The Ben Shapiro Show - The Worst Of Times | Ep. 940

00:00:00.000 Bernie Sanders takes the upper hand in the Democratic 2020 contest, the Senate impeachment trial kicks into high gear with John Bolton's revelations, and Kobe Bryant and his daughter tragically die in a helicopter accident.

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

00:00:11.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:00:13.000 Today's show is sponsored by ExpressVPN.com.

00:00:20.000 It's how my listeners secure their internet.

00:00:23.000 Join them at expressvpn.com slash Ben.

00:00:25.000 We'll get to the Kobe Bryant stuff a little bit later on in the show.

00:00:28.000 If you grew up in Los Angeles, it's a devastating day for you because the fact is that Kobe Bryant was such a part of everybody's life.

00:00:35.000 Yeah, I'm from Los Angeles.

00:00:37.000 It's obviously a tragic, tragic incident.

00:00:39.000 The fact that his daughter was on the helicopter is just unthinkable.

00:00:42.000 We'll get to that a little bit later on in the show.

00:00:45.000 We'll pay tribute to Kobe.

00:00:46.000 We'll talk about what he meant to the city of Los Angeles, to basketball in general.

00:00:50.000 Really bad stuff happening over the weekend.

00:00:52.000 We begin, however, with the update on your polls going into Iowa.

00:00:56.000 So we are now, what, 10 days out of Iowa?

00:00:58.000 We are very, very close to the Iowa caucuses, and right now, It appears that Bernie Sanders has grabbed the upper hand in those Iowa caucuses.

00:01:06.000 The current polling has Bernie up a substantial percentage in Iowa.

00:01:09.000 There are three polls out.

00:01:11.000 They are sort of all over the place.

00:01:12.000 Emerson has Sanders up nine in Iowa.

00:01:15.000 Suffolk has Joe Biden up six in Iowa.

00:01:18.000 New York Times has Bernie Sanders up seven in Iowa.

00:01:21.000 So one of those polls is going to have to be wrong.

00:01:24.000 At least one of them.

00:01:26.000 All of those polls, by the way, came out inside the last two days, but There's a pretty good indicator that Sanders is coming out on top.

00:01:32.000 Sanders does have the youth vote.

00:01:34.000 Sanders does have the momentum.

00:01:36.000 He has tremendous momentum in New Hampshire, where the latest polls have him up double digits in New Hampshire.

00:01:40.000 In Nevada, the latest poll actually has Joe Biden up by like one point, which means that right now, the betting markets have Bernie Sanders as the favorites to win the Democratic nomination, which is almost unthinkable.

00:01:51.000 I mean, the fact that you have a man Who is a communist for nearly his entire, not nearly, his entire career.

00:01:57.000 You have a guy who is now pretending to be a democratic socialist who likes Norway, but he started off loving Venezuela and Cuba and the USSR and even now can't really get himself up for condemning communism anywhere on planet Earth.

00:02:09.000 Bernie Sanders could be the Democratic nominee and in fact has a solid shot at being the Democratic nominee.

00:02:14.000 It's pretty insane.

00:02:16.000 Again, Bernie has spiked dramatically in Iowa.

00:02:19.000 And it's important to remember who Bernie Sanders is and how a wing of the Democratic Party could theoretically take control of the entire Democratic Party.

00:02:25.000 I've said for a long time, the best thing for Donald Trump here is for Bernie Sanders to win the nomination because Bernie Sanders, the election will become a referendum on Bernie Sanders.

00:02:35.000 If Sanders is the nominee, it won't be a referendum on Trump anymore.

00:02:37.000 Trump is baked in.

00:02:38.000 And people basically get Trump is out of the box. 1.00

00:02:41.000 Trump says dumb, weird things. 0.80

00:02:43.000 Trump doesn't really get the job in some ways, but Trump does a lot of things that we like. 1.00

00:02:47.000 He gives us a really good economy.

00:02:49.000 He's made us safer on the world stage.

00:02:51.000 Bernie Sanders is an out-and-out communist who roots for the worst people on planet Earth to win all over the world, wants to destroy the American economy, has never met a government program he doesn't think should be expanded, and has never met a private industry he doesn't think should be nationalized.

00:03:03.000 It is going to be so easy for Donald Trump to turn the election into a referendum on Sanders.

00:03:07.000 The best thing for Trump is for Sanders to win.

00:03:09.000 The worst thing for the United States is for Bernie Sanders to win the nomination.

00:03:13.000 The reason being, one, that then he will have, minimum, a 40% shot at being president, an actual Honestly, got a communist as president of the United States, a lifelong socialist as president of the United States.

00:03:25.000 And also, even if the Democratic Party doesn't love everything that Bernie is saying, they are now going to centralize around his point of view in the same way that in 1972, George McGovern ran for the Democrats and dragged that party dramatically to the left.

00:03:37.000 And eventually, that resulted in the complete takeover of the Democratic Party by the hard left.

00:03:41.000 Bernie Sanders could do the same thing, turning what was a not supremely anti-capitalist party into a supremely anti-capitalist party, turning the party of Barack Obama into the party of AOC, which seems like a distinction without a difference, but it is a distinction with a difference.

00:03:57.000 And the fact is that Barack Obama was not in his guts A complete opponent of capitalism.

00:04:02.000 He didn't like it very much, but he wasn't like Bernie, a complete hater of capitalism.

00:04:05.000 Obama understands that capitalism actually generates prosperity, whereas Bernie Sanders believes that capitalism is ruinous no matter where it's tried.

00:04:12.000 You can tell where Bernie Sanders is on all of these issues simply by listening to Bernie Sanders and listening to his surrogates.

00:04:18.000 So Bernie Sanders over the weekend has been asked the unfortunate question of how he plans to pay for all of the things that he wants to pay for.

00:04:24.000 And the man simply doesn't have any answers along these lines.

00:04:26.000 He was on CBS Evening News with Norah O'Donnell, and he was asked how he was going to sell his healthcare plan.

00:04:31.000 And he basically just said, the rainbows will pay for it.

00:04:36.000 Democratic.

00:04:37.000 Democratic, put in there, please.

00:04:38.000 Thank you.

00:04:39.000 Your agenda has promised free health care for everybody, free college tuition, and to pay off people's college loans.

00:04:45.000 The price tag for that is estimated to be $60 trillion over 10 years, correct?

00:04:52.000 Well, look, we have political opponents.

00:04:55.000 You don't know how much your plan costs?

00:04:56.000 You don't know.

00:04:57.000 Nobody knows.

00:04:58.000 This is impossible.

00:04:59.000 You're going to propose a plan to the American people and you're not going to tell them how much it costs?

00:05:02.000 Of course I will.

00:05:03.000 Of course I will.

00:05:03.000 He won't.

00:05:04.000 He won't.

00:05:04.000 He literally said, nobody knows.

00:05:07.000 And then in the same sentence, he said, of course I'm going to tell them how much it costs.

00:05:10.000 These two things cannot live in the same universe.

00:05:12.000 If you don't know the answer to a question, you don't also know the answer to a question.

00:05:15.000 These are mutually exclusive statements.

00:05:17.000 But that is Bernie Sanders' agenda.

00:05:19.000 Free everything, paid for presumably by the rich.

00:05:22.000 But the rich don't have the kind of money to pay for $60 trillion worth of spending on what he is talking about.

00:05:27.000 And you can tell What is really animating the Sanders campaign has nothing to do with his plans, has nothing to do with his spending, has nothing to do with where he wants the country to go.

00:05:34.000 What really is animating Bernie Sanders' campaign is hatred for all that is.

00:05:38.000 It's hatred for the quote-unquote status quo.

00:05:41.000 And his surrogates say this.

00:05:42.000 So Michael Moore is a big Bernie Sanders fan.

00:05:44.000 And he's out there saying that we are like the French Resistance.

00:05:47.000 See, it's not what Bernie is for that matters, it's what Bernie is against.

00:05:49.000 Bernie is against capitalism, Bernie is against the American system, Bernie is against American history, Bernie is for a complete overthrow of the American system wholesale, and Michael Moore is totally into it.

00:05:59.000 Here is Michael Moore characterizing Bernie Sanders' opposition as basically Nazi-esque and suggesting that Bernie Sanders is the French resistance, which is an amazing statement given the fact that Bernie Sanders During World War II, if he had been a politically active man at that time, he would have been on the side of the USSR, which at the beginning was at least on the side of the Nazis.

00:06:17.000 In any case, that's not to say Bernie Sanders is a Nazi. 0.88

00:06:20.000 The point is that to characterize Bernie Sanders' opposition as Nazi-esque and Bernie as a French Resistance member is ridiculous on his face. 0.83

00:06:27.000 Here is Michael Moore explaining that he is like the French Resistance. 0.51

00:06:32.000 You know we're in the French Resistance now, right?

00:06:36.000 Right?

00:06:38.000 Right?

00:06:39.000 You got nine.

00:06:40.000 Remember the French Resistance, right?

00:06:42.000 Nobody in the French Resistance ever said, Jesus, yes, I'd like to help you stop those Nazis coming down the road there, but we've got couples therapy at four today.

00:06:51.000 No!

00:06:53.000 You have to get along with your spouse for the next week or two!

00:06:56.000 There's no couples therapy! 0.69

00:06:58.000 Just get along!

00:06:59.000 Get along for the greater good of this country!

00:07:02.000 So get out there, because it's like the French Resistance, guys, and if you don't make Bernie Sanders the nominee coming out of Iowa, it's because you were just a bad person who didn't care about the Nazis.

00:07:12.000 Well done.

00:07:13.000 Michael Moore also suggested he's tired of hearing that we are the land of the free, which is a weird thing for a... a...

00:07:19.000 I am sick and tired of hearing this, that we live in the land of the free.

00:07:23.000 That this is a democracy.

00:07:25.000 It's an amazing thing for Michael Moore to suggest that he is tired of hearing we're the land of the free while he stands there railing against the land of the free, which is something that typically does not happen in dictatorships.

00:07:33.000 More Michael Moore on the campaign trail standing behind a podium labeled with Bernie Sanders insignia.

00:07:39.000 Here he is.

00:07:40.000 I am sick and tired of hearing this, that we live in the land of the free.

00:07:44.000 That this is a democracy.

00:07:47.000 First of all, do you have any friends in another country or even Canada where you try to explain to them?

00:07:54.000 Where you try to explain to them that the person who gets the most votes in the democracy doesn't necessarily win?

00:08:04.000 Nobody understands that.

00:08:06.000 No, we need to make so many changes because it's not just enough for it to be a political democracy.

00:08:12.000 When we get that part of it fixed, the Electoral College gone.

00:08:16.000 The Electoral College makes us not a democracy, apparently, according to Bernie Sanders.

00:08:20.000 By the way, he should learn some things about other countries, where very few Prime Ministers of other countries actually win a majority of the actual vote.

00:08:26.000 Most of them, many Prime Ministers, Prime Ministers as in, I believe Boris Johnson, in the latest round of elections, I think his party won something like 43% of the total vote.

00:08:36.000 In Israel, the Prime Minister typically wins something on the order of maybe 20%, 25% of the total vote for his party.

00:08:43.000 So, the idea that it's done specifically along popular vote lines, and the person who wins the absolute majority always wins, like, I don't know what he's talking about, but he doesn't know what he's talking about either.

00:08:52.000 The difference is that he's saying it and I'm critiquing it, so that doesn't make a lot of sense from his perspective.

00:08:55.000 The reason I'm playing you, Michael Moore, is because Michael Moore says the quiet part out loud, but Bernie Sanders also says the quiet part out loud.

00:09:00.000 They all say the quiet part out loud.

00:09:02.000 So get ready.

00:09:03.000 I mean, again, this is the best thing for Trump running against a Democrat. 1.00

00:09:05.000 It's the worst thing for the country if people start to resonate to this idiocy. 0.99

00:09:09.000 We'll get to more of that in just one second. 0.96

00:09:11.000 First, let us talk about the simple fact that it is difficult to predict the future, unfortunately.

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00:09:19.000 You never know when, God forbid, something could happen to you.

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00:09:23.000 This is why you need life insurance.

00:09:24.000 You need to be a responsible human being.

00:09:26.000 When I first got married, one of the first things I did was to look around for life insurance.

00:09:29.000 It's kind of hard to find good life insurance and you think you'll get some good stuff through your employer.

00:09:29.000 You know what?

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00:10:21.000 Okay, it's not just Michael Moore on the stump for Bernie Sanders, it is also AOC on the stump for Bernie Sanders.

00:10:27.000 So AOC, another popular communist who is out there suggesting that there's a big problem in New York City because there are homeless people in New York City and unsold luxury apartments.

00:10:37.000 So I guess her proposal is that we should take the luxury apartments and give them to the homeless people, which will obviously create great incentive for developers to create new buildings.

00:10:46.000 That will then be seized from them by the government and given to homeless people.

00:10:49.000 Clearly, if you want to clear up a shortage of supply, the best thing you can do is forcibly grab the apartments that have been built and then pass them out for free to people who are going to piss on the walls.

00:10:59.000 Clearly, that is going to be the best possible solution.

00:11:01.000 Here is AOC trying to explain that America is evil because there are luxury apartments in her city of New York City and there are homeless people on the streets of New York City. 1.00

00:11:09.000 And because she's because she's a fool. 0.94

00:11:12.000 She believes that the way to solve this problem is by taking the apartments that are unoccupied and giving them to the homeless people, as opposed to, you know, creating an economic structure that incentivizes the creation of new development units so that there's a place for the homeless people to go, also ignoring the fact that many homeless people, probably the plurality or majority of homeless people, Are drug addicts, alcoholics or mentally ill? 0.99

00:11:31.000 Here's AOC just saying silly things.

00:11:32.000 But again, silly things are the order of the day. 0.83

00:11:35.000 Silly things are the order of the day because we've become so wealthy as a country. 0.90

00:11:37.000 We have.

00:11:38.000 We've become so incredibly free as a country that people sit around and they critique the country that has made them wealthy and free.

00:11:45.000 I mean, AOC has led an ideal American life.

00:11:47.000 Truly.

00:11:47.000 She went to college.

00:11:48.000 She got an econ degree without knowing anything, which is a pretty amazing accomplishment.

00:11:51.000 She then went and she bartended and then she ran for Congress on the basis of this stellar record.

00:11:56.000 And she became a congressperson.

00:11:57.000 Who now has a luxury apartment in Washington DC with like a Peloton room.

00:12:01.000 That's the American dream right there.

00:12:02.000 And here she is bitching about it. 1.00

00:12:04.000 Talking about how America is terrible.

00:12:05.000 And the evidence that America is terrible is that there are luxury apartments in New York City that can't be occupied by homeless people. 0.99

00:12:13.000 Which is just the dumbest thing in the world. 0.98

00:12:15.000 It's like something that my three-year-old would propose. 0.99

00:12:17.000 Truly.

00:12:18.000 Like, when you are three, and you see somebody else with a thing that you want, you just say, I want it.

00:12:24.000 And then your parents, if they're a good parent, says, yes, but that's not yours.

00:12:27.000 Instead, if you're a good boy, and you act well, then maybe you'll be able to get that.

00:12:32.000 But that's not the way that AOC or any of these folks operate.

00:12:35.000 Instead, it's, look, there's this thing I want.

00:12:37.000 And because it's a thing I want, obviously, that is a thing I should have.

00:12:41.000 And if somebody else doesn't have something that they want, then we should take it away from some other person and give it to them.

00:12:45.000 Here's AOC not understanding basic economics, but wearing her glasses. 1.00

00:12:48.000 So I guess the glasses make her smart.

00:12:50.000 You know, I live in New York City.

00:12:53.000 The rates of people that are experiencing homelessness are some of their highest rates since the Great Depression.

00:13:01.000 Yet one in every four luxury apartments in New York City goes unsold.

00:13:05.000 There are about three empty apartments for every one person experiencing homelessness in New York City.

00:13:13.000 And that juxtaposition of some of the largest excess next to some of the worst depravity is not an accident.

00:13:24.000 Okay, what's hilarious about this is that New York City is governed by folks on her side of the aisle. 0.99

00:13:28.000 Democrats have been governing New York City for pretty much forever.

00:13:31.000 There have been some Republican mayors.

00:13:32.000 They were all not particularly conservative on economics.

00:13:35.000 And then you go to LA.

00:13:36.000 We have a huge homeless problem here.

00:13:37.000 It's been governed by Democrats my entire life.

00:13:39.000 Then you go to San Francisco, which has never been dominated by Republicans.

00:13:42.000 Seattle, never dominated by Republicans.

00:13:42.000 Huge homeless problem.

00:13:44.000 Enormous homeless problem.

00:13:45.000 Why?

00:13:46.000 It's almost as though there is a pattern of bad economic policy leading to homelessness.

00:13:50.000 My favorite is where she says, look at all these unoccupied luxury apartments.

00:13:53.000 Well, clearly, that's because they're somehow disempowering the homeless. 1.00

00:13:58.000 Maybe the luxury apartments are not occupied because everyone who could possibly provide a tax base is leaving New York City, you idiot. 0.97

00:14:05.000 Maybe the reason that people aren't getting a luxury apartment in New York City is because of the exorbitant tax rates that AOC wants to force down and the insane business regulations she would prefer that drove literally thousands of jobs out of her district. 1.00

00:14:16.000 Maybe it's because of that.

00:14:17.000 But this is Bernie Sanders economics, right?

00:14:20.000 This is the future of the Democratic Party if people don't wake up in time.

00:14:25.000 Now, here's the problem.

00:14:26.000 I think that almost any way you slice this, this is the future of the Democratic Party.

00:14:29.000 I think the way that you slice it, really, no matter where this goes, the future of the Democratic Party is this nonsense.

00:14:34.000 This is where it's going.

00:14:35.000 The reason I say that is let's say that Joe Biden wins the nomination, and then let's say that Joe Biden loses the election to Donald Trump.

00:14:41.000 The first move will be, you didn't get the passionate people out there, you didn't get the bass out, we didn't provide our strongest horse, instead we just went with the moderate, again, and so what we really need is we need to swing over to the Bernie side.

00:14:51.000 And then let's say that Bernie wins the nomination, and he doesn't win the presidency, which is quite likely if he does win the nomination, then it will be, ah yes, but that's just the boomers, it's just the old people. 0.99

00:15:02.000 Because as the young people age and as they maintain their political point of view, the future is AOC. 0.88

00:15:08.000 The future is Rashida Tlaib.

00:15:10.000 We'll get to Rashida Tlaib in just a second because you're hearing from Camp Bernie and the rest of the Democrats this week.

00:15:15.000 It's Holocaust Remembrance Week because this is the week that Auschwitz was liberated.

00:15:19.000 You're going to hear from Democrats this week a lot about the Holocaust.

00:15:22.000 Meanwhile, they're going to prop up Rashida Tlaib, who is actively participating in a blood libel over the weekend.

00:15:26.000 She's also a surrogate for Bernie Sanders. 0.90

00:15:28.000 We'll get to that in just one second.

00:15:30.000 First, let's talk about the safety and security of your neighborhood. 0.99

00:15:32.000 So my neighborhood has turned to absolute garbage.

00:15:33.000 I live in Los Angeles, which means that it used to be a really nice city. 0.92

00:15:36.000 Now, the city has refused to actually enforce any of the laws and has prohibited the police who are trying to do their best.

00:15:42.000 from actually enforcing laws.

00:15:43.000 That means that street crime has gone up.

00:15:45.000 It means that break-ins have gone up.

00:15:46.000 It means that there are people with criminal intent who may be wandering your neighborhood.

00:15:50.000 And this is true in large cities across the country.

00:15:52.000 And even if you're living in an area that's relatively safe, why would you not protect yourself with Ring security?

00:15:57.000 I have Ring.

00:15:58.000 It makes me feel a lot better about my property.

00:16:00.000 It makes my wife feel a lot better. 1.00

00:16:01.000 I've got little kids.

00:16:02.000 I don't want people wondering about my property without me knowing about it.

00:16:05.000 This is why I have Ring.

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00:16:36.000 Ring.com slash Ben.

00:16:38.000 So again, this is the Bernie Sanders campaign with surrogates like AOC and Rashida Tlaib.

00:16:42.000 Over the weekend, Rashida Tlaib pushed an actual blood libel. 0.99

00:16:46.000 Hanan Ashrawi is a spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization, which is a terrorist organization.

00:16:51.000 And Hanan Ashrawi tweeted out a story.

00:16:55.000 Supposedly about a Palestinian child who was allegedly kidnapped by, quote, a herd of violent Israeli settlers, assaulted and thrown in a water well, and then drowned in the water well.

00:17:04.000 That did not happen.

00:17:05.000 Okay, that is not a thing that happened.

00:17:07.000 What actually happened is that there was a reservoir in Jerusalem, it rained really heavily, and unfortunately the seven-year-old slipped and fell in the reservoir and drowned.

00:17:15.000 Okay, Hanan Ashrawi tweeted out, The heart just shatters.

00:17:17.000 The pain is unbearable.

00:17:19.000 No words.

00:17:19.000 I mean, this is an unverified account that originally tweeted out this person was kidnapped and executed.

00:17:23.000 This kid was kidnapped and executed by Israeli settlers.

00:17:25.000 Now, there have been violent incidents between Jews against Palestinians before.

00:17:29.000 That's a thing that's happened before.

00:17:30.000 But when things like this happen, normally what you'd want to do is wait for any evidence to come out.

00:17:34.000 Hanan Ashrawi did not because she is, of course, a propagandist on behalf of an anti-Jewish, anti-Semitic terror group.

00:17:39.000 Rashida Tlaib, because she is also a propagandist on behalf of anti-Semitic, anti-Jewish terror groups all over the region.

00:17:45.000 She also decided to retweet that.

00:17:48.000 This is a blood libel.

00:17:50.000 She retweeted this to her 900,000 followers.

00:17:53.000 And then, when it came out that this was false, she deleted it and she said nothing.

00:17:58.000 Even Hanan Ashrawi had the sense to issue a half-baked retraction.

00:18:02.000 She said, my apologies for retweeting something that's not fully verified.

00:18:05.000 It seems the news of his being kidnapped is not certain.

00:18:09.000 Not only was it not certain, it apparently never happened.

00:18:11.000 Tlaib just deleted it and never said anything.

00:18:14.000 Because she's a wild anti-Semite. 1.00

00:18:16.000 Because this is the Democratic Party. 0.98

00:18:17.000 Because the Democratic Party is willing to tolerate all of this nonsense.

00:18:20.000 Ambassador Danny Dayan tweeted out, I'm always extremely cautious in criticizing U.S.

00:18:24.000 elected officials.

00:18:25.000 However, when an American elected official retweets an unfounded blood rival against Jewish Israelis, I cannot remain silent.

00:18:30.000 Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib just did. 1.00

00:18:32.000 That will receive no media attention.

00:18:34.000 Meanwhile, you'll hear that Donald Trump is an anti-Semite, even as we'll see, as he proposes a peace plan that is the first real peace plan for the region in quite a long time.

00:18:43.000 And even though he's been an extraordinarily pro-Israel and pro-Jewish president.

00:18:46.000 But this is your Democratic Party.

00:18:48.000 It's the party of Rashida Tlaib, the party of AOC, the party of Michael Moore.

00:18:53.000 This is the Democratic Party of Bernie Sanders, and Bernie Sanders right now, again, is the odds-on favorite to become the Democratic nominee, according to the betting odds.

00:18:59.000 The betting odds have him currently at 38%.

00:19:00.000 This is a late surge. 0.99

00:19:02.000 Joe Biden has run a garbage campaign. 0.98

00:19:04.000 Joe Biden did not do any on-the-ground organizing until the last three months in Iowa. 0.99

00:19:08.000 Joe Biden has basically staked his claim to the presidency on being able to win South Carolina and Nevada.

00:19:13.000 If he loses the first three, if he loses Nevada, he's in serious, serious trouble.

00:19:17.000 Because Bernie is almost assuredly going to win New Hampshire.

00:19:20.000 If Bernie wins Iowa, he will win New Hampshire.

00:19:22.000 If he wins Iowa and New Hampshire, there's an excellent shot that he goes on to win Nevada, at which point it's very difficult to stop the Bernie train.

00:19:29.000 So everybody better hope in the Democratic Party that it is Biden coming up from behind in Iowa because otherwise they are in serious...

00:19:39.000 And Biden doesn't help himself because Biden is pathologically dishonest about his own record.

00:19:45.000 So for example, he was hit by Bernie Sanders over the past few weeks about his views on Now, as I've said, in the past, when Joe Biden wasn't running for president, he used to be a somewhat reasonable human being, right?

00:19:56.000 He voted for the crime bill of 1994, which was, contrary to popular opinion, a very good bill that helped lower the crime rates in the United States from historic highs.

00:20:05.000 It's one of the great stories in American legal history, is the decline in crime between 1994 and 2015.

00:20:12.000 People don't like to talk about that because that happened as a result of greater law enforcement and it's more comfortable to rip on law enforcement.

00:20:17.000 In times of great prosperity and great peace, it is easy to rip on the sources of the prosperity and the peace.

00:20:22.000 Biden was for that.

00:20:23.000 Biden was also in favor, 20 years ago, of freezing Social Security or at least reorganizing Social Security because he wasn't a complete insane person.

00:20:30.000 But in the Democratic Party, this is a big no-no.

00:20:31.000 So here is Joe Biden finally admitting yesterday, and I guess he was in New Hampshire, that he had talked about a social security freeze 20 years ago, but now he says he doesn't want to talk about that anymore.

00:20:41.000 It's unnecessary because here's the thing in the Democratic Party, you never speak truth to progressive power.

00:20:45.000 This fight with Bernie Sanders over Social Security.

00:20:48.000 You've said that he, quote, doctored video of you from the Senate back in the day talking about Social Security.

00:20:53.000 But you did argue that cost-of-living adjustments as part of a general spending freeze were necessary to cut federal spending and reduce the deficit.

00:21:01.000 That aside... That was 20 years ago.

00:21:03.000 Even if Sanders is playing a little rough here, and your position has changed, what about those Democratic voters who say... It hasn't changed.

00:21:08.000 Okay, 20 years ago, right?

00:21:10.000 So there he is admitting that that's what he used to hold.

00:21:12.000 But the difference is that Joe Biden is not willing to run on the basis of actual reasonable positions.

00:21:16.000 By the way, neither was Elizabeth Warren, who just received the Des Moines Register endorsement.

00:21:20.000 She throws a little bit of a wrench into things in Iowa for Bernie if she starts getting any support. 0.54

00:21:25.000 But right now, you gotta consider that Bernie Sanders is the person who is most likely to win at least the first couple of states.

00:21:32.000 Pete Buttigieg getting desperate.

00:21:33.000 He thought that he had the momentum in Iowa and New Hampshire.

00:21:36.000 He was asked, he did a Fox News town hall, and he was asked about abortion by a pro-life Democrat, and he basically said, we have no place in our party for pro-life Democrats anymore, so at least the cat's out of the bag.

00:21:45.000 I respect where you're coming from, and I hope to earn your vote, but I'm not going to try to earn your vote by tricking you.

00:21:52.000 I am pro-choice, and I believe that a woman ought to be able to make that decision.

00:21:57.000 I know that the difference of opinion that you and I have is one that we have come by honestly.

00:22:03.000 And the best that I can offer, and it may win your vote, and if not, I understand.

00:22:07.000 The best I can offer is that if we can't agree on where to draw the line, the next best thing we can do is agree on who should draw the line.

00:22:17.000 And in my view, it's the woman who's faced with that decision.

00:22:20.000 The woman asked, will you allow pro-life Democrats in the party?

00:22:22.000 And there he is basically saying, no, I will never allow pro-life Democrats in the party.

00:22:25.000 This is your democratic party.

00:22:27.000 No pro-life Democrats. 0.66

00:22:28.000 Full-on socialism.

00:22:29.000 America is a bad country.

00:22:30.000 Open anti-Semites in position of power.

00:22:32.000 That is the Bernie Sanders Democratic Party.

00:22:34.000 So Democrats, if that is what you want, by all means, go for it.

00:22:37.000 Just recognize that number one, you are probably conceding this election to Donald Trump.

00:22:41.000 And number two, Democrats who don't believe this stuff, now would be the time for you to get up on your hind legs and say so.

00:22:47.000 And meanwhile, President Trump, this is why I say, best thing for Trump is for Sanders to win the nomination.

00:22:51.000 Worst thing for the country is for Sanders to win the nomination.

00:22:53.000 President Trump is running behind virtually every Democrat in the national polling right now.

00:22:58.000 That's not true necessarily in the swing states, but banking on the swing states alone is not a wonderful electoral strategy if you have any sort of possibility of not doing that.

00:23:06.000 Right now, according to the new Fox News polling, former VP Joe Biden is leading Trump by nine points.

00:23:12.000 Bloomberg also has an eight point margin over the president.

00:23:15.000 Sanders has a six point margin on Trump.

00:23:17.000 Warren is up by five.

00:23:18.000 Buttigieg and Klobuchar also lead Trump in that same survey.

00:23:22.000 Now, again, it's early.

00:23:24.000 People have sort of a fond opinion of Bernie Sanders because they've never actually dealt with Bernie Sanders' positions.

00:23:28.000 With that said, Trump is obviously not in a wonderful position.

00:23:33.000 And that position becomes less wonderful if there happens to be anything to this impeachment.

00:23:37.000 So the whole purpose for the Democrats here is not actually to get rid of Trump.

00:23:40.000 So Democrats have been pushing impeachment because they believe that Trump is going to win if they don't impeach him.

00:23:45.000 But they can do him damage anyway.

00:23:47.000 They can hurt Trump.

00:23:48.000 And that is why Trump's best line of defense, always and forever, Was that Democrats are motivated, Democrats do not like me, Democrats hate me, and that because Democrats are motivated and don't like me and they hate me, they're willing to skew what was an unfortunate phone call into an impeachable offense.

00:24:06.000 Trump's line of defense always should have been Yes, I tied the foreign aid, the military aid to Ukraine to them pushing against corruption, including investigating all sorts of 2016 election interference, including corrupt activities with regard to the Obama administration.

00:24:20.000 You should have just said that straight up.

00:24:22.000 And then you should have said, you know what?

00:24:23.000 That's not a crime.

00:24:24.000 You may disagree with it.

00:24:25.000 You may think it was bad policy.

00:24:26.000 You may think that I'm a conspiracist.

00:24:28.000 But, it was my opinion that this was in the interest of the United States public, and therefore I went forward with it.

00:24:32.000 That would be unimpeachable.

00:24:33.000 You could not do anything with it.

00:24:34.000 Instead, because President Trump has a strategy that whenever he's accused of anything, he denies it all the way, instead he said, The problem is that is an unsustainable position.

00:24:46.000 That is not a sustainable position.

00:24:48.000 Now, the first position is a full-on sustainable position, right?

00:24:51.000 The first position, which is this... Of course, I held back the ad because I was looking at 2016, right?

00:24:56.000 That is a full-on sustainable position.

00:24:57.000 I've been saying this literally all along.

00:25:00.000 And the fact that Democrats are going after him out of bad faith is obviously true as well.

00:25:04.000 I mean, Jerry Nadler said as much over the weekend, right?

00:25:06.000 Over the weekend, Jerry Nadler said, if you don't remove Trump, then he will become a dictator.

00:25:10.000 President Trump is an outlier.

00:25:12.000 He's the first and only president ever to declare himself unaccountable and to ignore subpoenas backed by the Constitution's impeachment power.

00:25:22.000 This is a determination by President Trump that he wants to be all-powerful.

00:25:27.000 He does not have to respect the Congress.

00:25:30.000 He does not have to respect The representatives of the people, only his will goes.

00:25:36.000 He is a dictator.

00:25:37.000 He's a dictator.

00:25:38.000 Weird enough, because I'm old enough to remember when Barack Obama rejected a subpoena of materials from Eric Holder and Fast & Furious and asserted executive privilege over them.

00:25:46.000 I'm also old enough to remember when Barack Obama suggested he was going to rule the country with a pen and a phone.

00:25:50.000 So yeah, I'm not going to buy all of this.

00:25:52.000 By the way, over the weekend, it was reported that back in 2016, Obama called Trump a fascist, which is hilarious considering that it was coming from a man who wanted government control of huge swaths of American life.

00:26:02.000 In any case, the best defense for Trump is always the Democrats didn't prove their case.

00:26:06.000 That's always the best defense, because that's all he has to do.

00:26:08.000 In a prosecution, you don't have to prove that you're innocent of all charges, you just have to prove that you're not guilty.

00:26:08.000 Right?

00:26:13.000 Right?

00:26:13.000 You just have to prove that they have not proved their case.

00:26:16.000 And one of President Trump's lawyers basically said as much.

00:26:20.000 He has a lawyer named Perpura, and this lawyer, Mike Perpura, he made the case, Deputy Counsel, he made the case that the Democrats had not proved their case because all they have at this point is speculation, which is true.

00:26:31.000 All the Democrats have to support the alleged link between security assistance and investigations is Ambassador Sondland's assumptions and presumptions.

00:26:42.000 And that part is true. 0.74

00:26:43.000 When he says that all they've got is someone's presumptions of Trump's intent, that part is true.

00:26:48.000 Someone testified that he thought that Trump was doing this with regard to Joe Biden, but he didn't have any real basis for that supposition.

00:26:56.000 That part is true.

00:26:57.000 The problem is, once the Trump team starts denying that there was any quid pro quo whatsoever, Right?

00:27:02.000 Even Mick Mulvaney said no.

00:27:03.000 He said, yeah, there was a quid pro quo.

00:27:04.000 It just wasn't an illegitimate quid pro quo.

00:27:06.000 And that was read by the media to say, oh, well, that means that he was engaged in bribery.

00:27:09.000 No, the question is whether that was legitimate or whether it was illegitimate.

00:27:12.000 When Joe Biden threatened Ukraine with a billion dollars in military aid.

00:27:16.000 Well.

00:27:17.000 The Democrats claim that was a perfectly legit quid pro quo.

00:27:19.000 So the question is whether that is a legit quid pro quo or a not legit quid pro quo.

00:27:23.000 The problem is you get in trouble when you deny stuff that is obviously not deniable.

00:27:27.000 So Mike Papura, again, an attorney for the president, here's where he gets into trouble.

00:27:30.000 He says people who asked Trump about a link between security assistance and investigations were told there wasn't any.

00:27:36.000 So here he's trying to prove a case that he doesn't have to prove.

00:27:38.000 Simply because Trump is what Trump is.

00:27:40.000 So Trump insists that you go out there and deny full-scale things that he probably did, and that makes you look bad.

00:27:45.000 It makes it look suspicious, as I will explain in just one moment.

00:27:48.000 So here are Trump's lawyers over the weekend making the case that there was no connection at all between the military aid and investigations of any kind.

00:27:55.000 Which then would beg the question, okay, so then why are you withholding the military aid in the first place?

00:27:59.000 Like, you literally did not explain why you're withholding the military aid.

00:28:02.000 The answer is very simple.

00:28:03.000 He was withholding the military aid to look into 2016.

00:28:05.000 It had nothing to do with Biden 2020.

00:28:08.000 It had to do with all corruption centered around Democratic Party being favored by the Ukrainian government circa 2016.

00:28:13.000 Okay, here is Mike Papura, though, trying to make an argument that he doesn't have to make.

00:28:18.000 The two people in the House record who asked President Trump about whether there was any linkage between security assistance and investigations were told in no uncertain terms that there's no connection between the two.

00:28:30.000 When Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland asked the President in approximately the September 9 timeframe, the President told him, I want nothing, I want nothing, I want no quid pro quo.

00:28:42.000 Even earlier, On August 31, Senator Ron Johnson asked the President if there was any connection between security assistance and investigations.

00:28:52.000 The President answered, no way.

00:28:55.000 I would never do that.

00:28:56.000 Who told you that?

00:28:57.000 Okay, well, the problem is that then you have to explain why exactly the military aid was being withheld.

00:29:04.000 Again, the case that Trump should be making here is, yes, I withheld the military aid.

00:29:07.000 Yes, it was for investigations.

00:29:08.000 The investigations were, in my opinion, legitimate.

00:29:10.000 And no, they were not about 2020.

00:29:11.000 They were about 2016.

00:29:13.000 Now, the reason this is important is because if he had made that case, the Democrats would have had no place to go.

00:29:18.000 Truly, they would have had no place to go.

00:29:20.000 Because then he's not actually disputing anything that is factually provable or not provable.

00:29:24.000 Instead, he's disputing his own motive.

00:29:25.000 The motive is not provable.

00:29:27.000 The motive is what's going on inside Trump's head.

00:29:30.000 And as everybody knows, it's weird in there.

00:29:32.000 So there's no way to prove what's going on inside President Trump's head.

00:29:35.000 That would be his strongest line of defense.

00:29:37.000 Instead, because he decided to set up his case at the furthest available point, which is perfect phone call, no quid pro quo, everything fine, out to get me.

00:29:46.000 Because he did that, now he's opened the door to witnesses, as I'm about to explain.

00:29:50.000 We'll get to that in just one second.

00:29:52.000 First, if you know anything about me, most likely heard me talk about my ardent support for the pro-life cause.

00:29:57.000 You know I am extraordinarily pro-life.

00:29:59.000 Remember last year, I streamed my podcast live from the March for Life in DC.

00:30:01.000 By the way, thank you to all the people who marched last week.

00:30:04.000 Really was amazing.

00:30:05.000 The media ignored it, even though President Trump showed up.

00:30:07.000 But it's an amazing, amazing event.

00:30:09.000 What you may not be aware of is when I spoke at the March for Life, how much grief this caused us from nasty political leftists.

00:30:15.000 Our advertisers were actually targeted by left-wing so-called media watchdogs, which is to say attack dogs.

00:30:20.000 We lost a fair bit of revenue.

00:30:22.000 That was not the first time, nor will it likely be the last time, that we are attacked in an attempt to shut down pro-life voices.

00:30:27.000 And we're not the only target.

00:30:27.000 Live action.

00:30:29.000 Our great pro-life fighters.

00:30:31.000 Lila Rose runs that organization.

00:30:33.000 I personally give money to the organization.

00:30:34.000 They continue to do incredibly important work in the space.

00:30:36.000 They raise awareness and education on the abortion issue.

00:30:39.000 They do undercover videos that have exposed Planned Parenthood and other abortion clinics for horrific human rights abuses.

00:30:43.000 And social media is constantly attempting to shut them down.

00:30:45.000 So we have partnered with them.

00:30:46.000 So from now until January 31st, just a few more days, when you go to dailywire.com and use promo code liveaction, a portion of your subscription actually goes to support that pro-life cause via liveaction.

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00:31:19.000 Okay, so the reason that it makes a difference where President Trump presents his defense and the direction in which Trump presents his defense is because let's say that Trump said, sure, I was withholding the military aid because I wanted these investigations because what happened in 2016 I was withholding the military aid because I wanted these investigations because what It is important to know, did the Ukrainians interfere?

00:31:42.000 It is important to know, were the Ukrainians working with the Obama administration?

00:31:45.000 It is important to know all of those things.

00:31:47.000 And you may not like how I went about that, but there's nothing illegal about that.

00:31:49.000 That is a normal part of American foreign policy.

00:31:52.000 Let's say Trump had said that.

00:31:53.000 Well then today, when John Bolton comes forward with quote-unquote revelations, everybody would go, okay, that's not a revelation.

00:31:57.000 We already knew all of that.

00:31:59.000 Instead, because Trump made the claim there was no quid pro quo, that military aid was never attempted to be held back in favor of investigations, now when John Bolton says stuff, it's newsworthy.

00:32:09.000 So, John Bolton is coming out with a new book.

00:32:10.000 It's coming out in March.

00:32:12.000 This whole thing is obviously a publicity setup, which makes it look a little bit scuzzy.

00:32:16.000 Apparently the day that the New York Times decided to release its report on John Bolton's new book, the thing went live at Amazon.

00:32:23.000 So obviously that looks a lot like a marketing pitch that was given to the New York Times in conjunction with the sales of the book.

00:32:29.000 The National Security Council apparently denied that any White House personnel outside of its purview had seen the manuscript of former National Security Advisor John Bolton's book that was submitted to the White House for review.

00:32:40.000 White House counsel Pat Cipollone is not part of the NSC, so this is apparently an on-the-record denial that anyone on Trump's impeachment defense team reviewed Bolton's manuscript, which makes sense, because why exactly would they be making a case that is explicitly contradicted by Bolton, which now means that the Democrats have a stronger case for calling Bolton than if the Republicans had said, yeah, everything that Bolton says is true, and also that's not impeachable.

00:33:03.000 Then they would say, we don't need to hear from Bolton, we already know what he has to say.

00:33:06.000 And by the way, we already admit that what he has to say is basically true.

00:33:10.000 We just disagree on the motive, and he doesn't know the motive, and he never makes any allegations as to the motive.

00:33:16.000 That would have taken the steam out of the kettle. 1.00

00:33:18.000 Unfortunately for Republicans and for the Trump team, they went out and they made the case that Trump wanted them to make, which is that everything is hunky-dory and that John Bolton is lying.

00:33:24.000 So what exactly is Bolton alleging?

00:33:26.000 According to the New York Times, President Trump told his national security advisor in August He wanted to continue freezing $391 million in security assistance to Ukraine until officials there helped with investigations into Democrats, including the Bidens, according to an unpublished manuscript by the former advisor John Bolton.

00:33:41.000 Okay, number one, right there, that could be the defense for Team Trump.

00:33:45.000 Right?

00:33:46.000 Because it's not just we want the Bidens investigated, it's we want everything investigated surrounding 2016, including the Bidens.

00:33:52.000 So does that sound like the Bidens are the sole target going into 2020?

00:33:55.000 Or does it sound like Trump is a vindictive, thin-skinned man who believes conspiracy theories fed to him by Rudy Giuliani and wanted to check out 2016?

00:34:02.000 All of which is bad and ugly, but none of which is impeachable.

00:34:05.000 That's the case I have been making for months on this program.

00:34:09.000 The president's statement, as described by Bolton, could undercut a key element of his impeachment defense, that the holdup in aid was separate from Trump's request that Ukraine announce investigations into his perceived enemies, including former VP Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden, who had worked for a Ukrainian energy firm while his father was in office.

00:34:24.000 And by the way, Trump could make the claim if he had made that case that I'm suggesting he made, that of course we should look into Hunter Biden.

00:34:29.000 Dude is corrupt as the day is long.

00:34:30.000 There's a picture of Hunter Biden today that is emerging in the media of him getting out of a $120,000 sports car with his wife. 0.89

00:34:37.000 Like three weeks ago, Hunter Biden claimed that number one, he was not the father of a child by a stripper, and number two, that he didn't have the money, that he was bankrupt, didn't have the money to pay for the child support for that kid, allegedly.

00:34:47.000 Right?

00:34:48.000 That none of that looks great for the Bidens.

00:34:51.000 Instead, because Trump insists on micromanaging every element of these defenses, and he insists on not just saying, OK, yeah, I shouldn't have done that, but like, was it really bad and was it really impeachable?

00:35:02.000 Instead, it turns into everything's a lie, outright lie, which.

00:35:06.000 Means that now it's very difficult not to call Bolton as a witness.

00:35:09.000 And I understand there are Republicans out there today saying, well, the Democrats didn't call Bolton as a witness in the House.

00:35:14.000 That's true.

00:35:15.000 They should have called Bolton as a witness in the House.

00:35:17.000 They should have.

00:35:18.000 And it goes to the Democrats' credibility, which is nil.

00:35:20.000 But if you're a Republican and you are running in a purple state in the Senate, do you want to be the person who said, I'm not going to hear from the key witness whose bombshell revelation directly contradicts statements by Team Trump?

00:35:32.000 Do you want to be that person?

00:35:33.000 That's what the Democrats are counting on.

00:35:35.000 Bolton's explosive account of the matter, according to the New York Times, was included in drafts of a manuscript that has circulated in recent weeks to close associates.

00:35:42.000 He also sent a draft to the White House for a standard review process for some current and former administration officials who write books.

00:35:48.000 Multiple people described Bolton's account of the Ukraine affair, The book presents an outline of what Bolton might testify to if he is called in as a witness.

00:35:55.000 The White House could use the pre-publication review process to delay or even kill the book's publication or omit key passages.

00:36:01.000 Just after midnight on Monday, Trump denied it, telling Bolton the aid was tied to the investigations.

00:36:05.000 And now we have a direct contradiction between Trump and his own former national security advisor, which again is going to almost necessitate that Bolton be called in as a witness.

00:36:12.000 And it's not going to look good.

00:36:13.000 The problem is that Trump is the worst defense client of all time. 0.97

00:36:17.000 The first rule of being a defense client is shut your pie hole. 0.91

00:36:20.000 Seriously, that is the first rule of being a defense client. 0.99

00:36:22.000 If your lawyer tells you shut up, the answer is shut up.

00:36:25.000 Don't go on Twitter and mouth off about things because now you have a direct 180 degree confrontation between John Bolton, who by the way is not a dishonest human being, and Donald Trump, who shall we say has a history of embellishing the truth.

00:36:40.000 Okay, and here is what Donald Trump had to tweet.

00:36:42.000 tweet.

00:36:42.000 He tweeted, I never told John Bolton that the aid to Ukraine was tied to investigation into Democrats, including the Bidens.

00:36:48.000 In fact, he never complained about this at the time of his very public termination.

00:36:52.000 If Bolton said this, it was only to sell a book.

00:36:54.000 With that being said, the transcripts of my call with President Zelensky are all the proof is needed.

00:36:59.000 In addition to the fact that President Zelensky and the foreign minister of Ukraine said no pressure and no problems.

00:37:04.000 I Additionally, I met with President Zelensky at the UN.

00:37:08.000 Democrats said I never met and released the military aid to Ukraine without any conditions or investigations and far ahead of schedule.

00:37:15.000 I also allowed Ukraine to purchase Javelin anti-tank missiles.

00:37:18.000 My administration has done far more than the previous administration.

00:37:20.000 Okay, like all the last part of that is true.

00:37:22.000 Everything he says in the last part is true.

00:37:23.000 There's only one sentence there that's a serious problem for him and it's John Bolton's line.

00:37:27.000 Right, that John Bolton is only doing this to sell a book.

00:37:29.000 Now, it may very well be true that this is going to help John Bolton's book sales.

00:37:32.000 Also, when you accuse your own former National Security Advisor of openly lying, this is going to make it very difficult for Republicans to turn down a vote to call John Bolton as a witness.

00:37:43.000 And this is why you are seeing Mitt Romney already saying he is likely to back witnesses.

00:37:47.000 Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski are likely to back witnesses.

00:37:49.000 It is very difficult at this point for the Republican senators to say no witnesses.

00:37:54.000 Now, if this is turned into a purity test for Republicans, seriously, it's going to be so irritating.

00:37:58.000 If there are people on the right who turn this into you back witnesses, therefore you're a disloyal Republican.

00:38:05.000 No, that's not the way any of this works.

00:38:06.000 When the president says one thing, and his former national security advisor says the opposite, this is a matter of interest to the American people.

00:38:13.000 The honesty of the president is a matter of interest to the American people.

00:38:13.000 It is.

00:38:16.000 Now, does that mean that anything Bolton says makes Trump impeachable?

00:38:20.000 No.

00:38:20.000 Does it even mean that Trump lying is impeachable?

00:38:23.000 The answer is no.

00:38:24.000 He was never under oath, which is why it would be insane to put him under oath. 0.98

00:38:27.000 And this is why when Trump was saying, I would love to testify, you gotta be crazy. 1.00

00:38:32.000 You gotta be absolutely nuts. 0.93

00:38:34.000 So I think it would be a good idea for Donald Trump to testify, which is why even Trump's most ardent defenders are not saying, we'd love to hear directly from Donald Trump, because that would be like the biggest mistake he could possibly make, because then you're in danger of perjury, of course. 0.89

00:38:46.000 Trump can mouth off however he wants.

00:38:48.000 The minute he takes an oath, now he's running the risk of perjury, and now you're in Bill Clinton 1998 territory.

00:38:53.000 Which is not where you want to be.

00:38:54.000 According to Bolton's allegations, he described how the Ukraine affair unfolded over several months.

00:38:58.000 He described not only the president's private disparagement of Ukraine, but also new details about senior cabinet officials who have publicly tried to sidestep involvement.

00:39:05.000 For example, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo acknowledged privately there was no basis to the claims by the president's lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, that the ambassador to Ukraine was corrupt and believed Giuliani may have been acting on behalf of other clients. 0.98

00:39:16.000 Okay, again, all of this is perfectly consonant with stupidity, but not with impeachment. 0.98

00:39:21.000 So it can be true, right? 0.99

00:39:22.000 I've been saying all along, I think this is what happened.

00:39:24.000 Really, I've been saying like this since... You can go back and listen to the tapes.

00:39:27.000 I've been saying this since like the first two weeks of this thing.

00:39:29.000 That what happened is that Rudy Giuliani was being misled by a bunch of people with alternative agendas in Ukraine.

00:39:33.000 He was feeding Trump a bunch of material that confirmed Trump's pre-existing biases with regard to 2016.

00:39:38.000 And then those people were manipulating Rudy, who's then manipulating Trump with regard to doing certain things like firing Marie Yovanovitch and going after the Bidens in Ukraine and all the rest of this.

00:39:48.000 Bolton said that after the President's July phone call with the President of Ukraine, he raised with AG William Barr his concerns about Giuliani and told Barr that the President had mentioned him on the call.

00:39:56.000 A spokeswoman for Barr denied he learned of the call from Bolton.

00:39:59.000 The Justice Department said he learned about it only in mid-August.

00:40:02.000 Well, again, maybe he maybe Bolton raised it with with Barr after Barr had learned about it, or maybe he talked with an assistant.

00:40:09.000 We don't really know.

00:40:10.000 The acting White House chief of staff was present for at least one phone call where the president and Giuliani discussed at the ambassador.

00:40:15.000 According to Bolton, Mulvaney has told associates who'd always step away when the president spoke with his lawyer to protect their attorney client privilege.

00:40:21.000 In any case, Bolton's lawyer blamed the White House for disclosure of the book's content.

00:40:27.000 The lawyer, Charles Cooper, said it's clear, regrettably, from the New York Times article published today, the pre-publication review process has been corrupted and that information has been disclosed by persons other than those properly involved in reviewing the manuscript.

00:40:37.000 The White House did not provide responses to questions about Bolton's assertions.

00:40:40.000 Okay, bottom line is, again, it's going to be difficult now for the Republicans to deny Bolton as a witness if he is called.

00:40:48.000 Again, I don't think he's going to say anything that's impeachable.

00:40:50.000 But it's not going to be good for Trump.

00:40:52.000 And this is the problem.

00:40:54.000 This whole thing was never about impeaching Trump.

00:40:55.000 It was really about just going after Trump and damaging Trump.

00:40:58.000 And now Trump has damaged himself because Trump, again, makes claims that are not defensible on the merits.

00:41:02.000 In the same way that, by the way, again, it was not defensible on the merits for President Trump to say he'd never met Lev Parnas.

00:41:07.000 He had no idea who Lev Parnas was.

00:41:08.000 And Lev Parnas, who's Rudy Giuliani's Skullduggerous associate in Ukraine is going around dropping tapes of Trump saying things directly to him.

00:41:18.000 None of that makes Trump look particularly honest in all of this.

00:41:21.000 Parnas did drop a tape over the weekend of Donald Trump telling him to take out the Ukrainian ambassador, which is a weird thing to say since, again, Marie Yovanovitch worked for Trump.

00:41:28.000 He could fire her anytime he wanted.

00:41:30.000 The biggest problem there, I think, where we need to start is we've got to get rid of the ambassador.

00:41:36.000 She's still left over from the Clinton administration. 0.92

00:41:38.000 Who are the ambassador?

00:41:39.000 Yeah, and she's basically walking around telling everybody, wait, he's going to get impeached. 0.92

00:41:39.000 Ukraine? 0.92

00:41:44.000 Just wait.

00:41:45.000 It's incredible.

00:41:47.000 She'll be gone tomorrow.

00:41:50.000 What's your initiative?

00:41:51.000 I don't remember.

00:41:53.000 So one of the things that will be, now that we have a Secretary of State that's been sworn in.

00:41:59.000 Get rid of her. 0.92

00:42:00.000 Hooray! 0.97

00:42:00.000 Get her out tomorrow. 0.97

00:42:03.000 Take her out. 1.00

00:42:04.000 Okay?

00:42:05.000 Excellent.

00:42:05.000 Do it.

00:42:06.000 Okay, so I suppose the idea is he's talking to Parnas, but we don't know who else is at the dinner, so maybe he's talking to one of his own officials.

00:42:13.000 Okay, the bottom line is that if you tell Trump anything that is bad about Trump in front of Trump, Donald Trump will then say, take the person out, right?

00:42:19.000 That's what Donald Trump is.

00:42:20.000 That doesn't violate the law.

00:42:21.000 She works for him.

00:42:22.000 He can say whatever he wants in a private conversation, even with scuzzbags like Lev Parnas.

00:42:28.000 It makes it difficult for the Republicans to take the full on Trump has never fibbed about anything.

00:42:32.000 Everything is on the up and up.

00:42:33.000 Everything here is hunky dory line because Trump refuses to defend his own line.

00:42:37.000 He refuses to defend what he actually did.

00:42:39.000 This is why when people are all over Mitt Romney about all likely back witnesses, as I've said all along, I don't really care about witnesses.

00:42:44.000 I think the American people generally have a right to disclosure, and I'm consistent about this.

00:42:48.000 If this were Barack Obama, I'd be saying the same thing.

00:42:50.000 I would love to hear from witnesses, and that would include Hunter Biden.

00:42:53.000 And yes, it would include John Bolton.

00:42:55.000 This notion by Republicans that it's some sort of failure of purity if you don't want to allow, if you are okay with allowing witnesses when the president is directly contradicting his own NSA.

00:43:04.000 I don't buy that.

00:43:05.000 I also don't buy that anything that Bolton is claiming is actually impeachable.

00:43:09.000 Anyway, here's Mitt Romney who is taking, so Mitt Romney came out.

00:43:12.000 He said that he would likely back witnesses.

00:43:13.000 I say there are other Republicans who have said they will likely back witnesses.

00:43:17.000 All of this could have been a lot easier if the defense attorneys for Donald Trump had told their client to stop this and stop it and be quiet and let us handle this.

00:43:24.000 Because guess what?

00:43:25.000 The Democrats did not prove their case.

00:43:27.000 I mean, even Jeffrey Toobin over the weekend, before this Bolton stuff, even Jeffrey Toobin was saying, the Republicans are winning and the President is winning.

00:43:35.000 The Republicans are winning here.

00:43:36.000 The President is winning here.

00:43:38.000 And as long as they don't, you know, completely fall on their faces, which they're all competent lawyers, they're not going to do that.

00:43:48.000 I think that's fine for them.

00:43:50.000 And that, of course, is right.

00:43:51.000 That's right.

00:43:52.000 Now, we're going to have witnesses.

00:43:54.000 Now, do the witnesses mean that anything fundamentally changes?

00:43:56.000 No, it doesn't mean any of that.

00:43:57.000 Nothing is going to fundamentally change here.

00:43:59.000 With that said...

00:44:00.000 Is any of this great for President Trump looking forward to re-election?

00:44:03.000 It is not.

00:44:04.000 And it is the best thing that could happen to somebody like Bernie Sanders, who again, is making the case that anybody can beat Trump, including an open commie at this point.

00:44:12.000 Meanwhile, very quick update on the coronavirus situation.

00:44:17.000 So, the coronavirus situation continues to grow.

00:44:21.000 According to the Chinese, we now have over 80 deaths from the coronavirus.

00:44:26.000 Draconian travel corps have been implemented.

00:44:28.000 Some 50 million people in China have been barred from travel.

00:44:30.000 There are apparently five cases in the United States of coronavirus.

00:44:35.000 Apparently also it is communicable before symptoms show which is scary because you could have somebody who has it doesn't know they have it and they're already passing it on to other people.

00:44:42.000 You know as far as how deadly this is and how much of a risk it is to the United States right now they're saying worldwide the number of confirmed cases is nearing 2,000.

00:44:50.000 I think that it is important at this point to point out that the seasonal flu in the United States that the the flu was obtained by something like 3.7 million people in the United States in 2019.

00:45:04.000 3.7 million cases of the flu, between 23,000 and 41,000 hospitalizations, and somewhere between 1,300 and 3,300 flu-related deaths in the United States, just between October 1st and December 7th, 2019.

00:45:17.000 So when we talk about the coronavirus and the threat of the coronavirus, just recognize that there's flu epidemics every year, and a lot of people die from those flu epidemics.

00:45:25.000 Is this a situation for panic?

00:45:26.000 No.

00:45:27.000 Is it a situation where crackdowns on travel are necessary?

00:45:29.000 You bet.

00:45:30.000 You bet.

00:45:31.000 And we ought to keep an eye on it, obviously.

00:45:32.000 Okay, time for a quick thing that I like and then a quick thing that I hate.

00:45:36.000 So, things that I like today.

00:45:37.000 So President Trump this week is going to propose his peace plan in the Middle East.

00:45:41.000 It's going to recognize some very simple on-the-ground realities.

00:45:44.000 Realities like The Jewish quote-unquote settlements in Judea and Samaria which are not illegal under international law.

00:45:49.000 There's nothing that says the Jews are forbidden from settling in areas of Judea and Samaria that are not only historic Jewish territory but are disputed territory under international law thanks to conflict.

00:45:59.000 The peace plans of the past had always assumed those would remain Israeli territory.

00:46:04.000 President Trump is going to maintain That those areas remain Jewish in any sort of deal, which of course is what is going to happen. 0.99

00:46:12.000 The reason that that is actually smart is because if you wish to put pressure on the Palestinians to come to the table, one of the things you say is, listen, all the territory that the Jews are going and grabbing by settling there, all that territory, that's not coming back off the table. 0.99

00:46:24.000 So the faster you make peace and you grab a territorial And you grab a territorial final settlement here, the better off you are going to be.

00:46:32.000 The Palestinians, of course, have never intended on making peace under any circumstances.

00:46:35.000 The great lie of the media and of the left is that the Palestinians have been desperate for peace.

00:46:38.000 That is, of course, untrue on every level.

00:46:40.000 They've been militating in favor of the destruction of the state of Israel consistently and without break.

00:46:46.000 Since the creation of the State of Israel, the Palestine Liberation Organization, lest we forget, was founded in 1964, before the 1967 Six-Day War, which means that what they were attempting to liberate, quote-unquote, was Haifa and Tel Aviv, not Jerusalem.

00:46:59.000 Right?

00:46:59.000 Not the West Bank, which was, at that point, covered by Jordan.

00:47:02.000 So all of this is a recognition of reality.

00:47:05.000 The Trump administration does recognize the reality on the ground with regard to the state of Israel.

00:47:10.000 The White House is hoping that it can get the support of both Benjamin Netanyahu, the current prime minister, and Benny Gantz, who is his lead rival for the prime ministership, and that would provide some momentum. 0.97

00:47:20.000 Gantz would be a fool to turn it down.

00:47:22.000 Yisrael Beiteinu leader Avigdor Libran, who's sort of the swing vote over there, he made comments about both Netanyahu and Gantz's goals. 0.98

00:47:27.000 Now, one of the great lies here is that the Trump administration is trying to prop up Netanyahu, as opposed to simply providing a real plan.

00:47:43.000 I know a lot of the players on both sides with regard to this. 0.98

00:47:47.000 Suffice it to say that Benny Gantz does not have significant disagreements with Benjamin Netanyahu on foreign policy, which I know comes as a great surprise to the idiots at the editorial board of the New York Times. 0.64

00:47:54.000 Suffice it also to say that the Trump administration, they like Bibi, but if Gantz is the prime minister, they'll deal with him too. 0.95

00:47:59.000 They don't really care.

00:48:00.000 They've been having ongoing talks with Gantz.

00:48:02.000 So the silliness that this is all a method of propping up Bibi is obviously untrue.

00:48:07.000 Meanwhile, Palestinians are responding to any peace plan with another day of rage, which is called Tuesday. 0.82

00:48:12.000 In the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

00:48:14.000 When you provide your people with no jobs, steal all the money and use it to build terror cells, it turns out that people get pissed off pretty easily.

00:48:21.000 Okay, we'll bring you more details on that plan when it is finally released and when the media rip it up and down because the media are corrupt and don't understand the first thing about Middle Eastern politics.

00:48:29.000 Okay, time for a quick thing that I hate.

00:48:30.000 Okay, so obviously the thing that I hate today is this awful, awful news out of Los Angeles.

00:48:40.000 Kobe Bryant and his daughter, among nine others, were killed in this awful helicopter crash that happened over here just off of Las Virginas.

00:48:47.000 Apparently, the sort of best available information at this point suggests it was likely pilot error and not mechanical failure, although I'm sure we'll get more information.

00:48:55.000 About that, as time goes on, it was very foggy yesterday, apparently, particularly in the area where the plane crashed.

00:49:00.000 It's very hilly, so that means that if the helicopter pilot could not see the landscape, because I guess the helicopter pilot was flying beneath the cloud cover, and so if it got real foggy, he couldn't see, all of a sudden he'd get disoriented.

00:49:10.000 Just an awful, awful story.

00:49:13.000 Also, I'm a Celtics fan, so that meant that I spent most of my childhood hating Kobe, because he was a Celtics killer, right?

00:49:18.000 I mean, there was at least one championship that Kobe was responsible for stealing from Boston.

00:49:23.000 He was a player where if he wasn't on your team, you loved to hate him.

00:49:25.000 And if he was on your team, you loved to love him.

00:49:27.000 There's nobody more beloved in the city of Los Angeles than Kobe Bryant.

00:49:29.000 He's also somebody who seems to have grown over time.

00:49:31.000 Obviously, he had a bunch of personal issues very early on in his career.

00:49:36.000 By the time of his death, his daughter being on the helicopter is just devastating.

00:49:40.000 I mean, just the worst thing in the world.

00:49:42.000 13 years old, just horrific in every way.

00:49:45.000 There is this tape that was going around yesterday of Kobe talking with his daughter, Gianna.

00:49:48.000 She was the one who was on the helicopter with him.

00:49:50.000 Do you think your daughter might want to play in the WNBA?

00:49:53.000 She does, for sure.

00:49:53.000 She does?

00:49:54.000 I mean, this kid, man.

00:49:55.000 Wouldn't that be great?

00:49:55.000 on Jimmy Kimmel talking about his daughter Gianna carrying on his basketball legacy.

00:49:58.000 She's aboard the helicopter as well.

00:50:00.000 Do you think your daughter might want to play in the WNBA?

00:50:03.000 She does for sure.

00:50:04.000 She does? 0.98

00:50:04.000 I mean, this kid, man. 0.98

00:50:06.000 Wouldn't that be great?

00:50:08.000 Dude, man, I'm telling you.

00:50:09.000 The best thing that happens is when we go out and fans will come up to me and she'll be standing next to me and they'll be like, hey, you got to have a boy.

00:50:18.000 You and V gotta have a boy, man.

00:50:20.000 You have somebody carry on the tradition, the legacy.

00:50:22.000 She's like, oh yeah.

00:50:23.000 I got this.

00:50:24.000 But that's right.

00:50:29.000 Yes you do.

00:50:30.000 You got this.

00:50:31.000 There's a tape of them a couple of weeks ago sitting at a Lakers game and they're going over strategy and you can see it's really quite charming.

00:50:37.000 He's talking with her.

00:50:38.000 She's finishing his sentences.

00:50:38.000 You can see he's proud of her for how she's analyzing the game.

00:50:41.000 you know, he, He obviously was a good father, a caring father.

00:50:44.000 There's tons of tape of him online talking about his kids and playing with his kids.

00:50:48.000 They had four kids, he and his wife.

00:50:50.000 It's just, just on a human level, it's truly awful.

00:50:53.000 And whenever, obviously, somebody who touches this many people, you know, people always, it's easy to say, oh, a celebrity died, who cares?

00:50:59.000 The same thing as anybody else dying.

00:51:01.000 The reality is that celebrities do touch people's lives because you make them a part of your life.

00:51:04.000 It's just awful.

00:51:05.000 It's just so terrible.

00:51:06.000 When somebody who's a celebrity dies, you shouldn't feel bad about feeling terrible about it.

00:51:13.000 They're a part of your life.

00:51:14.000 They're somebody you spent time with.

00:51:15.000 They're somebody you welcomed into your home.

00:51:17.000 And the fact is that even if you love to hate Kobe as a player, the man was an unbelievable basketball player.

00:51:23.000 And it seems like a pretty terrific father.

00:51:25.000 You know, in the last couple of years, he retired.

00:51:28.000 He'll be, I'm sure, inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame for what's that worth, you know, posthumously.

00:51:33.000 Here's a little bit of tape from Kobe's last game.

00:51:36.000 He retired.

00:51:36.000 His final game, of course, was a very Kobe game, right?

00:51:39.000 He scored 60 points in his final game.

00:51:41.000 He was leading a very bad Lakers team to a victory in that final year.

00:51:45.000 He was badly injured a couple of years before he retired.

00:51:48.000 Here's a little bit of footage from Kobe's last game, if we've got that.

00:51:52.000 A basket equals a 50-point game.

00:51:54.000 Kobe underneath.

00:51:56.000 He's got 51!

00:51:58.000 A two-possession game.

00:52:05.000 Here's his 19th field goal, Steve.

00:52:07.000 56 points!

00:52:08.000 Are you kidding me?

00:52:11.000 The amazing Kobe Bryant!

00:52:14.000 You've got to be kidding me.

00:52:17.000 So last night in the NBA, there were a bunch of teams, because he was number 24, there were a bunch of teams that traded 24-second violations for folks who don't watch basketball.

00:52:29.000 You have 24 seconds to bring the ball down court and take a shot and hit the rim.

00:52:32.000 And so there were a bunch of teams all around the NBA where they opened the game by dribbling out the clock, the 24 seconds, and then the other team would take the ball and dribble out the clock.

00:52:42.000 Obviously, it was a terrible story when he found out that Kobe was on the helicopter.

00:52:47.000 The story got an enormous amount worse when he found out that his daughter was on the helicopter as well.

00:52:52.000 You just gotta feel, for the family today, you gotta feel... I mean, really, stuff like this is so far apart from politics that it's not even worth discussing politics.

00:53:00.000 There are people today who are very upset with Trump for having tweeted about it. 0.93

00:53:02.000 That's very silly.

00:53:03.000 Again, obviously when somebody who is a major figure dies, and whether you like Kobe or whether you didn't like Kobe, that was a major figure, when that happens, it's worth taking time to actually pause and appraise, especially because it is true that we spend an awful lot of our lives sort of denying the reality of what's coming for all of us, and when something like this happens really suddenly, it's really quite Quite awful.

00:53:24.000 And really, we should all be praying for the Bryant family tonight, particularly his wife, who lost not only a husband, but also lost a child, which is just the most unthinkable thing that can happen.

00:53:33.000 I'm a parent as well.

00:53:34.000 If you're a parent, you know that even the thought of that is like the worst thing that could possibly happen.

00:53:38.000 And because I'm from Los Angeles, this is a big thing in LA.

00:53:41.000 I remember yesterday, I happened to be at a kid's birthday party, and the news started to go around at the kid's birthday party, and it was It's pretty awful.

00:53:48.000 I mean, the whole thing is really, really awful.

00:53:50.000 So again, prayers for the Bryant family and, you know, prayers for all of us.

00:53:55.000 Really, really bad stuff.

00:53:56.000 Alrighty.

00:53:57.000 Well, we'll be back here a little bit later today with two additional hours of content.

00:54:01.000 Otherwise, we'll see you here tomorrow.

00:54:02.000 I'm Ben Shapiro.

00:54:02.000 Shapiro, this is The Ben Shapiro Show. - this is The Ben Shapiro Show. -

00:54:30.000 On the Matt Walsh Show, we're not just discussing politics.

00:54:33.000 We're talking culture, faith, family, all of the things that are really important to you.

The Ben Shapiro Show - January 27, 2020

The Worst Of Times | Ep. 940

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