The Ben Shapiro Show - The Kneel Strong-Arm | Ep. 545

00:00:00.000 President Trump talks about the NFL's new ban on kneeling during the national anthem.

00:00:04.000 Plus, we meet the most entitled 30-year-old in America and bring you the latest on Spygate 2018.

00:00:09.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:00:10.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:00:16.000 Lot to get to today, and we will be talking about all of it.

00:00:18.000 First, I want to say thanks to our sponsors over at MVMT.

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00:01:31.000 Okay, so the big news of the day.

00:01:37.000 Which is, I think, a good move by the NFL, although I think it's done in the worst possible way, and they should have done it originally.

00:01:48.000 The NBA had this problem years ago when there was a player named Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf.

00:01:54.000 He was a guard, I believe, for the Denver Nuggets, and he didn't want to stand up for the National Anthem.

00:01:59.000 He was fined, and pretty quickly he ended up standing for the National Anthem.

00:02:04.000 Refused to put his hand over his heart for the national anthem.

00:02:06.000 I believe he was fined as well.

00:02:07.000 The NBA has always had this rule.

00:02:09.000 The NFL never should have allowed the politicization of its games.

00:02:12.000 It is a product.

00:02:13.000 When your product is politicized, then you take action to prevent that politicization.

00:02:17.000 But the NFL wanted to reach out to new audiences, and so not only did they support the politicization, they actually forwarded the politicization.

00:02:24.000 Even before the National Anthem protests, if you recall, all the way back to 2013, 2014, during the Ferguson issues in 2014, there were a bunch of players who ran out onto the field doing the hands up, don't shoot motion, no fine.

00:02:35.000 But there were people who wanted to wear gear that honored the slain Dallas police officers in 2015, and the NFL threatened to fine them, you know, before the NFL backed down. 0.95

00:02:44.000 So, the NFL took positions on these issues in the worst and stupidest possible way.

00:02:48.000 Well, now the NFL has decided they're going to come out and ban the kneeling altogether. 0.93

00:02:52.000 ESPN reports the new policy subjects teams to a fine if a player or other team personnel do not show respect for the anthem.

00:02:58.000 That includes any attempt to sit or kneel, as dozens of players have done during the past two seasons.

00:03:02.000 Those teams will also have the option to fine any team personnel, including players, for the infraction.

00:03:07.000 So Roger Goodell, who I think has been rather a not good NFL commissioner, actually.

00:03:11.000 He's been the beneficiary of tremendous growth in the NFL.

00:03:14.000 I'm not sure it's because of Roger Goodell, however.

00:03:16.000 He said,

00:03:25.000 We believe today's decision will keep our focus on the game and the extraordinary athletes who play it, and on our fans who enjoy it.

00:03:30.000 And the 32 teams agreed to the following requirements.

00:03:33.000 All team and league personnel on the field shall stand and show respect for the flag and the anthem.

00:03:37.000 The game operations manual will be revised to remove the requirement that all players be on the field for the anthem, so you can stay in the... in the... um...

00:03:44.000 In the locker room.

00:04:07.000 Okay, so what is the actual practical effect of this going to be?

00:04:10.000 A bunch of people are going to stay in the locker room out of solidarity with people who would kneel but were not allowed to. 0.99

00:04:15.000 As I said last year during the actual National Anthem controversy, I think it is stupid and counterproductive to kneel for the National Anthem. 0.98

00:04:22.000 I think it is disrespectful, but 0.98

00:04:24.000 I don't think so.

00:04:41.000 Or, things will get even worse, and what you will see is a bunch of players stay in the locker room, and the owners, in order to virtue-signal to the left, will decide to pay the fines.

00:04:47.000 And that's what we're getting from New York Jets chairman Christopher Johnson, who says he'll take the hit.

00:04:51.000 He said,

00:05:03.000 There are some big complicated issues that we're all struggling with, and our players are on the front lines.

00:05:07.000 I don't want to come down on them like a ton of bricks, and I won't.

00:05:09.000 There will be no club fines or suspensions or any sort of repercussions.

00:05:12.000 If the team gets fined, that's just something I'll have to bear.

00:05:15.000 I think you're going to see a lot of other owners follow suit, and then owners who don't follow suit will be called antagonists of free speech, people who don't support free speech.

00:05:24.000 And this controversy will just continue.

00:05:26.000 Well, President Trump responded to all of this by celebrating this big victory for President Trump culturally. 0.96

00:05:33.000 And because everything in our politics has broken down into stupid conversations over winners and losers, as opposed to what's good for the country, this has turned into a big win for Trump. 0.79

00:05:41.000 And Trump not only says that it's a big win for Trump because Trump got the NFL to cave and change their policy, but it's a big win for America. 0.97

00:05:47.000 Here's President Trump explaining.

00:05:49.000 You have to stand proudly for the National Anthem.

00:05:52.000 Well, you shouldn't be playing.

00:05:53.000 You shouldn't be there.

00:05:54.000 Maybe you shouldn't be in the country.

00:05:56.000 You have to stand proudly for the National Anthem.

00:05:59.000 And the NFL owners did the right thing if that's what they've done.

00:06:02.000 Okay, so here's the reality.

00:06:04.000 You don't have to stand for the national anthem in the United States.

00:06:07.000 Should you stand?

00:06:07.000 Sure.

00:06:08.000 Is it a sign of respect for the nation?

00:06:09.000 Yes.

00:06:10.000 And all of the players who are black and who are protesting about supposed police brutality against black folks, I think that they would be better served to take a play from the playbook of Frederick Douglass or a play from the playbook of Martin Luther King and say, listen, I'm going to stand for the anthem because the anthem is mine too.

00:06:25.000 And then they can come out and they can say,

00:06:27.000 And I don't think we're living up to the anthem.

00:06:29.000 It's not like these guys have no platform.

00:06:30.000 They do have a platform.

00:06:31.000 When celebrities speak, people listen.

00:06:33.000 But kneeling for the national anthem was a crude method of attempting to draw attention and actually created more of a backlash than it was meant to do.

00:06:40.000 I do not think it is appropriate for the President of the United States to be inserting himself in these controversies.

00:06:44.000 I don't.

00:06:45.000 I don't think it was appropriate when Obama did it.

00:06:46.000 I don't think it's appropriate when President Trump does it.

00:06:48.000 President Obama, the Obama administration, inserted themselves into controversies like this in North Carolina when there was an act at the local level in Charlotte to prevent transgender people from using opposite-sex bathrooms.

00:06:59.000 And there was a boycott of the NCAA, and the entire left supported it.

00:07:03.000 They thought this was great.

00:07:04.000 The NCAA was not going to allow Final Four games to be played in North Carolina thanks to a local bathroom policy.

00:07:09.000 They thought this was great, but if the NFL says we're not going to allow people to kneel,

00:07:13.000 Then it's a huge problem because the NFL is cracking down on free speech.

00:07:16.000 Now listen, I am a free speech absolutist, but private companies have the ability to take steps to curb free speech.

00:07:24.000 Hey, there's a difference between me going and speaking at UC Berkeley and me going and speaking at DePaul University.

00:07:29.000 When I spoke at DePaul University, they threatened to arrest me.

00:07:31.000 They said if you walk on this campus, even though I'd been invited by a student group, they said if you walk on this campus, you will be arrested.

00:07:37.000 And I respected that because, listen, it is a private university.

00:07:40.000 Were they wrong? 1.00

00:07:41.000 Were they stupid? 1.00

00:07:42.000 Sure. 1.00

00:07:42.000 Do they have the right to do it? 1.00

00:07:44.000 You bet they do.

00:07:44.000 Now, there is also a major difference, and I don't like the comparisons between, oh, you conservatives complaining about safe spaces on college campuses, but now you want a safe space at an NFL game.

00:07:53.000 There is no comparison between a college campus and an NFL game.

00:07:56.000 There really is not.

00:07:57.000 Okay?

00:07:57.000 For a simple reason.

00:07:58.000 College campuses are explicitly places for exchange of ideas.

00:08:02.000 When I'm invited by a student group, it is not to play football. 0.96

00:08:05.000 When I'm invited by a stu- I mean, I suck at football. 0.93

00:08:07.000 When I'm invited by a student group, it is specifically to give my opinion.

00:08:11.000 When you go to an NFL game, you are purchasing an entertainment package to watch the NFL.

00:08:16.000 And part and parcel of that is the patriotic show.

00:08:18.000 So I was at the Super Bowl last year, and the Super Bowl was deeply patriotic.

00:08:22.000 Deeply patriotic.

00:08:22.000 For those who have never been to a game, it's not just the national anthem beforehand.

00:08:26.000 It's the waving of the flag during the commercials.

00:08:28.000 It's the, this was in a domed stadium, but usually it's the, it's the Blue Angels flyover.

00:08:33.000 It's the whole deal.

00:08:34.000 The NFL has always been heavily tied in with a lot of patriotic imagery.

00:08:38.000 That's part of the products that they are selling to the American people, is that this is the all-American sport where we get together as a community every Sunday afternoon, and we remember that America is a great place, and we enjoy ourselves and just watch some people clock each other.

00:08:49.000 That's basically what football is all about, and it's not the NFL's fault if that product is being undercut by people on the field and they say,

00:08:57.000 We're not going to withstand the fans who don't want to watch our games.

00:09:01.000 We are not going to withstand the ticket sales loss, and we're not going to withstand the TV ratings loss.

00:09:07.000 The entire NFL is moving in the direction of whatever the TV ratings say, and the TV ratings in 2017 were down a full 8%.

00:09:12.000 That's a significant, significant drop.

00:09:14.000 Now, not all of that is due to the National Anthem controversy, but certainly part of it is due to the National Anthem controversy.

00:09:20.000 When there have been polls done of people who say they're not watching as much NFL, something like 50% of them cite the National Anthem controversy.

00:09:26.000 Because they don't feel solidarity with the players who are kneeling for the national anthem.

00:09:30.000 This is not the same thing as a college campus.

00:09:32.000 Again, it's more like, first of all, I'm an outside contractor who's brought in by a student group for that free exchange of ideas.

00:09:37.000 Again, college campuses are for ideas.

00:09:40.000 NFL games are for playing football and production of a product.

00:09:44.000 It's more like if a college campus had a professor who taught engineering, and this engineering professor decided that they were going to talk politics at the beginning of every engineering class, and pretty soon, it turns out that all the students want to just learn engineering, and they're not interested in hearing the politics, and so they all drop out of the class.

00:10:00.000 Does the college now have the right to lay the guy off?

00:10:03.000 In my opinion, the college does have the right to lay the guy off.

00:10:05.000 He's speaking outside of his realm of political purview.

00:10:09.000 If you were in poli-sci, it's a little bit of a different story.

00:10:11.000 If he's in engineering, he's there to provide an engineering product.

00:10:14.000 And if the engineering product does not meet specifications, the college can do what it wants.

00:10:17.000 And that's not quite the same thing as a student group inviting someone for a political conversation and then the college cracking down on a political side of that political conversation.

00:10:28.000 The case that's being made on campus is that this is a safe space and that people with differing political points of view in an inherently political area should not be able to speak.

00:10:37.000 The case being made with regard to the NFL is I'm not going to tune in to watch lectures on police brutality when I want to watch a football game.

00:10:44.000 That is not the same case that's being made.

00:10:46.000 It's not about the NFL being a safe space.

00:10:48.000 It is about the NFL not providing what it promised to consumers.

00:10:51.000 And that's why you've seen so many people drop out.

00:10:53.000 Now, with that said, you know, Mike Pence tweeted out hashtag winning.

00:10:56.000 I do not think.

00:10:58.000 It is appropriate for government officials to say that it is winning to pressure a private organization to crack down on members of its organization for political reasons.

00:11:07.000 I don't think that's appropriate.

00:11:09.000 I think that it's one thing for you or for me to say I'm turning off the TV.

00:11:13.000 I think if Trump said, listen, I've been turning off the TV, that's fine.

00:11:16.000 I think the the attempt, the pretty clear attempt, governmental attempt to pressure private organizations to do things on the free speech basis.

00:11:23.000 I don't like it.

00:11:24.000 And I don't think it's winning, by the way.

00:11:25.000 I don't think that you're winning with your base.

00:11:28.000 You're winning with your base.

00:11:29.000 But I'll explain why I think this is actually counterproductive for Trump and Pence to a certain degree in just one second.

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00:12:40.000 Alrighty, so here is why I don't think this is super productive for President Trump.

00:12:44.000 His entire base believes it is wrong to kneel for the national anthem.

00:12:46.000 He's getting them jazzed up, right?

00:12:48.000 And I think that that is a useful political tactic.

00:12:50.000 But in its way, it's no different from what Obama did when he would get people jazzed up about Ferguson to go out and vote for him in a midterm election or in a presidential election in 2012 by sending Joe Biden out to say that Mitt Romney was going to put y'all back in chains.

00:13:02.000 I do not like the idea of the president of the United States

00:13:05.000 Taking an inherently political issue and instead of being circumspect about the issues that are being, that are in play, going straight to the everybody who disagrees with me should be deported stuff. 0.99

00:13:14.000 I think it's dumb. 0.98

00:13:15.000 I think it's counterproductive. 0.97

00:13:16.000 I think it doesn't unify the country and actually has a counterproductive response because here's the question.

00:13:21.000 For Trump, it's all about the political win.

00:13:23.000 I get it.

00:13:23.000 Okay?

00:13:23.000 He's a politician.

00:13:24.000 It's about the political win.

00:13:25.000 But, for the country, what I would like is more Americans to believe that standing for the National Anthem is an inherent good, not fewer Americans. 0.95

00:13:33.000 The polls show that before President Trump got involved in this particular issue, something like 75%, 80% of Americans thought that it was stupid and wrong to kneel for the National Anthem.

00:13:42.000 Now that Trump has gotten himself involved, it's more like 55% or 60%.

00:13:45.000 So, to win for Trump, because the majority of the public still agrees with him, but it is not a win for America if 20% of the public now believes the other way simply because they don't like President Trump.

00:13:55.000 So, again, I understand the gut-level response of President Trump, which is what he is, it's what he does.

00:14:02.000 I understand why that's popular, but I don't think that it's productive for the country.

00:14:05.000 Now, with all of that said, it was not Trump who politicized the NFL.

00:14:08.000 It was the NFL players who politicized the NFL long before Trump was even involved with this.

00:14:13.000 They were the ones who decided to kneel for the national anthem. 0.89

00:14:15.000 They were the ones who decided to wear socks, as Colin Kaepernick did, with the depiction of cops as pigs. 0.96

00:14:21.000 That was their decision to make. 0.91

00:14:22.000 Okay, and you can't blame people for responding to that decision.

00:14:26.000 Just as I don't blame protesters for protesting my speeches.

00:14:28.000 Right?

00:14:28.000 They are allowed to protest my speeches.

00:14:30.000 That's fine.

00:14:31.000 I think they're wrong, but that's okay.

00:14:33.000 That's part of the political conversation.

00:14:34.000 Well, this is part of the political conversation, too.

00:14:37.000 Again, I do not think that NFL games are anything like college campuses.

00:14:40.000 I'm not...

00:14:42.000 Crazy about the idea of the NFL cracking down on players doing this, although I think they should have done so at the beginning.

00:14:48.000 Jonathan, last I thought, had a good suggestion.

00:14:50.000 The NFL should have just come out and said, listen, our consumers don't want to see what you are doing.

00:14:55.000 Our consumers don't like this.

00:14:56.000 So we're setting rules.

00:14:57.000 End of story.

00:14:58.000 Instead, they turned it into a sort of principled point.

00:15:01.000 And obviously, everyone can see through the principled point.

00:15:04.000 Everyone can see through the so-called principled idea here, because it's not really principled.

00:15:08.000 It's much more about the notion that they are going to crack down on players in order to make sure that their wallets are still stuffed.

00:15:15.000 So I get all of it.

00:15:17.000 Listen, I understand the arguments.

00:15:19.000 I'm just not in love with it.

00:15:21.000 I know a lot of people on the right are very much in love with this.

00:15:22.000 It's a big win.

00:15:23.000 I'm not in love with it as much as everybody else, because I see the danger in private organizations seeing political speech

00:15:31.000 Okay, meanwhile, speaking of people who need a safe space, I have to show you this tape.

00:15:41.000 There's a 30-year-old who was evicted from his home in a judicial proceeding.

00:15:46.000 So he's a 30-year-old unemployed man.

00:15:48.000 He's a self-described conservative.

00:15:52.000 So, the host of CNN, Brooke Baldwin, had this guy on. 0.99

00:15:55.000 This guy's obviously a crazy person.

00:15:56.000 The guy is named Michael Rotondo, and it did not go well for him. 0.95

00:16:01.000 It's my understanding you've lived, you know, at your parents' house, rent-free for eight years, and I know you do your own laundry, you buy your own food, but they asked you five times, please move out.

00:16:15.000 Why couldn't you guys resolve this without the court?

00:16:21.000 I would consider much of what they were doing to try to get me out as a tax and what I was trying to, I was just, you know... I mean, hey, do you, you know, a lot of us have lived with our parents maybe a little bit longer than we wish we could.

00:16:40.000 Please take a sip of your water.

00:16:42.000 I'm sure you're irked.

00:16:43.000 I'm sure your parents are irked.

00:16:45.000 But, you know, you only have one mom and dad.

00:16:47.000 And I understand that you are probably more upset than even you're letting on.

00:16:52.000 But don't you want to reconcile with them?

00:16:56.000 OK, let me let me point out here that Brooke Baldwin obviously is having this guy on just to humiliate him. 1.00

00:17:02.000 And this is this is not great as a television host. 1.00

00:17:05.000 You shouldn't have people on simply to make them look stupid. 0.99

00:17:08.000 I think that it's kind of a waste of time and a waste of everybody's time. 0.99

00:17:10.000 That said, there's another point here to be made.

00:17:13.000 So CNN is spending an awful lot of time with this guy.

00:17:15.000 They spent like five, 10 minutes with this guy talking about how he wanted to stay home and he was entitled.

00:17:21.000 CNN is very much in favor of the idea that if you occupy somebody else's dwelling, you should not be evicted.

00:17:27.000 They're the ones who are saying that when banks evict people for non-payment of their bills, that this is somehow cruel and terrible.

00:17:34.000 People on the left want to have it both ways.

00:17:35.000 They want to say the millennial generation is entitled when they act precisely how CNN and MSNBC tell them to, which is, you should mooch off your parents.

00:17:43.000 We were told that until we were 26, we were staying on our parents' health insurance, and we should mooch off our parents.

00:17:48.000 Our parents owe it to us.

00:17:49.000 We were told that if we decide to live in the home, there is nothing wrong with that.

00:17:53.000 You should stay as long as you want.

00:17:54.000 You should be able to squat.

00:17:55.000 You should be able to live on the street.

00:17:56.000 You should be able to do whatever you want. 0.96

00:17:57.000 This guy does it, and suddenly he's being castigated for the doofus that he is. 0.99

00:18:02.000 And obviously, he is a doofus. 0.98

00:18:03.000 But it does go to show you how even the underlying narrative points that CNN is trying to drive home that are successful for them, in many cases, are conservative points. 0.96

00:18:12.000 It's really funny.

00:18:12.000 When you go and you watch movies from Hollywood, you know, Hollywood, obviously, a very, very left area.

00:18:16.000 It's a place where virtually everybody is a Democrat.

00:18:19.000 But if you just watch the movies without knowing the politics of the people behind it, and you could avoid all of the stupid insertions of politics into the particular movies that you are watching, what you would see is actually a very conservative narrative that's drawn out in nearly every movie. 0.82

00:18:32.000 It's usually a good guy and a bad guy. 0.71

00:18:33.000 There's a concept of good and evil.

00:18:35.000 It's usually somebody who comes into conflict and has to resolve that conflict through a crisis of will and principle.

00:18:41.000 A very conservative idea.

00:18:42.000 Well, the same thing happens on CNN right here.

00:18:44.000 So CNN, if this were a story about the parents evicting their son,

00:18:48.000 Let's say they'd come at it from the other angle.

00:18:49.000 This is a story about parents trying to get rid of their son.

00:18:51.000 They would have said, look how cruel these parents are. 0.99

00:18:53.000 These parents are so cruel. 0.99

00:18:56.000 So terrible.

00:18:57.000 But because they decided to take the conservative angle, it's much more compelling TV, which is, why are you suing your parents to stay in their home?

00:19:03.000 Again, it's hilarious to see so many folks on the left who are saying, you should be independent.

00:19:07.000 You should get out of your parents' home.

00:19:09.000 Why are you bothering your parents?

00:19:10.000 And then at the same time, they say, well, you know what?

00:19:12.000 You really should be deeply dependent on the government.

00:19:15.000 Be dependent on the government.

00:19:16.000 Be dependent on everyone else.

00:19:17.000 There's nothing wrong with taking a government check.

00:19:19.000 There's nothing wrong with taking a handout.

00:19:21.000 There's nothing wrong with demanding a handout.

00:19:23.000 Now, they say this guy's a self-described conservative, but he's acting like a Bernie Sanders lefty.

00:19:26.000 It's Bernie Sanders lefties who say that I am here, therefore you owe me stuff.

00:19:31.000 And that's precisely the angle that this guy is taking.

00:19:33.000 And CNN's ripping him for it.

00:19:35.000 So at some point, I'd like them to ask Bernie Sanders what this guy did wrong.

00:19:38.000 I just think it'd be really funny.

00:19:39.000 Like, they could have this guy on with Bernie Sanders, and they could ask Bernie Sanders if the guy is doing something truly awful.

00:19:45.000 Because he's paying his rent, right?

00:19:47.000 I mean, he's doing what he's supposed to do.

00:19:49.000 Presumably Bernie Sanders would stand up for him.

00:19:51.000 But CNN is not standing up for him because even they understand that there is nothing good happening there in terms of the useful.

00:19:57.000 Okay, so before I go any further, I want to talk about President Trump and North Korea because he made a pretty major move on North Korea this morning.

00:20:03.000 First, I want to say thanks to our sponsors over at PuppySpot.

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00:21:36.000 Puppyspot.com slash Ben.

00:21:37.000 I'm so uncomfortable being emotional in public.

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00:21:51.000 If only I had a heart.

00:21:52.000 Like really, if only I had a heart, I feel like I would be using Puppyspot.com.

00:21:56.000 Unfortunately,

00:21:57.000 My heart is three sizes too small.

00:22:00.000 So I'll have to ask people at the office to do it for me, and then they will know how great Puppy Spot is.

00:22:04.000 Okay, so.

00:22:05.000 Meanwhile, President Trump has gotten himself into, not a pickle, out of a pickle, I would suggest.

00:22:11.000 So I have always been skeptical of the idea that there was going to be a grand summit between the Trump administration and the North Korean dictatorship.

00:22:19.000 I have always been deeply skeptical of this.

00:22:20.000 I was from the beginning, when people were shouting,

00:22:23.000 Well, President Trump did the right thing.

00:22:43.000 A few days ago, North Korea threatened a nuclear showdown with the United States.

00:22:47.000 So this was just a few, a couple of days ago.

00:22:50.000 North Korea, according to Huffington Post, has escalated its war of words with the U.S., repeating a threat on Thursday to call off the planned June 12 summit with President Donald Trump.

00:22:58.000 Warning that a nuclear showdown could instead be on the table.

00:23:00.000 In a statement published by North Korea's official Korean Central News Agency, the North's Vice Minister of Public Affairs, Cho Sun-hui, blamed reckless remarks made by top U.S.

00:23:09.000 officials as the reason behind Pyongyang's second thoughts.

00:23:12.000 Cho took aim at VP Mike Pence in particular and called him a political dummy.

00:23:17.000 Who defended North Korea with his unbridled and imprudent comments.

00:23:20.000 And impudent comments, rather.

00:23:21.000 Pence had warned in a Fox News interview that Pyongyang could follow the Libya model if Kim Jong-un doesn't make a deal, which was a deal where Muammar Gaddafi met a brutal end after his decision to denuclearize.

00:23:30.000 OK, North Korea has long expressed distaste at comparisons with Libya.

00:23:33.000 They don't want to look like a weak country.

00:23:35.000 They gave up their nuclear weaponry and all the rest.

00:23:37.000 So they were ripping on Mike Pence and they were suggesting that they were going to pull out of the June 12th summit.

00:23:43.000 And so Trump came out and he wrote a letter and his letter basically said, fine, stay home.

00:23:46.000 I don't care.

00:23:47.000 Which is exactly right.

00:23:48.000 That's exactly right.

00:23:49.000 The United States is not the country in trouble here.

00:23:52.000 The country in trouble here is North Korea.

00:23:53.000 And let's face the reality.

00:23:55.000 North Korea is in trouble because they blew up their own nuclear mountain.

00:23:57.000 It collapsed in on them weeks ago.

00:23:59.000 They do not have a nuclear testing site inside North Korea because they had a physical problem with their nuclear testing site.

00:24:05.000 It broke.

00:24:06.000 They broke their own testing site, which is an amazing thing.

00:24:09.000 And President Trump was just sitting there and then they're like, can we have some talks?

00:24:12.000 He's like, absolutely, you can have some talks.

00:24:14.000 And then in order to save face, they're making all sorts of noises about nuclear war.

00:24:18.000 So President Trump, this is where President Trump's habit of being just a bloviating hammer of a human being.

00:24:26.000 It really comes in handy.

00:24:27.000 So here is what he wrote.

00:24:28.000 You have to love this.

00:24:29.000 It's so good.

00:24:29.000 He writes,

00:24:42.000 We were informed that the meeting was requested by North Korea, but that to us is totally irrelevant.

00:24:47.000 I was very much looking forward to being there with you.

00:24:49.000 Sadly, based on the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent statement, I feel it is inappropriate at this time to have this long-planned meeting.

00:24:58.000 Therefore, please let this letter serve to represent that the Singapore summit, for the good of both parties but to the detriment of the world, will not take place.

00:25:06.000 You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I pray to God they will never have to be used.

00:25:14.000 Okay, that last sentence is so Trump.

00:25:15.000 It's so Trump and it's so great. 0.97

00:25:17.000 I mean, it's like Donald Trump brags about his genitals and his nuclear capabilities in exactly the same way. 0.96

00:25:23.000 They're so massive and powerful. 0.53

00:25:24.000 I pray to God they will never have to be used.

00:25:27.000 It's just spectacular.

00:25:29.000 It's so good, right?

00:25:30.000 I mean, it's the president of the United States telling North Koreans, guys, like, let's be real here.

00:25:35.000 You're pretending that this is a partnership of co-equals, that we're gonna sit down across the table and we're gonna pretend like North Korea is a real country and not a crazy dictatorship where you imprison in a gulag hundreds of thousands of people?

00:25:46.000 And then test her crappy level nuclear weapons? 1.00

00:25:48.000 Like, we're gonna pretend that?

00:25:49.000 But, let's be real.

00:25:50.000 We're massive.

00:25:51.000 We're huge, you might say.

00:25:53.000 And then he continues.

00:25:54.000 That was a beautiful gesture and was very much appreciated.

00:25:56.000 Which is him reminding them, uh, you guys already made concessions to me, so ha ha ha ha ha ha. 1.00

00:26:13.000 You idiots. 1.00

00:26:14.000 You let out the hostages, and now we're not gonna do a meeting, and I'm gonna laugh about how my nuclear weapons are better than yours. 1.00

00:26:18.000 Again, all of this is kind of hilarious.

00:26:20.000 Can this be real?

00:26:21.000 Kind of funny?

00:26:22.000 Does it increase the chances of nuclear war?

00:26:24.000 No, because the North Korean regime does not want to get into nuclear war with the United States.

00:26:28.000 We would turn his palace into an ocean of glass in 30 seconds flat.

00:26:32.000 This is not happening, okay?

00:26:33.000 There's not gonna be a war between North Korea and the United States because Kim Jong-un is not suicidal.

00:26:38.000 And all of the concessions he was prepared to make were not going to be made because Donald Trump sweet-talked him.

00:26:43.000 This is never going to be about Donald Trump being able to cut a better deal than anyone else or anything like that.

00:26:48.000 The art of negotiation does not lie in you giving somebody a pat on the head and a shoulder rub.

00:26:53.000 That's not how negotiation works.

00:26:55.000 The way it works is Trump is ready to walk away from the table.

00:26:58.000 This is true for your salary negotiations at your own company.

00:27:00.000 It is true for everyone.

00:27:01.000 You have to decide in your own head, what is your walkaway point?

00:27:04.000 What is the point where you say, listen, this is not worth it for me.

00:27:07.000 I'm out.

00:27:08.000 Trump knew that his walkaway point was pretty much anything.

00:27:10.000 That if North Korea decided to make trouble, he was just going to say, fine, screw it.

00:27:14.000 Enjoy your poverty stricken country.

00:27:16.000 We're out.

00:27:17.000 And if you make trouble, well, guess what?

00:27:19.000 Our military threat is still on the table.

00:27:21.000 It continues along these lines.

00:27:22.000 If you change your mind having to do with this most important summit, please do not hesitate to call me or write.

00:27:28.000 The world, North Korea in particular, has lost a great opportunity for lasting peace and great prosperity and wealth.

00:27:33.000 This missed opportunity is a truly sad moment in history.

00:27:37.000 Sincerely yours.

00:27:52.000 Okay, you can hate Donald Trump as much as you want.

00:27:55.000 That's pretty great stuff.

00:27:55.000 This is what he is supposed to do.

00:27:57.000 What's hilarious is folks on the left are saying, how could Donald Trump do this?

00:28:01.000 It just shows how Donald Trump blew it.

00:28:02.000 Now, here's where Donald Trump went wrong.

00:28:04.000 He shouldn't have been running around talking about how he was going to win the Nobel Prize for meeting with Kim Jong-un beforehand, but that's Trump's thing.

00:28:11.000 Okay, are we going to pretend for half a second here that President Trump isn't the guy who walks around bragging about everything?

00:28:17.000 Have you met him?

00:28:18.000 Have you seen him?

00:28:18.000 Of course, as soon as people started saying Nobel Prize, he was going to go around talking about how he was about to win eight Nobel Prizes in physics, in literature, all of them, right?

00:28:28.000 He was going to like that was going to happen.

00:28:30.000 But here's the I thought that that was trapping him in a situation where he was going to have more stake in having the meeting than in getting something good out of the meeting.

00:28:37.000 That obviously was not true.

00:28:38.000 So if I sound relieved, it's because I am.

00:28:40.000 President Obama was not like this.

00:28:43.000 President Obama

00:28:43.000 I was skeptical about this, but it is.

00:28:45.000 It is in making a good deal.

00:28:46.000 It is in making a better deal.

00:28:48.000 I am very much heartened

00:29:04.000 By President Trump's willingness to walk away from the table with Kim Jong-un, because I don't think that it was smart for him to put it out there that we were going to meet with Kim Jong-un without preconditions in the first place.

00:29:14.000 I don't think it was smart to walk into a room not knowing what we wanted from Kim Jong-un.

00:29:17.000 I'm very happy that he said, listen,

00:29:19.000 My walkaway point was right here.

00:29:21.000 You passed it.

00:29:21.000 We're out.

00:29:22.000 Good.

00:29:23.000 Good.

00:29:23.000 Now, maybe it was preemptive, OK?

00:29:25.000 To be skeptic, maybe it was preemptive.

00:29:26.000 Maybe he figured the North Koreans were going to cancel.

00:29:28.000 He wanted to cancel first.

00:29:30.000 It was more of a, you can't, you can't fire me.

00:29:32.000 I quit.

00:29:33.000 Maybe it was that.

00:29:34.000 Maybe that's what was going on.

00:29:35.000 But whatever it was, at least Trump was willing to say that.

00:29:38.000 And you got to love the dude, right?

00:29:39.000 You got to love the attitude because the attitude is just spectacular.

00:29:42.000 It is indeed.

00:29:43.000 Hilarious.

00:29:45.000 It is so good.

00:29:46.000 I can enjoy it, okay?

00:29:47.000 I can enjoy it. 0.85

00:29:48.000 Well, in just a second, I'm going to give you the update on this ins— I have to talk to you about this judicial decision about Trump's Twitter feed because it's just ridiculous.

00:29:57.000 But first, I want to say thanks to our sponsors over at Software Advice.

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00:31:36.000 Okay, so I do want to talk.

00:31:38.000 about the latest on the so-called Trump scandals.

00:31:41.000 I want to talk about an insane and ridiculous Twitter controversy.

00:31:45.000 But first, you're going to have to go over to Daily Wire.

00:31:47.000 So for $9.99 a month, go over to Daily Wire, get the subscription.

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00:33:05.000 We are the largest, fastest growing conservative podcast in the nation.

00:33:13.000 All righty, so now I want to talk to you about the stupidest judicial ruling I have seen in a long, long time.

00:33:17.000 So, a federal judge ruled Wednesday morning, according to LawAndCrime.com, that President Donald Trump may not block critics on Twitter. 0.87

00:33:25.000 So many of those critics must now be unblocked.

00:33:28.000 I don't know how Twitter works.

00:33:29.000 The way it works is that you send off your little missives into cyberspace and anyone can see them, unless that person annoys you, in which case you have the ability to do one of two things.

00:33:37.000 You can either mute them so you can't see their responses to you.

00:33:40.000 This is my preferred method because I just am amused by the idea that there are people who are so upset about what I'm saying that they are firing back tweet after tweet at me and I can't hear them at all.

00:33:49.000 It's the equivalent of me hitting mute on my TV screen or sticking my thumbs in my ears.

00:33:53.000 I don't actually need to listen to you, and you still think you're talking to me, so I think that's really funny.

00:33:57.000 But there's also block.

00:33:58.000 Okay, the block function is where you can't even see my tweets.

00:34:01.000 So I don't believe I've actually used the block button on anyone on Twitter.

00:34:04.000 If I have, it's like one or two people, maybe.

00:34:06.000 But President Trump has over the years blocked

00:34:08.000 A lot of people.

00:34:09.000 And there are lots of legislators who have.

00:34:10.000 I am blocked by a number of Hollywood celebrities.

00:34:12.000 A number of Democrats have blocked me as well.

00:34:15.000 That is not a shock, because they don't want you seeing their tweets and then mocking them.

00:34:18.000 Particularly if you have a big following. 0.99

00:34:20.000 Because, you know, I have 1.4 million followers on Twitter, and so that gives me the ability to, if someone tweets something stupid, 0.97

00:34:25.000 Tweet out about their tweet and then it's not good for them. 0.88

00:34:28.000 So, in any case, there's a lawsuit filed against Trump for blocking people on Twitter. 0.99

00:34:32.000 Here's why this is dumb.

00:34:33.000 First of all, you can still view any of Donald Trump's tweets simply by going to Twitter.com and not logging in. 0.95

00:34:38.000 If you don't log in and you just view his Twitter feed, you can do that without actually having to count on Twitter.

00:34:43.000 Second,

00:34:44.000 Are we really suggesting the media don't cover Trump's Twitter feed?

00:34:47.000 Is the suggestion here that you have no access to what Donald Trump said if you are not unblocked by President Trump?

00:34:53.000 And Twitter is not a public utility, right?

00:34:56.000 Twitter is a method for distribution.

00:34:58.000 So this would seem to suggest that if the President of the United States gives an interview to one outlet, he must give an interview to all outlets.

00:35:04.000 You can't give an exclusive anymore.

00:35:06.000 Instead, every outlet must be welcomed into the White House press office every time Trump has a press conference. 1.00

00:35:12.000 Well, obviously this is stupid. 0.99

00:35:14.000 A 75-page order. 0.99

00:35:15.000 U.S.

00:35:15.000 District Judge Naomi Rice Buchwald concisely began her lengthy analysis with the following emphatic finding of the law.

00:35:20.000 The answer to both questions is no.

00:35:36.000 And she says, Well, Twitter owns Trump's account.

00:35:37.000 Twitter could shut down his account tomorrow.

00:35:38.000 He doesn't own Twitter.

00:35:39.000 Okay, Twitter is not a public forum.

00:35:40.000 He doesn't pay tax dollars to Twitter. 1.00

00:36:04.000 Again, this is this is completely idiotic. 0.99

00:36:05.000 And if this is the case, then presumably I should sue all the Democratic legislators who have been blocking me. 1.00

00:36:10.000 But antipathy for the antipathy for the the Trump administration has led the judiciary just to the stupidest possible conclusions, like really, really dumb conclusions.

00:36:20.000 What they say is that under Supreme Court jurisprudence, there are three types of public forums, foura, traditional, designated, and limited, and closed. 0.54

00:36:28.000 So they found that this is a designated public forum because anyone can view Trump's tweets, because anyone with a Twitter account can follow Trump's tweets, because anyone who's not blocked on Twitter can interact with Trump's tweets, and because the social media directly said, social media director at the White House, Dan Scavino, said Twitter is how Trump communicates with you, the American people.

00:36:44.000 Twitter is a private company.

00:36:46.000 Twitter is not a public forum. 1.00

00:36:47.000 But this is how stupid the judiciary has become. 1.00

00:36:50.000 Now, speaking of Twitter and stupidity, Michael Avenatti, you remember him? 1.00

00:36:53.000 This is the lawyer for Stormy Daniels. 0.99

00:36:55.000 And he is the great leader of the Democratic Party now.

00:36:57.000 He is the great white hope to take down President Trump.

00:37:00.000 Trump will fall thanks to the bravery and supreme leadership 1.00

00:37:03.000 Well, now it turns out that Michael Avenatti is a coward. 0.98

00:37:05.000 So he has now made his account on Twitter. 0.92

00:37:17.000 Locked.

00:37:17.000 He's locked it.

00:37:17.000 He's made it a private account.

00:37:19.000 So he has like 600,000 followers on Twitter, and he blocked his entire account.

00:37:22.000 So presumably I can sue Michael Avenatti, since this is the way he gets out information, and I can make the claim that Michael Avenatti is not able to block me because Twitter is a public forum.

00:37:30.000 Twitter's a public forum, just like in a public park.

00:37:32.000 He can't force me to be removed from a public park, can he?

00:37:35.000 He says, I purposely locked my account due to the following, due to the following, bots, abusive trolls, and we will be releasing some sensitive info in the coming weeks, and I want to somewhat control who has initial access to it.

00:37:46.000 You're not going to control who has initial access to it, dude.

00:37:49.000 You have 600,000 followers on Twitter, and a lot of those people, presumably, are going to distribute that information as soon as it hits. 0.83

00:37:56.000 Ryan Lizza at CNN rightly said, this is ridiculous. 0.96

00:37:59.000 He rightly said, this is hypocritical. 0.92

00:38:01.000 How can you say that he's a champion of the press, when at the same time, he's blocking reporters who are covering him after there were mildly critical tweets? 0.98

00:38:09.000 But again, hypocrisy, thy name be leftism, and the hypocrisy of the left is on full display throughout all of this just silliness. 1.00

00:38:18.000 And this Twitter spat is really particularly stupid. 0.98

00:38:21.000 I mean, the fact that Trump tweets things out and that people look at those tweets does not mean that you have direct access to President Trump's every thought, any time, regardless as to who you are, or that you have no access to Trump if you can't follow him on Twitter. 0.99

00:38:32.000 I promise you, people are pretty aware of what President Trump is doing these days, but it shows the perversion of the judiciary and the fact that the judges that President Trump is selecting are deeply important because once the judiciary is monopolized by the left, then they will use that judiciary to cram down whatever dumb policy they see fit to cram down that day.

00:38:49.000 Okay, meanwhile, the Mueller investigation continues to move forward.

00:38:55.000 The latest on that

00:38:57.000 Is that Mueller is planning on sentencing George Papadopoulos.

00:39:00.000 You remember George Papadopoulos.

00:39:01.000 He's a former Trump campaign aide.

00:39:03.000 The case that was being made by the Obama administration, the FBI, the DOJ under Obama, is that it was scrutiny of George Papadopoulos that led to the opening of the Trump-Russia collusion investigation, because Papadopoulos had met with a professor in London who had said that he had access to Hillary Clinton's emails via Russian hacking, and Papadopoulos had gone around bragging about it.

00:39:22.000 This is what led to the opening of the investigation, according to the FBI.

00:39:26.000 Now, apparently, according to CNN reporter Shimon Prokopesk, he says that the Mueller office has asked the courts to begin the sentencing process.

00:39:35.000 He says, it signals to now they're done with George Papadopoulos and his cooperation.

00:39:39.000 He's been providing them information for months, now cooperating with them.

00:39:42.000 Within the last hour, the special counsel's office filed a status report saying they are ready for him to be sentenced.

00:39:46.000 And they are ready.

00:39:47.000 So this does not really give us an indicator as to what exactly he knew or when he knew it or what this means for President Trump.

00:39:53.000 But the Mueller investigation continues apace.

00:39:55.000 Now, one of the things that's hilarious about all of this is that it is quite plausible.

00:39:59.000 It is quite plausible and possible the Mueller investigation comes up with nothing.

00:40:03.000 The latest indicator that they could come up with nothing is Jared Kushner.

00:40:06.000 So Jared Kushner, as you recall, is President Trump's son-in-law.

00:40:08.000 He's also a top advisor to President Trump.

00:40:10.000 He has run his Middle East policy and his China policy and his toilet replacement policy and pretty much every other policy.

00:40:16.000 A lot of the policy considerations go through Kushner's office.

00:40:19.000 I think some of them beyond his brief, but he's done a good job on the Middle East, so I'm happy with that.

00:40:23.000 In any case, Jared Kushner,

00:40:25.000 He has been very cooperative with Robert Mueller, and you recall that just a few months ago, his top-secret security clearance was revoked by John Kelly, who is the White House Chief of Staff, because he had a temporary top-security clearance, and that was revoked after there was a staffer who was ousted from the White House for having allegedly abused his ex-wife and ex-girlfriends.

00:40:47.000 You remember that whole story.

00:40:48.000 Well, after that, John Kelly revoked the temporary top-secret clearances of a bunch of people, including Jared Kushner.

00:40:54.000 And a bunch of people in the press said, this must be because Kushner is corrupt. 0.78

00:40:57.000 It must be because Kushner is corrupt.

00:40:58.000 Well, now, Kushner has his top-secret security clearance back. 0.96

00:41:01.000 So, so much for the whole, he's so corrupt he can't get top-secret clearance back routine.

00:41:06.000 He's got his top-secret clearance back.

00:41:07.000 Not only that, he was given his top-secret clearance back after he's been interviewed by Robert Mueller.

00:41:12.000 Twice.

00:41:13.000 For seven hours.

00:41:14.000 Here's Kushner's lawyer explaining.

00:41:16.000 I don't know that anybody could be cooperating more.

00:41:18.000 He has spoken to them when asked.

00:41:21.000 He has provided them with tons of documents that reflect what he's provided Congress and what else they've asked for.

00:41:27.000 He sat down in the fall when they wanted to ask questions about General Flynn, and he was very happy to spend almost an entire workday when they asked again.

00:41:36.000 So I would say it's the definition of cooperation.

00:41:38.000 So the assumption on the part of the left is that Jared Kushner was going to go to jail, that there was too much corruption.

00:41:43.000 He was going to go to jail.

00:41:44.000 That's why he didn't have his top secret clearance.

00:41:46.000 That obviously was false.

00:41:47.000 And not only was that false, Kushner has sat down with Robert Mueller on more than one occasion and everything is fine for him.

00:41:54.000 So I think that a lot of the left narrative about

00:41:56.000 Mueller is going to get Trump.

00:41:57.000 It's all going to fall apart for Trump.

00:41:58.000 I think a lot of that is falling apart.

00:42:00.000 Now, with that said, I still am skeptical of President Trump's story that he was unfairly targeted by the FBI at the beginning of 2016.

00:42:07.000 I'm still very skeptical of this.

00:42:09.000 I don't

00:42:11.000 I don't see why, if he was targeted by the FBI, he doesn't just declassify the documents demonstrating this.

00:42:16.000 The President of the United States has plenary power to declassify anything he wants under FBI auspices.

00:42:21.000 So that means, tonight, he could just get rid of the classification status for the FISA warrant on Carter Page.

00:42:28.000 He could just get rid of the classification status on all of the information about the informant against his campaign.

00:42:33.000 And again, I am not sure that, we have to be very specific in our language.

00:42:37.000 When President Trump says that he was spied on, his campaign was spied on,

00:42:40.000 Members of his campaign had an informant against them.

00:42:43.000 That's not quite the same thing as saying that Trump himself was spied on, or Kushner was spied on, or Bannon was spied on, or any of the top members of his campaign at any point.

00:42:52.000 Low-level people who are openly discussing the possibility of working with Russia, it seems to me, were the targets of the informants.

00:42:57.000 The reason I'm being careful here is just I want to go where the evidence leads.

00:43:00.000 If the evidence ends up leading to SpyGates 2018, fine.

00:43:04.000 Fine, if that's where it leads, I'm happy to go there.

00:43:06.000 But so far, I'm not seeing the evidence and I want to be very specific before we start slandering the entire FBI and suggesting the FBI was out to get Trump in March 2016 before he had even won the nomination.

00:43:16.000 Okay, so, you know, let's just be specific in our accusations.

00:43:19.000 Okay, I think that it's time for some things I like and then some things that I hate.

00:43:23.000 So,

00:43:24.000 A thing that I like today.

00:43:26.000 So I have been watching this Starz series.

00:43:29.000 It's an old Starz series from 2013, 2014, with Rebecca Hamilton, who's become a relatively major star.

00:43:35.000 She was in Life with Jake Gyllenhaal.

00:43:37.000 She's in a bunch of other stuff now as well.

00:43:39.000 And this is a miniseries, The White Queen.

00:43:42.000 The White Queen is about the period in English history.

00:43:44.000 This is like 1470s, 1480s.

00:43:47.000 The period in English history, British history, in which it's the War of the Roses.

00:43:51.000 This is the period covering

00:43:53.000 Edward IV, Richard III, who you'll recall from your Shakespeare classes in high school, if you actually went to a decent high school, and then the period immediately following with the restoration of Henry IV.

00:44:04.000 So, yes, Henry IV.

00:44:06.000 So that is... Henry VI?

00:44:08.000 Okay.

00:44:08.000 In any case, the series is quite good.

00:44:12.000 It's really well produced.

00:44:14.000 It stars.

00:44:14.000 That means there's a little bit of boobage for no apparent reason.

00:44:17.000 So just be warned about that if that's something that bothers you.

00:44:19.000 But the production quality is excellent.

00:44:23.000 It is really worth watching.

00:44:24.000 And the portrayal of Richard III is really interesting because it is exactly counter to the Shakespearean portrayal of Richard III.

00:44:29.000 So remember that Richard III was the last of the Plantagenets.

00:44:33.000 And at the time that Shakespeare was writing, which is 200 years after, well, let's see, when was Shakespeare writing?

00:44:37.000 Now I'm going to have to check it out.

00:44:38.000 So Shakespeare was writing within the next century, right?

00:44:41.000 Shakespeare was writing in the late 1500s.

00:44:43.000 He's about a hundred years later, and he's writing after this.

00:44:46.000 And the current regime in Britain, it's Elizabethan England.

00:44:51.000 Elizabethan England is a spawn of the line that followed Richard III.

00:44:56.000 Right, so remember that the House of Lancaster has recovered its predominance by the time that Shakespeare is writing.

00:45:04.000 And Richard III's family, his entire family, was the last of the Plantagenets.

00:45:13.000 So it was the Lancasters versus the Yorks.

00:45:15.000 It was the York family.

00:45:16.000 So the York family was fighting the Lancasters for predominance.

00:45:20.000 The Lancasters ended up winning.

00:45:21.000 Shakespeare is writing under a Lancaster queen, Queen Elizabeth.

00:45:25.000 And what this results in in his work is this real bias against Richard III.

00:45:29.000 Richard III is an evil guy who killed his nephews and all the rest.

00:45:33.000 I'm gonna have to recommend a book probably next time on Richard III that sort of debunks this.

00:45:37.000 But this series sort of debunks it as well.

00:45:38.000 So here's a little bit of the preview for The White Queen. 0.56

00:45:40.000 I'm Lady Elizabeth Grey, Your Grace.

00:45:45.000 The King has done what he should not.

00:45:47.000 He has married from another house and a commoner at that.

00:45:50.000 There are many who will be wishing us to fall.

00:45:51.000 You're making it sound more like a battle than a marriage.

00:45:55.000 It is a battle.

00:45:56.000 She could never be royal.

00:45:58.000 She's my queen of choice.

00:45:59.000 This can easily be undone.

00:46:00.000 There was an uprising.

00:46:02.000 Warwick brings 10,000 men from the south.

00:46:05.000 You are to lead his crusade.

00:46:07.000 We will crush Queen Elizabeth for good. 0.68

00:46:12.000 I have to go.

00:46:12.000 Okay, so the series is actually really well shaded.

00:46:15.000 You don't get the idea that any one of these people is like the great hero, although Richard III is treated very sympathetically.

00:46:21.000 Production quality, very, very high.

00:46:23.000 It was Henry VII, by the way, who was the successor to Richard III.

00:46:27.000 Obviously, you remember from Shakespeare class, my horse, my horse, my kingdom for a horse, that comes from Richard III, that last battle.

00:46:33.000 That is what the series approaches near the end, but it's really well done.

00:46:36.000 The acting is quite good.

00:46:37.000 The scripting is quite good.

00:46:38.000 Well worth watching.

00:46:39.000 Very sympathetic take on virtually all of the characters, so definitely worth checking out.

00:46:44.000 Okay, now time for a quick thing that I hate.

00:46:50.000 Okay, so, here is the thing that I hate today.

00:46:52.000 The thing that I hate is that there was a Freedom of Information Act request that was reported by the Baltimore Post about Barack Obama and his top advisors after the tragedy at Sandy Hook.

00:47:03.000 Okay, right after the tragedy at Sandy Hook, after the act of evil at Sandy Hook in which 20 children were shot and 6 staffers were shot as well.

00:47:11.000 The top members of the Obama administration immediately began discussing how to use this as a political weapon before the bodies were even cold.

00:47:19.000 So two days after the massacre that left 26 dead, there is a text exchange between Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, former chief of staff for President Obama, and Education Secretary Arne Duncan.

00:47:29.000 About what to do.

00:47:31.000 And they were discussing.

00:47:31.000 So Duncan said, what are your thoughts?

00:47:33.000 In the subject line, CT shooting.

00:47:35.000 And Emmanuel said, go for a vote this week ASAP before it fades.

00:47:38.000 Tap people's emotion.

00:47:39.000 Make it simple.

00:47:40.000 Assault weapons.

00:47:41.000 Yep.

00:47:41.000 Thanks, replied the education secretary.

00:47:43.000 And then Emmanuel wrote back, when I did Brady Bill and assault weapons for Clinton, we always made it simple.

00:47:46.000 Criminals or war weapons.

00:47:48.000 And then Duncan asked about so-called gun show loopholes.

00:47:56.000 He said, So they were already trading ideas on how exactly to take advantage of this entire thing, the immediate polarization, the immediate politicization, the attempt to turn it into a rallying cry for gun control.

00:48:10.000 Tap people's emotions is, you know, listen, that's politics.

00:48:14.000 But when it's exposed to public view, it is a little bit gross. 0.60

00:48:17.000 It is a little bit gross.

00:48:18.000 And I think everybody should see that the the supposed sincerity of the Obama administration in pushing legislation connected with gun control was largely about tapping into people's emotion, which you could tell certainly at the time.

00:48:30.000 OK, we'll be back here tomorrow with Mailbag.

00:48:31.000 So if you're going to subscribe, now is the day to do it, because this means that you get to be part of our Mailbag tomorrow.

00:48:36.000 Check it out over at Daily Wire.

00:48:37.000 And if you want to join our events in Phoenix or Dallas, go to dailywire.com slash events.

00:48:42.000 Check us out as well on Apple News.

00:48:43.000 We always appreciate it.

00:48:44.000 We'll see you here tomorrow.

00:48:45.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:48:45.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:48:50.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is produced by Senya Villareal, executive producer Jeremy Boring, senior producer Jonathan Hay.

00:48:56.000 Our supervising producer is Mathis Glover, and our technical producer is Austin Stevens.

00:49:00.000 Edited by Alex Zingaro.

00:49:02.000 Audio is mixed by Mike Carmina.

00:49:04.000 Hair and makeup is by Jesua Alvera.

00:49:05.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is a Daily Wire Ford Publishing production.

00:49:08.000 Copyright Ford Publishing 2018.

The Ben Shapiro Show - May 24, 2018

The Kneel Strong-Arm | Ep. 545

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