The Charlie Kirk Show - The Coming Dollar Disaster? with E.J. Antoni and Rep. Warren Davidson

00:00:00.000 Today in the Charlie Kirk show, E.J. Antoni from the Heritage Foundation joins us.

00:00:00.000 Hey, everybody.

00:00:05.000 And also Warren Davidson, we talk inflation, we talk spending, we talk fiscal policy, and we close with, according to Wallet Hub, what is the happiest city in America? 0.99

00:00:14.000 It's a bunch of garbage. 0.99

00:00:15.000 You have to listen to this. 0.99

00:00:16.000 Email us freedom at charliekirk.com and get involved with TurningPointUSA at tpusa.com.

00:00:20.000 That is tpusa.com.

00:00:22.000 Buckle up, everybody.

00:00:23.000 Here we go.

00:00:24.000 Charlie, what you've done is incredible here.

00:00:26.000 Maybe Charlie Kirk is on the college campus.

00:00:28.000 I want you to know we are lucky to have Charlie Kirk.

00:00:31.000 Charlie Kirk's running the White House, folks.

00:00:35.000 I want to thank Charlie.

00:00:36.000 He's an incredible guy.

00:00:37.000 His spirit, his love of this country.

00:00:39.000 He's done an amazing job building one of the most powerful youth organizations ever created.

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00:01:06.000 This hour will be dedicated to some very serious questions about our currency, about inflation, about our fiscal health, our fiscal solvency.

00:01:14.000 Joining us now is E.J. Antoni from the Heritage Foundation, the new and improved Heritage Foundation, economist and very smart man.

00:01:23.000 EJ, welcome to the program.

00:01:25.000 Charlie, thank you for having me.

00:01:27.000 Of course, what, in your opinion, is the true inflation rate?

00:01:30.000 And what does that mean for middle-class, muscular-class people in the heartland of the country that are just trying to make ends meet?

00:01:37.000 The floor is yours.

00:01:38.000 Charlie, it's a great question.

00:01:40.000 You know, inflation is, in the short run, really difficult to measure.

00:01:43.000 In the long run, it's pretty easy because everything tends to go up by about the same amount.

00:01:47.000 But in the short term, it's affected by what government is purchasing and where the money is going at first before it has a chance to filter out to the rest of the economy.

00:01:57.000 So we have a lot of different ways to measure inflation, but all of the official government metrics have a lot of flaws to them, not the least of which is the fact that they fail to account for those who are affected the most by inflation and taking a more accurate measurement of the cost increases that those people are facing.

00:02:17.000 And once you do that, in my opinion, you add at least two or three percentage points to the official inflation metric.

00:02:25.000 You can look at something like eggs, for example.

00:02:27.000 That is a very good illustration of how the poor who disproportionately use eggs as a source of protein have been just dramatically affected by the increase in food prices because eggs have gone up so much more than filet mignon, for example, on a percentage basis.

00:02:47.000 So the number is hard to pinpoint.

00:02:49.000 Let's go into the main drivers of this.

00:02:51.000 We created $6 trillion out of thin air in, I think, really fiscal mismanagement over the last couple of years.

00:03:00.000 And we're not seeing inflation slow down in any of the kind of core consumer price index metrics that I think really matter.

00:03:07.000 Are we going to see a cooling off in your estimation with inflation now that money's getting more expensive and interest rates are going up?

00:03:14.000 What do you think the next six to 12 months are going to hold?

00:03:17.000 Well, unfortunately, while we have seen some moderation in the Fed's growing of the money supply, now all of that is being reversed with all of these bailouts.

00:03:26.000 Every time the Fed creates money, it is increasing the money supply.

00:03:31.000 And so we have to realize that the Fed doesn't have a vault of cash.

00:03:34.000 Calling it the Federal Reserve is really a misnomer.

00:03:37.000 It doesn't have a reserve.

00:03:39.000 It creates money whenever it gives that money out.

00:03:42.000 So every time the Fed finances one of these bailouts, it's reversing what we call the quantitative tightening that it has been doing for months now.

00:03:50.000 Now, you have to remember that anytime the Fed acts, the effects are not immediate.

00:03:55.000 you usually see months pass by before those effects actually manifest themselves in the term of high terms of higher or lower prices.

00:04:03.000 So we probably will see a lot of those official inflation metrics continue to moderate.

00:04:09.000 We're not going to get back to 2% anytime soon.

00:04:11.000 But eight or nine months from now, what we're going to feel are the effects of all the money creation that's going on today to finance these bank bailouts.

00:04:20.000 So in addition to that, as we deteriorate our currency and we weaken the dollar, the world's reserve currency is built on the American dollar.

00:04:30.000 It seems as if the Chinese, the Russians, and the Saudis are all talking about using a petro won.

00:04:35.000 Let's play cut 44 of Fareed Zakaria, play cut 44.

00:04:39.000 The dollar is America's last surviving superpower.

00:04:43.000 It gives Washington unrivaled economic and political muscle.

00:04:47.000 It can slap sanctions on countries unilaterally, which frees that country out of large parts of the world economy.

00:04:54.000 And Washington can spend freely, certain that its debt will be bought up by the rest of the world.

00:05:00.000 And then play cut 34.

00:05:02.000 The share of dollars in global central bank reserves has dropped from roughly 70% 20 years ago to less than 60% today and falling steadily.

00:05:14.000 The Europeans and the Chinese are trying to build international payment systems outside the dollar-dominated SWIFT.

00:05:21.000 Saudi Arabia has flirted with the idea of pricing its oil in Yuan.

00:05:25.000 India is settling most of its oil purchases from Russia in non-dollar currencies.

00:05:31.000 Digital currencies might be another alternative.

00:05:33.000 And in fact, China's central bank has created one.

00:05:38.000 So, EJ, what does that mean?

00:05:41.000 They're dumping the dollar as the world reserve currency.

00:05:44.000 And what does that mean for American strength and sovereignty?

00:05:48.000 Well, we need to realize that by having the dollar as the reserve currency of the world, one of the things that that has allowed the Federal Reserve to do is export inflation abroad.

00:05:58.000 And so it has isolated Americans from some, but certainly not all, of those cost increases.

00:06:03.000 The rest of the world is catching on to this.

00:06:05.000 And so they don't want to rely on a currency that is as volatile as the dollar has become.

00:06:11.000 But on top of that, there's a political point here that needs to be made.

00:06:15.000 Not because this is inherently a political issue, but because politics has now invaded the monetary field.

00:06:21.000 And it's this.

00:06:22.000 After the war in Ukraine commenced, we actually confiscated dollars that were owned by the Russian people and by the Russian central bank.

00:06:32.000 And this is not justifying at all what Putin has done, to be clear.

00:06:36.000 But it is the case that what we did is we broke a contract that we were going to hold those dollars available for depositors.

00:06:44.000 And as soon as that happened, we effectively weaponized the dollar.

00:06:49.000 And as a consequence of that, a lot of countries around the world are now wondering, are we, for example, woke enough for the Biden administration?

00:06:57.000 What if we disagree with the Biden administration on climate change, on gender-related issues, on abortion?

00:07:04.000 You pick, whatever the case may be.

00:07:06.000 Countries are now Wondering, are my dollars safe if this administration disagrees with me politically?

00:07:13.000 And the answer to that right now is frankly very vague.

00:07:16.000 And with all of that doubt, the dollar is now losing its rock steady dependability, and people are losing their faith in the dollar.

00:07:25.000 The reason why this is so scary, and what the viewers and listeners really, really need to understand here is that there are right now trillions of dollars overseas that are being used to conduct international commerce.

00:07:38.000 If people no longer want to conduct commerce in those dollars, if they want to use the Chinese currency, or if they want to use the Russian ruble, or if they want to use gold, whatever the case may be, all of those dollars come back here because this is going to be the only place you can spend those dollars.

00:07:55.000 You are talking about maybe doubling the money supply here in the United States.

00:08:00.000 I mean, the inflationary effects of this would be so catastrophic, they can't be overestimated.

00:08:07.000 I know that sounds hyperbolic.

00:08:11.000 Well, it doesn't.

00:08:12.000 It sounds right on.

00:08:13.000 So, EJ, can you just elaborate on the agreement we broke and Putin and Russia?

00:08:18.000 That's interesting.

00:08:19.000 I didn't quite understand that.

00:08:20.000 Can you just elaborate on that, please?

00:08:23.000 Certainly.

00:08:23.000 There are a lot of foreign countries that own dollars because what happens when you have a trade deficit as massive as we do, we are constantly sending dollars abroad.

00:08:34.000 And so, those countries have a stockpile of dollars.

00:08:37.000 They can take those dollars and invest them back here in the United States.

00:08:41.000 They can put them on deposit perhaps to earn some interest.

00:08:44.000 And so, the Russian central bank had a massive stockpile of dollars.

00:08:49.000 We're talking billions and billions of dollars here in the United States.

00:08:53.000 Now, those did not belong to the United States.

00:08:55.000 They did not belong to the American people.

00:08:57.000 They did not belong to the United States government.

00:08:59.000 They belonged to the Russian central bank and the Russian people.

00:09:02.000 And what the United States government did was literally confiscate those dollars from the Russian central bank.

00:09:09.000 And as soon as that happened, people are now, people then began to wonder again: am I going to be next?

00:09:16.000 You know, obviously, again, what Putin did was wrong invading another country.

00:09:20.000 This is not supposed to be some kind of defense of Putin's actions.

00:09:23.000 It's merely to point out that the promise that those dollars would be kept safe and would be available whenever the creditor wanted them, that promise was broken.

00:09:34.000 That is fascinating.

00:09:35.000 I haven't heard anyone else make that argument that basically we shot our own currency confidence by doing that.

00:09:45.000 And that destabilizes the dollar as the world reserve currency.

00:09:49.000 I mean, do our leaders think about this stuff?

00:09:50.000 Do they want to get rid of the dollar?

00:09:52.000 I mean, it seems as if that's if you wanted to get rid of the dollar as the world reserve currency, that's exactly what you would do.

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00:10:38.000 So, EJ, we're in a very confusing economic climate currently.

00:10:42.000 Washington, D.C. seems just determined to continue to spend more money as inflation goes and the economic indicators go under.

00:10:51.000 We have bank collapses.

00:10:53.000 Federal government is doing more than ever.

00:10:55.000 The fourth branch of government seems completely just unchecked and they are doing whatever they want.

00:11:01.000 So, EJ, We're seeing this confusing economic time, and it's hard to pinpoint exactly where we are at.

00:11:09.000 And I know this is a difficult question, but if you were to forecast the economic trends, do you think we're going to already in a deep recession?

00:11:17.000 We're going to stay in a deep recession.

00:11:20.000 What is the data showing you?

00:11:22.000 Carly, it's a really, really great question.

00:11:25.000 And when we try to determine, for example, when a recession begins or ends, we have to look at a whole host of different factors.

00:11:31.000 And right now, the majority of those are pointing down, but probably not enough to really say definitively, yes, the economy is contracting right now.

00:11:41.000 But what it looks right now, just given today's data, before year's end, we are definitely going to be into that downswing where the economy is, in fact, contracting.

00:11:52.000 And I have quite frankly given up on all of the so-called experts who are supposed to officially determine whether or not we're in a recession.

00:12:00.000 Because look at last year.

00:12:01.000 Look at the first half of the year when the economy actually shrank.

00:12:04.000 And what happened?

00:12:05.000 That came and went.

00:12:07.000 And again, the so-called experts never batted an eye.

00:12:11.000 Whether or not that was politically motivated, I'll leave that to you to determine.

00:12:15.000 But the fact remains that the economy did contract for the first half of last year, and it's very likely going to begin contracting again in the very near future.

00:12:24.000 One of the key things to look at, which a lot of people don't for some reason, is new orders for businesses.

00:12:30.000 And what we've found is that when you examine that data, there is not enough new orders coming in to sustain current levels of output.

00:12:38.000 Businesses have literally been surviving in part on old backlogs of orders.

00:12:44.000 Some of those still date from 2020.

00:12:47.000 But once those are gone, there's again not enough new orders for businesses coming in to sustain current levels of output, which means you can't sustain current employment, which means layoffs.

00:12:57.000 We've already started to see that on a small scale in select industries.

00:13:01.000 But as we go into the recession, that becomes widespread.

00:13:04.000 Yeah, and it's interesting because I was talking to some private equity guys earlier, and they say they actually have had no difficulty raising money from higher income clientele.

00:13:14.000 And I think there's a lot of dollar bills out there, which is the X factor, right?

00:13:19.000 So we're not going to have a liquidity crunch, at least in the short term that we saw in 2008, but we certainly are going to have a value implosion crisis, which is, have we allocated dollar bills to businesses and industries that have just kind of been Potempkin villages?

00:13:35.000 Therefore, the only way to let that correct is through collapses or actual economic calamity.

00:13:43.000 I mean, so EJ, I guess what I'm getting at is we're in an unprecedented economic moment, and the only way out of it would be a restoration of sane fiscal policy.

00:13:56.000 Is there a soft landing you see in the next couple of years?

00:14:00.000 No, I don't think there's any way you get out of this through a soft landing.

00:14:04.000 You know, you can't spend, borrow, and print trillions upon trillions of dollars and not expect negative consequences for it.

00:14:12.000 There is just no way to softly land this thing.

00:14:15.000 You can't take the plane up to 50,000 feet, burn out the engines, and then expect that you're somehow miraculously going to cruise to that soft landing.

00:14:25.000 The Fed has set this economy up for a disaster, and they have done it in large part because they needed to finance the trillions of dollars that the government spent that it simply didn't have.

00:14:39.000 It's fascinating.

00:14:40.000 EJ from the Harris Foundation, EJ Antoni.

00:14:43.000 Thank you so much.

00:14:44.000 Well, thank you for having me.

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00:16:10.000 So Matt Taibbi testifies in front of Congress, asked questions by the weaponization of government committee, and talks about how Twitter has been involved with the federal agencies.

00:16:22.000 And then he gets a knock on the door from the IRS.

00:16:27.000 And who is it?

00:16:29.000 It's the IRS asking about your tax returns.

00:16:33.000 Now, that's very unusual.

00:16:38.000 The IRS really doesn't do house visits.

00:16:41.000 And why is it that they then decide to go knock on the door of a dissident journalist?

00:16:45.000 We know the reason.

00:16:47.000 This is Stalinistic, Maoist behavior from the Biden regime to try to chill speech and intimidate journalists.

00:16:54.000 Could you imagine that if when Trump was president, this is the equivalent, that when Trump was president, Maggie Haberman got a knock on the door from the IRS and they just knock on the door to Matt Taibbi.

00:17:05.000 Well, it'll be a shame if you get audited.

00:17:07.000 I mean, we're supposed to believe this is a coincidence.

00:17:09.000 No way.

00:17:11.000 This is a massive story that we're going to unpack in greater detail tomorrow.

00:17:16.000 I want to play a piece of tape here for a couple of reasons.

00:17:18.000 Let's just play this.

00:17:19.000 It's just interesting.

00:17:19.000 Then we'll get to Warren Davidson.

00:17:21.000 Biden, Treasury Secretary, Janet Yellen.

00:17:23.000 Public opinion in the IRS is extremely negative because the IRS is not large enough.

00:17:26.000 Play Cut 50.

00:17:27.000 Well, it's extremely negative because the IRS has been starved for resources.

00:17:34.000 You think it's resource-related that they have a bad reputation.

00:17:38.000 It's nothing to do with historical culture in the agency or anything like that. 0.93

00:17:43.000 I mean, they're a bunch of Stalinists. 0.86

00:17:45.000 Joining us now is Representative Warren Davidson from Ohio.

00:17:49.000 Congressman, thank you for joining the program.

00:17:51.000 You're on the Financial Services Committee.

00:17:53.000 Any initial thoughts before we dive into this on the Internal Revenue Service, the targeting of dissident journalists?

00:17:59.000 Or what's going on here?

00:18:00.000 Your thoughts, Warren Davidson?

00:18:02.000 It's an honor to join you, Charlie, and you've got it exactly right.

00:18:04.000 The Weaponization of Government Committee gets testimony from Matt Taibbi, and the next thing you know, they're weaponizing government.

00:18:13.000 And I love that you tied the clip in with Janet Yellen saying, hey, we just need more people.

00:18:17.000 The Biden administration proposes 87,000 agents in addition to the 78,000 they already have.

00:18:25.000 For reference, 87,000 agents is the equivalent of five infantry divisions.

00:18:29.000 You don't need five infantry divisions, five additional infantry divisions of IRS agents to go after millionaires and billionaires.

00:18:37.000 They're going after people like Matt Taibbi, who dares to question the regime.

00:18:41.000 They dare to question the regime.

00:18:43.000 Not even just ask questions of what they're doing, and they send these Stalinistic forces after them.

00:18:50.000 So, Congressman, there's so many things to talk about on the Financial Services Committee that you're handling.

00:18:55.000 Let's talk about one element: ESG.

00:18:58.000 What is ESG?

00:19:00.000 Where does it come from and why does this now involve Congress?

00:19:04.000 I believe it's an existential threat to the American capitalist system.

00:19:08.000 Your thoughts?

00:19:09.000 Yeah, that's a good way to summarize it. 0.66

00:19:11.000 It's a pro-China anti-American heresy code.

00:19:17.000 So what does the ESG stand for?

00:19:19.000 It sounds pretty benign.

00:19:20.000 Environmental, social governance.

00:19:22.000 We care about the environment.

00:19:23.000 We want people to care about their neighbors, social, you know, care about a just society, and we want good governance in our companies.

00:19:32.000 But the exact thing that they're putting out there that sounds so nice is really just meant to be cancel culture against disfavored, totally legal, but disfavored things.

00:19:42.000 And it's selectively applied only to American companies.

00:19:46.000 So companies like BlackRock in the private sector, ostensibly private sector, will cancel American companies, do things that hurt Exxon, where they're on the board of directors.

00:19:57.000 Meanwhile, they'll bid up contracts that go to the Chinese-backed companies that they're partnered with the Chinese government on, because they don't apply the ESG standards outside the United States.

00:20:09.000 So it is, you know, a way to deprive Americans of capital formation and selectively give it to people that are good with the cause.

00:20:20.000 Yes.

00:20:20.000 It's a Maoist social credit score system that is being implemented via economics.

00:20:26.000 So Biden vetoed the bill.

00:20:28.000 It was actually the first veto of his presidency.

00:20:31.000 So Congressman, what is your take on that?

00:20:33.000 Biden wants the Chinese-style social credit system in our economy.

00:20:38.000 Why do you think that is?

00:20:40.000 Yeah, I mean, every kind of hearing that you could think of where the Democrats have said, all but, gosh, we really envy the power the Chinese Communist Party has. 0.82

00:20:49.000 We should implement something like that here in America.

00:20:53.000 What was going on here with the bill that he vetoed, it was a bipartisan bill that passed the House and the Senate, made it to his desk.

00:21:00.000 And what it did is it said, the people that manage your retirement savings, they're supposed to manage it so that it's in your best interest, that it gets a return.

00:21:08.000 People plan and plan for, prepare for retirement by earning returns in their retirement savings account, not by pushing a woke domestic agenda favoring one party's domestic politics.

00:21:21.000 And that's basically what Joe Biden said.

00:21:23.000 We're going to keep using all of your money to work against your own interests and to advance the cause of our ideology.

00:21:31.000 And very few people understand the threat that ESG poses to the entire society.

00:21:38.000 And we do not have enough votes to overcome the veto.

00:21:41.000 And I mean, money managers across the country, if any of you out there are using Vanguard or Fidelity, I got to tell you, you are part of a very dangerous trend of a Chinese-style social credit system that is coming via through rating companies and fund managers. 0.61

00:21:58.000 Strive is a good competitor to that. 0.99

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00:22:02.000 All right, I want to play a piece of tape here, Congressman.

00:22:04.000 We played this previously.

00:22:06.000 Let's go to cut 45 on how the share of dollars, people are dumping dollars as our world reserve currency.

00:22:14.000 Play cut 45.

00:22:16.000 The share of dollars in global central bank reserves has dropped from roughly 70% 20 years ago to less than 60% today and falling steadily.

00:22:27.000 The Europeans and the Chinese are trying to build international payment systems outside the dollar-dominated SWIFT.

00:22:34.000 Saudi Arabia has flirted with the idea of pricing its oil in Yuan.

00:22:38.000 India is settling most of its oil purchases from Russia in non-dollar currencies.

00:22:44.000 Digital currencies might be another alternative.

00:22:47.000 And in fact, China's central bank has created one.

00:22:50.000 We are seeing the deterioration of the American dollar.

00:22:53.000 Congressman, your thoughts.

00:22:55.000 I'm glad you're calling attention to this.

00:22:58.000 This really should be America's foremost threat to our national security is preserving the US dollar as the global reserve currency.

00:23:06.000 And you see all these actions that undermined it, and a lot of it is domestic.

00:23:10.000 How did we get here?

00:23:12.000 We destroyed the value of the dollar by spending too much money.

00:23:18.000 We spent more money, not just more money than we were collecting in taxes, not just more money than people would lend us.

00:23:24.000 We spent so much money that the Federal Reserve's balance sheet in 15 years' time has grown from less than $1 trillion before the 08-09 financial crisis to a little over $4 trillion back then by 2010, 2011, to now it's up at around $9 trillion.

00:23:40.000 And it's growing because there's no appetite in the market to keep taking up all the money that needs to be created to cover for the massive spending.

00:23:50.000 So this is how it's related to the debt ceiling fight.

00:23:53.000 We hit that limit.

00:23:54.000 And when you hit a credit limit, you're supposed to take measure.

00:23:57.000 Like, well, should I actually change course?

00:24:00.000 And it's a warning sign: change course, turn back.

00:24:03.000 Global markets are telling you the same thing.

00:24:05.000 People don't want the dollar.

00:24:07.000 And it's a combination of too much spending by the federal government, the Federal Reserve intervening and loading up their balance sheet, the Federal Reserve artificially holding rates the wrong way, too low for long, and then juicing them real fast instead of letting the market set rates.

00:24:23.000 And then lastly, we're disincentivizing the productive part of our economy.

00:24:27.000 We're paying adults not to work, not to participate in the economy.

00:24:32.000 And working-age adults need to participate in the economy.

00:24:35.000 We can't get a growth rate without it.

00:24:37.000 That's one of the biggest constraints on supply when you talk to everyone across the economy.

00:24:41.000 We could grow faster.

00:24:42.000 We could meet the demand if we had people.

00:24:45.000 And meanwhile, part of the spending is going to people that won't even go to work.

00:24:50.000 And that's a good segue to the debt ceiling fight.

00:24:53.000 Where does that stand?

00:24:55.000 By what date do we have to get that hiked?

00:24:58.000 And do you think that this new Republican Congress can get some serious spending cuts passed?

00:25:04.000 Well, we have to change course, right?

00:25:06.000 You know, one person in this negotiation is President Biden, and he said it's non-negotiable.

00:25:12.000 So he's the guy that's immovable.

00:25:13.000 He's saying we can't negotiate.

00:25:15.000 Kevin McCarthy has said we absolutely need to negotiate.

00:25:19.000 We have to talk about how did we get here and how are we going to make sure not only do we not bankrupt America now, we don't bankrupt America in the future.

00:25:28.000 So of course we're not going to default on America's debt.

00:25:31.000 The question is, are we going to come up with a plan not to default on our debt down the road?

00:25:35.000 And that's the conversation Joe Biden wants to avoid that we have to have.

00:25:40.000 We have to turn back and cut some of our spending.

00:25:43.000 We have to scale back some of the Federal Reserve's non-market interventions.

00:25:47.000 We have to let markets set rates and we have to get people back to work.

00:25:51.000 Where do you think we're most likely to actually get some spending cuts anywhere?

00:25:57.000 I mean, we're spending way too much money and our debt is $30 plus trillion dollars and we just seem comfortable with it.

00:26:04.000 Where do you think is the place that we can isolate where we can actually get some serious spending cuts?

00:26:10.000 I think the easy thing are the things that Joe Biden is doing that are already unconstitutional.

00:26:14.000 Things like student debt forgiveness that has a price tag of anywhere from $400 billion to $1 trillion, depending on who's scoring it.

00:26:22.000 And I think the other thing is there's a lot of money that was created, part of that $9 trillion that's on the Federal Reserve's balance sheet.

00:26:29.000 That cash is sitting in the U.S. Treasury unspent.

00:26:32.000 It's not obligated for anything else.

00:26:34.000 So if it stays laying there, it's going to get spent on something.

00:26:37.000 We should roll that back and that'll give us a start.

00:26:41.000 And it's not something that Congress is in the habit of doing.

00:26:44.000 I mean, since I've been here, I haven't really seen anything get cut.

00:26:48.000 We still have Obama phones, for example.

00:26:50.000 So there are a lot of low-hanging items out there that we could cut.

00:26:54.000 And then there's tougher conversations where I think, you know, like President Trump has been right to point out, we have to take some things off and make them off limits.

00:27:01.000 We should be clear to seniors.

00:27:03.000 You've already retired.

00:27:04.000 There's nothing.

00:27:05.000 Nobody's coming to change your retirement.

00:27:07.000 You can't change that right now.

00:27:08.000 And I think it would be really fraud on behalf of the United States government to somehow change the deal after people have already retired.

00:27:16.000 So you should stop letting people scare seniors about that.

00:27:19.000 It's dishonest.

00:27:21.000 I agree.

00:27:21.000 Congressman Davidson, thank you so much for joining us, and we'd love to have you on again soon.

00:27:25.000 Thank you for the fight on the Financial Services Committee and all that you're doing for our country.

00:27:29.000 Thank you so much.

00:27:30.000 God bless you and all your listeners and viewers.

00:27:30.000 Thanks, Charlie.

00:27:35.000 Okay, the new study is out.

00:27:37.000 I always get a kick out of these.

00:27:38.000 CNBC.com as if there's some sort of subject matter expert on this.

00:27:43.000 Having traveled to all 50 states multiple times over, I have a pretty good idea of whether or not these studies are full of nonsense.

00:27:51.000 This California city is the number one happiest place to live in the United States, and it's not LA, San Diego, or San Francisco.

00:27:58.000 This is according to a recent Wallet Hub study that goes through the World Happiness Report, and it's the 2023 happiest cities in America.

00:28:09.000 And so it goes through what are the happiest cities in America.

00:28:12.000 And so it's just fascinating.

00:28:15.000 Okay, so number one, actually, let's just, we'll reveal.

00:28:19.000 We'll go through it.

00:28:20.000 Number 10, which there's no way this is true, okay?

00:28:23.000 I mean, it's interesting.

00:28:25.000 I would love to learn why, because if you were to say, Charlie, this would be one of the nastier cities in America, not one of the happier.

00:28:32.000 Burlington, Vermont is the 10th happiest city in America.

00:28:37.000 No, there's voter fraud in this survey.

00:28:40.000 There's no way this is true.

00:28:42.000 Those people are not happy.

00:28:43.000 When I go to Burlington, they are not joyful people.

00:28:47.000 Okay.

00:28:48.000 There are a lot of things they're not happy.

00:28:51.000 The number nine is South Burlington, Vermont.

00:28:53.000 More voter fraud.

00:28:55.000 No way is that true.

00:28:56.000 They manipulated it.

00:28:57.000 They're using machines or something. 0.96

00:28:58.000 So screwed up.

00:28:59.000 Number eight, Sioux Falls, South Dakota. 0.91

00:29:02.000 That one I would believe.

00:29:03.000 There are some really good Midwestern folks, but I think Rapid City is actually a nicer city than Sioux Falls.

00:29:08.000 And I love Rapid City.

00:29:09.000 It's great.

00:29:10.000 It's like a time warp from 1955.

00:29:12.000 Every corner has a statue of a U.S. president.

00:29:15.000 Great memories in Rapid City.

00:29:17.000 Then Columbia, Maryland.

00:29:18.000 I don't understand how that one snuck in.

00:29:20.000 Number seven.

00:29:21.000 And again, I mean, no offense.

00:29:22.000 We're going to find out how happy you really are because we're going to get emails.

00:29:25.000 Charlie, I live in Burlington and I'm happy.

00:29:27.000 Yeah.

00:29:27.000 Okay, right, sure.

00:29:29.000 Columbia, Maryland, apparently one of the happiest cities in America.

00:29:32.000 Irvine, California.

00:29:33.000 Now, this one I believe.

00:29:35.000 Orange County, I actually think is a slice of heaven.

00:29:38.000 I really do.

00:29:39.000 I think that Irvine, California is a slice of heaven.

00:29:42.000 Number five, San Francisco, just not possible.

00:29:45.000 San Francisco is not the fifth happiest city in America.

00:29:45.000 I'm sorry.

00:29:50.000 Impossible.

00:29:51.000 We're supposed to believe that?

00:29:52.000 No way.

00:29:53.000 Number four, Overland Park, Kansas, which is a suburb of Kansas City.

00:29:56.000 I believe that.

00:29:58.000 Then Madison, Wisconsin.

00:29:59.000 Are you kidding me?

00:30:01.000 Have you ever been to Madison, Wisconsin?

00:30:04.000 And so they say, well, their emotional and physical well-being, number five.

00:30:08.000 Community and environment rank, number eight.

00:30:11.000 No way.

00:30:11.000 Number two, San Jose.

00:30:14.000 Really?

00:30:15.000 That San Jose is the second happiest city in America?

00:30:19.000 If that is the second happiest city in America, they're happy because no one can afford anything.

00:30:26.000 We all rent.

00:30:27.000 Jeez.

00:30:28.000 And then Fremont, California, number one, which might just be because there's a bunch of Asians there and they just are generally really happy people.

00:30:34.000 So it could be.

00:30:35.000 I don't know.

00:30:36.000 But then I go into the Wallet Hub survey and it goes down.

00:30:39.000 I'm actually interested at the least happy.

00:30:42.000 Detroit, Michigan.

00:30:43.000 Okay, no, I think that's probably right.

00:30:47.000 Nothing against Detroit, but I don't think that they're really known for, I don't think they're really known for their joy in Detroit.

00:30:56.000 Then Cleveland, Ohio.

00:30:58.000 You know, this will be a thought crime.

00:31:01.000 I would much rather live in Cleveland than San Jose.

00:31:06.000 I'm telling you, Cleveland, I went there for the Republican Convention in 2016.

00:31:11.000 People call it the mistake on the lake.

00:31:13.000 The problem is that it's too cloudy.

00:31:15.000 I will give you that.

00:31:16.000 Okay, then Montgomery, Alabama is the third unhappiest city.

00:31:19.000 Oh, no, I'm sorry.

00:31:20.000 Knoxville, Tennessee is the third most depressed city.

00:31:24.000 Then Vancouver, Washington is the most, fourth most depressed.

00:31:28.000 And then Spokane.

00:31:30.000 That's just a cloud thing, honestly.

00:31:33.000 By the way, Knoxville, Tennessee is actually really sweet.

00:31:35.000 It's right on the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains.

00:31:37.000 I've been there multiple times.

00:31:38.000 I actually think it's really nice.

00:31:40.000 And then they say the lowest depression, this goes to show that weather really does matter.

00:31:44.000 I know this is crazy.

00:31:45.000 Not crazy.

00:31:46.000 It's actually interesting.

00:31:47.000 That Pearl City, Hawaii, Honolulu, Hawaii, San Jose, California, and Irvine, California have the lowest depression rates in the entire country.

00:31:55.000 And the highest depression rates are in West Virginia, West Virginia, Tennessee, Washington, Washington.

00:32:02.000 It's fascinating.

00:32:04.000 Yeah, I'm sorry.

00:32:04.000 I'm just not buying it.

00:32:06.000 I'm not buying the San Jose as the second happiest city in America.

00:32:10.000 Nope.

00:32:11.000 Something wrong with that.

00:32:15.000 Thanks so much for listening, everybody.

00:32:16.000 Email us your thoughts as always, freedom at charliekirk.com.

00:32:19.000 Thanks so much for listening, and God bless.

00:32:25.000 For more on many of these stories and news you can trust, go to CharlieKirk. com.

The Charlie Kirk Show - March 29, 2023

The Coming Dollar Disaster? with E.J. Antoni and Rep. Warren Davidson

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