The Charlie Kirk Show - Nothing is Normal Now with Alex Epstein and Kurt Schlichter

00:00:00.000 Hey everybody, Tanthan Charlie Kirk Show.

00:00:01.000 Kurt Schlichter joins us to talk about the California primary and so much more.

00:00:08.000 And then Alex Epstein joins us to talk about global warming, climate change, and environmentalism.

00:00:13.000 Email me your thoughts as always freedom at charliekirk.com.

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00:00:19.000 That is tpusa.com.

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00:00:25.000 Turning point USA is America's best hope.

00:00:28.000 So go to tpusa.com.

00:00:31.000 That is tpusa.com.

00:00:33.000 Email me your thoughts as always freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:00:36.000 Buckle up, everybody.

00:00:37.000 Here, we go.

00:00:38.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.

00:00:40.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus.

00:00:42.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.

00:00:46.000 Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.

00:00:49.000 I want to thank Charlie.

00:00:50.000 He's an incredible guy.

00:00:51.000 His spirit, his love of this country, he's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created, Turning Point USA.

00:00:59.000 We will not embrace the ideas that have destroyed countries, destroyed lives, and we are going to fight for freedom on campuses across the country.

00:01:08.000 That's why we are here.

00:01:11.000 Brought to you by my friends, Andrew and Todd at Sierra Pacific Mortgage, 888, 888, 1172, or AndrewNTodd.com.

00:01:22.000 Welcome back, everybody.

00:01:23.000 Email us freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:01:25.000 Joining us now is Alex Epstein.

00:01:26.000 Did I say that right, Alex?

00:01:27.000 I think I mean no offense.

00:01:29.000 Okay, good.

00:01:29.000 You got it.

00:01:30.000 You got it.

00:01:30.000 Thank you.

00:01:31.000 Thanks for joining the program, Alex.

00:01:33.000 I consider you to be the foremost thinker on this topic.

00:01:36.000 You know, Alex, one of the hardest parts of my job is when I do these college things, I have to be at least fluent or, you know, at least pretty well educated on about 500 different topics.

00:01:48.000 And the one that kids want to talk about the most is the environmental topic, right?

00:01:53.000 And so as this was happening, this is actually a clip from early March.

00:01:57.000 Right afterwards, I told Andrew, I said, we got to have Alex back on the program.

00:02:00.000 Listen to what he was saying and just ignore my response.

00:02:04.000 My response was fine.

00:02:04.000 It was average, above average, right?

00:02:06.000 But I could have done much better.

00:02:08.000 And I want you to tell us how we could respond to it better, okay?

00:02:12.000 Okay, sounds great.

00:02:13.000 So we're going to play 84 and then 85.

00:02:15.000 And, you know, you'll see the crowd chanting and stuff.

00:02:17.000 Play cut 84 and then play cut 85, please.

00:02:21.000 Given that you believe human beings are exacerbating climate change, shouldn't you agree that we ought to transition away from fossil fuels?

00:02:28.000 Well, no, I don't agree with that.

00:02:30.000 My contention is I don't know.

00:02:31.000 Are there any other contributing factors to rising global temperatures other than human activity?

00:02:36.000 If so, what are they?

00:02:37.000 And to what degree do they factor into rising global temperatures?

00:02:40.000 So how much of the global temperature rising is because of human activity?

00:02:43.000 No.

00:02:43.000 What percentage?

00:02:44.000 Is it 70%, 80%, 85%, 5%, 1%?

00:02:47.000 Because that's not what the study said.

00:02:48.000 They're saying that human activity is contributing to part of the increase.

00:02:51.000 What part?

00:02:52.000 They don't know.

00:02:53.000 That's debated.

00:02:55.000 The next one.

00:02:56.000 How and where should we dispose of the incredibly acidic, sometimes radioactive batteries that electric vehicles use?

00:03:04.000 Where should we dispose of them?

00:03:05.000 But that argument, you see, it's a straw man because you can't.

00:03:08.000 Answer the question.

00:03:10.000 I am answering question.

00:03:11.000 I am answering.

00:03:13.000 I am literally answering your questions, right?

00:03:15.000 So you're arguing about this renewable energies and their batteries and how they cause environmental harm, right?

00:03:22.000 I've asked a question.

00:03:23.000 I'm not making an argument.

00:03:24.000 What should we do with the batteries once we use them?

00:03:28.000 That's a straw man because you can't.

00:03:29.000 Strawman question.

00:03:30.000 That's a first.

00:03:31.000 I've never been accused of a strongman question.

00:03:34.000 So it goes on, Alex, that video's gone viral.

00:03:36.000 There's a lot there, but how would you respond when they say, hey, humans are definitely contributing?

00:03:40.000 Don't you want to get rid of fossil fuels?

00:03:43.000 Yeah, so both of these are interesting.

00:03:45.000 So I'd love to talk about both.

00:03:46.000 Please go ahead.

00:03:47.000 The first one, I think the first one, what I want to highlight is the framing, because often it's the problem with the question is the framing of the question.

00:03:55.000 So, notice he said, Do you agree that human beings are exacerbating climate change?

00:04:00.000 So, based it that is focusing, and I'll give you the quick answer, but I just want to sort of frame, I want to step back and think about how to think about it.

00:04:07.000 So, one is he's making climate change the only issue.

00:04:10.000 He's totally ignoring the benefits of fossil fuels, including the fact that fossil fuels make us safer from climate than ever.

00:04:17.000 We have a 98% decline in climate-related disaster deaths, largely thanks to things like fossil fuel irrigation, fossil fuel heating, fossil fuel cooling, etc.

00:04:25.000 So, the way so he's focusing on just the side effects, and then he's also assuming that they're negative.

00:04:30.000 Notice he said exacerbating climate change.

00:04:33.000 In his mind, there's nothing, there's no such thing as positive climate change that we could contribute to.

00:04:38.000 And yet, part of our climate change is greening, which is very positive overall.

00:04:43.000 And then, even warming is significantly positive in a world where far more die from cold than from heat.

00:04:47.000 That doesn't mean it's only positive, but so what I'm going to notice is he's got this bias against climate is the only issue, and then all our impact is negative.

00:04:55.000 And then he's sort of asking you to respond and just neutralize that.

00:04:59.000 Whereas, what I would say is, no, no, it's an absolute fact that fossil fuels have dramatically decreased climate danger.

00:05:05.000 That's the key thing.

00:05:06.000 What we care about is not the exact state of the climate, but how dangerous it is.

00:05:11.000 And we've dramatically reduced climate danger.

00:05:13.000 So, that's what that's what I think.

00:05:14.000 I think that's super smart.

00:05:15.000 You said there was a second part you wanted to mention: electric vehicles.

00:05:18.000 And that ties into our premise of the Biden electric vehicle proposal, but please, yes.

00:05:18.000 Oh, that was the second part.

00:05:23.000 Yeah, so that one, I think, what you know, it's with the EVs.

00:05:28.000 So, I think the point to make about EVs is people think about them as magic.

00:05:33.000 So, when they think about fossil fuels and fossil-fueled vehicles, they think of them only in terms of negative side effects.

00:05:38.000 And when they think of solar, wind, and batteries, they think of them as magically positive, only talk about positives, don't talk about negatives, including the biggest negative of all of those things is not all the mining consequences, though those are real.

00:05:51.000 It's the lack of positive.

00:05:52.000 It's that solar and wind can't provide low-cost, truly reliable electricity, let alone all of our energy, and that EVs are not cost-effective for the vast majority of people now, let alone with our declining grid.

00:06:04.000 So, those are the main points.

00:06:05.000 I think it is legitimate to talk about the negative environmental impacts, and particularly the fact that the so-called green movement is totally ignoring them.

00:06:13.000 They're ignoring slave labor, they're ignoring where these supply chains are, they're ignoring that they're in China.

00:06:19.000 And what this shows me is that the focus is not really on having cleaner, better energy, it's just finding some excuse to attack fossil fuels.

00:06:27.000 And then, when they discover that green energy is not green, then they'll just attack that too, because the root of this is just a hostility toward human impact.

00:06:35.000 This is why you see more and more like Greta was just protesting against some windmills.

00:06:38.000 They are against impact, and if you're against impact, you're against all energy because energy is impact.

00:06:44.000 I think that's really smart, and you have to call out the inconsistencies on the greeny side.

00:06:49.000 You have to.

00:06:50.000 It creates division and schism, and it destroys their uniformity.

00:06:54.000 But it really is an anti-human movement, is what is at the core of this, right?

00:06:58.000 It's anti-human at the core.

00:07:00.000 So, I want to read your tweet here.

00:07:02.000 I think it's very powerful.

00:07:03.000 Biden, so Biden has a new proposed electric vehicle mandate saying that by 2030, he wants 67% of all vehicles to be electric vehicles.

00:07:13.000 Is that right?

00:07:14.000 Am I understanding that?

00:07:16.000 Yes, it's technically 2032, and it's but it's really devious, right?

00:07:21.000 Because this is the Environmental Protection Agency, which, if it's supposed to do anything, is like setting reasonable thresholds for clean air where we have relatively clean air, but we can also prosper and enjoy our lives.

00:07:32.000 And instead, what they're using it for is to dictate what percentage of EVs we should drive.

00:07:38.000 It's currently around 6% of new vehicles, and they're saying that within less than 10 years, it should be 67%.

00:07:44.000 And what does this mean?

00:07:45.000 This means forcing on us vehicles that we do not want to drive and also forcing EVs on us in a situation where the Biden administration is destroying reliable electricity.

00:07:55.000 So they have plans to gut the reliability of the grid, which has already been partially gutted in the next seven years.

00:08:01.000 And then they're saying, we're going to destroy reliable electricity and then we're going to radically increase demand for reliable electricity.

00:08:07.000 What could go wrong?

00:08:07.000 This is just classic dictatorial, so-called central planning, but with a hostility toward industry.

00:08:13.000 So it's even worse than the Soviet kind because the people behind it don't really care about industry. 0.75

00:08:17.000 And they're willing to use complete force to do it, right?

00:08:22.000 Of course.

00:08:23.000 And that's the point.

00:08:24.000 And so, yes.

00:08:25.000 You see here in the, you say here in the tweet, create a huge new demand for reliable electricity on a grid that is declining in reliable electricity supply.

00:08:34.000 I think that's really smart, a point you made.

00:08:36.000 People look at this as if it is, it's magic.

00:08:40.000 It's now modern day alchemy, right?

00:08:42.000 You just kind of, it just appears and it just is able to drive.

00:08:46.000 They don't think about what actually might power it or any of the other costs associated.

00:08:50.000 So one of the, I want to have you elaborate, force Americans to drive inferior cars. 0.96

00:08:56.000 What do you mean by that?

00:08:58.000 Yeah, because people will say, I know a Tesla, that's not an inferior car.

00:09:02.000 But inferiority and superiority are a matter of cost effectiveness.

00:09:06.000 So how much value do you get for how much you have to pay?

00:09:09.000 And for the vast majority of people, the most cost-effective option by far is a gasoline vehicle that is cheaper, but maybe even more important, it's more effective.

00:09:18.000 So it allows you to, you know, it has, it's easier to quote unquote charge.

00:09:22.000 You fill it up at three minutes in the gas station versus going to some supercharger that takes a long time.

00:09:28.000 It doesn't have the same range issues in part because of the charging speed, in part because the gas stations are much more, you know, much more, much more common than EV type charging stations.

00:09:37.000 And this is, this is the, the thing I want to emphasize is the force because I'm all for EVs competing on the market.

00:09:43.000 There are certain advantages to EVs, but right now, for most people, there are more disadvantages than advantages.

00:09:48.000 And as I also stress, it's really, really important that EVs make you far more dependent on government because government controls the grid.

00:09:57.000 This is exactly.

00:09:57.000 And government is controlling the grid in an anti-electricity way.

00:10:03.000 So just to give you rough numbers, right now we have about 1,000 gigawatts.

00:10:08.000 They call it gigawatts in Back to the Future.

00:10:10.000 We have 1,000 gigawatts of what I would call reliable capacity.

00:10:13.000 This means capacity you can control.

00:10:15.000 So this includes hydro, nuclear, coal, and gas.

00:10:19.000 Those are the main sources of it.

00:10:20.000 It could include oil, but we don't usually use oil power plants.

00:10:23.000 So we have a thousand and the Biden EPA plus the other Biden plans threatens to reduce that by 20% to 800 in the next seven years.

00:10:31.000 This, I think, is the biggest energy emergency nobody is talking about.

00:10:34.000 It's the electricity emergency.

00:10:36.000 So they have plans to cut the supply of reliable electricity by 20%.

00:10:42.000 And then they're mandating a huge increase in demand, most notably with EVs, but also, right, no more gas stoves.

00:10:48.000 We need electric everything.

00:10:50.000 So you're having centralized control by an administration and by a movement that is hostile to energy.

00:10:56.000 This is really terrifying, and we really need to wake up.

00:10:59.000 Centralized control of people that can't run a border or get weapons out of Afghanistan. 0.79

00:11:03.000 That's who we should allow control our lives. 0.84

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00:12:20.000 I want to make sure I mention your book, Fossil Future.

00:12:23.000 So, Alex, you have a very, I think, effective way of framing this.

00:12:27.000 Let me just ask you another question here: Charlie, why wouldn't we want to have government subsidies towards electric vehicles or green energy?

00:12:36.000 It is the future.

00:12:38.000 Shouldn't the government subsidize what is good for the environment?

00:12:44.000 Well, I would say if something is, if you're saying it's the future, so you're saying it's superior.

00:12:49.000 This is parroting.

00:12:50.000 No, no, no, I'm talking to the questioner.

00:12:52.000 I'm talking, I wasn't confused about that.

00:12:55.000 So, if you're really saying it's the future, I mean, you're saying this can be more cost-effective, including giving you more value with less pollution.

00:13:04.000 And so, if that's the case, what you need is the same thing you need for any other superior product, which is freedom.

00:13:09.000 So, if you're focused on, hey, I think there are promising forms of green energy, make sure we have things like the freedom to develop land, which we definitely don't in the U.S.

00:13:17.000 I mean, you notice the Biden administration just shut down a huge mining project in Minnesota after claiming they want domestic minerals.

00:13:23.000 So, it's really or the nuclear.

00:13:25.000 Nuclear, we virtually criminalize.

00:13:27.000 So, I think there are promising alternatives, but they need to be liberated from actually the green movement, which is really the anti-impact movement.

00:13:35.000 If you're talking about subsidizing, why not subsidize and mandate inferior things?

00:13:40.000 Well, why don't I just force you to do an inferior thing?

00:13:43.000 That just means that your life is worse.

00:13:44.000 You can do less with it.

00:13:46.000 You have fewer resources.

00:13:47.000 And with solar and wind, it's particularly insidious because the way the subsidies work is that we, the grid policies, make us pay more money for unreliable electricity as reliable electricity.

00:13:59.000 So, that's like you go to a rental car place and you're forced to pay more for a car that works a third of the time than a car that works all the time.

00:14:05.000 Imagine what that would do to the rental car market.

00:14:07.000 Well, that's what it's done to the grid.

00:14:09.000 So, we have more and more incentive to shut down reliable power plants and to spin up unreliable power plants, which is why, as I mentioned, we've got a threatened 20% decline in our already too low level of reliable electricity today.

00:14:21.000 So, stop subsidizing unreliable, inferior things and liberate superior things.

00:14:27.000 I mean, I can't help but think, Alex, outside of the environmental considerations, there is an agenda, a nefarious plot to just restrict human liberty and freedom.

00:14:38.000 I think environmentalism is a gateway for technological tyranny.

00:14:44.000 Am I wrong?

00:14:47.000 Yeah, you could put it even more strongly than that, because in a sense, yeah, it's obvious.

00:14:51.000 I mean, historically, Ayn Rand has this great book, The New Left, where she documented, and others did it too, that the whole green movement was an attempt by the left to continue to support anti-capitalism after capitalism had proved that it could out-produce socialism.

00:15:05.000 I mean, dramatically.

00:15:06.000 So, the old left supported socialism, capitalism was clearly superior.

00:15:10.000 So, what the left unfortunately did was they abandoned industry, right?

00:15:12.000 Instead of embracing industry and then embracing capitalism, they rejected industry with this whole idea that impact is wrong.

00:15:19.000 So, in a sense, there's the watermelon phenomenon of green on the outside, red on the inside.

00:15:24.000 But from another perspective, the green perspective is just fundamentally anti-freedom because it says human impact on nature is immoral and inevitably self-destructive.

00:15:34.000 Well, if impact is immoral, we survive by impact.

00:15:37.000 That's what we do.

00:15:38.000 So if you believe that our means of survival is immoral, the only way to prevent it is to stop us from acting.

00:15:44.000 So anti-impact equals anti-freedom.

00:15:46.000 Yeah, I was just looking this up as you mentioned it.

00:15:48.000 I'm familiar.

00:15:48.000 I've read a lot of Ayn Rand's work.

00:15:52.000 This is really well summarized on Ayn Rand.org.

00:15:54.000 Again, I have plenty of disagreements with her, but this is really powerful.

00:15:57.000 She disagrees.

00:15:58.000 She analyzes the campus protests of the 1960s and the ideology of the new left, concluding that far from rebelling, they were slavishly following every basic idea of their teachers, and that far from being idealistic, they were attacking the key foundations of a rational, free society.

00:16:15.000 Riff on that for a minute, Alex, as we conclude.

00:16:18.000 Sure.

00:16:18.000 So this is, this is, there's a book called The Cashing in the Student Rebellion.

00:16:22.000 I'd highly, highly recommend it.

00:16:23.000 It's basically saying that these people who are so-called rebels were actually just employing like the subjectivist relativist ideas that they got from their stodgy old white professors and also collectivist ideas.

00:16:35.000 And what she's saying is the radical ideas are individualism.

00:16:38.000 And that's what she's advocating, what I advocate.

00:16:40.000 That's what we need a movement for is individualism and freedom.

00:16:43.000 And we should see that as the most progressive thing.

00:16:45.000 Collectivism, statism, anti-freedom, those are regressive.

00:16:48.000 That's why I don't call them progress.

00:16:50.000 Yeah, tribalism, sectarianism, trying to say that your rights come from a group.

00:16:54.000 It's regressive and it would bring us back. 1.00

00:16:56.000 That's what they're trying to do.

00:16:58.000 Alex, thank you.

00:16:59.000 Remind us of the two books again.

00:17:01.000 So the main book, the only one you need is Fossil Future.

00:17:04.000 It replaces the moral case for fossil fuels and you can get it anywhere, including fossilfuture.com.

00:17:09.000 And for answers to every question that Charlie comes up against, go to energytalkingpoints.com.

00:17:14.000 At least any energy, environmental, and climate question.

00:17:16.000 I got all the answers for free there.

00:17:18.000 I didn't know that.

00:17:19.000 So now I'm going to it right now.

00:17:21.000 Alex, I could be somewhat fluent on this, but nowhere near you, but I'm trying.

00:17:26.000 Cause I tell you, these college students, it is a religion.

00:17:29.000 It is a cult religion of earth worship.

00:17:33.000 I think one out of three questions I get is on the environment.

00:17:36.000 Alex, thank you so much.

00:17:37.000 I appreciate it.

00:17:38.000 You'll have everything you need.

00:17:39.000 Thanks so much, Alex.

00:17:40.000 You bet.

00:17:44.000 Hey, everybody, this is Charlie Kirk.

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00:18:50.000 Joining us now is Kurt Schlichter.

00:18:52.000 Love having Kurt on the program.

00:18:54.000 Kurt, lots to talk about.

00:18:56.000 Let's start with your latest piece.

00:18:57.000 I think it's really smart.

00:18:58.000 Do not fall for the normalcy presumption.

00:19:01.000 Nothing is normal anymore.

00:19:04.000 What do you mean by that, Kurt?

00:19:06.000 Well, great to be here, Charlie.

00:19:08.000 My new town hall piece basically argues that the left uses the idea that everything is normal, that the institutions are functioning, that everything works, that, for example, we have a justice system that's not a biased machine designed to free criminals and persecute the political opponents of the regime.

00:19:27.000 And, you know, a lot of these sucker squish Republicans fall for. 0.98

00:19:32.000 You know, when you hear them say, Well, we need to hear what the jury has to say. 0.62

00:19:36.000 No, no, we don't.

00:19:38.000 Because when you take a key component out of the system, it breaks the system.

00:19:42.000 The system changed.

00:19:43.000 What Soros did by going in and buying the district attorney offices in a bunch of counties across the United States, what he did is he took a position that had a lot of leeway, a lot of discretion, because where it was a Republican or a Democrat, they usually just prosecuted criminals, but now they abuse that discretion.

00:20:04.000 So you see people using self-defense like Daniel Perry in Texas or the family attacked at their own home in Missouri, and suddenly they're being prosecuted for self-defense.

00:20:17.000 Well, actual criminals are going free.

00:20:19.000 And of course, two words, Alvin Bragg.

00:20:22.000 And so there is this attitude that exists in especially 60 or 70-year-old Republican circles where they're outraged on the surface, but then you really dive into it and they say, oh, I mean, there's no way this can continue.

00:20:42.000 There's this built-in.

00:20:44.000 And I will say this: you know, Eric Weinstein is a liberal.

00:20:49.000 He's interesting.

00:20:50.000 He has a term for it.

00:20:51.000 And he said it's specifically boomer called the ego, the embedded growth obligation.

00:20:58.000 That things are just always going to get better, no matter what.

00:21:01.000 Yes.

00:21:02.000 And yeah, I think that's related.

00:21:04.000 I think people are thinking this is still the system that we always had.

00:21:07.000 And look, when I was growing up, because I'm about 108 years older than you, but 307 years younger than Biden, everything was getting better.

00:21:18.000 The 70s were kind of problematic, but the 80s were great.

00:21:21.000 And then the 90s were pretty good.

00:21:23.000 And they're in the 2000s and it starts kind of going downhill.

00:21:27.000 These guys seem to think, hey, we've got a system.

00:21:30.000 It's not broken.

00:21:32.000 You know, we just need some minor tweaks.

00:21:34.000 But the problem, Charlie, is that our cultural Marxist enemies have come in.

00:21:38.000 They've taken over the system.

00:21:40.000 They take over the institutions.

00:21:42.000 They destroy everything that gave the institutions their credibility.

00:21:46.000 Yet they still demand credibility.

00:21:48.000 They said, like regime media people still demand to be treated as neutral truth tellers who are speaking truth to power and afflicting the comfortable and comforting the afflicted.

00:22:00.000 That's all baloney.

00:22:02.000 That all changed.

00:22:03.000 The system changed when they changed components of it, when they stopped doing the things necessary for the system to exist and to function.

00:22:12.000 And when they did that, we stopped having a system, but there are a lot of Republicans out there who are afraid to face the reality.

00:22:18.000 Yes, that's right.

00:22:20.000 Well, and you know, that old expression, obviously, ignorance is bliss.

00:22:23.000 There is some truth to that.

00:22:24.000 I don't think people are comfortable admitting the country they grew up in is dead.

00:22:29.000 We can refound it.

00:22:30.000 We can bring parts of it back.

00:22:32.000 But it's almost as if the lie of acting as if the country you loved is still around is more comfortable, is more comforting.

00:22:40.000 This really bothers people when I say it.

00:22:42.000 Yeah.

00:22:43.000 It's denial.

00:22:44.000 It's the stages of grief.

00:22:46.000 It is.

00:22:46.000 It's look, it's also human nature.

00:22:50.000 In the Battle of Kenai, when Hannibal surrounds all the Romans, Romans, toughest soldiers in the world, and they're getting butchered.

00:22:59.000 And when they found, and after the Carthaginians killed them all, they found some of the Romans had just buried their head in the sand because they couldn't take the fact that the world had turned upside down, that they were no longer the strongest, no longer the best, and that they were, you know, they were going to die.

00:23:16.000 Like ostriches, they bury their heads in the sand, literally.

00:23:19.000 And that's what we have here.

00:23:21.000 Because if you admit there's a problem, the next step is: okay, senator or congressman or governor, what are you going to do about it?

00:23:30.000 And many of them are afraid to step up.

00:23:32.000 You know, Ron DeSantis steps up.

00:23:34.000 Greg Abbott, to his great credit, stepped up and said, I'm going to go through the process of pardoning Daniel Perry.

00:23:41.000 I can't do it tomorrow because of the way the law is, but I'm going to do it.

00:23:44.000 And then I'm going to go take out these Soros DAs who are doing so much damage in Texas. 0.98

00:23:51.000 We've got to stop pretending it's 2005.

00:23:54.000 I know it's hard.

00:23:55.000 I know it's tough.

00:23:57.000 Too bad.

00:23:58.000 Sorry that.

00:23:59.000 you know, sorry that this happened on your watch, but it happened on your watch.

00:24:04.000 Your duty is to fight for our interests, not to pretend, not to try and have an easy way out, not to stick your head in the sand, but to fight for the interests of the American people.

00:24:16.000 And I think that really is the issue: people do not want to look over the edge of the abyss.

00:24:21.000 They'd be rather like, oh, this is fine.

00:24:22.000 Like, I mean, I got in a debate.

00:24:25.000 I got in a debate with somebody the other day.

00:24:26.000 They said, Charlie, this Trump thing, it's really going to be a good thing because then he'll be able to fight it and he'll get acquitted by a jury of his peers.

00:24:35.000 And we have to let the process play out.

00:24:38.000 No.

00:24:40.000 That's crazy.

00:24:41.000 Look, it's not a legal process.

00:24:43.000 It's a power process.

00:24:44.000 Yes, that's right.

00:24:46.000 I'm a lawyer.

00:24:47.000 I look at this.

00:24:48.000 It's ridiculous on the face of it, legally, but that doesn't matter because it's not a legal process. 0.67

00:24:54.000 It's a power process.

00:24:55.000 And you make a mistake if you treat it as a legal process.

00:24:58.000 Now, let me give you a caveat.

00:24:59.000 That's an important one.

00:25:00.000 Some people are saying, well, you know, Andrew McCarthy and a baseball crank on NRO, they're analyzing this as if it's a legal issue.

00:25:08.000 They don't get it.

00:25:10.000 I think we need to do that for the folks who are not based, for the normal people who are out there going, you know, there's something wrong. 1.00

00:25:17.000 I can't put my finger on it.

00:25:19.000 You need guys like Andrew McCarthy and baseball crank to go ahead and explain legally why this is all nonsense.

00:25:26.000 But guys like you, guys like me, who've been in the fight, guys like you're on.

00:25:30.000 We know exactly what it is.

00:25:32.000 I don't need to hear the convoluted legal theory, right?

00:25:36.000 Yeah, so it's not for us.

00:25:38.000 That needs to be done, but it's not directed at us.

00:25:41.000 It's directed at the people we need to persuade who need to understand why they're feeling everything's out of control.

00:25:48.000 Guys, here's why you're feeling it because you're right to feel it.

00:25:52.000 So in that case, we need to understand.

00:25:55.000 But I got to tell you, I don't want to hear anymore about, well, could you imagine if Biden did what Trump just did?

00:26:02.000 Or can you imagine what would happen if Trump did what some Democrat did?

00:26:06.000 Yeah, we get the hypocrisy thing.

00:26:09.000 That's over here.

00:26:10.000 We're about two miles down the road this way, guys.

00:26:13.000 We get it.

00:26:13.000 Thanks.

00:26:14.000 Hypocrisy was very like 2011.

00:26:17.000 Okay.

00:26:17.000 Yes.

00:26:18.000 That was 12 hours ago.

00:26:20.000 Right.

00:26:21.000 That is for the normals.

00:26:22.000 That's for the people who are not based.

00:26:25.000 For us, it's about power and how you wield it.

00:26:29.000 And again, when I say wield power, I do not mean doing some of the things Democrats are doing.

00:26:34.000 They are literally trying to frame Donald Trump.

00:26:37.000 They are trying to use the criminal process to unjustly convict him of a crime he did not commit.

00:26:41.000 That is framing.

00:26:42.000 I don't advocate that.

00:26:43.000 That's un-American. 0.81

00:26:44.000 The Bible tells you you don't do it.

00:26:46.000 You don't do it.

00:26:48.000 But you do stop with the presumption of, you know, we're not going to investigate our political opponents, even when it smells really bad.

00:26:55.000 I would like to know, Charlie, how Nancy Pelosi became America's preeminent stock picker.

00:27:03.000 I mean, she doesn't seem that bright to me.

00:27:05.000 She's a little cunning, but you know.

00:27:07.000 She's the oracle of San Francisco, Kurt.

00:27:10.000 Are you kidding me?

00:27:11.000 She runs circles around Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett. 0.81

00:27:15.000 Well, maybe she just went, looked at what Jim Kramer said, and then did exactly the opposite.

00:27:21.000 I don't know.

00:27:21.000 Yes, that'd be right.

00:27:23.000 No, I mean, it would be very interesting.

00:27:24.000 Think how under the new paradigm, that's something we should look at where we wouldn't have 10 years ago.

00:27:30.000 Well, I mean, but yeah, I mean, just an easy one that I keep on floating.

00:27:33.000 And I've called a couple attorneys general, and they're worthless.

00:27:37.000 They're gutless wonders.

00:27:38.000 I said, Why are you not indicting BLM?

00:27:40.000 Let's start there.

00:27:41.000 They are a holy organization on the American left, and the crimes are right there.

00:27:45.000 It's charitable fraud.

00:27:47.000 They have donors that have come from every state.

00:27:49.000 They have jurisdiction, right?

00:27:51.000 This is not some sort of a stretch.

00:27:52.000 So, Alabama, Louisiana, Texas, Oklahoma, they have donors that were defrauded.

00:27:59.000 So, they have jurisdiction.

00:28:00.000 Why is there not been an indictment of that?

00:28:03.000 That is a great question.

00:28:05.000 That is definitely see.

00:28:07.000 And that's not framing them.

00:28:09.000 Well, no, it's taking action.

00:28:11.000 They stole money from they stole money from upper-middle-class white liberals in like suburban Oklahoma City or Norman, Oklahoma, and they bought a mansion in Malibu, California.

00:28:23.000 Look, look, I think an aggressive attorney general should be doing that.

00:28:27.000 But there's not asking those and going through the legal process because we have to let the legal process play through, right?

00:28:34.000 Or do we only do that for conservatives?

00:28:38.000 We don't.

00:28:38.000 And I think part of the issue, and this is human nature, so I want your thoughts on this on this as we close out this segment, Kurt, is that the trappings of America, the trappings of Western society, we have a lot of wealth, a lot of free time, a lot of luxury.

00:28:52.000 And I think people are afraid, literally afraid, to leave comfort and to go into the fight.

00:29:00.000 The only good wrinkle I see out of mass inflation and America becoming poor is that people might actually be willing to get involved in political activism again is because you're actually going to be super poor.

00:29:10.000 And I know that sounds really sick and twisted, but it's actually true. 0.90

00:29:15.000 It's like, okay, you can't go on a vacation.

00:29:17.000 Maybe you should actually fight for your country.

00:29:19.000 But, you know, you look human, human nature is like that.

00:29:24.000 Most people want to live nice, comfortable lives.

00:29:27.000 Unfortunately, and I think it's going to be a problem for them down the road.

00:29:32.000 The cultural Marxists have decided they can't tolerate that.

00:29:35.000 They have to afflict these people.

00:29:37.000 They have to go and hassle them.

00:29:39.000 You know, somebody was saying, you know, somebody, again, another conservative is just not basically goes, well, you know, I'm tolerant.

00:29:45.000 I think we should just live and let live.

00:29:47.000 Dude, I tried living and let living, and you had grown men working in thongs in front of little kids' faces.

00:29:55.000 Don't tell me about tolerance.

00:29:57.000 That is not a tolerance.

00:29:58.000 Live and let live is the most basic system.

00:30:01.000 Me lets you live, but you got to let me live.

00:30:04.000 And if you're not letting me live, we don't have a system.

00:30:07.000 It's like, and I, I, isn't an example, you know, exactly right.

00:30:12.000 Young people go out on a date, the guy doesn't buy dinner, and she's like, well, I can't believe he didn't buy dinner.

00:30:19.000 Also, I'm a feminist. 1.00

00:30:21.000 Okay, a system. 1.00

00:30:22.000 Chivalry's a system.

00:30:24.000 It's a system.

00:30:26.000 It's a system.

00:30:27.000 And if there's no system, if all the parts aren't working, it's not a system in your obligation.

00:30:32.000 That's exactly right.

00:30:33.000 So, so if a tranny was on the show, right, they would say, live and let live, right? 1.00

00:30:37.000 Charlie, I'd say, are you going to live and let me live?

00:30:40.000 And exactly.

00:30:41.000 It doesn't go both ways.

00:30:42.000 It has to be mutual cooperation or the contract falls apart.

00:30:47.000 Yes, there's no, we are free of our obligation under the social contract they invented.

00:30:52.000 I like live and let live.

00:30:53.000 I think live and let live is the best way to do things.

00:30:57.000 Yes.

00:30:57.000 But some people don't get power out of it, so they don't want to do it.

00:31:00.000 It only works if it's mutual.

00:31:02.000 I have a whole article right now on humanevents.com hilariously called The Lie of Live and Let Live.

00:31:07.000 It's exactly this, which is if you do not have mutual cooperation and we're the only ones that are living, it's live and let them rule.

00:31:14.000 Right.

00:31:14.000 And so it's over.

00:31:16.000 Sorry, you guys broke the peace.

00:31:19.000 You guys decided to cross the Rubicon.

00:31:21.000 It's not live and let live. 0.92

00:31:22.000 So, now one people, somebody's going to be in control, and the mature adults that want to protect children are going to be in control, not the perverts or the twerking trans peoples. 1.00

00:31:30.000 Kurt, I want to ask you about California politics.

00:31:33.000 Diane Feinstein is not going to run for re-election, so it started the most bizarre Game of Thrones situation we've seen.

00:31:40.000 It's basically who can be the greatest trans anti-racist. 0.97

00:31:45.000 And I mean, this thing is a total clown car. 0.91

00:31:48.000 I mean, we have a lot of different people.

00:31:50.000 We got Adam Schiff, Katie Porter, Representative Barbara Lee.

00:31:56.000 I can't even keep track of all of it.

00:31:58.000 Kurt, what's going on?

00:31:59.000 RoConna?

00:32:00.000 Wow.

00:32:00.000 It is like Game of Thrones, except everybody's Joffrey.

00:32:05.000 And they're all trans.

00:32:11.000 Let's look at these.

00:32:12.000 Barbara Lee is the one person who voted against fighting back against Al-Qaeda.

00:32:16.000 She's from Alameda County, which has Oakland. 0.93

00:32:19.000 She is the perfect embodiment of the total failure of the kind of left Democrats.

00:32:27.000 But then so is Adam Schipp, who's from Los Angeles County.

00:32:30.000 He's just terrible in every single way.

00:32:33.000 You know, he looks like the guy idling in a van outside elementary school. 0.99

00:32:40.000 And Katie Porter, I mean, she's just a monster.

00:32:45.000 I mean, she's just literally. 0.75

00:32:47.000 I mean, did you read the last allegation? 1.00

00:32:49.000 She threw boiling potatoes on her husband's head and then called him stupid and, you know, a blanking, blank, blank. 1.00

00:32:56.000 There's no way she would let good potatoes go to waste. 1.00

00:32:58.000 Impossible.

00:32:59.000 Well, exactly.

00:33:00.000 I mean, you know, as a noted carbohydrate advocate, you would think that that would be a very, very cheap. 1.00

00:33:06.000 She definitely gets her, she gets her fair share of carbs. 1.00

00:33:09.000 I mean, you look at her and she is just like, she's every obnoxious, woke, Trader Joe Chardonnay swilling wine woman who screws up your PTA meetings. 1.00

00:33:24.000 You know, and she is, you know, she definitely drives the Prius with the saddest suspension in all of automotive history. 1.00

00:33:34.000 And on the back of it, she has both a coexist bumper sticker and an exterminate right-wing lunatics bumper sticker. 1.00

00:33:43.000 She's just like the essence of evil. 1.00

00:33:45.000 You know, I'm trying to think of an okay Democrat in California.

00:33:51.000 I think Ro Conna, who's a socialist, comes closest.

00:33:54.000 And we're saying, you know, the guy who's merely a socialist is probably the best of all these bad choices.

00:34:01.000 That doesn't say much for my state.

00:34:04.000 Is Eric Swallow running?

00:34:05.000 I can't keep track of this.

00:34:08.000 Well, he's going to be running from the Department of Justice with our Republicans.

00:34:12.000 Seriously, no kidding.

00:34:14.000 That statue of limitations gets extended.

00:34:16.000 Yeah, Toots Swalwell.

00:34:19.000 You know, maybe I put him in charge of, you know, patching things up with the Chinese. 1.00

00:34:25.000 I heard that he's foreign espionage.

00:34:29.000 So, Kurt, it's not inconceivable then, because of California's goofy system, that two Democrats could go to the wrong.

00:34:37.000 No, I think it's likely.

00:34:39.000 And the thing is, the California Republicans don't have much of a bench out here.

00:34:43.000 We really don't have a lot of great candidates.

00:34:47.000 And, you know, when I got here to California, Ronald Reagan was governor, which tells you how old I am.

00:34:54.000 And for 30 years after that, we had a great state.

00:34:58.000 It was the greatest place to be.

00:35:00.000 It was wonderful growing up in here in the 70s and 80s, just an amazing time.

00:35:05.000 And then people began voting Democrat, and it has just completely gone off the rails and gone downhill.

00:35:11.000 But we don't have that bench we used to have.

00:35:14.000 You know, there's no George Luc Majin, no Pete Wilson, nobody really to come and run.

00:35:22.000 So we're, you know, we are a cautionary tale to the rest of America.

00:35:26.000 You do not want to do this.

00:35:28.000 You red states out there, particularly you red states.

00:35:32.000 You guys, you know, you get soft, you get squishy, like you were bringing up, Charlie.

00:35:36.000 They're not out there aggressively using their attorney generals to prosecute you.

00:35:40.000 Not a single one.

00:35:40.000 No, but they're going to be invited to country clubs this weekend.

00:35:44.000 Yeah, and it's sad.

00:35:45.000 It's sad because you get these red states.

00:35:48.000 Everybody who wants to be in politics becomes a Republican, including people who'd be a Democrat elsewhere.

00:35:53.000 And then you get them voting down school choice, you know, trying to allow gun control, all sorts of nonsense.

00:36:01.000 Yep.

00:36:01.000 Don't do what California did.

00:36:03.000 It's really smart.

00:36:04.000 Kurt, plug your book, 30 seconds remaining.

00:36:08.000 Get Inferno.

00:36:09.000 It is the newest of the Kelly Turbo novels.

00:36:11.000 It's number seven.

00:36:12.000 I'm writing number eight now.

00:36:14.000 I followed what Andrew Breitbart says.

00:36:16.000 If you like conservative culture, make some.

00:36:19.000 And I have people love these books.

00:36:22.000 They're funny.

00:36:22.000 There's guns.

00:36:23.000 There's action.

00:36:25.000 And the good guys, as the conservatives always win.

00:36:27.000 Very good.

00:36:28.000 Kurt, hope to see you soon.

00:36:29.000 God bless you.

00:36:29.000 Thanks so much.

00:36:31.000 Thank you.

00:36:32.000 Thanks so much for listening, everybody.

00:36:33.000 Email us your thoughts as always, freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:36:36.000 Thanks so much for listening, and God bless.

00:36:40.000 For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to CharlieKirk. com.

The Charlie Kirk Show - April 14, 2023

Nothing is Normal Now with Alex Epstein and Kurt Schlichter

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