The Ben Shapiro Show - The Shutdown of Common Sense | Ep. 1051

00:00:00.000 California shuts down again, Governor Andrew Cole makes a fool of himself over a weird poster, and virtue signaling on racial issues continues to matter more than saving lives.

00:00:09.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:00:09.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:00:11.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is sponsored by ExpressVPN.

00:00:19.000 Why haven't you gotten a VPN yet?

00:00:21.000 You should have.

00:00:22.000 Visit expressvpn.com slash Ben.

00:00:25.000 Okay, so we begin at this hour with your latest COVID-19 update.

00:00:29.000 So the continued increase in caseload is indeed continuing.

00:00:34.000 We are seeing an increased caseload in places like California, in places like Florida.

00:00:37.000 We're seeing increased test positives.

00:00:39.000 But there is a simple reality, which is that we are not seeing this thing spike the way that it did in New York.

00:00:44.000 In New York, the curve looked extremely steep on one end, and then it came down extremely steeply on the other end of the curve.

00:00:49.000 The reason for that is because it burned through the entire city.

00:00:52.000 In fact, there are precincts in New York where some 50 to 60 percent of all the people in these particular precincts already have antibodies.

00:00:58.000 So that is the reason why you have seen this thing come down so quickly.

00:01:01.000 It's not because of masterful leadership in New York and crappy leadership elsewhere.

00:01:04.000 In fact, it's precisely the reverse.

00:01:05.000 It is decent leadership elsewhere in a variety of different parties, right?

00:01:09.000 From Colorado to Georgia, and then the crappy leadership over in New York City.

00:01:13.000 So what most of these states have done is indeed flatten the curve.

00:01:16.000 In fact, there is a doctor from the University of Southern Florida, who was talking about this on CNN yesterday, talking about the issues over in Florida with regard to the increased caseload.

00:01:29.000 And he pointed out that this is a different epidemic than hit New York.

00:01:32.000 In fact, he pointed out that Florida's emergency department visits from COVID actually peaked last week, and the test positive rate actually peaked last week.

00:01:39.000 So when you look at all of the headlines coming out of Florida, it's doom, disaster about to hit Florida.

00:01:44.000 Listen, things are not gonna be great in Florida for a couple of weeks because death As always, is a lagging indicator.

00:01:49.000 But the idea that they're going to see Florida-type numbers, that is so far unsupportable by the data.

00:01:54.000 The only people who have seen New York-type numbers are the New Yorkers.

00:01:57.000 And the reason they saw New York-type numbers is because Andrew Cuomo decided to do all the things wrong.

00:02:01.000 He shut down late.

00:02:02.000 When he did shut down, he didn't clean any of the subways.

00:02:04.000 When he did shut down, he then proceeded to ship all of the COVID-positive nursing home patients back into the nursing homes.

00:02:11.000 And there are some people out there We're literally attempting to pretend that Andrew Cuomo did a wonderful job here.

00:02:16.000 I mean, I'm not kidding about this.

00:02:17.000 There are a bunch of people on the left who keep saying this.

00:02:19.000 Andy Slavitt, the former Obama-era official from, I believe, the FDA under Obama.

00:02:24.000 Andy Slavitt actually tweeted out that New York had done an incredible, incredible job.

00:02:29.000 Why?

00:02:29.000 Because Cuomo, he actually talked to the people.

00:02:32.000 You know who else thinks he did a wonderful job?

00:02:34.000 It's Andrew Cuomo himself.

00:02:36.000 And so I have to begin today with this insane poster that Andrew Cuomo put out.

00:02:40.000 Now, imagine if President Trump put out a poster showing the curve for COVID in the United States, the number of COVID deaths in the United States, which has declined by some 30 to 40% in the United States over the period of time, actually more than that, about 60% since the height of COVID.

00:02:53.000 Okay, imagine that Trump had put out a poster championing himself Championing his own performance during COVID-19.

00:03:00.000 That's exactly what Andrew Cuomo did.

00:03:01.000 And we are being told that this guy is the epitome of American leadership.

00:03:04.000 And so I need to talk to you about this poster for a second because it's totally insane.

00:03:08.000 I mean, it's totally bat bleep loony.

00:03:10.000 So Cuomo put out on the official New York website for sale, New York tough posters, smart, united, disciplined, loving.

00:03:18.000 And this is the statement he put out, quote, I love history.

00:03:21.000 I love poster art.

00:03:22.000 Poster art is something they did in the early 1900s, late 1800s, when they had to communicate their whole platform on one piece of paper.

00:03:28.000 Over the past few years, I've done my own posters that capture that feeling.

00:03:32.000 I did a new one for what we went through with COVID.

00:03:34.000 And I think the general shape is familiar to you.

00:03:36.000 We went up the mountain, we curved the mountain, we came down the other side, and these are little telltale signs that to me represent what was going on.

00:03:43.000 Okay, first of all, if you take this mountain and you map it directly onto the charts of what we're supposed to avoid with our COVID treatments, it maps exactly.

00:03:52.000 Like literally, you could take this curve and you could actually plant it.

00:03:55.000 I remember there was the very famous bend the curve, lower the curve chart, the flatten the curve chart.

00:03:59.000 And the flatten the curve chart looked like one big curve that spiked up real high and then came down really quickly, but it spiked above the line.

00:04:05.000 And then there was the good curve chart.

00:04:07.000 And the good curve chart grew kind of slowly and then it sort of peaked and then it sort of receded.

00:04:11.000 Well, the problem is that Andrew Cuomo's mountain looks exactly, exactly like the bad curve.

00:04:17.000 Like, exactly like the bad curve.

00:04:19.000 This is the most insane... It's the most insane poster I've ever seen in my entire life.

00:04:25.000 It's totally crazy.

00:04:26.000 It says on the top, wake up America, forget the politics, get smart, Governor Andrew Cuomo.

00:04:31.000 And then there's a rainbow across the top that says love wins.

00:04:36.000 So apparently it's a gay rights poster or something.

00:04:38.000 I mean, that's what it's reminiscent of, right?

00:04:39.000 I mean, that's the love is love rainbow, right?

00:04:41.000 What?

00:04:42.000 Love wins?

00:04:44.000 35,000 people died in your state, dude.

00:04:46.000 What?

00:04:48.000 Okay, and then it shows on the left-hand side of the poster, it shows a plane and it says, Europeans, 3 million, January to March, COVID-19 on a plane, right?

00:04:58.000 And then it shows a face.

00:05:00.000 It says, winds of fear, winds of fear.

00:05:05.000 And then, there's a rope that's being pulled by New Yorkers of all types.

00:05:10.000 New Yorkers, healthcare workers, essential workers.

00:05:13.000 And it's being pulled over the mountain.

00:05:14.000 It says, Up in the sky, by the way, is hanging a weird, emblazoned sun, as well as a moon, upon which is sitting President Trump, saying it's just the flu.

00:05:28.000 And then there's an arrow pointing nearly straight up that says projection models, but they defeated the projection models.

00:05:34.000 No, you didn't defeat the projection models.

00:05:36.000 This is exactly what the models look like.

00:05:37.000 Exactly.

00:05:39.000 Exactly what they look like.

00:05:40.000 And then it just has a series of various sort of things that were done.

00:05:45.000 Right, it's got a picture of the daily briefing.

00:05:47.000 And then it says, make hand sanitizer.

00:05:49.000 Ooh, because remember they made hand sanitizer?

00:05:51.000 You can memorialize the crappiest time in modern New York history with this poster.

00:05:54.000 You can put it right on your wall.

00:05:55.000 And you can remember each and every day how New York was just a trash heap, where the sirens were going 24 hours a day and everybody was locked in their home.

00:06:02.000 And you can celebrate along with Andrew Cuomo.

00:06:04.000 All you have to do is drop a few bucks to the state of New York.

00:06:08.000 I mean, this is patently insane.

00:06:10.000 It's totally crazy.

00:06:11.000 Like, it's wild.

00:06:13.000 This is like, Honest to God, it's like a Stalin poster in the middle of the Haladomar, right?

00:06:17.000 It's like, we starved Ukraine, also, breadbasket of the world, right? 0.96

00:06:22.000 Like, what?

00:06:23.000 Okay, so it says, make hand sanitizer, new Rochelle hotspot.

00:06:27.000 There's like a picture of little fire.

00:06:29.000 And then, New York, pause, shutdown, sorry, we're closed.

00:06:32.000 Testing, tracing, and there's an actual nostril with a swab going up the nose.

00:06:36.000 Hospital, surge and flex, Javits Center, economy falls.

00:06:40.000 You can see a river going down.

00:06:43.000 111 days of hell.

00:06:44.000 And then it says, New York State leads again.

00:06:46.000 No, this is bad, guys.

00:06:50.000 This is real bad.

00:06:52.000 It didn't go well.

00:06:53.000 Do you not remember that it didn't go well?

00:06:55.000 Now, even the chart, what's hilarious about this is even his little timeline shows that he did a crappy job.

00:07:01.000 Like, because not only does the thing peak really steeply and then start to fall because it burned through the entire city.

00:07:08.000 Also, it shows them masking up only at the peak.

00:07:12.000 Right, that's what it says, you should mask up at the peak.

00:07:14.000 And then phase one, socially distance, after the peak.

00:07:18.000 And then it says, follow the data.

00:07:20.000 Boyfriend cliff.

00:07:22.000 I have no idea what boyfriend cliff is supposed to be.

00:07:25.000 It says boyfriend cliff, I don't know what that is.

00:07:28.000 And then there's like an actual guy hanging from a cliff.

00:07:30.000 I don't understand.

00:07:31.000 And then at the very end it says, follow the facts, stay smart, caution ahead.

00:07:34.000 And then underneath it says, the sea of division.

00:07:38.000 Okay, it's just nuts. 0.99

00:07:40.000 The man's a nut. 0.99

00:07:41.000 I'm sorry, New Yorkers, you elected a nut, and you deserve it because you elected him, and he's got like an 80% approval rating in your unbelievably insane state. 0.99

00:07:48.000 What in the actual F? 0.97

00:07:50.000 This is your governor.

00:07:51.000 This is your governor.

00:07:52.000 Well done, everyone.

00:07:53.000 It's good that you have such artistic souls as Andrew Cuomo leading you through these turbulent times.

00:07:58.000 By the way, Andrew Cuomo is making a cottage industry out of just lecturing everyone.

00:08:01.000 He's seriously lecturing everyone.

00:08:02.000 He's lecturing DeSantis, who's responsible for a number of deaths that is, I believe, one-ninth.

00:08:08.000 The number of deaths that New York has seen on a case per million level, on a deaths per million level, New York is like something like eight to nine times as high as Florida.

00:08:17.000 And you've got DeSantis being lectured by Andrew Cuomo.

00:08:20.000 We got Andrew Cuomo lecturing people on how masks work?

00:08:24.000 Dude, it wasn't the masks that quote-unquote saved New York.

00:08:27.000 What happened is that everyone died.

00:08:30.000 Okay, that is the actual answer as to what happened in New York, is that it burned through your entire city.

00:08:35.000 By the way, New York is now suggesting they're gonna attract visitors.

00:08:37.000 They're gonna fine you if you don't provide your contact information when you enter the state of New York.

00:08:41.000 Now, I'm old enough to remember when other states did this to New York, and Andrew Cuomo said that it was a violation of the Constitution.

00:08:46.000 Remember this?

00:08:47.000 Florida said, if you come in from New York, we're gonna check you. 0.90

00:08:50.000 And Cuomo was like, you can't do that.

00:08:52.000 Privileges and immunities clause.

00:08:54.000 You need to let everybody in.

00:08:55.000 And now he's doing precisely the opposite to everybody else. 0.74

00:08:58.000 I mean, he's just awful. 0.98

00:08:59.000 He's just awful. 0.65

00:09:00.000 But the media's narrative about Cuomo is that he's doing an incredible job.

00:09:05.000 It's astounding to me how open and obvious the media have become in their bias.

00:09:09.000 To the point where they're openly lying at this point.

00:09:12.000 They were lying before about Cuomo's performance, but now they're just clearly lying.

00:09:15.000 Because we can all see the mountain right in front of us.

00:09:18.000 He turned the mountain into a painting.

00:09:20.000 He turned the mountain of death into a painting you can put on your wall. 0.98

00:09:24.000 Honestly, it reminds me of nothing so much as the scene from Winnie the Pooh, where Winnie the Pooh gets his ass stuck in Rabbit's house, and Rabbit, deciding he can't do anything about the fact that Winnie the Pooh is now stuck there and wedged in and cannot get out, decides that he's going to make antlers out of Winnie the Pooh's ass. 0.98

00:09:40.000 Right? 0.88

00:09:40.000 He actually, like, paints a face on it, and he puts antlers on it, and he puts a little mantle below it, because... 0.88

00:09:45.000 He's gonna turn what is a bad situation into a work of art.

00:09:48.000 And that's Andrew Cuomo right here.

00:09:49.000 He's got like a pile of dead bodies.

00:09:50.000 He's like, you know what?

00:09:51.000 I'm making a poster, guys.

00:09:52.000 And you can hang that poster on your wall.

00:09:54.000 What?

00:09:57.000 As you'll see, the artistic soul in New York is not dead.

00:10:00.000 In fact, it has infused all of New York politics.

00:10:03.000 Wait until we get to Bill de Blasio and race in a little bit.

00:10:05.000 Because he too loves to paint.

00:10:07.000 These guys love to paint.

00:10:10.000 I have a line here I cannot use, but it has to do with the producers.

00:10:15.000 So if you can think of a producer's line about painting, then you'll know where I'm going.

00:10:19.000 If not, tough.

00:10:20.000 Deal with it.

00:10:22.000 We'll get to more of this in a second.

00:10:24.000 Plus, we'll get to California shutting down again.

00:10:27.000 I think that the lockdowns have become sort of a crutch for people who don't actually want to make tough public policy decisions.

00:10:31.000 Lockdowns are just a way for you to say to the media, I'm doing everything I can.

00:10:34.000 Please leave me alone.

00:10:35.000 Please stop this.

00:10:36.000 Because you won't get criticized if you lock everything down, all the things in the world.

00:10:40.000 But you will get criticized if you try and bully your way through this thing and recognize that there are risks and rewards to shutting down.

00:10:46.000 So if you're a governor, given the media coverage right now, the best thing you can do for your own political profile is to shut everything down. 0.97

00:10:52.000 That's what Gavin Newsom is doing in California, my garbage state. 0.92

00:10:55.000 We'll get to that in just one second. 0.67

00:10:57.000 First, let's talk about the fact that cell phone bills are one of those things that never go down.

00:11:01.000 People just get used to that.

00:11:02.000 Well, you shouldn't really be used to that.

00:11:03.000 By switching to Pure Talk USA, you can cut costs and free up cash on a monthly basis, starting with your wireless provider.

00:11:09.000 Pure Talk covers 99% of Americans.

00:11:11.000 The president and CEO of Pure Talk is a U.S.

00:11:13.000 veteran who cares deeply about serving Americans by making wireless affordable.

00:11:17.000 So start your saving today.

00:11:18.000 It'd be weird not to save money on your cell phone bill when you absolutely can.

00:11:22.000 Dial pound 250.

00:11:23.000 Say keyword Ben Shapiro for unlimited talk, unlimited text, two gigs of data for just 20 bucks a month.

00:11:28.000 Plus, you'll get 50% off your first month.

00:11:31.000 Stop paying too much to big wireless providers.

00:11:33.000 Switch to Pure Talk today.

00:11:34.000 Save 50% off your first month.

00:11:36.000 Dial pound 250 and say the keyword Ben Shapiro.

00:11:39.000 Pure Talk USA.

00:11:40.000 Simply.

00:11:41.000 Smarter.

00:11:41.000 Wireless.

00:11:41.000 Go check them out.

00:11:42.000 Right now, Pure Talk USA, that is simply smarter wireless.

00:11:46.000 Again, you should save money on your cell phone bill if you possibly can, and this is why you need Pure Talk.

00:11:51.000 You really don't need that unlimited data the way that you are looking at it right now.

00:11:55.000 Instead, what you need is exactly what Pure Talk provides you.

00:11:58.000 Dial pound 250, say keyword Ben Shapiro for unlimited talk, unlimited text, two gigs of data for just 20 bucks a month.

00:12:05.000 Dial pound 250, say keyword Ben Shapiro.

00:12:07.000 Okay, so Gavin Newsom has shut down the entire state of California again, again.

00:12:13.000 And remember, Gavin Newsom has basically escaped scrutiny thus far, even though he had a spike at the exact same time as Florida and Texas.

00:12:19.000 He's escaped scrutiny because he didn't actually open anything up.

00:12:22.000 I mean, I'm from LA.

00:12:23.000 Nothing actually opened, right?

00:12:25.000 All the things are actually closed.

00:12:26.000 But we're now going to close everything back down.

00:12:29.000 Now, here's the thing.

00:12:31.000 The only reason to lock things down at this point, seriously, is because you think that the healthcare system is going to be overwhelmed.

00:12:37.000 I've seen no indicators that the state of California is on the verge of being overwhelmed.

00:12:42.000 For some reason, the language of flatten the curve was shifted from, we're flattening the curve to avoid overwhelming the system to, we're trying to crush the curve so that nobody ever gets COVID again.

00:12:52.000 And that is not a reality in our current situation.

00:12:54.000 We have millions and millions, maybe up to 20 million Americans who have this thing.

00:12:59.000 I mean, those are the CDC estimates.

00:13:00.000 They say that for every positive test, there are probably 10 people who already have it who don't know about it, which would put us at like 23 million at this point.

00:13:07.000 So if that's the case, there's community spread.

00:13:10.000 Shutting this thing down for a prolonged period of time, all that's going to do is stop it in the moment.

00:13:15.000 But the minute you open up again at all, there's going to be increased caseload.

00:13:18.000 Now, again, the good news is that we're treating this thing a lot better.

00:13:20.000 We have a bunch of different drugs that we have been using.

00:13:23.000 We've come up with new techniques.

00:13:24.000 The fatality rate, the case fatality rate on this thing has dropped like a stone, particularly in hospitals.

00:13:30.000 In Florida, for example, the case fatality rate is now down below 1%.

00:13:34.000 In New York, it was up near 5% during the peak, which is really, really high, obviously.

00:13:37.000 Well, in California, California is experiencing a surge.

00:13:42.000 The surge has not reflected itself in mass death.

00:13:46.000 Okay, so California doesn't look great.

00:13:48.000 I mean, I'm not going to pretend that California has not experienced an uptick.

00:13:51.000 Of course it has experienced an uptick, and it has experienced an uptick in death.

00:13:56.000 As of the latest statistics in California, California was leading the way in terms of new deaths.

00:14:03.000 So total deaths yesterday.

00:14:05.000 There were approximately 45 new deaths yesterday.

00:14:08.000 That would have been Sunday in terms of the reporting in California.

00:14:13.000 In terms of the daily deaths, they really escalated last week.

00:14:17.000 Last week, there were, by day, 118, 150, 137, 102.

00:14:22.000 On Friday, there were 74.

00:14:23.000 So, those numbers are a lot higher than they had been, but they are nothing like New York numbers.

00:14:28.000 Remember, the population of California is extraordinarily high.

00:14:31.000 The population of the state of California is, what, 30 million?

00:14:34.000 35 million?

00:14:34.000 I believe it's 35 million.

00:14:38.000 Sorry, 39 million.

00:14:39.000 It's 40 million people live in the state of California.

00:14:41.000 So there are 150 deaths at the peak in California.

00:14:45.000 And they may have already crossed the peak and moved back down the other side, right?

00:14:47.000 We don't know yet, so we're still watching that.

00:14:50.000 The idea that you're gonna shut down the entire state of California, which is exactly what Gavin Newsom is doing, I don't know how that looks like commonsensical policy, particularly because he's not just closing places that are like the highest risk, he's closing everything.

00:15:02.000 I understand closing back down, for example, indoor dining at restaurants.

00:15:07.000 Whenever I dine out, I've been dining outside, which I've been recommending for a long time, is that restaurants should be able to use city streets in order to allow people to eat outside.

00:15:16.000 But he's not just doing that.

00:15:17.000 He's shutting down all the things.

00:15:19.000 He's shutting down all gyms, all places of worship, all malls, all personal care services, all barber shops, all salons, and non-critical offices in counties on the state's monitoring list.

00:15:28.000 They all have to shut down.

00:15:30.000 30 counties are placed under the new lockdown order.

00:15:32.000 That's 80% of the state's population.

00:15:35.000 Gavin Newsom explained.

00:15:36.000 He explained why he was shutting all of this down.

00:15:38.000 Here he was yesterday.

00:15:40.000 We are now effectively, rather effective today, requiring all counties to close their indoor activities, their indoor operations, in the following sectors.

00:15:52.000 Restaurants, wineries, tasting rooms, movie theaters, family entertainment centers, zoos and museums, card rooms, and the shuttering of all bars.

00:16:02.000 This is in every county in the state of California.

00:16:07.000 Okay, so that's for everyone.

00:16:13.000 That's not just the monitoring list.

00:16:15.000 That's everywhere.

00:16:16.000 That's everywhere.

00:16:17.000 Okay, let's be clear about this.

00:16:19.000 LA never really opened except for the protests.

00:16:21.000 The protests were the big opening.

00:16:22.000 Everybody got COVID, apparently, from the protests.

00:16:24.000 In fact, even Barbara Farrar, the L.A.

00:16:26.000 County public health official, she said, oh yeah, by the way, it might have been the protests that sort of seeded this stuff again.

00:16:31.000 California reported more than 320,000 cases of COVID-19 and 7,000 deaths total for a state of 39.5 million people.

00:16:38.000 Again, remember, California has twice the population of the state of New York, and they have approximately One quarter the number of deaths, less than one quarter the number of deaths thus far.

00:16:47.000 Cuomo has done a great job, though.

00:16:48.000 Just pointing out, Cuomo did an amazing job.

00:16:50.000 On Sunday, 23 people died from the virus in California.

00:16:54.000 According to the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University, L.A.

00:16:57.000 County leads the state with more than 133,000 cases.

00:17:01.000 California's been on and off and on and off.

00:17:03.000 Also, L.A.

00:17:04.000 and San Diego have announced that they are going to keep the schools shut in the fall, which, again, there's very little data to support the idea that the schools must be shut down.

00:17:12.000 We just don't know enough, is the answer, right?

00:17:14.000 There's a lot of conflicting data.

00:17:16.000 What we do know is that in Europe, most of the schools are already open and have been open for quite a while, and they have not seen a significant surge among the childhood population.

00:17:23.000 There's some creative ways to deal with it, which we talked about yesterday.

00:17:26.000 But the problem is all the political incentives right now are in favor of this binary, because the media have drawn this binary, right?

00:17:31.000 They've been doing it since Georgia.

00:17:33.000 They've been saying that if you are in a state where they have quote-unquote reopened, that means everything is open.

00:17:39.000 It means that people are willy-nilly doing exactly what they want.

00:17:41.000 It is not true, okay?

00:17:43.000 It is not true.

00:17:44.000 I've been in Florida for like a couple of weeks here, and I've been going around.

00:17:48.000 Every single person is wearing a mask.

00:17:49.000 Everyone is masked up.

00:17:51.000 Most businesses are still not open.

00:17:54.000 If I want to take my kids somewhere, the only places I can take my kids are places that are outdoors, which I think is actually good.

00:17:59.000 The idea that Florida is wide open, and therefore that Florida had it coming, or the idea that California had wide opened itself, it's not true.

00:18:07.000 California never really opened.

00:18:08.000 California never went back to status quo ante.

00:18:11.000 California was shut down this entire time, which suggests that really what has changed here at all is the weather and personal activity a little bit.

00:18:19.000 And by the way, the idea that government lockdowns changed any of this is not true either.

00:18:21.000 You can actually look at the statistics and you can see how people changed their travel and association habits as the virus began to gain all sorts of coverage in the media.

00:18:30.000 People actually stopped traveling before this stuff started to happen. 0.98

00:18:33.000 But remember, for politicians, because people tend to look at politicians as godlike figures who can fix everything, As opposed to, like, idiots who can ruin everything, which is pretty much all they can do. 0.55

00:18:42.000 Instead of that, people tend to look to their politicians as, well, if something bad happened, it's the politician's fault. 0.97

00:18:47.000 In some cases, that's true.

00:18:48.000 Like, if you have an obvious thing you can point to, like shipping people with COVID back into nursing homes, that's a pretty obvious case of the politician fail.

00:18:54.000 But if the question is, oh man, if these politicians only mandated masks, that would change everything.

00:19:01.000 No, not really.

00:19:02.000 Because the truth is that people who are cautious are putting on masks and have been doing so for quite a while.

00:19:07.000 And people who are not cautious, it's going to be very difficult to regulate them into wearing masks.

00:19:11.000 Just a simple fact of the matter.

00:19:13.000 So much of this has become about virtue signaling, however, even with regard to the masks.

00:19:18.000 Like there's a, to the point where it's become basically just a point of trying to shame people.

00:19:22.000 You don't take it seriously enough. 0.96

00:19:23.000 If you're not wearing a mask 24 hours a day, the stupidest example of which, there was a picture yesterday going around of our friend Ted Cruz, right? 0.96

00:19:31.000 And Ted Cruz was on a plane and somebody took a picture of him and they said, Ted Cruz not wearing a mask on a plane. 0.95

00:19:37.000 He's literally holding up a cup of coffee.

00:19:39.000 There's a picture of him one minute before and like one minute after with the mask on.

00:19:43.000 But because he took down his mask to drink a cup of coffee, people were all over him because the idea is that you're denying that masks work.

00:19:49.000 By the way, I love how masks work has become an absolute point of faith in America now.

00:19:53.000 I'm old enough to remember when that was actually kind of a controversial contention because the CDC said so.

00:19:58.000 The CDC itself told us we weren't supposed to wear masks.

00:20:01.000 They literally said cloth masks are not going to do anything.

00:20:05.000 Now they're like, oh yeah, cloth masks are going to do everything.

00:20:07.000 And if you don't actually participate in the mask wearing, it's because you're evil.

00:20:10.000 Now listen, I've been saying for a long time on this show, you can go back and you can listen to it.

00:20:13.000 I've been saying to it, I've been saying for months, that when you are out and about, you should be wearing a mask when you're in close contact with other people.

00:20:19.000 At the very least, you're preventing some of the droplets that exit your mouth from being ejected into the air.

00:20:24.000 I've been saying this for a long time, so I'm not an anti-mask guy, but to pretend that the evidence for masks is like 100% solid, that we know full well what all the masks are gonna do, or that, by the way, most of the people wearing masks know how to wear a mask is crazy.

00:20:35.000 They literally have in medical school classes on how to, like, they have a course that you're supposed to take on how to properly fit a mask.

00:20:41.000 And we're talking about, like, the best masks.

00:20:43.000 The ones that get the surgical masks, where they have holes up here, right?

00:20:46.000 I mean, unless you have it, like, properly fitted to your face, the air is coming up out of there anyway, so you're cutting down on some of the communication of the germs, but not all of the communication of the germs.

00:20:56.000 That doesn't mean you shouldn't wear it, but the idea that, like, you are an actor of great evil.

00:21:01.000 If you are out in public at any point, and you don't have the mask on your face, Is purely crazy.

00:21:06.000 It has become sort of a virtue signaling thing, not just an element of good science.

00:21:13.000 And this is why, again, every step along the way, I think I'm one of the few people who can say this on the right, every step along the way, when the experts changed their opinions, I also changed my opinion.

00:21:25.000 Okay, every step along the way, when the experts said, don't wear a mask, I was like, okay, I guess we're not supposed to wear masks.

00:21:30.000 Then the experts were like, wear a mask.

00:21:31.000 I was like, okay, Sounds good.

00:21:32.000 I guess we'll have to wear masks.

00:21:34.000 Then the experts were like, you know what?

00:21:35.000 We probably should shut down some of the indoor areas because lots of communication of details.

00:21:39.000 Okay, I get that.

00:21:41.000 But now, now that you've given us every message on every possible topic, I'm gonna have to let common sense take over.

00:21:47.000 And what common sense tells me, along with the science, is that children are not in great danger from these things.

00:21:52.000 This idea that you are endangering vast scores of children by opening schools is insane. 0.93

00:21:56.000 Common sense tells me that most Americans are pretty willing to stay away from each other unless they're dumb 20-year-olds who want to go to bars.

00:22:03.000 In which case, okay, so you shut down the bars because you don't want the virus transmitted at a high rate. 0.88

00:22:07.000 But also, if 20-year-olds get it, they're probably not going to die because that's what the stats actually say.

00:22:11.000 That's what the science tells me.

00:22:13.000 But don't tell me that science tells me you have to shut down entire cities again and that this is going to solve the problem in any serious way.

00:22:20.000 I mean, this propagandistic effort to make a policy decision and then retcon it into, I'm just following the science, it's pretty wild.

00:22:27.000 Arne Duncan, the Secretary of Education under Barack Obama, he tried this routine yesterday.

00:22:30.000 He said that anybody who advocates for opening the schools wants people to die, which is just crazy.

00:22:35.000 Okay, over in Europe, they've had open schools for a very, very long time.

00:22:39.000 And there's not a lot of evidence that those schools are centers of transmission.

00:22:43.000 And there's also not a lot of evidence that kids are really getting hurt by this thing.

00:22:45.000 In fact, you're more likely to die from the flu than you are to die from this if you are under the age of 20.

00:22:50.000 Here's Arne Duncan, however, propagandizing.

00:22:53.000 The real travesty here, Brian, is that there is no body count high enough for the president to actually pay attention to science.

00:23:01.000 We could lose another 10,000.

00:23:03.000 We could lose another 50,000.

00:23:04.000 We could lose another 100,000.

00:23:06.000 Nothing would compel him to listen to Dr. Fauci and others.

00:23:11.000 We're actually fighting to try and save lives.

00:23:13.000 And schools are not going to put teachers, principals, their children, or their children's families in a position of risk that's far too high.

00:23:21.000 Okay, well some schools are going to do all of that because the data actually supports the idea that schools should open.

00:23:26.000 The American Academy of Pediatrics says the schools should open.

00:23:29.000 Dr. Robert Redfield at the CDC said the schools should reopen.

00:23:32.000 But according to Arne Duncan, you're not following the science unless you listen to him.

00:23:35.000 Okay, so this is all about, at this point, so much of this is about virtue signaling as opposed to actually following good common-sense policy-making advice.

00:23:43.000 And people don't want to have the arguments, they just label other people You know, bad actors, malicious actors who don't care about human life.

00:23:49.000 It's very irritating.

00:23:50.000 Okay, we're gonna get to more of this, especially on the issue of race, where the narrative has overwhelmed common sense in just one second.

00:23:55.000 First, let's talk about something great that you can do for your parents.

00:23:58.000 Okay, here's something great for your parents, also for yourself, and that is you can preserve your family memories.

00:24:03.000 Legacy Box.

00:24:03.000 It's a super simple mail-in service to have all your home movies and pictures digitally preserved on a thumb drive, DVD, or the cloud.

00:24:09.000 Don't let those priceless family memories disappear because that's what happens if you don't take action.

00:24:13.000 Out in your garage.

00:24:14.000 Right now.

00:24:14.000 I know.

00:24:15.000 You've got a bunch of VHS tapes.

00:24:15.000 You know.

00:24:16.000 You got a VCR?

00:24:17.000 Nope.

00:24:18.000 My kids don't even know what a VCR is.

00:24:19.000 Out in that garage.

00:24:20.000 You got a bunch of old photos.

00:24:21.000 They're moldering.

00:24:22.000 They're falling apart.

00:24:23.000 The rats are getting at them.

00:24:24.000 What should you do?

00:24:25.000 You should instead have them preserved digitally.

00:24:27.000 So Legacy Box helps you do this.

00:24:28.000 It's a way for you to easily and affordably preserve your past.

00:24:31.000 The process from start to finish is really easy.

00:24:33.000 You pack and you send.

00:24:34.000 Their team digitizes everything by hand, and then you enjoy.

00:24:36.000 You get back perfectly preserved digital copies on thumb drive, DVD, or the cloud, ready to watch, share, and enjoy.

00:24:42.000 Everything is digitized by hand at their secure 8-acre digitizing campus.

00:24:46.000 These premier scanners and playback decks to ensure every memory is mastered to the highest quality.

00:24:50.000 Get started future-proofing your memories today.

00:24:52.000 Go to Legacybox.com slash Shapiro.

00:24:54.000 Get an incredible 40% off your first order.

00:24:56.000 I've been doing this for my own parents.

00:24:57.000 I think it's a really, really important thing to do.

00:24:59.000 Buy today.

00:25:00.000 Take advantage of the exclusive offer.

00:25:02.000 Send in the materials when you're ready.

00:25:03.000 Go to Legacybox.com slash Shapiro.

00:25:05.000 Save 40% while supplies last.

00:25:07.000 That's Legacybox.com slash Shapiro.

00:25:08.000 40% off.

00:25:09.000 Okay, so.

00:25:11.000 Meanwhile, the same sort of messaging is taking place on issues of race.

00:25:14.000 It's not just on COVID.

00:25:15.000 So on COVID, it's basically Democratic governors are geniuses and do all the right things, and lockdowns are the only solution, and you're a bad person if you ever, ever, ever take off the mask at any point whatsoever.

00:25:26.000 Not that you reject the signs of masks.

00:25:28.000 You can fully accept them.

00:25:29.000 But if you are caught in an unconscious moment taking down the mask, you're very bad.

00:25:33.000 Unless you're a Democrat marching with Black Lives Matter protesters, in which case you're very good, and no one will die, and everything is fine. 0.91

00:25:39.000 So it seems that so much of this has to do with narrative and very little of it has to do with common sense at all.

00:25:45.000 Lockdown, no lockdown, the bottom line is this thing is going to move its way through the population unless there is a vaccine, there are gonna be therapeutic treatments, and as long as the healthcare system is not overwhelmed, there's not all that much you can do about that.

00:25:56.000 That's pretty much all.

00:25:58.000 That's pretty much it.

00:26:00.000 But on race, it's the same sort of stuff.

00:26:02.000 So, disproportionately, Black and Hispanic people getting shot in New York City.

00:26:06.000 It's getting real ugly over in New York City.

00:26:08.000 New York City has seen mass shooting increases, obviously.

00:26:11.000 New York City, over the weekend, saw a rise in shootings again.

00:26:14.000 A one-year-old boy was murdered after a gunman fired on a gathering in a park, which is always a good look. 1.00

00:26:19.000 I'm glad that Bill de Blasio reopened the parks in time for people to get shot there.

00:26:22.000 That's exciting.

00:26:23.000 A one-year-old boy was killed.

00:26:24.000 At least 34 people were injured in more than two dozen shootings in New York City over the weekend, continuing a rise in violence that began earlier this summer, according to police officials.

00:26:32.000 This is the Wall Street Journal reporting.

00:26:34.000 The boy was shot in the stomach when gunmen opened fire on Sunday night on a gathering in a park in Brooklyn.

00:26:39.000 According to New York Police Department officials.

00:26:40.000 The child, DeVell Gardner, was taken to a local hospital where he was pronounced dead.

00:26:45.000 Three other people were also shot in the incident, which took place around 11.30 p.m.

00:26:49.000 in the Bedford-Soyvescent section of the borough, according to the officials.

00:26:52.000 All three were expected to survive.

00:26:54.000 New York City Bill de Blasio, mayor, called the incident so painful.

00:26:58.000 He said it's not something we can ever look away from.

00:27:01.000 It's something we must address and stop.

00:27:03.000 And it's just horrifying.

00:27:04.000 So how is he addressing and stopping all of this?

00:27:07.000 The shooting of like babies.

00:27:08.000 A one-year-old's baby.

00:27:10.000 The shooting of a baby in New York City.

00:27:11.000 How exactly is he making all of that stop?

00:27:13.000 Well, he's painting Black Lives Matter murals.

00:27:15.000 And he says that we cannot allow, we cannot allow people to deface Black Lives Matter murals.

00:27:20.000 It's very important that this painting on the street remain.

00:27:24.000 This is the key.

00:27:26.000 This is the key.

00:27:27.000 There was paint that was splashed on the mural.

00:27:29.000 Somebody splashed red paint over the Black Lives Matter mural.

00:27:33.000 Okay, and then Bill de Blasio showed up and helped repaint it.

00:27:37.000 Okay, so all of his DOT workers, he's got money for the DOT workers to repaint this thing.

00:27:42.000 Okay, he, it's unbelievable.

00:27:45.000 Here's what he tweeted out.

00:27:46.000 To whoever vandalized our mural on Fifth Avenue, nice try, Department of Transportation has already fixed it.

00:27:52.000 The Black Lives Matter movement is more than words and it can't be undone.

00:27:56.000 If by more than words you mean it is only words to you.

00:27:58.000 It is literally only words.

00:28:00.000 It is literally words on a street.

00:28:03.000 That is all it is to you. 0.99

00:28:04.000 You don't give a damn that a black kid just got shot at a park. 0.99

00:28:07.000 You don't give a damn that shootings in your city have risen dramatically. 0.99

00:28:10.000 It is literally only words.

00:28:11.000 It is three words in yellow letters on a street.

00:28:14.000 That's it.

00:28:15.000 That is the entire thing for Bill de Blasio.

00:28:17.000 He does not give two hot dams about the fact that every single person who has been shot in the city of New York in the last month has been a person of color.

00:28:25.000 He does not care about that.

00:28:26.000 He doesn't.

00:28:27.000 Not one iota.

00:28:28.000 What he cares about is the virtue signaling.

00:28:31.000 How do you know?

00:28:31.000 Because here are his priorities.

00:28:34.000 Gotta keep that paint down there.

00:28:35.000 You splash red paint, we're on it.

00:28:37.000 We got the funding for the DOT, but we're gonna cut funding from the cops.

00:28:41.000 And not only are we gonna cut funding from the cops, the goals of defunding the police, it's the right move.

00:28:46.000 The goal of defunding the police, that's the right move.

00:28:48.000 So here's Bill de Blasio back to back.

00:28:49.000 He says, one, you can't stop the Black Lives Matter movement because we have paint. 0.90

00:28:54.000 Because we have paint.

00:28:55.000 And then he says, defunding is the right direction.

00:28:58.000 Here he is, defunding the police, the right direction.

00:29:01.000 We obviously took money out of the NYPD budget, put it into youth programs, put it into social services, put it into recreation centers for young people.

00:29:12.000 That's really the right direction.

00:29:14.000 I'm glad we did that.

00:29:15.000 But the fact that we're going to have to fight crime in many ways is also clear.

00:29:21.000 We need the good work of the men and women of the NYPD in the streets of our city.

00:29:26.000 We need communities to come forward, particularly through civic leadership, clergy, the Cure Violence movement.

00:29:34.000 Do all the things that they can do.

00:29:36.000 And they can do things that police can't do.

00:29:38.000 So bottom line is, people are going to get shot in his city?

00:29:42.000 He doesn't care.

00:29:42.000 He's got the words.

00:29:43.000 He's got paintings.

00:29:44.000 In the city.

00:29:45.000 That's what he's got. 0.98

00:29:47.000 Okay, this signaling bulls**t, because that's what it is. 0.91

00:29:52.000 It's just signaling bulls**t. All that this is, is a way to avoid commonsensical realities. 0.97

00:29:58.000 Like, if you remove cops from the streets, more people die. 0.98

00:30:02.000 That's it. 0.94

00:30:02.000 I mean, honest to God, F this guy. 0.94

00:30:04.000 I mean, it's just unbelievable.

00:30:06.000 All these politicians are so focused on the important things in life.

00:30:09.000 We gotta have that painting on that street.

00:30:14.000 The worst thing of all is going to be, I mean, the symbolism of New York City, really, is the Black Lives Matter painting on the street and a person getting shot on that street, right?

00:30:21.000 I mean, if you had to create a political cartoon, that's what it would be.

00:30:23.000 A person bleeding out on the street that says, Black Lives Matter, while Bill de Blasio stands there with a paintbrush.

00:30:28.000 That is everything.

00:30:29.000 That's what's going on right now.

00:30:30.000 And that's what's happening nationwide.

00:30:32.000 There are serious problems in this country, all of which are being elided.

00:30:35.000 Not even the problem of police brutality is being handled.

00:30:38.000 Nothing has been done.

00:30:39.000 The Republicans introduced a bill and the Democrats killed it.

00:30:41.000 They filibustered a discussion of the bill.

00:30:44.000 No one cares about actual answers.

00:30:46.000 All they care about is the virtue signaling.

00:30:47.000 Another piece from the New York Times today.

00:30:50.000 A slap in the face.

00:30:51.000 New York Town rejects Black Lives Matter painting.

00:30:54.000 The debate over whether to allow the street art has exacerbated racial tensions in Catskill, where just over a fifth of the population is black.

00:31:01.000 According to the New York Times, the street painting would stretch about three blocks, from Village Pizza 2 to the stoplight at the southern end of Main Street, spelling out Black Lives Matter on the pavement.

00:31:10.000 The proposal didn't seem like too much of an ask.

00:31:12.000 In the weeks since George Floyd was killed by the police in Minneapolis, the phrase has been painted on streets from Washington, D.C.

00:31:17.000 to Charlotte, North Carolina, and on Thursday, even in front of Trump Tower in Manhattan.

00:31:20.000 But village leaders in Catskill balked, offering several counter-proposals instead, including one that would have allowed the painting, but in the black area of town.

00:31:27.000 I knew it was gonna be a no, said ShirleyCross31, a member of the Hudson Catskill Housing Coalition, which proposed the painting. 0.93

00:31:32.000 I feel like it's a slap in the face for black people.

00:31:36.000 Okay, alternatively, those paintings don't do bleep. 0.93

00:31:39.000 They don't do anything.

00:31:41.000 The paintings mean nothing.

00:31:42.000 Nothing.

00:31:43.000 They are all symbolic nonsense. 0.82

00:31:46.000 If you want black lives to matter, you know what you have to do? 1.00

00:31:49.000 You actually have to pursue policies that make black lives matter.

00:31:53.000 Now, the father of that one-year-old was on TV yesterday.

00:31:55.000 He said he didn't get a single call from Bill de Blasio.

00:31:57.000 Not one.

00:31:57.000 He hasn't received a call from the New York City government.

00:32:00.000 But, Bill de Blasio's out there with a paintbrush.

00:32:02.000 I mean, this is, it's absolute insanity.

00:32:05.000 All that matters is the signaling.

00:32:07.000 In the end, the signaling is the policy.

00:32:09.000 This is why you see, for example, the U.S.

00:32:11.000 Conference of Mayors now backing Democrats' plans for slavery reparations commissions, which will never come to fruition.

00:32:17.000 On Monday, the U.S.

00:32:18.000 Conference of Mayors published a letter in which they backed the idea of Democrats to create a reparations commission so the idea of slavery reparations to 41 million black Americans could be examined, according to Hank Berry in writing for the Daily Wire.

00:32:28.000 The letter, signed on behalf of the mayors by Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer, The president of the organization was addressed to Senator Cory Booker of New Jersey and Representative Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas, who had submitted bills in their respective houses to create a reparations committee.

00:32:42.000 Problem solved, guys.

00:32:43.000 A committee. 0.98

00:32:44.000 And if you oppose this, it's because you're a racist.

00:32:46.000 We're gonna get to more of the virtue signaling over common sense in just one second.

00:32:50.000 First, let's talk about your internet freedom.

00:32:52.000 It's the same snowflakes you want to control.

00:32:53.000 All aspects of your life.

00:32:54.000 They'd also love to be able to control the kind of material you see.

00:32:58.000 One way you can avoid them controlling the kind of materials you want to read or watch, use ExpressVPN.

00:33:03.000 Because the fact is, that masks and anonymizes your internet traffic.

00:33:06.000 You can control your own access to your own data.

00:33:08.000 The problem with big tech companies is not only do they censor what you read, they will track what you do online.

00:33:12.000 They'll track what you're searching for, the videos you watch, everything you click.

00:33:15.000 They use that data to serve you ads and can match your activity to your offline identity using your device's unique IP address.

00:33:21.000 When I use ExpressVPN, these tech companies can't see my IP address at all.

00:33:24.000 My identity is masked and anonymized by a secure VPN server.

00:33:28.000 Plus, ExpressVPN also encrypts 100% of your data to protect you from hackers and internet bad guys.

00:33:33.000 If that sounds complicated, it is not, I promise.

00:33:35.000 ExpressVPN software takes one minute to set up on your computer or phone.

00:33:39.000 You tap one button, you are now protected.

00:33:40.000 So, why give these tech companies a free license to know everything about you and then turn around and sell off your information?

00:33:45.000 Instead, check out expressvpn.com slash ben.

00:33:48.000 By visiting my special link, you get an extra three months of ExpressVPN service for free.

00:33:52.000 Again, that's E-X-P-R-E-S-S-V-P-N-dot-com-slash-Ben-Express-V-P-N-dot-com-slash-Ben-to-protect-your-data-today-expressvpn.com-slash-Ben.

00:34:01.000 Now, all of this is disconnected from reality.

00:34:04.000 If you think that most Americans care deeply about paintings on sidewalks, if you think that this solves any problems in the United States, you're out of your mind.

00:34:11.000 If you think that most Americans are worried about a Slavery Reparations Commission, and I'm talking about, like, on the list of priorities for black Americans, do you think that Slavery Reparations Investigatory Commission is, like, in the top hundred?

00:34:24.000 I would go no.

00:34:26.000 I would go no, but Again, it's all about the signaling, which is why you are, and it's all about the generalized message, which is that America is bad and responsible for all your problems.

00:34:34.000 Inculcating and reinforcing that message is the key.

00:34:38.000 Actually doing the hard work of making lives better?

00:34:41.000 That has nothing to do with anything.

00:34:42.000 The only thing that matters is the signaling.

00:34:44.000 The signaling above all.

00:34:46.000 That's why, for example, you're seeing James Madison College at Michigan State University considering changing its name, according to John Brown, over at dailywire.com.

00:34:54.000 Administrators of a residential college named after James Madison, you know, the guy who framed the Constitution, announced their willingness to expunge the founding father's name from their institution.

00:35:02.000 In a letter addressed last week to alumni students and friends of the college, Interim Dean Linda Racciopi An assistant dean, Jeff Judge, expressed their desire to foster an environment where students can thrive as scholars and human beings.

00:35:14.000 Adding, quote, as such, the college is taking steps to combat systemic racism and the perpetuation of whiteness and to probe how it can best support students of color, especially black students.

00:35:23.000 So what exactly are they going to do?

00:35:26.000 They intend to combat racism and advance an anti-racist agenda within our college, such as revising curricula and course material, recruiting more students of color, providing counselors for students of color dealing with racial trauma, and dipping into an endowment to annually host a visiting scholar-in-residence who will teach and engage in research on LGBTQ issues.

00:35:43.000 Also, they're considering renaming the James Madison College, which is really important.

00:35:51.000 Racism solved, guys.

00:35:52.000 But again, it's not about solving racism.

00:35:54.000 It's about the idea that America is thoroughly and entirely evil.

00:35:58.000 And by the way, with each surrender in this particular culture war, that doesn't make the argument better for the other side.

00:36:03.000 It's not like by conceding, the other side, you know what?

00:36:06.000 You're not a racist.

00:36:07.000 We've decided, you're right.

00:36:08.000 You're right.

00:36:08.000 You know, America is less racist today than it was yesterday because you removed James Madison from the name of your residential dormitory.

00:36:15.000 Nobody's gonna say that on the left. 0.53

00:36:17.000 If you actually believe that, you're out of your mind.

00:36:19.000 Nobody on the left is going to say, well, you know, because you painted Black Lives Matter on the street, that means that now you are exempt from everything further. 0.53

00:36:26.000 There's this weird idea in the culture wars that if you surrender in the culture wars, that everybody leaves you alone after that, and it's nonsense.

00:36:32.000 Do you think that the crusade to cleanse all of our public spaces of anything that could possibly be interpreted by white, woke liberals as offensive to minorities, which is really what's happening here, that this sort of stuff is going to, in the end, make America a more tolerant place?

00:36:49.000 Is that what you think?

00:36:50.000 For example, the Washington Redskins are officially announcing that the NFL team is going to retire the name and the logo.

00:36:55.000 I hear the case.

00:36:55.000 I do.

00:36:56.000 I mean, like, no one would walk around today saying Redskin because, of course, it's offensive.

00:37:00.000 But the idea that you have actually cleansed America of racism by getting rid of the name, or that this is the final step, is nonsense.

00:37:06.000 There is no final step.

00:37:08.000 Okay, immediately upon this happening, there is now a Washington Post editor, Karen Atia, who by the way has suggested that white people are bad, right? 0.97

00:37:16.000 That white women should be taken revenge upon. 0.99

00:37:18.000 She had to delete that tweet. 0.94

00:37:19.000 She's their global opinions editor, Karen Atia.

00:37:22.000 And she did one week of reading about the Texas Rangers, like the group the Texas Rangers, and then she says the Texas Rangers should rename themselves.

00:37:30.000 She said, to know the full history of the Texas Rangers is to understand that the team's name is not so far off from being called the Texas Klansmen.

00:37:37.000 Attia, who grew up in Dallas, said she was raised on myths about Texas Rangers as brave and wholesome guardians of the Texas frontier.

00:37:42.000 What we didn't realize at the time was that the Rangers were a cruel, racist force when it came to the non-whites who inhabited the beautiful, untamed Texas territory.

00:37:50.000 The Texas Ranger Division is an agency within the Texas Department of Public Safety with lead criminal investigative responsibility.

00:37:55.000 I mean, it's still a group that exists, obviously.

00:37:57.000 Atiyah noted the first job of the Rangers, formed in 1835, was to clear the land of Indians for white settlers.

00:38:02.000 And she said that was just the start.

00:38:03.000 And then she talks about the bad history of the Texas Rangers, citing a book about the Rangers by Doug Swanson.

00:38:09.000 She pointed out that she did, I'm not kidding.

00:38:11.000 She said, I read for a week about this and now I'm offended.

00:38:14.000 So until now, no one was really offended because everybody was like, oh, you mean like the cops, the Texas Rangers?

00:38:19.000 You mean like the group inside the Texas government, the Texas Rangers?

00:38:23.000 Because I don't think anybody who roots for the Texas Rangers, like the Nolan Ryan Texas Rangers, is going, yeah, man, secret white supremacist signals.

00:38:30.000 But now, you're retroactively outraged by a thing you didn't know about until five seconds ago, and that no one cared about until five seconds ago.

00:38:37.000 Racism, has it been expunged?

00:38:38.000 Has it been cleansed?

00:38:39.000 So now she is calling for the Texas Rangers to go, because Karen Atia did some reading, guys.

00:38:43.000 She did some reading.

00:38:45.000 And now that she's done reading, she is offended.

00:38:47.000 Offended!

00:38:48.000 And that means everything changes.

00:38:51.000 This is, obviously, this does nothing to make lives better in the United States.

00:38:55.000 Nothing.

00:38:56.000 No life has been made better by any of this.

00:38:59.000 I challenge you to find me the life that has been made better by the controversy over the Washington Redskins name.

00:39:04.000 I challenge you to find me the life that has been made better by a giant mural that says Black Lives Matter in front of Trump Tower, while people are being shot at twice the normal rate in New York City.

00:39:13.000 Please, find me the person whose life was made materially better by this. 0.97

00:39:17.000 Find me the person whose life was made materially better by the sort of idiotic training that companies are now forcing employees to go through, where you are told to examine your own whiteness and to look at all of your black colleagues with a sort of awkward level of disconnect, as Robin DiAngelo basically suggests in White Fragility. 0.97

00:39:35.000 Is that gonna make the workplace more integrated or less integrated? 0.99

00:39:38.000 When you look at your black coworker and you think to yourself, does that person fear me?

00:39:43.000 The answer is, no, the person doesn't fear you, they're your coworker. 0.61

00:39:46.000 But according to the left, they do fear you because of your inherent whiteness and because of the whiteness of the system. 0.88

00:39:51.000 In order for you to be an ally, you actually have to be more at a remove from your black colleagues. 1.00

00:39:56.000 In order for you to be an ally to the anti-racism movement, you have to see yourself as a malicious actor in a racial drama that predates your existence and you have never participated in. 0.67

00:40:07.000 And if you don't do that, then you're not an ally.

00:40:10.000 It's all about the signaling.

00:40:11.000 It's all about, and the signaling, in the end, is about Americans, broadly speaking, white Americans, broadly speaking, but mostly about America generally.

00:40:18.000 The systems of America have to be torn out by the root.

00:40:21.000 Now, again, the virtue signaling doesn't extend everywhere.

00:40:23.000 So the NBA is a virtue signaling culture.

00:40:26.000 The NBA's virtue signaling only extends to one particular area, right, in terms of race.

00:40:32.000 The NBA will never extend its virtue signaling to, for example, challenging Chinese domination of Hong Kong.

00:40:38.000 There's a story out of the Washington Free Beacon that we're gonna get to in a second, which demonstrates the complete hypocrisy of the social justice warrior NBA in just one second.

00:40:45.000 First, when you are running a business, as you know, HR issues can absolutely murder you.

00:40:50.000 HR issues are some of the toughest issues you gotta deal with, you gotta staff up, you gotta have a whole HR department just to deal with all of the regulations and requirements and wrongful termination suits and all the rest of this kind of stuff.

00:41:01.000 Well, do you really wanna pay an entire HR department, or do you actually just wanna go out and get Bambi?

00:41:07.000 In our HR manager salary, it's not cheap.

00:41:08.000 It can be up to $70,000 a year.

00:41:10.000 Bambi, spelled B-A-M-B-E-E, was created specifically for small business.

00:41:14.000 You get a dedicated HR manager, you craft HR policy, and you maintain your compliance, all for just $99 a month.

00:41:19.000 With Bambi, you can change HR from your biggest liability to your biggest strength.

00:41:23.000 Your dedicated HR manager is available by phone, email, or real-time chat.

00:41:27.000 From onboarding determinations, they customize your policies to fit your business and help you manage your employees day-to-day, all for just $99 a month.

00:41:33.000 Month-to-month.

00:41:34.000 There are no hidden fees.

00:41:35.000 You can cancel anytime.

00:41:36.000 You didn't start your business because you were desperate to do HR.

00:41:39.000 So, why don't you just get it handled and not spend a fortune doing it?

00:41:41.000 Head on over to BAMBEE.com slash Shapiro right now to schedule your free HR audit.

00:41:45.000 That is BAMBEE.com slash Shapiro.

00:41:47.000 B-A-M-B-E-E dot com slash Shapiro. 0.63

00:41:50.000 BAM to the B-E-E dot com slash Shapiro.

00:41:53.000 Go check them out right now and get your HR issues off the table.

00:41:57.000 Okay, we're gonna get to more of this in just a moment.

00:41:59.000 First, reminder, my new book, How to Destroy America in Three Easy Steps, goes on sale Tuesday, one week from today, July 21st, 6 p.m.

00:42:07.000 Eastern, 3 p.m.

00:42:08.000 Pacific.

00:42:09.000 We will be doing a virtual live signing event on the day of release.

00:42:12.000 With your purchase of a signed copy, you can write in a question, and I may read it on air, and I may discuss it with you.

00:42:17.000 Order your pre-signed copy right now, or pre-order your signed copy, and write in your question at dailywire.com slash Ben.

00:42:23.000 The book is, it could not be more important.

00:42:25.000 What we are watching right now is the book as prophecy, basically.

00:42:28.000 I say that if you destroy America's history, culture, and philosophy, then the country will fall apart.

00:42:33.000 And we are seeing attacks on all three prongs.

00:42:34.000 The book isn't just a description of the problem, it is the solution.

00:42:37.000 The book itself is part of the solution.

00:42:39.000 You can give it to all your friends, you can remind them why America was always great, why America's flaws do not Do not destroy the idea that America is a great nation built on fundamentally good principles that is responsible for the freedom and prosperity of billions of human beings around the world.

00:42:54.000 It is the antidote to the nonsense you see in the mainstream media every single day.

00:42:58.000 Go check it out right now, How to Destroy America, in three easy steps.

00:43:01.000 You can pick it up either at Amazon, like pre-order, or you can head on over to dailywire.com slash ben if you want the special signed copy.

00:43:07.000 Also, if you're not already a Daily Wire member, you should consider getting a reader's pass to dailywire.com.

00:43:11.000 It's a great value for only three bucks a month.

00:43:13.000 When you sign up, you get that first month for only 99 cents.

00:43:15.000 You also get access to our mobile app, articles ad free, and access to exclusive editorials like this one.

00:43:20.000 from one of our contributors, how politicization, anxiety, and misdirection are still driving the pandemic narrative.

00:43:27.000 If you haven't checked out our Reader's Pass, head on over to dailywire.com and sign up for just $1.

00:43:31.000 Go check them out right now.

00:43:32.000 Dailywire.com.

00:43:33.000 Sign up for just a buck.

00:43:34.000 about your listening to the largest, fastest growing conservative podcast and radio show in the nation.

00:43:38.000 Now the nice thing about making all of American politics about the signaling as opposed to the actual policy is it means that if you signal the wrong way we can oust you before we even get to policy.

00:43:54.000 See, if you can go after people based on their thought crime before you even have to have the debate about policy, it makes the debate about policy moot.

00:44:01.000 You just get rid of all the people who are not super hot on the idea that giant virtue signaling paintings on the street that say black lives matter, thus implying that a huge percentage of Americans believe that black lives do not matter.

00:44:13.000 If you can get people to quote unquote out themselves as racist for opposing random signal of the day, then that means you never have to have a policy discussion about the actual awkward stuff in American public life.

00:44:23.000 Like, why are so many people shooting each other in New York City?

00:44:26.000 Like, why are so many people shooting each other in Washington, D.C.?

00:44:28.000 Why are there disproportionate poverty rates?

00:44:31.000 And why are there disproportionate education rates?

00:44:33.000 And what does that have to do with history, how much of that is history, and how much of that is current-day decision-making?

00:44:38.000 Right?

00:44:38.000 All of the awkward conversations can be completely elided if you can cast out of the Overton window.

00:44:43.000 If you can wish into the cornfield all the people who refuse to go along with the virtue signaling.

00:44:48.000 Remember, what virtue signaling is really about is raising a flag.

00:44:51.000 You raise the flag, people rally around the flag.

00:44:52.000 If they refuse to rally around your flag, they are out of the tent.

00:44:55.000 They cannot be inside your war camp. 0.88

00:44:58.000 You cannot have any sort of conversation with them inside the tent.

00:45:01.000 That is the goal here.

00:45:03.000 So much of politics is about rallying around a particular slogan or message or flag.

00:45:11.000 And if you make it so that everyone who refuses to rally around a particular slogan, message, or flag is cast out of the tent, you've just made your job a lot easier.

00:45:19.000 Because here's the thing.

00:45:21.000 Let's say that I, Ben Shapiro, am not in favor of painting a giant mural that says Black Lives Matter in front of my house.

00:45:26.000 Because hey, it's a public street.

00:45:27.000 We all own it.

00:45:28.000 And I believe that Black Lives Matter, just as everyone else's life matters.

00:45:32.000 And by the way, when I say that, not only is that not racist, most Americans agree with it.

00:45:36.000 There's a poll from Economist YouGov.

00:45:38.000 You want to talk about the disconnect from our political media and the American public?

00:45:42.000 There's a poll from Economist YouGov, and it asks, among different racial groups, how many people believe that the slogan, All Lives Matter, is bad?

00:45:51.000 Because remember, this is the going wisdom on the left, is that if somebody says to you, Black Lives Matter, You are not allowed to say either all black lives matter, which apparently is bad, right? 0.99

00:45:59.000 Don Lemon told me on CNN it's bad.

00:46:01.000 If I say all black lives matter, then I'm discussing the problems of murder in black communities, I'm discussing the problems of poverty and inequality and education and all of the, and single motherhood and all those, and he's saying we can't say that.

00:46:14.000 Black lives matter doesn't mean all black lives matter, it just means the cops are bad.

00:46:17.000 Right?

00:46:18.000 Black Lives Matter equals defund the police, in essence.

00:46:20.000 Right?

00:46:20.000 So we're not allowed to say that, but the thing you're really not allowed to say is all lives matter.

00:46:23.000 If somebody says to you, black lives matter, what you're not allowed to do is say all lives matter.

00:46:26.000 And if you say all lives matter, it's because you're bad. 0.98

00:46:29.000 Now, most Americans instinctively are like, what the hell are you talking about? 0.99

00:46:32.000 All includes the category black. 0.96

00:46:34.000 When I say black lives matter, and I say all lives matter, black is just a subset of all. 1.00

00:46:39.000 So of course, when I say all lives matter, I mean, yes, including black people, clearly.

00:46:43.000 But the media have decided that that detracts from the message that Black Lives Matter.

00:46:46.000 Why?

00:46:46.000 Because the Black Lives Matter message is an implicit rebuke of the United States, because the implicit rebuke is that out there somewhere, there are a bunch of people who deny that Black Lives Matter.

00:46:55.000 And when you say all lives matter, what you're really saying is that most Americans agree that all lives matter.

00:47:00.000 That's really what you're saying.

00:47:00.000 Okay, so how do Americans feel about the slogan, All Lives Matter?

00:47:03.000 This is a poll.

00:47:04.000 June 7th to June 9th, 2020, The Economist YouGov.

00:47:07.000 1,500 US adults.

00:47:11.000 Does the following slogan carry a positive or a negative association to you?

00:47:15.000 All lives matter.

00:47:16.000 And we're gonna do this by race.

00:47:18.000 Okay, by race.

00:47:19.000 Okay, in total, 56% of Americans say that they have positive associations with the phrase, all lives matter.

00:47:26.000 17% say they are neutral.

00:47:28.000 So that means that 73% of Americans, 73% of Americans are positive or neutral on the phrase, all lives matter.

00:47:36.000 But how about among Black Americans?

00:47:37.000 Aren't Black Americans deeply offended by the phrase, All Lives Matter?

00:47:40.000 The Economist YouGov poll says 45% of Black Americans say that they have positive feelings about the slogan, Black Lives Matter.

00:47:48.000 21% say they are neutral on it.

00:47:50.000 So 66%, two-thirds of Black Americans say that the phrase, All Lives Matter, is not offensive or they like it.

00:47:58.000 According to the media, that's bad. 0.93

00:48:00.000 So are these Black people racists? 0.97

00:48:02.000 Are these Black people outside the Overton window, outside the tent? 1.00

00:48:05.000 By the way, among Hispanic people, 58% have positive associations, the same number among whites. 0.81

00:48:11.000 In fact, whites and Hispanics have very similar numbers, which gives the lie to the quote-unquote people of color all think the same way nonsense, right? 0.77

00:48:18.000 Blacks and Hispanics actually think very differently about this.

00:48:21.000 Whites and Hispanics think kind of the same.

00:48:23.000 Hispanics, 58% say they have positive associations with All Lives Matter.

00:48:27.000 16% say they have neutral associations with All Lives Matter.

00:48:30.000 So 74% of Hispanics compared to 66% of blacks compared to 65%, sorry, 75% of whites say that they have positive associations with All Lives Matter.

00:48:43.000 Now, you wouldn't know that from the media coverage, would you?

00:48:45.000 You wouldn't know that, because according to the media coverage, this is a signal, right?

00:48:49.000 The signal is all that matters. 0.97

00:48:50.000 If you say All Lives Matter to Black Lives Matter, you're a racist. 0.95

00:48:52.000 That's the signal, and we don't have to have a conversation with you.

00:48:54.000 Never mind that most Americans of every single racial group have positive associations with the phrase All Lives Matter.

00:49:02.000 So how far does the virtue signaling go?

00:49:04.000 Only as far as the left says it does.

00:49:05.000 So the NBA has been virtue signaling about all of these racial topics, obviously, particularly on the police.

00:49:12.000 And they've decided they're going to allow people to wear social justice messages on the back of their jerseys.

00:49:16.000 Now, the first person who puts on the back of their jersey, tariffs are bad public policy and foster political dysfunction along the way.

00:49:24.000 On the back of their jersey, I will personally give $1,000.

00:49:27.000 Any player who puts that on the back of their jersey, I will crowdfund half a million dollars for any player who puts Free Hong Kong on the back of their jersey.

00:49:38.000 Oh wait, you can't.

00:49:39.000 You can't, the NBA won't allow you.

00:49:41.000 According to the Washington Free Beacon, in keeping with the league policy on political statements, the official online store of the NBA does not permit fans to order a custom jersey with the phrase Free Hong Kong printed on the back.

00:49:52.000 Free Hong Kong is one of the many phrases banned under the NBA's New Jersey policy.

00:49:56.000 So you can put up Black Lives Matter, but you can't do Free Hong Kong. 0.69

00:50:00.000 If you type free Hong Kong into the text box, they say we are unable to customize this item with the text you have entered.

00:50:04.000 Please try a different entry.

00:50:07.000 Here are some of the phrases that you are allowed to put into the NBA phrase generator.

00:50:12.000 F Hong Kong you could do. 0.50

00:50:14.000 You could do defund police.

00:50:15.000 You could do abolish cops. 0.99

00:50:17.000 You could do beware of Jews. 1.00

00:50:19.000 You could do ban gypsies. 1.00

00:50:20.000 You could do Xi for life.

00:50:22.000 You could do 9-11 hoax.

00:50:24.000 You could do end Taiwan. 1.00

00:50:26.000 You could do Trump has AIDS, Pence is gay, and Uyghurs lie. 1.00

00:50:30.000 All of those you could put on the jerseys. 0.98

00:50:33.000 As the Washington Free Beacon points out, a number of NBA players, including LeBron James, have rallied around ESPN reporter Adrian Wojnarowski, who was recently suspended after writing FU in response to a press release from Josh Hawley pointing out the warmth between the NBA and the government of China.

00:50:48.000 So a lot of virtue signaling with no virtue over in the NBA.

00:50:53.000 Always good news.

00:50:54.000 Okay, so we have two more hours of additional content a little bit later.

00:50:57.000 You know, one thing that I've neglected to do for several weeks because of all of the news and the riots and everything else are things I like.

00:51:02.000 So I want to recommend a book that is worthy of reading.

00:51:05.000 It is a book by John McWhorter, who is a linguistics professor.

00:51:08.000 It's a book from back in 2001 and has lost none of its punch.

00:51:11.000 It's called Losing the Race, Self-Sabotage in Black America. 0.99

00:51:15.000 And he talks about the real, many of the actual real problems inside the black community that don't involve painting giant slogans on street corners to make white woke people feel better about themselves.

00:51:26.000 It's really worthy of the read.

00:51:27.000 He's an associate professor of linguistics at UC Berkeley.

00:51:30.000 He's the author of several books.

00:51:32.000 And this book is certainly worth the reading.

00:51:35.000 Go check it out right now.

00:51:37.000 Losing the Race, Self-Sabotage in Black America by John McWhorter.

00:51:40.000 Again, when we talk about real problems, we should talk about real solutions.

00:51:42.000 McWhorter talks about some of them in, I think, a deep and nuanced way.

00:51:46.000 If you're a liberal, you'll find it non-offensive to you.

00:51:48.000 Let's put it that way.

00:51:48.000 You can go check it out today.

00:51:50.000 Alrighty, we'll be back here later today.

00:51:51.000 Two additional hours of content.

00:51:52.000 Otherwise, we'll see you here tomorrow as we approach the launch of my brand new book, How to Destroy America, in three easy steps.

00:51:57.000 That big day happening next week.

00:51:59.000 So go pre-order the book right now over at dailywire.com.

00:52:02.000 When you do, you can get a signed copy.

00:52:05.000 You can pre-order it right now.

00:52:07.000 Go check that out.

00:52:07.000 Or you can go over to Amazon, pick up a copy.

00:52:09.000 Otherwise, we'll see you here a little bit later.

00:52:10.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:52:11.000 This is The Ben Shapiro Show.

00:52:16.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is produced by Colton Haas, executive producer Jeremy Boring, supervising producer Mathis Glover and Robert Sterling, assistant director Pavel Lydowsky, technical producer Austin Stevens, playback and media operated by Nick Sheehan, associate producer Katie Swinnerton, edited by Adam Sajovic, audio is mixed by Mike Koromina, hair and makeup is by Nika Geneva.

00:52:36.000 The Ben Shapiro Show is a Daily Wire production, copyright Daily Wire 2020.

00:52:41.000 Hey everybody, it's Andrew Klavan, host of The Andrew Klavan Show.

00:52:44.000 You know, some people are depressed because the American Republic is collapsing, the end of days is approaching, and the moon has turned to blood.

00:52:50.000 But on The Andrew Klavan Show, that's where the fun just gets started.

The Ben Shapiro Show - July 14, 2020

The Shutdown of Common Sense | Ep. 1051

Episode Stats

Summary

Transcript