David Brooks, a faux-conservative columnist for the New York Times, argues that the American upper middle class has become exclusionary. But what does that mean, exactly? And why does it matter? Ben Shapiro explains why it matters, and why it's not even remotely close to what's actually going on in the world as we know it. Plus, Tim Kaine's treasonous tweet about Hillary Clinton, and whether or not Donald Trump is guilty of treason, and much, much more. Ben Shapiro is the host of the Ben Shapiro Show on The Ben Shapiro Podcast, and he's also a contributing editor at The Daily Wire. He's a frequent contributor to The Weekly Standard, and is a regular contributor at The Huffington Post, The Daily Beast, and The Daily Caller, among other publications. He is the author of several books, including The Dark Side of America: A User s Guide to the American Utopia, which you should read if you haven't already done so, if you're a reader of The Daily Mail, The Atlantic, or The New Republic, and/or the New Republic. And if you don't already read them, you can do so on Amazon Prime, or wherever else you get your news and information, you're in for it. If you're not, then you should definitely check them out! if you have the time, because they're worth it. And if not, you'll get a copy of the book, because it's pretty good. . Thanks for listening, Ben Shapiro -- it's a must-listen to Ben Shapiro's excellent work, and it's worth listening to, too. -- especially if you want to know what's going to be the most important thing you can be done in America's most of all, it's the most influential book on the world's most important book in the past two decades, and you're going to get the most out of it, right? of all of that, right there, right in front of you, right across the internet, right at the front page of the internet? -- and you'll have access to the most of the top podcasts and social media sites in the best places in the land, right now, right next to the best podcasts on the best of the world, right after all, and everything else you need to know about what's happening in the place you're talking about, right up to it, and there's a whole lot more.
00:00:01.000On Tuesday, David Brooks, the faux-conservative columnist for the New York Times, and a columnist so ensconced in wry analysis of the American upper-middle class that he seems to have completely lost touch with reality, penned a pretty condescending column, aren't they all, about how upper-middle class Americans have created their own society.
00:00:17.000Brooks' thesis, quote, over the past generation, members of the college-educated class have become amazingly good at making sure their children retain the privileged status.
00:00:25.000They've also become devastatingly good at making sure the children of other classes
00:00:29.000This is a pretty astonishing claim, given that income mobility in the United States hasn't really changed since the 1970s, and that income mobility in the U.S.
00:00:38.000is the same as Europe's despite Europe's higher levels of redistribution.
00:00:42.000Virtually all differences in income mobility
00:00:44.000Between the United States and Europe are attributable to dropping out of high school or having babies out of wedlock.
00:00:49.000But according to Brooks, the new elite have chopped off the ladder behind them.
00:01:03.000Upper middle class parents have the means to spend two to three times more time with their preschool kids than less affluent parents.
00:01:09.000Since 1996, education expenditures among the affluent have increased by almost 300%, while education spending among every other group is basically flat.
00:01:18.000Yes, it turns out that making more money does accord your children extra benefits.
00:01:22.000But that doesn't mean that you are responsible for shutting off someone else's path to success.
00:01:26.000According to Brooks, however, the upper middle class has now become exclusionary.
00:01:30.000First, Brooks cites zoning laws in college admissions.
00:01:33.000Fair game for a talk of bending rules in favor of the upper middle class, although it's important to note that the vast majority of high school graduates in the United States now go to college, 66% as of 2013, including 46% of graduates from low-income families.
00:01:48.000He goes after what he calls informal social barriers that segregate the lower 80%.
00:01:51.000Here is his best example, quote, Recently, I took a friend with only a high school degree to lunch.
00:01:57.000Insensitively, I led her into a gourmet sandwich shop.
00:02:00.000Suddenly, I saw her face freeze up as she was confronted with sandwiches named Padrino and Pomodoro, and ingredients like soppressata, cappuccino, and striata baguette.
00:02:09.000I quickly asked her if she wanted to go somewhere else and she anxiously nodded yes, and we ate Mexican.
00:02:33.000Sport the right baby carrier, have the right podcast, food truck, tea, wine, and Pilates taste.
00:02:37.000Not to mention the right attitudes about David Foster Wallace, child rearing, gender norms, and intersectionality.
00:02:41.000Status rules are partly about collusion, about attracting educated people to your circle, tightening the bonds between you and erecting shields against everyone else.
00:02:49.000We in the educated class have created barriers to mobility that are more devastating for being invisible.
00:02:54.000The rest of America can't name them, can't understand them.
00:02:59.000We have not created informal barriers to mobility.
00:03:01.000We associate with people who think like us.
00:03:04.000This is just as true for the shishi yoga instructor moving to Lubbock as it is for a Lubbock kid moving to Hollywood.
00:03:09.000But to pretend that the habits of the upper middle class in Texas are the same as the habits of the upper middle class in Massachusetts is stupid and ignorant.
00:03:15.000Brooks's column is just another way to suggest that low-income Americans have insuperable barriers to success in America.
00:03:21.000And those barriers can be found in sandwich choices, not merely the institutional obstacles we can identify and tackle.
00:03:27.000In his column, Brooks actually contributes to a far greater barrier to success in America than cultural striation.
00:03:33.000He contributes to an unearned sense of victimhood, when the best option would be to encourage people to make solid life choices rather than lamenting their ignorance about soppressata.
00:03:42.000For the record, I have no idea what the hell soppressata is because I keep kosher.
00:03:46.000So there's a cultural barrier all to yourself.
00:04:21.000They're not great for Donald Trump Jr., but we'll talk about all of that.
00:04:24.000Plus, I have a huge announcement coming up in about 30 seconds.
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00:05:36.000Young America's Foundation, who does wonderful work sponsoring me going all over the country, they have worked out that I will be going to Berkeley on September 14th.
00:05:43.000And I fully expect that the administration of Berkeley will do its legal duty to prevent the heckler's veto.
00:05:49.000Violence from Antifa is not going to stop us.
00:05:52.000Attempted violence from Antifa is not going to prevent this.
00:05:54.000And if the Berkeley administration decides they want to shut down my speech because they can't control their own students or outside agitators, well then that's going to be on their own head.
00:06:04.000But we are coming to Berkeley in about, well, a couple of months now.
00:06:08.000So in September 14th we are coming to Berkeley.
00:06:10.000I look forward to seeing everyone there, and hopefully we can have a good, solid discussion as we have at campuses all over the country, wherever they let me speak.
00:06:17.000So, Bennett Berkeley, it's right now, moving on Twitter, hashtag Bennett Berkeley, looking forward to seeing you all there on September 14th.
00:06:28.000Well, actually, you know, before I mention the news, I know I'm really, like, stringing this out, but before I get to the huge news of the day, I just want to mention, have you seen this cup?
00:06:58.000So, as we discussed yesterday, there was a story from the New York Times that said that there was a meeting between Donald Trump Jr.
00:07:02.000and Paul Manafort and Jared Kushner and a Russian-connected lawyer named Natalia Veselnitskaya, which is an appropriately Russian name, and
00:07:11.000And I said that there were open questions about this.
00:07:13.000There's a story that came out from the Times also, a follow-on story, that says that Trump knew that she was an agent for the Russian government.
00:07:20.000There was an email exchange containing that information.
00:07:23.000And that had not yet been confirmed, so I was a little bit skeptical of that information until we actually saw the emails.
00:07:29.000And yesterday, the media decided that they were going to go nuts over this in lieu of seeing the emails.
00:07:33.000They were going to suggest that the meeting itself was criminal no matter what.
00:08:45.000said that he specifically went to the meeting with the hopes of soliciting negative information about Hillary.
00:08:54.000It's starting to smell more and more like collusion to, I think, the public.
00:09:00.000But most importantly, we really need to get the facts straight on this.
00:09:03.000Okay, so this sort of drip-drip-drip language, of course, we had to take with a grain of salt because the Democrats have been saying this since literally the middle of last year, and that drip-drip-drip hadn't actually amounted to anything.
00:09:13.000Senator Richard Blumenthal, he did the same thing.
00:09:27.000This meeting, and most especially Donald Trump Jr.'
00:09:30.000's clear acknowledgement of the reason for it, is bombshell evidence of conspiracy and criminal intent, because he went to that meeting for a purpose, and that purpose was seeking dirt on Hillary Clinton, potentially in violation of the law.
00:09:45.000And that would be 18 United States Code 1030, which is the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, among other statutes.
00:09:52.000There are a variety of other statutes that might be covered.
00:09:54.000But an agreement to violate the law, even if somebody doesn't know all the actions are going to be taken, is a conspiracy.
00:10:04.000Okay, the legal provision that he just cited is really inapplicable.
00:10:06.000The idea that this was absolutely collusion, from what we know, is that no information was actually passed and there was no actual collusion.
00:10:12.000It was quote-unquote attempted collusion, if anything.
00:10:15.000Okay, so we didn't even know that as late as yesterday.
00:10:18.000And then, we finally get this email exchange.
00:10:20.000So the New York Times is about to break a story on Donald Trump Jr.'
00:10:27.000makes the genius move of revealing all of the emails himself.
00:10:31.000He reveals all of the emails himself, and they are not good.
00:10:36.000So we are going to go through them, and I'm going to explain what exactly is happening here.
00:10:40.000So first, I want to introduce you to a man named Rob Goldstone.
00:10:44.000So Rob Goldstone was apparently an agent who was involved with one of the sponsors, a Russian family that's connected to the Russian government and to Trump originally.
00:10:52.000That family was one of the co-partners or sponsors.
00:10:56.000This ship made me think of my childhood.
00:11:23.000Favourite cartoon... No, it wasn't a cartoon.
00:12:30.000Amin is the guy who was a co-investor with Trump in the 2013 Miss Universe contest.
00:12:35.000Amin just called and asked me to contact you with something very interesting.
00:12:38.000The Crown Prosecutor of Russia just met with his father Aras this morning, and in their meeting offered to provide the Trump campaign with some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia and would be very useful to your father.
00:12:51.000This is obviously very high level and sensitive, but is part of Russia's and its government's support for Mr. Trump.
00:13:23.000This is openly stating that the meeting was based on the notion that the Russian government was going to provide information to the Trump campaign.
00:13:31.000Number two, it openly says that this was going to be part of Russia and its government's support for Mr. Trump.
00:13:37.000Third, the email explicitly says that if we don't go to you, then we can just go right around you to Donald Trump Sr.
00:13:44.000Right, the implication being that maybe they have some sort of connection to Donald Trump Sr., or at least could get some connection to Donald Trump Sr.
00:14:07.000Right, okay, so he's just a dope, and he doesn't know any better, and he figures, okay, people gather information from all sorts of sources all the time.
00:14:14.000In fact, there's a story last year that the Ukrainian government was meeting with surrogates of Hillary Clinton in order to provide them information about Trump and Russia.
00:14:21.000So, the idea that foreign actors have no influence over American elections is just not true.
00:14:26.000The Daily Caller's Peter Hafson reported that yesterday.
00:14:28.000He pointed us to this Politico link where they talked about this last year at the time.
00:14:34.000Okay, I'm just gonna go gather information.
00:14:36.000He then goes to Manafort, who should know better, and Jared Kushner, and all three of them meet, but they're meeting with the notion that this is going to be some sort of Russian government source.
00:15:40.000So, we've already met the go-between, Andy Pandy.
00:15:43.000Now we're about to meet Natasha from Natasha and Boris.
00:15:46.000She is an attorney who clearly has links to the Russian government, but she was on NBC News crying about how she feels betrayed and talking about Trump Jr.
00:15:55.000and says she doesn't actually work for the Russian government.
00:15:58.000They had the impression, it appears, that they were going to be told some information that you had about the DNC.
00:16:32.000Okay, so if you listen to Vesel Netskaya, then she's not related to the Russian government, but the Trump team was so eager to get information from the Russian government that they met with her randomly.
00:16:40.000So none of this story makes any sense from her perspective.
00:16:43.000She is clearly pretty closely linked to the Russian government.
00:16:46.000She works closely with the Russian government, has represented state-owned businesses, and a senior government official's son.
00:16:51.000She is what they call a cutout, meaning that she's somebody who has deniable links with Russia, but is pretty clearly associated
00:16:57.000Okay, so what is the upshot of all of this?
00:18:10.000I mean, if you want comfortable underwear and socks and shirts and undershirts, there's nothing better than slipping on comfortable clothing when you're hanging around the house or when you're going out.
00:18:30.000So, let's assume that everything in this email is just as it suggests that it is, and let's talk about whether this is illegal or not.
00:18:38.000So, Jonathan Turley, who's a professor over at George Washington University School of Law, he was talking about this yesterday, and the assumption, which was confirmed this morning, that Trump Jr.
00:18:47.000met with the Russians knowing that they were the Russians, and that he was attempting to get information, he says, even if that's the case, this is not necessarily illegal.
00:19:13.000Does it complicate this legally that it was a meeting with someone from another country who may have a tie to the Kremlin, as most people do in some tangential way or otherwise?
00:19:22.000No, it's only if we get more information.
00:19:25.000There could be some wire that's tripped.
00:19:27.000But the fact that you receive information from a foreign source is not itself any type of crime unless you start to radically broaden the campaign finance rules.
00:19:36.000The fact is campaigns and aides meet with foreign leaders and nationals all the time.
00:19:41.000They share information about trade and other issues.
00:19:44.000Sometimes they share information that runs against their opponent in a campaign.
00:19:49.000Okay, what he's saying there is exactly right.
00:19:50.000It is unusual, but it's not clear there's a criminal act.
00:19:53.000If we are now going to say that getting information from a foreign actor is a violation of campaign finance,
00:20:08.000Basically, information counts as some sort of donation.
00:20:11.000Then, Hillary Clinton was getting information, apparently, from the Ukrainian government, as I mentioned earlier, and so it's a little bit difficult to make that case.
00:20:20.000So, it may not be illegal, but it is certainly going to be the beginning of the Democrats really ramping this into high gear.
00:20:29.000I mean, now they're going to get really rabid because they're going to say, okay, this was just the beginning.
00:20:32.000Obviously, you have a willingness on the part of the Trump campaign to meet with members of the Russian government, or people who they thought were members of the Russian government.
00:20:38.000Obviously, you have a willingness on the part of the Russian government to say straight out that they were attempting to swing the election for Trump.
00:20:44.000Now, there's a way to read that, which is the Russian government was approaching Trump in an effort to entrap him, that basically they wanted to just mess with the election.
00:20:51.000The only way to get to Trump was to say, we support you.
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