000 So there's fear of God and there's love of God.

00:24:47.000 And as a religious person, you're supposed to have both. 0.85

00:24:48.000 You're supposed to fear God's justice because if God ever implemented his justice with you, you would surely be screwed.

00:24:55.000 And you're supposed to love God because God has given you all that you have and constructed a universe that is made for man, right?

00:25:01.000 This is the basic idea of fear of God and love of God.

00:25:04.000 Well, the paganistic secularists, when it comes to COVID, they have fear of COVID and love of COVID.

00:25:09.000 They have a bizarre fear of COVID.

00:25:11.000 They believe that only by By attempting sort of paganistic sacrifices, if they wear the mask, and if they dictate that you wear the mask, if they offer their children up on Mount Moriah as sacrifices to COVID, mask up the five-year-old, and make sure that this kid cannot go to Aladdin unless this kid is double, triple, quadruple, octuple-vaxxed, then this will somehow prevent the wrath of COVID, right?

00:25:40.000 And then there's love of COVID.

00:25:40.000 Fear of COVID.

00:25:42.000 These people love it.

00:25:43.000 COVID has constructed an alternative universe where they get to do whatever they want, where they get to dictate all the terms of engagement, where people have been more willing to give up power to government than any time in American history.

00:25:43.000 They love it.

00:25:54.000 People are just willing to, like, they're throwing power at government, especially in the blue states.

00:25:58.000 Like, okay, fine, you want to mask us?

00:25:59.000 Please mask us.

00:26:00.000 Please, master, mask us.

00:26:01.000 Please do it.

00:26:02.000 Please throw, just do it.

00:26:04.000 Please tell us what jobs we can and cannot work.

00:26:06.000 Please tell us whether we can open our business, whether we can't open our business.

00:26:10.000 And if we fear COVID and we love COVID enough, it will usher in a new kingdom of COVID glory upon Earth, where we build back better, where we wreck all the institutions, where we get rid of logic, where we get rid of data, and we live solely on faith.

00:26:24.000 We live as one in faith with COVID.

00:26:28.000 That is the attitude. 1.00

00:26:29.000 And that's why you end up with idiotic pieces of culture like Jimmy Fallon cutting songs for Christmas with Ariana Grande and Megan Thee Stallion. 1.00

00:26:37.000 Her middle name is Thee. 1.00

00:26:38.000 I'll never get over this.

00:26:39.000 It's Megan Thee Stallion, which I assume was not her given name, but Megan Thee Stallion.

00:26:44.000 Not Thee Stallion, which would make some sense because then she would be Thee Stallion.

00:26:47.000 Megan Thee Stallion.

00:26:48.000 You, my friend, are Thee Stallion, because it's T-H-E-E.

00:26:51.000 Megan Thee Stallion, with Ariana Grande, singing with Jimmy Fallon, who's aging like a bad piece of cheese over here.

00:27:00.000 I gotta say, I remember when Jimmy Fallon was young and he's now reaching the age where this is just kind of creepy and odd and sort of yucky.

00:27:10.000 Here he is singing a song with Ariana Grande and Megan Thee Stallion about masking up for Christmas.

00:27:15.000 And they're so, here's the thing, they're playing it as parody, but they're actually kind of comfortable with it.

00:27:19.000 They kind of love it.

00:27:20.000 They're kind of into it.

00:27:21.000 Because this means that they are, they are the elite.

00:27:23.000 They get to dictate to you.

00:27:25.000 What sort of sacrifices you should perform?

00:27:27.000 Sure, Christmas is supposed to be a time for Christians where you celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ, but for Jimmy Fallon and Ariana Grande and Megan Thee Stallion, all of whom are definitely, I would say, excellent advocates on behalf of traditional Christian worldview, what Christmas is truly about is COVID masks and shots and sitting by the fire wearing odd accoutrements. 0.54

00:27:57.000 Her fingernails are syringes, in case you can't see.

00:28:00.000 on the couch, this year hang that mistletoe.

00:28:04.000 Her fingernails are syringes, in case you can't see.

00:28:06.000 You can tell.

00:28:07.000 Take those towels and jingle bells. 1.00

00:28:09.000 Put Purell on.

00:28:10.000 And now you have a person twerking while wearing paper towels, and they're spraying everything with hand sanitizer.

00:28:18.000 Somebody wipe Rudolph's nose. 0.81

00:28:20.000 Oh, hey, I promise we'll be OK.

00:28:24.000 Cause I learned life's a full story.

00:28:28.000 And then this creepy thing of Jimmy Fallon wearing a mask with Ariana Grande's face on it and the same thing with her.

00:28:34.000 We'll be in line for a booster.

00:29:00.000 Bye.

00:29:02.000 Here's the thing.

00:29:03.000 It's obviously, look, he's trying to be funny, and Jimmy Fallon hasn't been funny for quite a while here, but it is pretty amazing.

00:29:13.000 Megan says, this year, hang that mistletoe.

00:29:15.000 I'mma kiss everybody that I know.

00:29:19.000 But it was a masked Christmas.

00:29:21.000 We stayed in the house.

00:29:22.000 We covered our nose and covered our mouth.

00:29:24.000 But now the boosters are available.

00:29:26.000 Then they can party it up.

00:29:29.000 Until they can't, of course.

00:29:31.000 Because, according to Dr. Anthony Foucher, by the way, even if you're fully boosted, you should still mask up when you are in the presence of others.

00:29:36.000 In fact, there's an entire article in the Atlantic.

00:29:38.000 It is titled, How to Socialize Safely in the Booster Era.

00:29:41.000 Okay, so I have a recommendation as to how to socialize safety in the booster era. 0.99

00:29:46.000 Get a booster or don't, and then do whatever the hell you want because it's a free country and shut the f*** up. 0.99

00:29:51.000 We're done! 0.98

00:29:52.000 Wasn't that amazing?

00:29:53.000 Incredible.

00:29:54.000 Because the vaccines are widely available, and we have therapeutics, and Omicron is less threatening than Delta, and you're fine. 0.99

00:30:02.000 Shut up. 0.99

00:30:04.000 Stop. 1.00

00:30:04.000 Like, enough. 1.00

00:30:06.000 But we still have to hear from our masters, the high priests of COVID.

00:30:10.000 And so the Atlantic says, This past spring, if someone told you they were fully vaccinated, you knew precisely what they meant.

00:30:15.000 At least two weeks before, they'd received two doses of Moderna, two doses of Pfizer, or one of Johnson & Johnson.

00:30:20.000 Now, what it means to be vaccinated encompasses much more variety.

00:30:23.000 Some people have gotten their initial doses, but haven't gotten a booster.

00:30:26.000 Some people mixed and matched the brands of their first shots in their booster.

00:30:28.000 What's more, everyone is on their own personal timeline, depending on when they got their shots.

00:30:32.000 Amid this complexity, kids under five still aren't eligible for any shots at all.

00:30:35.000 When trying to gauge whether a gathering will be risky, Outside and with masks?

00:30:39.000 But she's vaxxed! 1.00

00:30:40.000 And probably boosted!

00:30:41.000 It's so tiresome.

00:30:41.000 Like, what?

00:30:42.000 It's tiresome.

00:30:42.000 vaccinated. Jessica Mladie Rivera, a research fellow at Boston Children's Hospital, told me she wouldn't feel safe spending time with an unvaxxed person indoors. If she saw them at all, the meetup would be outside and with masks. Outside and with masks? But she's vaxxed and probably boosted. Like, what? It's so tiresome. It's tiresome. But again, all of this makes them feel better about themselves. It makes them feel self-righteous.

00:31:09.000 Just like all other virtue signaling from the left, it is all about doing irrelevant things that have no impact on the real world and then saying that your friends aren't doing it so you're better than they are.

00:31:18.000 It's like composting, or recycling, or in a big city where they take all your recycling and they toss it into the same landfill as your garbage.

00:31:25.000 They're like, oh well, did you fully use your recyclables?

00:31:29.000 Okay, guys, I'm sorry.

00:31:31.000 If you're building your notion of a virtuous life around whether you are boosted and whether you're... Bottom line is this.

00:31:40.000 Until our bodies are at least 85% comprised of just the vaccine, until our body weight is 80% vaccine, we can't go back to normal.

00:31:50.000 They never want to go back to normal.

00:31:51.000 This is the new normal.

00:31:52.000 They love it.

00:31:54.000 These people are not miserable.

00:31:55.000 They're happy.

00:31:56.000 They're happy in their misery.

00:31:58.000 Because here's the thing.

00:31:58.000 If they didn't want to live like this, they wouldn't have to.

00:32:01.000 You know how I can tell that?

00:32:02.000 Because we're down here in Florida and ain't none of us been living like that.

00:32:05.000 Down in Florida, my family has been out and about since we were vaxxed.

00:32:09.000 End of story.

00:32:10.000 Enjoying life.

00:32:11.000 Having a good old time.

00:32:13.000 Going to synagogue with hundreds of people.

00:32:14.000 And I know there are a bunch of people in blue states who are cringing right now.

00:32:17.000 Oh my god.

00:32:18.000 Went to synagogue with hundreds of people.

00:32:19.000 Yeah, you know how many people died?

00:32:21.000 Big zero.

00:32:23.000 You know why?

00:32:23.000 Because everybody who wanted to get vaxxed, got vaxxed.

00:32:25.000 I don't know how many times I have to say this.

00:32:27.000 Leave other people alone.

00:32:29.000 You're not a better person for trying to control other people's lives when they do not pose a risk to you. 1.00

00:32:34.000 Okay, meanwhile, Joe Biden continues to roll out an administration filled with buffoonery and idiocy. 0.98

00:32:40.000 And now he's got more crisis on the foreign front. 0.99

00:32:42.000 We'll get to that momentarily.

00:32:44.000 First, Inflation continues to dominate the country.

00:32:47.000 We are at levels of inflation we have not seen in decades.

00:32:49.000 The cost of everything is going up.

00:32:50.000 So, it's time to be pragmatic, protective, and prepared.

00:32:54.000 If you are a homeowner, you should be considering a mortgage refinance right now.

00:32:57.000 Because the Fed is already talking about tapering.

00:32:59.000 The mortgage rates are going to go up.

00:33:01.000 The impact that a refi can make on your budget is substantial.

00:33:03.000 And the people to help you are the folks over at American Financing.

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00:33:08.000 You can learn about custom loans that fit your life better.

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00:33:19.000 Why not see what they can do for you?

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00:33:25.000 Or visit AmericanFinancing.net and MLS182334 and MLSConsumerAccess.org.

00:33:31.000 Now is an excellent time to refinance.

00:33:32.000 If you're paying too high a mortgage rate, you're not going to get a better mortgage rate.

00:33:36.000 A year from now, I promise you mortgage rates are going to be higher than they are right now.

00:33:38.000 Now's a great time to refi.

00:33:40.000 Head on over to AmericanFinancing.net or give them a call at 866-721-3300.

00:33:44.000 Okay, we're going to get to Joe Biden's foreign policy crises because he is a disaster on all fronts.

00:33:51.000 First, it has never been more important that Americans get their news from objective voices who value the truth, which is why we created our newest podcast, Morning Wire.

00:33:59.000 Morningware has been topping the Apple and Spotify charts since its release.

00:34:02.000 We're continuing our commitment to bring you the news without a hidden agenda.

00:34:06.000 We're conservative.

00:34:07.000 We value your time.

00:34:08.000 We value the truth.

00:34:09.000 That's what Morning Wire is about.

00:34:10.000 And while we are working overtime to bring you the news you need to know, we need your help to keep those facts trending toward number one.

00:34:16.000 Start listening right now to Morning Wire on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts.

00:34:16.000 Subscribe.

00:34:20.000 Leave a five-star review if you like what you hear.

00:34:23.000 Also, if you haven't heard, Matt Walsh is now an honorary member of the LGBTQ plus star sign, open parentheses, closed bracket, weird carrot thingy.

00:34:33.000 Weird squiggly thing that goes over Spanish letters.

00:34:38.000 Hey, he's a member of that community now.

00:34:39.000 Because his best-selling new book, Johnny the Walrus, did not only sell out immediately after its release, it's now the number one LGBTQ+, I-A-A, blue, color purple, print sign, bestseller on Amazon's charts.

00:34:53.000 Yes, you heard that right.

00:34:54.000 Matt Walsh is not just a beloved children's book author, he's now a best-selling LGBTQ+, minus, multiplication sign, division sign, long division sign, square root, imaginary number sign author.

00:35:07.000 And don't worry, you can reserve your copy at johnnythewalrus.com.

00:35:10.000 Get your hands on the next batch, shipping out soon.

00:35:12.000 Johnny the Walrus.

00:35:13.000 It's the exhilarating tale of a young boy who pretends he's a walrus.

00:35:16.000 And it is all pretend, until the internet tells Johnny's mommy that Johnny is actually a walrus and she must uphold his trans walrus identity. 0.72

00:35:22.000 If you know Matt's brain, you'll laugh your butt off reading this to your kids or to yourself.

00:35:26.000 So, head on over to johnnythewalrus.com, reserve your copy of Matt's timely masterpiece, Johnny the Walrus, today.

00:35:31.000 You're listening to the largest, fastest growing conservative podcast and radio show in the nation. 0.58

00:35:34.000 All right, so meanwhile, we have our doddering old fool of a president who has somehow pulled defeat from the draws of victory with the economy, pulled defeat from the jobs of victory, the draws of victory with regard to COVID. 0.84

00:35:53.000 And now he's pulling defeat from the draws of victory with regard to foreign policy. 0.96

00:35:57.000 So he already did this in Afghanistan.

00:35:58.000 He literally just surrendered Afghanistan to a bunch of eighth century tribal barbarians who stuff women into bags and then stuff them into the basement and starve children and marry off those children for an actual fee. 1.00

00:36:10.000 He just gave up a country to those people. 0.99

00:36:12.000 And now he is facing down other crises from Russia, from China, from Iran.

00:36:17.000 It's hilarious.

00:36:18.000 He keeps going to Iran.

00:36:19.000 He's like, can we, can we make a deal on nuclear program?

00:36:23.000 And Iran's like, um, no, because we don't want to. 1.00

00:36:29.000 And then Iran's like, no, we don't want to. 1.00

00:36:31.000 And Israel's like, well, what if we just blow up an Iranian nuclear reactor? 0.53

00:36:33.000 How about that?

00:36:34.000 How about that?

00:36:36.000 Joe Biden, man, he's such a joke.

00:36:37.000 The two big foreign policy crises right now, not Iran, Russia and China.

00:36:42.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, three potential crises are proceeding in tandem.

00:36:46.000 A potential Russian invasion of Ukraine, continuing Chinese pressure on Taiwan, and the potential collapse of Iran nuclear talks.

00:36:52.000 Any one of these standoffs has the potential to shake the world order and produce wider conflict.

00:36:57.000 Now, Joe Biden is about to hold a Democratic conference.

00:36:58.000 There is one problem, which is that the Democracy Summit is being attended by a bunch of places that are not actual democracies.

00:37:02.000 Jen Psaki was asked about this yesterday about the human rights record of some of the so-called democracies attending this thing.

00:37:06.000 is to find a way to show firmness on each front without provoking a crisis.

00:37:09.000 Now, Joe Biden is about to hold a Democratic conference.

00:37:13.000 There is one problem, which is that the Democracy Summit is being attended by a bunch of places that are not actual democracies.

00:37:19.000 Jen Psaki was asked about this yesterday about the human rights record of some of the so-called democracies attending this thing.

00:37:25.000 Didn't go great.

00:37:26.000 The Democracy Summit that will happen later this week is an opportunity to bring together U.S.

00:37:33.000 officials, civil society leaders, and foreign leaders who represent a diverse array of experiences to talk about strengthening democracy, defending against authoritarianism, fighting corruption, and promoting respect for human rights.

00:37:49.000 Inclusion or an invitation is not a stamp of approval on their approach to democracy, nor is exclusion a stamp of the opposite of that, of disapproval.

00:38:00.000 They're still strong on human rights this administration?

00:38:02.000 Man, I think that they've got a handle on all of this.

00:38:06.000 So when it comes to China, China is now building military bases in the Pacific.

00:38:12.000 They're seeking their first military base on Africa's Atlantic coast, according to U.S.

00:38:16.000 intelligence.

00:38:17.000 According to the Wall Street Journal, classified American intelligence reports suggest that China intends to establish its first permanent military presence on the Atlantic Ocean in the tiny Central African country of Equatorial Guinea, according to U.S.

00:38:27.000 officials.

00:38:28.000 The officials declined to describe details of the secret intelligence findings, but they said the reports raised the prospect that Chinese warships would be able to rearm and refit opposite the east coast of the United States, a threat that is setting off alarm bells at the White House and the Pentagon.

00:38:42.000 So, Heming in China, that's going really well, particularly after we surrendered in Afghanistan and made clear that we are a complete and utter paper tiger.

00:38:52.000 The great power skirmishing over a country that rarely draws outside attention reflects the rising tensions between Washington and Beijing, according to the Wall Street Journal.

00:38:58.000 The two countries are sparring over the status of Taiwan, China's testing of a hypersonic missile, the origins of COVID-19, and other issues.

00:39:05.000 Worldwide, the United States finds itself maneuvering to try to block China from projecting military power from new overseas bases, from Cambodia to the United Arab Emirates.

00:39:14.000 In Equatorial Guinea, the Chinese likely have an eye on Bata, according to a U.S.

00:39:17.000 official.

00:39:18.000 Bata already has a Chinese-built deepwater commercial port on the Gulf of Guinea.

00:39:21.000 Excellent highways link the city to Gabon and the interior of Central Africa.

00:39:26.000 The most significant threat from China would be a militarily useful naval facility on the Atlantic coast of Africa, said General Stephen Townsend, commander of U.S.

00:39:33.000 Africa Command.

00:39:34.000 By militarily useful, I mean something more than a place they can make port calls and get gas and groceries.

00:39:38.000 I'm talking about a port where they can rearm with munitions and repair naval vessels. 0.93

00:39:43.000 So things are going really well with the Chinese. 1.00

00:39:46.000 Meanwhile, Jen Psaki and the Biden administration, they are taking the overwhelmingly brutal move of saying they won't send official representatives to the Beijing Olympics.

00:39:54.000 Ooh, I'm sure that Xi Jinping is just quaking in his boots.

00:39:58.000 I mean, after all of the harsh treatment we gave them for unleashing a virus on the world that killed upwards of five million people, I'm sure that he's quaking in his boots that we won't be sending an undersecretary of state from Tony Blinken's Coffee break room over to Beijing for the Winter Olympics.

00:40:14.000 Probably Xi Jinping is like, Oh my God, that's crazy.

00:40:16.000 What are we going to do now?

00:40:17.000 Except for everything we were going to do before.

00:40:19.000 Here was Jen Psaki announcing this massive move. 1.00

00:40:22.000 The Biden administration will not send any diplomatic or official representation to the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympic Games, given the PRC's ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and other human rights abuses.

00:40:39.000 The athletes on Team USA have our full support.

00:40:43.000 We will be behind them 100% as we cheer them on from home.

00:40:46.000 We will not be contributing to the fanfare of the games.

00:40:51.000 Okay, and I'm sure that the China... So basically what we've now achieved by not sending a diplomat to China is to piss off the Chinese without actually doing anything. 0.68

00:41:00.000 Which seems to be a great strategy.

00:41:02.000 That's great.

00:41:03.000 Meanwhile, the Russians are mobilizing almost 200,000 troops along the Ukrainian border.

00:41:08.000 And Vladimir Putin is making demands.

00:41:10.000 According to the Washington Post, reporter Isabel Kursugian and Paul Sohn, with Russian troops massed along the border with Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin is expected to issue President Biden an ultimatum during a video meeting on Tuesday.

00:41:24.000 Wait, I was told that Hillary Clinton was going to hit the reset button. 0.99

00:41:26.000 Russia might soon launch an offensive against its neighbor.

00:41:29.000 The Kremlin has said it wants written guarantees from the United States and allies in NATO that the military alliance will not expand east, both in terms of membership and Western forces.

00:41:37.000 The video call comes during an unprecedented low point in U.S.-Russia relations, especially over Ukraine.

00:41:42.000 Wait, I was told that Hillary Clinton was going to hit the reset button. 0.99

00:41:45.000 I was told that Joe Biden was a masterful manipulator of the international scene. 1.00

00:41:50.000 By the way, anybody who told you that's an idiot. 1.00

00:41:52.000 It was Barack Obama who famously said, don't underestimate Joe Biden's ability to F things up. 1.00

00:41:57.000 It was Robert Gates, former Secretary of Defense under both Obama and under Bush, who said, yeah, this guy has never made a right decision on foreign policy.

00:42:07.000 The White House has threatened Russia with serious consequences.

00:42:10.000 Wow, like sanctions.

00:42:11.000 Ooh, that's obviously.

00:42:13.000 Those sanctions, they've done wonders for our anti-Russian position.

00:42:17.000 Those sanctions on particular figures inside the Russian national system.

00:42:22.000 So they just use a bunch of cutouts to move their money.

00:42:24.000 It's obviously really deterred the Russians.

00:42:27.000 Putin plans to outline Russia's proposal to Joe Biden.

00:42:29.000 Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Monday, their talks are expected to be quite long and substantive.

00:42:35.000 I'm sure that that is going to be by quite long and substantive.

00:42:39.000 They mean that Joe Biden is going to fall asleep 10 minutes into the conversation.

00:42:42.000 And then Vladimir Putin is just going to threaten him for a while.

00:42:45.000 And then Joe Biden, his unconscious face is going to slam into the hang up button on the phone.

00:42:49.000 That's how that's how World War Three starts is with the president slipping into unconsciousness and his hand hitting the nuclear button.

00:42:55.000 That seems like how this is going to work out.

00:42:58.000 Meanwhile, over at the White House, they're trying to struggle for like, what do they do here?

00:43:03.000 So a reporter asked the White House, you know, Joe Biden was vice president when Vladimir Putin took over Crimea and he did a bad job then.

00:43:08.000 So why are we supposed to believe he's going to do a good job now?

00:43:12.000 You mentioned that Biden was obviously deeply involved with the Ukraine in 2014.

00:43:17.000 And I'm wondering if you could talk about what his takeaways are from that experience, because a lot of the things that he's saying this time, supporting NATO allies on the eastern flank, sanctions, those sound like the same things that you guys tried to do in 2014, and it didn't stop Russia from taking Crimea.

00:43:33.000 So why does he think this will be different?

00:43:36.000 Well, I think first, our objective at this point, Mara, is of course to prevent them from moving forward.

00:43:46.000 That didn't answer the question.

00:43:48.000 So the reporter's like, yeah, last time you tried this, Putin took Crimea.

00:43:51.000 He's like, right, but he hasn't taken Ukraine yet.

00:43:53.000 And the reporter's like, that's what I'm asking you, actually.

00:43:57.000 No answer from the administration.

00:43:58.000 According to the Washington Post, Biden plans to make clear to Putin what costs the United States and its allies will impose on Russia if an invasion occurs, but also will offer a diplomatic pathway that could address Russian concerns about NATO activities, as well as U.S.

00:44:10.000 and European concerns about Russian activities.

00:44:12.000 The official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

00:44:15.000 Still, the official suggested a written guarantee from Washington that NATO will not expand to include Ukraine was a non-starter, noting the United States believes every sovereign nation should have the right to make its own decisions about its security.

00:44:25.000 Well, Putin has to know that, right?

00:44:27.000 Putin has to know that the West is not going to give him a written guarantee that NATO will never include Ukraine, which means that he's basically just looking for an excuse to invade Ukraine.

00:44:37.000 Now, this seems like it's not a big deal up until the point where Putin crosses that border with 100,000 troops.

00:44:42.000 At that point, this becomes a very serious situation indeed.

00:44:45.000 Because what exactly is the West prepared to do?

00:44:48.000 We obviously are not prepared to put a trigger force in there that would prompt a wider fight back against the Russians.

00:44:55.000 We've given the Ukrainian military under President Trump, we've given them some javelin missiles, but they have not been rearmed under Biden to any serious extent.

00:45:05.000 Sanctions ain't gonna do it. 0.83

00:45:07.000 So if you're Vladimir Putin, probably what you do is you just grab another piece of Ukraine.

00:45:12.000 Not the whole thing.

00:45:13.000 Walk into Kiev or something.

00:45:15.000 And then you dare the West to do anything about it.

00:45:17.000 And given what we did over Georgia, given what we did over Crimea, the answer is probably the West does nothing over it.

00:45:22.000 And Vladimir Putin just goes home, notches another win.

00:45:26.000 And the West once again just starts taking Russian oil.

00:45:31.000 There's a famous quote attributed to Stalin.

00:45:34.000 That you basically push where there's mush, meaning that wherever the other side is willing to give, that's where you push.

00:45:41.000 Vladimir Putin has yet to discover the hard core of the West.

00:45:44.000 And it is questionable as to whether there is a hard core in the West anymore.

00:45:49.000 When we said that there was a mistake for the Biden administration to randomly pull out of Afghanistan because it conveyed weakness, there are consequences to that weakness.

00:45:57.000 And that is the exacerbated chances of a great power conflict, for sure.

00:46:02.000 Meanwhile, CNN's Jeff Zeleny, he points out, and he is correct, there is no appetite for U.S.

00:46:05.000 military intervention in Ukraine.

00:46:07.000 Here's the thing.

00:46:08.000 The less appetite you show for military intervention, the more your enemies are going to dare you to intervene.

00:46:13.000 This is the way that it works.

00:46:15.000 The way deterrence works is the more, right, strength, peace through strength, the Reagan-esque slogan, was designed to mean, we will show you that we are willing to go to war so we don't have to.

00:46:26.000 It seems that the new American style is.

00:46:28.000 We will show you that we are never willing to go to war.

00:46:30.000 And then war is somehow randomly thrust upon us.

00:46:32.000 Here's CNN's Jeff Zeleny pointing out the obvious here.

00:46:36.000 There is no appetite here for military intervention.

00:46:40.000 On a briefing earlier with a senior administration official, there was several moments of silence when that question was asked about a military solution to all of this.

00:46:50.000 Does the U.S.

00:46:51.000 have the stomach for that?

00:46:52.000 So, of course, they're not ruling anything out, but they simply do not want to add another thing, which would be a significantly dangerous thing to the plate of this Biden administration, which is already quite full, quite frankly.

00:47:07.000 America's enemies are on the move.

00:47:08.000 They're on the move because they sense weakness from this administration, and they are right to sense weakness from this administration.

00:47:13.000 This is a weak administration, a deeply weak administration.

00:47:17.000 All righty, we'll be back here later today with an additional hour of content.

00:47:19.000 In the meantime, go check out The Michael Knowles Show.

00:47:21.000 That's available right now.

00:47:22.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:47:22.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:47:23.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is produced by Elliot Feld.

00:47:32.000 Executive Producer Jeremy Boring.

00:47:33.000 Our Supervising Producer is Mathis Blover.

00:47:35.000 Production Manager Pavel Lydowsky.

00:47:37.000 Associate Producer Bradford Carrington.

00:47:39.000 Host Producer Justin Barber.

00:47:41.000 The show is edited by Adam Sajovic.

00:47:43.000 Audio is mixed by Mike Koromina.

00:47:45.000 Hair and Makeup is by Fabiola Cristina.

00:47:47.000 Production Assistant Jessica Kranz.

00:47:49.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is a Daily Wire production.

00:47:51.000 Copyright Daily Wire 2021.

00:47:54.000 The White House pushes a meaningless diplomatic boycott of the Chinese Olympics.

00:48:00.000 Lame duck Bill de Blasio pushes a private sector vaccine mandate in New York.

00:48:06.000 And Switzerland legalizes 3D-printed suicide pods.

The Ben Shapiro Show - December 07, 2021

New York City’s Forever Pandemic | Ep. 1390

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