The Glenn Beck Program - Ep 237 ｜ 'Young Turks' Host： Democrats Need to WAKE UP ｜ Ana Kasparian ｜ The Glenn Beck Podcast

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00:00:34.220 We are living at such an exciting time.

00:00:37.800 Everything is changing, and strange times create strange bedfellows.

00:00:42.440 More and more, I find myself sitting down and having actual conversations with people who even just five years ago would have never thought to talk to me or me talk to them in a million years.

00:00:54.940 But things have changed in a good way.

00:00:58.180 And people on the right, people on the left, and the people somewhere in between, or nowhere at all, are starting to agree,

00:01:06.380 hey, we have problems, and we have to stop this political division before it destroys us completely.

00:01:13.000 Christmas is coming up, and you'll probably be getting together here soon with a family member who voted differently than you.

00:01:23.060 Can you bring that back together?

00:01:25.420 That old friend that you had?

00:01:27.300 You know, can they believe that you're not a fascist or a communist?

00:01:33.920 How do we maintain the vision of E Pluribus Unum?

00:01:37.580 How can we come back together?

00:01:40.500 I think we can.

00:01:42.320 To test my theory, I am joined today by a prominent political commentator from the left side of the aisle.

00:01:48.000 Welcome, host and producer of the globally popular online news show, The Young Turks, Anna Kasparian.

00:01:58.760 I can't wait to talk to Anna, and I hope you listen to this entire conversation, because I think this is really important.

00:02:06.980 And we're going to talk about abortion.

00:02:08.640 At least I have it on my list.

00:02:10.280 Let me talk to you about pre-born.

00:02:11.640 The left would like you to think that every woman who gets an abortion magically gets happier.

00:02:17.360 And some people on the right want you to believe that they're magically evil.

00:02:22.420 I don't know the people who want to shout their abortion. 0.84

00:02:25.820 That is evil.

00:02:27.340 But the truth is, women are trapped and babies die.

00:02:31.600 And the only way we're going to change this is by changing people's hearts and their minds.

00:02:37.480 The ministry of pre-born is fighting for moms who are deciding between the life and death of their unborn child.

00:02:43.760 First thing they do is they introduce the mom to their child on a free ultrasound.

00:02:49.140 That doubles the chances that mom will choose life. 1.00

00:02:52.820 Then they show those babies and mothers God's love by providing additional assistance for up to two years,

00:02:59.560 because many times these moms feel trapped and alone.

00:03:03.280 Right now, you can make a big difference.

00:03:05.820 At the end of the year here, your tax-deductible donation can be the difference between life and death.

00:03:12.840 $28 will buy an ultrasound.

00:03:14.880 $15,000 will buy an ultrasound machine.

00:03:19.020 $5,000 covers the entire thing for a day throughout the country.

00:03:23.760 And through a generous match, your gift is going to be doubled.

00:03:27.300 To donate, dial pound 250.

00:03:28.780 Say the keyword, baby.

00:03:29.740 That's pound 250, keyword, baby.

00:03:31.460 Or go to preborn.com slash Glenn.

00:03:33.420 And that's preborn.com slash Glenn.

00:03:35.900 Sponsored by Preborn.

00:03:50.800 Anna, how are you?

00:03:51.840 I'm doing well.

00:03:52.600 Thank you.

00:03:52.940 How are you?

00:03:53.580 Very good.

00:03:54.420 Thank you.

00:03:54.820 So, for people who might not know who you are, how would you describe who you were?

00:04:03.080 Because you've had some transition on some things.

00:04:06.300 Who you were.

00:04:07.200 How you would self-identify yourself over the last 10 years?

00:04:12.480 Well, I would say that I was firmly identifying myself as a Democrat.

00:04:19.840 I think that if you look at my policy prescriptions, for the most part, I'm still pretty much left-wing.

00:04:27.580 There are some social issues that...

00:04:29.640 Hold on.

00:04:30.540 Definition of left-wing to you.

00:04:32.460 Is that Democrat or left-wing?

00:04:34.240 What does that mean?

00:04:34.860 Well, left-wing in regard to, you know, I would say like one of my grounding political values is that workers should have better pay, better working conditions, a seat at the table.

00:04:50.400 Unionized labor, I think, is incredibly important, which, you know, it's something that's been decimated in recent decades in this country.

00:04:58.220 But that's like my number one interest in politics.

00:05:02.280 And that's not really something that has really been favored by the Republican Party, traditionally speaking.

00:05:09.540 And historically, unionized labor was something that the Democratic Party looked out for.

00:05:16.160 And I don't really see that as the case anymore when it comes to the mainstream Democrats.

00:05:20.640 They're certainly more corporate now.

00:05:22.700 They're certainly captured by their corporate donors.

00:05:25.900 I think that the way that this last election went down really does show you the kind of political strategist rot that exists, the corruption that exists.

00:05:36.760 And there's real tension now between the voters who want very specific policy prescriptions in order to deal with the rising inequalities that we have in this country when it comes to wealth and income.

00:05:51.680 And then you have the Democratic Party, which is heavily funded by corporate interests and moneyed interests.

00:05:57.580 And what those donors want severely conflicts with what the base of Democratic voters want.

00:06:04.000 And so this has been a growing issue with the Democratic Party.

00:06:07.620 And what I see as, you know, their campaign call is more and more culture war stuff.

00:06:15.800 And it gets more and more extreme every election cycle.

00:06:19.520 And I think that they're pushing more and more people away by sticking to the corporate politics while also getting more and more maximalist when it comes to some of the culture war type issues.

00:06:33.300 So as I look, because it is so hard what you do, what I do.

00:06:38.500 There's so many words that come out of us every single day and and then out of context or not worded, you know, exactly right.

00:06:49.520 But the way I look at the Democratic Party or the left is that there is the machine that is in bed now with big business.

00:07:05.620 And that's just the crony capitalism, just the the vomitous kind of corruption that we all hate in either party, any party.

00:07:15.780 Right.

00:07:15.920 Then there's the average Democrat who might disagree on taxes or whatever, but they believe in the Constitution and they believe in the Bill of Rights and everything else.

00:07:27.740 And I think that has been the majority that is the majority of people.

00:07:33.280 Absolutely.

00:07:33.560 And then there's this crazy left wing Marxist, you know, destroy it all kind of group.

00:07:42.300 And that I don't even know, maybe 8 percent, 10 percent is that.

00:07:46.480 And it's the middle people who have been either. 0.99

00:07:51.660 Lied to so effectively by so many people, mainly mainstream media.

00:07:57.320 But we're at the beginning in the Democratic Party, possibly of those people waking up and going, I don't like either end of this spectrum.

00:08:09.500 Yeah. Look, I take a little bit of issue with the use of Marxist in this context, because honestly, I think that there's maybe a total of like five actual Marxist in this country.

00:08:19.480 In reality, we're talking about individuals whose politics is mostly based on, you know, some fringe issue or some cultural issue that they have.

00:08:30.300 It's not just that they care about that issue.

00:08:32.860 It's that they've taken that issue and they've made it part of their identity, the core of who they are.

00:08:38.580 And it's almost like what you would expect from religious zealots, you know.

00:08:43.860 And so there's a fundamentalism involved in the way that they treat these issues.

00:08:49.000 And there's no room to negotiate.

00:08:51.720 There's no room to maybe consider the thoughts and concerns of other individuals.

00:08:56.540 And so as they become more and more kind of like authoritarian in what they demand, they are pushing people away.

00:09:04.240 And there are some issues in which the rights of one group might actually end up conflicting with the rights of another group, depending on what type of legislation you're pursuing.

00:09:13.580 And so, of course, this has come up with the trans issue.

00:09:16.520 And I've always been supportive of the transgender community.

00:09:19.940 But when the rights of transgender people, particularly transgender women, start to cause some tension with the rights and freedoms of women or the perceived safety of women, well, let's have a conversation and avoid assuming the worst of the people who want to have that conversation.

00:09:40.260 Right. Because I think that in a country like America, where you have so many different people with so many different backgrounds, beliefs, people of faith, you the only way this works is if we respect each other and actually engage in these conversations in good faith.

00:09:54.940 And I felt that the left was able to do that back in the day.

00:09:58.620 And I don't know what happened, but we've moved further and further away from being able to have those conversations in good faith without assuming malice toward individuals who have a slight difference of opinion.

00:10:12.040 So, I mean, well, let me just ask you first.

00:10:17.240 Do you believe in the Bill of Rights?

00:10:18.400 Of course. Yes.

00:10:19.520 All of them?

00:10:19.980 I love this country.

00:10:20.920 Yeah, I know.

00:10:21.400 I love this country.

00:10:22.120 I love the idea of this country.

00:10:23.500 I'm not questioning.

00:10:25.060 I just want to note, do you believe in the Bill of Rights as written?

00:10:28.360 Okay.

00:10:29.440 That used to be our unum.

00:10:31.700 We could all come together and disagree and live different lifestyles as long as I'm not taking away your rights.

00:10:40.140 You're not taking away my rights.

00:10:41.640 I have a right to disagree with you.

00:10:43.260 We can have conversations about anything and walk away and go, see you tomorrow, Bill.

00:10:49.800 You know what I mean?

00:10:51.300 That's what's happened to us.

00:10:52.960 There's been this erosion of education of how important the Bill of Rights is.

00:10:59.940 We're looking now at a population, especially a younger population, that thinks that there's limits on speech.

00:11:06.500 Right.

00:11:07.100 There's not limit.

00:11:08.420 Well, there are some limits, right?

00:11:09.900 What are they?

00:11:10.960 The typical example is you can't yell fire in a crowded movie theater.

00:11:15.720 That was actually written by the Supreme Court to prove against that.

00:11:20.780 Really?

00:11:21.060 Yeah, it was not.

00:11:21.960 But you can't incite violence.

00:11:23.460 Yes, that's true.

00:11:24.460 You can't engage in defamation.

00:11:25.400 You can't say things that directly incite violence or panic.

00:11:32.380 Right.

00:11:32.780 And it's very clear when, you know, we're going to go kill them and we're going to kill them now.

00:11:38.960 Well, that's the end of freedom of speech.

00:11:41.020 Right.

00:11:41.200 But without freedom of speech, where we can't say, I'm sorry, I respect this person.

00:11:51.380 You know, I love this person.

00:11:52.820 They can live their life.

00:11:53.900 But if I'm taking them to the hospital, I am telling the doctor, that's a man, not a woman. 1.00

00:12:02.240 Now, they can call themselves whatever.

00:12:04.900 I could even be totally cool with it.

00:12:07.720 But we have to be able to have a civil, non-hateful conversation about truth.

00:12:18.460 I mean, I agree with you on that.

00:12:20.140 And, you know, the argument, and I think this is a decent argument that you'll hear from those who are more restrictive in or wanting more restrictions on speech is, well, we want better terms of service when it comes to, you know, private companies.

00:12:35.100 But free speech only has to do with the government.

00:12:39.220 And if the government isn't violating your free speech, then why are we complaining about, you know.

00:12:45.080 That's not a problem if the government's not in bed with all of the business. 0.96

00:12:50.380 You know what I mean?

00:12:51.300 Interesting.

00:12:51.800 What do you mean by that?

00:12:54.840 Republicans used to be the big business people.

00:12:57.440 Right.

00:12:57.940 Yeah.

00:12:58.260 I think they still are to a large extent.

00:13:00.880 I think the, remember we talked about those, the three with Republicans, there's that machinery Republican.

00:13:08.580 They're all in bed still.

00:13:10.160 They're all in bed.

00:13:11.320 That section, I hope, comes to an end.

00:13:14.560 But they'll always be those people.

00:13:17.460 So I agree with you on that.

00:13:18.800 Um, but, uh, it was when you're in bed, especially now, I don't know how you define fascism, but fascism, the technical definition of fascism is a public private partnership with the government and private industry.

00:13:40.160 Communism doesn't let you have private, uh, ownership.

00:13:44.860 Fascism says, no, no, you can have private industry, but you're going to do it our way and we'll let you have the company.

00:13:51.920 And if you don't want to do it our way, we'll destroy you, you know, take it away from you or whatever.

00:13:58.680 That's, we've been headed that way for a hundred plus years.

00:14:02.920 Both sides have been, have been doing it right now.

00:14:07.400 So the public private partnership where the government says, we can't do this, but you can, that's fascism.

00:14:17.420 That's wildly dangerous.

00:14:20.120 Um, but because of social media and, and Google and everything else, we are in a situation to where who's controlling whom, who, which one is more afraid of the other, the government or Google?

00:14:45.260 Who's afraid of who, you know what I mean?

00:14:47.540 Who has more power?

00:14:48.800 Well, I would say right now it feels as though the corporations have more power.

00:14:52.740 I agree with you.

00:14:53.600 Especially considering the fact that, you know, corporate interests fund politicians on both sides of the political aisle.

00:15:00.160 And so they're completely captured by corporate interests.

00:15:02.640 And I think that that has happened to the detriment of the American people, regardless of whether they vote Democrat or Republican.

00:15:09.620 And so what I see as a bigger problem when it comes to this speech question and how it's impacting private companies is that private companies are increasingly catering to niche audiences or one side of the political spectrum over the other.

00:15:28.980 And unfortunately, and I understand this because I think I was also kind of in that bubble of seeking content or information that only validated what I already believed because it's comfortable.

00:15:43.920 And I totally understand why people do that.

00:15:46.340 I used to do that myself.

00:15:47.620 I didn't do it consciously.

00:15:49.280 It was like a thing that I think I was just doing because it's like, I trust this source because this source is reporting accurately.

00:15:56.460 But it turns out, no, I actually trust that source because that source is telling me what I want to hear.

00:16:01.840 And so this is a huge problem because the divisions in the country and the inability.

00:16:08.340 Excuse me.

00:16:09.320 Because the divisions in the country and the inability to have conversations with people you disagree with, I think, is a product of the bubbles that we live in.

00:16:18.920 Right.

00:16:19.080 The media bubbles we live in.

00:16:20.720 And I don't know how to fix that.

00:16:23.000 I mean, one way that I've tried is by providing counter narratives and a different point of view or playing devil's advocate on TYT.

00:16:33.240 Or more importantly, if I've changed my mind, I want to be as honest with my audience as possible.

00:16:38.640 You have to.

00:16:39.520 And living in Los Angeles, living in California, which is completely controlled by the Democratic Party, it has allowed me to see some of the flaws in the policies that the Democratic Party is pushing for on a more national scale.

00:16:53.400 And I don't want that to happen if I've experienced some of these policies and they have not worked out so well.

00:16:59.460 But what's interesting is the resistance to any of that critique that you'll see from, you know, not everyone in the audience, not even the majority of the audience.

00:17:08.260 But there's always that very loud minority of people who demand that you only tell them what they want to hear.

00:17:16.940 I know.

00:17:17.280 And validate what they already believe.

00:17:18.880 Or you're a traitor.

00:17:19.900 Or you're a traitor.

00:17:20.640 Exactly.

00:17:21.180 Yeah.

00:17:21.420 Or a grifter.

00:17:22.240 I think, you know, one of the things.

00:17:23.840 Yeah, I love that one.

00:17:24.700 Yeah.

00:17:24.840 I was against Trump in 2016.

00:17:27.440 Very vocal about it.

00:17:28.680 I remember.

00:17:29.360 And I was a traitor and a grifter.

00:17:30.940 I was just trying to make money.

00:17:32.440 And then he did some things that I said he'll never do.

00:17:35.540 And I agreed with the policies.

00:17:36.960 And I had said, if I'm wrong, I'll admit it.

00:17:39.840 I did.

00:17:40.640 And I was a grifter and a traitor again.

00:17:42.360 I mean, it's just there's no.

00:17:43.520 Yeah.

00:17:43.880 There's no winning.

00:17:44.740 There's no way to win.

00:17:47.740 More with Anna here in just a second.

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00:17:50.800 And I don't know about you, but I have felt the aches and pains that come along with the

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00:17:57.020 I even used to suffer from horrible pain in my hands.

00:18:00.420 I went to every expert possible.

00:18:02.700 Every expert.

00:18:04.300 Nobody could make the pain go away.

00:18:07.080 And, you know, it was, well, I guess you just kind of live that way.

00:18:10.460 And I didn't want to live that way.

00:18:12.580 My wife told me, try Relief Factor.

00:18:14.820 I honestly did not think it was going to work.

00:18:16.980 It's 100% drug free.

00:18:18.240 OK, it's a supplement.

00:18:19.940 Uh-huh.

00:18:20.240 That's going to work.

00:18:21.400 I've been to the Mayo Clinic.

00:18:23.040 Nothing's going to work.

00:18:24.440 Well, I tried it.

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00:18:54.940 Do you have hope that there's been a sea change?

00:19:00.160 We're at the very beginning of it.

00:19:01.700 But, you know, it's strange.

00:19:04.960 I was just talking to Donald Trump.

00:19:06.640 I was doing a fundraiser at Mar-a-Lago a couple of days ago.

00:19:10.640 And I said, I think, like, we're like the cool kids now.

00:19:17.240 I've never been at the cool kids' table.

00:19:18.760 This is wild.

00:19:20.180 Look, I'm going to pause on saying the cool kids.

00:19:25.160 No, no, no.

00:19:25.300 But I will say this.

00:19:26.220 But we've never been even near the cool kids.

00:19:29.520 We're in the hallway of the cool kids' table.

00:19:33.060 You know what I mean?

00:19:33.680 I know that.

00:19:34.240 But we've never, I mean, and he said, YMCA.

00:19:39.600 How is YMCA suddenly cool?

00:19:42.620 It's not just about that.

00:19:44.060 You know, Trump is, and the audience hates when I say this, but it's just demonstrably true.

00:19:50.540 He's funny.

00:19:52.040 He's an entertainer.

00:19:53.140 I mean, he was an entertainer before, you know, he was a politician.

00:19:56.720 That's for sure.

00:19:57.180 That's what also causes trouble for him.

00:19:59.260 It does.

00:19:59.840 It certainly does.

00:20:00.500 But, you know, I think the reason why you're feeling how you're feeling about the perception

00:20:06.600 of the Republican Party now versus, you know, in the Bush era.

00:20:10.860 Hang on just a second.

00:20:11.480 I don't want to say Republican Party because that's not cool.

00:20:13.920 That'll never be cool.

00:20:15.880 There's this new coalition of Trump, Tulsi Gabbard, RFK, Elon Musk, people that are coming

00:20:26.880 from all different points of view, it's the way America that I grew up in, it's the way

00:20:32.560 America was.

00:20:34.640 We disagree on a lot, but we have one central vision, and that is, in this case, end this

00:20:41.440 corruption, end this nonsense.

00:20:43.620 Yes, yes.

00:20:44.400 Right?

00:20:44.820 Yeah.

00:20:45.040 No, that's a great way of putting it.

00:20:46.620 And, you know, the CEO and my co-host, Cenk Uygur of the Young Turks, he is really trying

00:20:54.280 to bring, like, a populist coalition of people together, you know, and individuals, basically

00:21:00.460 Americans who see the rot in our political system thanks to the corruption.

00:21:05.460 And so it's been his top issue ever since I've met him.

00:21:09.220 And so he's been trying to get money out of politics.

00:21:11.300 So these politicians actually represent what the people want, as opposed to what a small

00:21:18.060 group of corporate executives want.

00:21:21.100 And I think that's really the key in fixing what's broken in our political system.

00:21:26.140 The other thing is, I mean, look, members of Congress really should see themselves as

00:21:30.300 public servants, as opposed to individuals who are elected into office just to enrich themselves.

00:21:35.240 All of them should be.

00:21:36.260 So we have to ban their ability to trade individual stocks.

00:21:41.300 I mean, this is madness that they're able to do this.

00:21:44.520 Ban the trading of stocks.

00:21:46.600 Do not allow them to go into any business that they had any regulation or anything for

00:21:53.480 at least 10 years.

00:21:55.480 I totally agree.

00:21:56.540 This revolving door is obscene, absolutely obscene.

00:22:07.980 I say this.

00:22:11.300 Kindly, because I've been on the other side of the table.

00:22:14.520 And I wish people had given me the benefit of the doubt of being a decent human being and

00:22:23.000 actually meaning what I say, because I do.

00:22:25.780 Um, so I say this, believing you're an actual decent human being.

00:22:32.120 Okay.

00:22:32.680 Okay.

00:22:35.240 The one thing that I look for in people who say, I've seen the light is.

00:22:43.020 I know when I've changed and I've changed many big points of view and many big things in

00:22:51.680 my life, but I can tell you what color the carpet was when I had that epiphany.

00:22:57.660 I can tell you the time of day.

00:23:00.620 I can tell you everything about that moment because it was like, holy mother, I'm wrong.

00:23:06.860 And time stopped and you remember it.

00:23:09.900 Right, right.

00:23:10.860 If you're sincere.

00:23:12.440 I don't think that's necessarily true.

00:23:14.140 I think for some people change comes slowly.

00:23:17.760 And especially if your career and your life depends on a particular identity, a particular

00:23:25.020 outward identity, you're going to resist internal change.

00:23:29.340 And you're going to resist and resist and resist until you can't resist anymore.

00:23:33.500 That's what I feel happened with me.

00:23:35.080 Okay.

00:23:35.360 So wait, wait, wait.

00:23:36.300 So then what was that?

00:23:38.480 I think, I think we might be saying similar things because it's not, you know, the heavens

00:23:43.500 didn't open up.

00:23:44.640 Right.

00:23:45.260 You all of a sudden go, I can't do this.

00:23:48.960 I can't say this anymore.

00:23:51.080 So was there a time?

00:23:53.100 Yes, it happened slowly, but was there a moment that changed you and said, I can't do this

00:23:58.480 anymore.

00:23:58.660 I can't do it anymore.

00:24:01.720 I mean, I would say the phrase, I can't do it anymore for me applies to a handful of

00:24:12.420 policy issues that the Democratic Party has been championing that I don't agree with.

00:24:17.680 So there's no personal, there was no personal event or anything that happened in your life

00:24:23.140 to where you went.

00:24:24.280 I mean, I was sexually assaulted by a homeless guy.

00:24:26.880 Right.

00:24:27.360 Okay.

00:24:27.600 Yeah, I was sexually assaulted by a homeless guy in Los Angeles in my neighborhood as I

00:24:31.600 was walking my dog.

00:24:33.680 Oh my gosh.

00:24:34.100 And it was awful.

00:24:34.960 I mean, I've talked about it multiple times and look, I don't want to put myself in this

00:24:38.800 position of being like this victim who's looking for empathy.

00:24:41.680 But it is the moment where something very scary happened to me and it wasn't just that that had

00:24:51.900 happened to me.

00:24:52.640 It was the reaction I received from a faction of the left.

00:24:57.680 Okay.

00:24:58.160 The social justice left, if you want to call it that, who think that, you know, in some cases, the criminals are actually the victims and the victims are the criminals.

00:25:08.060 Like it's insane.

00:25:08.920 And I don't know how big this faction is, but they're loud enough to push me away completely.

00:25:13.540 And so it wasn't that that had happened to me.

00:25:16.580 It was the reaction of the left and how they were far more concerned with me talking about it because they felt that that was stigmatizing the homeless community.

00:25:26.740 I have never gone out of my way to say negative things about homeless people.

00:25:31.460 I mean, people who are living on out on the streets are in a lot of cases, victims who need help.

00:25:36.480 Right.

00:25:36.640 Yes.

00:25:37.240 But I was victimized by a guy that was strung out on something could have been meth.

00:25:43.040 You know, he was jerking around as he was walking toward me with his buddy.

00:25:47.760 And, um, I'm so sorry.

00:25:49.740 I didn't.

00:25:50.100 Yeah.

00:25:50.420 It's okay.

00:25:51.520 It's okay.

00:25:52.000 But it took a while for me to get over that because I still have to walk my dog.

00:25:58.700 And so multiple times a day, I literally have to think about that incident.

00:26:02.680 And so I thought maybe it would help to talk about it.

00:26:06.200 And then when I did talk about it, I totally regretted it because I was shocked at the way people reacted to me.

00:26:11.740 Um, but what that moment taught me was some of the characteristics of the quote unquote left that I thought,

00:26:20.860 we're good, right?

00:26:22.980 Like the, the kindness, the open-mindedness, the, you know, willingness to go out of your way, to look out for people who need help, like that kind of stuff.

00:26:33.720 There's a portion of the left that has shed those characteristics.

00:26:37.740 They've taken on a more nihilistic approach to things.

00:26:40.740 And they don't even believe in reforms.

00:26:43.600 They just believe that everything about every political system, every program we have, every institution we have is just worthless and we need to burn it all down.

00:26:54.380 Okay.

00:26:55.760 Um, so that nihilistic nature, I think, leads to a lot of really bad ideas and terrible behavior online.

00:27:03.740 And that's pushing people out, pushing people away.

00:27:07.380 And like, I mean, you look at places like Los Angeles, for instance, right?

00:27:12.120 Or Cook County, which is where Chicago is.

00:27:15.080 I paid very close attention to Cook County and what the election results were going to be in Cook County.

00:27:21.080 Because you have an influx of migrants going to Chicago, right?

00:27:27.580 You have a lot of anger among the black community in Chicago because they've been nickel and dimed by their local government.

00:27:34.420 It's crazy.

00:27:34.860 And at the same time, their mayor, Brandon Johnson, is doling out the cash for migrants and justifying it.

00:27:42.000 And so they're angry.

00:27:43.540 And so I'm watching all of this happen and I'm just like, Democrats need to wake up.

00:27:47.560 Because more and more voters feel like they're being abandoned by the Democratic Party, economically speaking.

00:27:55.120 And everyone got mad at me.

00:27:57.120 Everyone's like, oh, you're anti-immigrant.

00:27:58.980 I'm not anti-immigrant.

00:28:00.500 I'm not anti-immigrant.

00:28:01.700 Immigrants built this country.

00:28:04.080 Yes, my parents are immigrants.

00:28:05.060 Yes.

00:28:05.480 Okay.

00:28:05.780 I am not anti-immigrant.

00:28:06.960 But I do have a problem with the Biden administration neglecting the border, pretending like there wasn't a migrant crisis at all.

00:28:17.600 Allowing these municipalities to be inundated with migrants without any federal resources to deal with the problem. 1.00

00:28:24.020 And what?

00:28:24.840 We're going to pretend like that's not going to cause electoral harm?

00:28:28.380 Of course it is.

00:28:29.200 So when you look at places like L.A., there was an 11-point swing toward the Republican Party.

00:28:35.020 Kamala Harris still won, you know, L.A. County. 0.69

00:28:37.700 But 11% toward Republicans?

00:28:41.540 That's crazy in Los Angeles.

00:28:43.500 You know, my problem with the policy there, again, I could be friends and debate and whatever with anyone.

00:28:57.920 If it's honest, Thomas Jefferson said,

00:29:03.300 Question with boldness even the very existence of God.

00:29:06.040 For if there be a God, he must surely rather honest questioning over blindfolded fear.

00:29:11.520 Honest questioning means if I ask you a question and you present me with an answer and I'm like, hmm, I'm open to changing.

00:29:23.400 You know what I mean?

00:29:24.100 We don't have honest questioning.

00:29:26.920 We now have got you questioning.

00:29:29.080 We have cancel you questioning.

00:29:31.920 And beyond that, we have this system that props up lies and a government that is willing to engage in lies.

00:29:43.440 If you wanted to bring people in and open the borders the way you did and then move people with our tax dollars on airplanes to cities where you're changing everything in that city, can we have that conversation first?

00:30:02.780 And part of the problem was they were saying it's not happening.

00:30:06.280 Well, yes, it is.

00:30:07.360 And you're doing it behind our back in the middle of the night.

00:30:09.620 Well, it's interesting because and look, I can definitely be honest about my own flaws and my own mistakes because I bought the mainstream media narrative that there wasn't a migrant crisis. 0.83

00:30:21.520 And yeah, I did believe it.

00:30:23.100 I believe because, look, I was an idiot because I mean, who do who do you trust in today's media landscape?

00:30:29.620 Right.

00:30:29.960 There's a lot of liars out there. 1.00

00:30:31.380 And when it comes to mainstream media, the fact of the matter is they do play defense more and more for the Democratic Party.

00:30:38.680 And that's an issue because there was a time when that didn't happen.

00:30:43.180 And so I still believed in their good faith reporting, even though it turns out, you know, a lot of these reports would omit really important details about what's really going on.

00:30:53.960 And so it wasn't until Texas Governor Greg Abbott started bussing or sending migrants to blue cities where that woke me up.

00:31:03.800 That woke a lot of people up.

00:31:05.520 And suddenly America realizes, oh, there is a migrant crisis.

00:31:09.800 Why did that wake you up?

00:31:10.980 Well, because all of a sudden you're seeing migrants sleeping on the floor in the police department in Chicago because they don't have shelter for these people.

00:31:21.300 Right.

00:31:21.900 You're seeing, you know, these I love watching streams of city council meetings because that's how you understand what's really going on in these cities.

00:31:31.160 Right.

00:31:31.460 These are real people who live there and they get their opportunity to speak.

00:31:35.340 Chicago's been an amazing thing to watch.

00:31:38.820 Chicago's been wild.

00:31:39.360 Yeah.

00:31:39.580 I mean, I watch every city council meeting from Chicago because it's incredible.

00:31:42.700 They're crazy.

00:31:43.180 Yeah.

00:31:43.360 And for me, rather than relying on mainstream media reporting or any anyone's reporting, to be quite honest with you, what I'll do is I'll go out of my way and I'll watch, you know, the entirety of a government function, local government function.

00:31:59.520 I talk to real people and I get a sense of where hearts and minds really are.

00:32:05.620 And so on election night, I wasn't surprised at all.

00:32:09.260 I knew it was coming.

00:32:10.640 I totally knew it was coming.

00:32:12.000 I knew that Cook County was going to swing.

00:32:15.400 I think it's about eight percentage points toward Republicans.

00:32:18.140 I knew L.A. County.

00:32:19.940 And this is what I was surprised about.

00:32:22.120 I did not expect Donald Trump to flip 10 counties in California from blue to red.

00:32:30.100 But I guess I shouldn't have been surprised about that either, because when you look at the conditions that people are living in, in a Democrat controlled state.

00:32:39.320 Well, yeah, you can understand why people are turning their backs on the Democratic Party.

00:32:43.140 You can understand why people are frustrated at the corruption, at the loss of $24 billion that was allocated to help the homeless when homelessness only exploded during that time.

00:32:56.920 And that money is now unaccounted for.

00:32:58.680 It was funneled to nonprofits whose executives get paid minimum $200,000, $250,000 a year.

00:33:06.180 And they have multiple executives who are making at least that or more.

00:33:11.000 And you just see the waste and you see the real grift.

00:33:15.620 And so for people out there who are concerned about the grifters, take a good hard look at the systemic grifting that's happening right now.

00:33:22.160 It's disgusting.

00:33:22.860 It is, again, I think, the problem with the public-private partnership.

00:33:30.020 Hundred percent, yes.

00:33:31.400 Stop it.

00:33:32.280 These NGOs, let them raise their own money.

00:33:35.460 Let them, if they're doing good, they will prosper.

00:33:39.540 You know, people will find them.

00:33:41.540 The government just funneling millions of dollars.

00:33:45.800 It just, it's a money laundering.

00:33:47.520 Ukraine, I don't know where you stand in Ukraine, but good God, man, that is just, that is a money laundering system and millions are being affected and hundreds of thousands are in a meat grinder right now.

00:34:01.700 For what?

00:34:02.540 I mean, look, I think that the UK and the US made a big mistake in discouraging Vladimir Zelensky from continuing or engaging in peace negotiations early on, early on in that war.

00:34:16.120 So that's the strongest opinion I have about what has transpired in Ukraine.

00:34:21.980 You know, my heart goes out to the Ukrainians.

00:34:25.300 They're trying to defend themselves.

00:34:27.860 You know, they were invaded wrongfully, obviously.

00:34:30.720 But I feel that the way the United States has carried out its foreign policy, certainly, you know, starting in the Bush years, and it's only gotten worse from that.

00:34:40.760 But it's not really benefiting anybody.

00:34:43.200 And it's certainly not benefiting the American people, which is another reason why I think you're noticing a bit of a shift or realignment when it comes to our political parties.

00:34:53.560 And it's bizarre.

00:34:55.040 Trump came in and he just kind of like messed everything up in the Republican Party.

00:34:59.680 And it's really weird to find myself in this place where you hear Republican voters take on this anti-war, you know, identity.

00:35:10.060 And Democratic voters take on a more pro-war, like neoconservative type flavor.

00:35:16.600 The Kamala speech at the convention on, it was like, what?

00:35:21.800 Are you Dick Cheney?

00:35:23.400 What is that?

00:35:25.020 It was bizarre.

00:35:25.420 She was honored by his endorsement.

00:35:27.480 Oh, I know, I know.

00:35:27.840 Which disgusted me, yeah.

00:35:29.200 So, but I think there's something to be said that I think with conservatives, the definition of conservative, what I believe is the right definition, is we look at things that are happening.

00:35:44.860 What's working?

00:35:46.640 Save that.

00:35:48.260 Get that part out of here because it's corrupt, it's garbage, it's old think, whatever.

00:35:53.660 And progressive should be, we're more anxious to move forward, let's go.

00:36:00.580 The two of those things together is what provides the balance, you know?

00:36:06.440 Totally.

00:36:06.980 You need that tension.

00:36:08.080 You need that.

00:36:08.900 It's important.

00:36:10.240 It's an eagle.

00:36:11.940 Can't fly with just one wing.

00:36:13.280 But when you look at what has happened to the conservatives, I started changing 2006.

00:36:27.560 I mean, I was all for the war. 0.65

00:36:30.180 I was all for Iraq. 0.92

00:36:30.520 I remember that, yeah.

00:36:31.560 Yeah, I was all for it because I believed that we could change things.

00:36:39.760 I was dumb enough to believe that you can hand people freedom and they want it or it will just work.

00:36:48.780 It barely works here.

00:36:50.920 You know what I mean?

00:36:51.660 You have to earn it.

00:36:53.260 You have to want it.

00:36:54.280 And I was also naive enough to think that we were the good guys.

00:37:00.240 That's a great point.

00:37:01.620 I mean, look at Iran. 0.97

00:37:03.700 I mean, we orchestrated a coup in Iran, which is part of the reason why, you know, you have this theocratic, you know, situation that we're now fighting against.

00:37:15.180 Doing regime change is not a good idea.

00:37:18.440 Not a good idea.

00:37:18.840 The U.S. should not be in the business of engaging in regime change wars, period.

00:37:22.440 George, if we, I don't know if you've read his farewell address.

00:37:26.220 Okay.

00:37:27.440 If we would just do that, we would have been fine.

00:37:31.560 But the State Department for decades has been on this, this path of we're going to control everything.

00:37:40.340 If you're a country that says, we don't torture, but we'll ghost plane you to some place that will torture, you're a monster.

00:37:52.060 A hundred percent.

00:37:52.520 You're a monster.

00:37:53.600 A hundred percent.

00:37:53.820 I can't believe I'm hearing you say this stuff.

00:37:55.820 It's crazy.

00:37:55.880 I've said this for years.

00:37:57.100 I've said it for years.

00:37:57.960 That's insane.

00:37:58.020 Wow.

00:37:58.320 That's awesome.

00:37:59.300 But it's, you have to be consistent with your principles.

00:38:04.120 And I think there's a lot of conservatives and I, I'm so happy to see that now there are some Democrats that are doing the same thing.

00:38:13.700 Like I, I was for big food.

00:38:15.980 I was for big pharma.

00:38:17.100 And then I saw it and I feel like saying to Democrats, guys, you were right.

00:38:24.500 Now, why have you abandoned that position?

00:38:27.620 Because we now, we would agree we could get so much done.

00:38:31.840 Can I ask you something?

00:38:32.780 I'm genuinely curious what you think about this because I started to really sour on Biden when, in my opinion, he was pretending to fight for his agenda.

00:38:43.880 And part of his agenda was to allow for our Medicare system to just simply negotiate drug prices with pharmaceutical companies, believe it or not.

00:38:54.120 And this is the most anti-capitalist thing imaginable, right?

00:38:57.760 Because capitalism, you're supposed to have competition.

00:38:59.920 You're supposed to welcome negotiation.

00:39:02.460 Our Medicare system not allowed to negotiate drug prices.

00:39:06.300 So he was pursuing a provision in his Build Back Better plan that would allow for the negotiations to happen.

00:39:13.300 Well, then they whittled it down, whittled it down to 10 pharmaceutical drugs.

00:39:20.000 Oh, what can we do?

00:39:21.520 You know, we, this is the thing.

00:39:23.020 The Democrats like to play good cop, bad cop.

00:39:25.560 So you'll have the majority of the Democratic Party in the Senate in particular, pretend like they're all on board with Biden's agenda and the idea of having Medicare negotiate drug prices.

00:39:36.080 We have the same problem in the Republican Party, by the way.

00:39:38.300 And then you'll always have the bad cops who are willing to raise their hands and basically torpedo that provision.

00:39:45.980 And that's essentially what happened with Senators Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema.

00:39:50.340 But don't make the mistake of thinking they were the only ones, because sitting on the bleachers waiting for other corporate Democrats who would step in if they needed to, to prevent the passage of that provision.

00:40:03.360 And so I love watching Democrats celebrate themselves, because now Medicare can negotiate the drug prices of 10, you know, 10 drugs.

00:40:13.300 And sure, that's better than nothing.

00:40:15.040 But I mean, I'm not going to give you a reward for whittling down a policy that made sense, that would have saved taxpayers in this country a lot of money.

00:40:27.860 I think we could come to agreement on this easily.

00:40:35.720 That's why I'm so excited about RFK.

00:40:39.240 Get them out of government.

00:40:43.120 Get them out.

00:40:44.560 I don't want them anywhere.

00:40:46.200 I want our government to have that limited work of just who do you run to if the police are in part of it.

00:40:55.460 You can't you can't run to the press and say, hey, look, because the press no longer is protecting the little guy.

00:41:02.280 They're protecting the pharmaceutical company or the government, which is the same.

00:41:06.500 The press was doing positive PR for the Democrats on this issue as the Democrats essentially destroyed their own agenda.

00:41:16.220 Like it was ridiculous.

00:41:18.280 So I just if you're going to run to the press to get accurate information about what's going on, I mean, you know, what I'm saying, though, on that is there is no good cop.

00:41:29.100 We are a system of checks and balances.

00:41:33.200 Congress and the Senate, they're all backroom deals.

00:41:35.880 I talk to congressmen and senators who say, what the hell am I even doing here?

00:41:39.620 We don't we don't we don't debate anything.

00:41:41.560 We don't talk about anything.

00:41:43.100 They come out and say, here it is.

00:41:45.360 You have 10 minutes to read it and vote.

00:41:47.560 And you're voting this way.

00:41:48.780 That's that's there's no checks and balance.

00:41:50.820 The the administration, it was does the admit does the president work for all of these administrators or do the administrators work for the elected guy?

00:42:06.540 You know, it's all it's all out of control.

00:42:10.040 And the one that was supposed to watch is the media and the media.

00:42:15.680 And now with big tech, they're all part of that system.

00:42:20.880 We have to find a way to go back to the I really feel like if we could.

00:42:28.380 Have you tried turning it off and turning it back on again and reset it to its factory settings?

00:42:34.860 You know what I mean?

00:42:35.700 There are things that we need that we can't cut.

00:42:38.440 There are things that we've got.

00:42:40.440 But we have got to it's rotted from the inside on both sides.

00:42:46.960 We have to I don't want to.

00:42:50.300 The American idea is right. 0.86

00:42:54.560 It's great.

00:42:56.100 It's to create a more perfect nation, meaning we're never going to be perfect.

00:43:01.000 And the mission statement in the Declaration of Independence.

00:43:04.080 There's nothing more inspiring from any country in the history of the world than that.

00:43:10.940 I want to try to create that knowing we'll never get there, but we can make progress towards it.

00:43:17.620 So we can't jettison everything.

00:43:21.360 But we have got to go in with.

00:43:24.500 I don't even know if you can do it with surgical knives anymore because it's so big and out of control.

00:43:32.520 Just start chopping down some of the reshaping the tree.

00:43:37.400 Yeah, there's been a lot of attention focused on, you know, Doge, right?

00:43:42.720 The Department of Government Efficiency and what they're going to focus their energies on.

00:43:47.180 You know, I'm cautiously optimistic, mostly because of the fact that a lot of the conversation is focused on the Pentagon.

00:43:53.980 And there's agreement on both sides of the political aisle that there needs to be a serious accounting for all of the resources that are being squandered on the Pentagon.

00:44:06.520 But that also has to happen in things that you're going to like.

00:44:11.320 I mean, I believe the Pentagon is completely out of control.

00:44:14.680 Yeah, I mean, they haven't been able to pass a single audit.

00:44:17.120 I mean, it's crazy.

00:44:18.100 It's crazy.

00:44:18.500 Yeah.

00:44:18.900 So I completely agree with that.

00:44:20.640 But I believe defense is very important.

00:44:22.180 And we'll, you know, we can go back and forth.

00:44:24.160 But there's also stuff on the other side.

00:44:25.900 We have we have squandered trillions of dollars.

00:44:29.140 We don't even how do we have a government that says, geez, where did we put that two trillion dollars?

00:44:34.480 How does that happen?

00:44:35.680 Yeah, it's crazy.

00:44:36.460 It is.

00:44:37.100 I mean, I agree with you.

00:44:39.820 I think that even when it comes to look, I agree with programs that are meant to help the homeless.

00:44:46.100 I totally am.

00:44:47.160 So that's that's the type of those are the types of policies.

00:44:50.860 If they're effective, but there's a lot of waste because the way that those policies are being implemented in places like California isn't really meant to help the homeless.

00:45:01.260 It's about funneling taxpayer money to nonprofits.

00:45:03.720 Yes, that's what it's about.

00:45:05.000 And so when we talk about waste, yeah, I'm open minded about taking a look at these government agencies and really questioning whether these massive bureaucracies make sense, right?

00:45:16.820 Whether the money is well spent on various programs.

00:45:20.820 You know, let's do a little bit of testing to see if these policies or these programs are even effective in carrying out what their objective is.

00:45:29.460 See, this is why I think the 10th Amendment is so important.

00:45:35.300 It creates 50 laboratories.

00:45:40.160 You want universal health care, Massachusetts?

00:45:43.160 Have it.

00:45:43.680 Do it.

00:45:44.100 Vote for it.

00:45:44.660 You want it in California?

00:45:45.780 Have it.

00:45:46.220 Do it.

00:45:46.720 If it works, we'll do it.

00:45:49.400 If it doesn't work, you can't just say, oh, we need bailout from the federal government.

00:45:55.660 Why should I pay for something that doesn't work?

00:45:58.480 You know what I mean?

00:45:59.800 And if there's 50 laboratories, somebody's going to come up with something better.

00:46:05.000 You know what I mean?

00:46:05.580 But we have all of this federal regulation to stop people from trying things that might work, you know?

00:46:15.500 Yeah.

00:46:15.920 So are you consistent on that issue, though, on the idea of states' rights and allowing for the federal government to just kind of take a step back?

00:46:24.320 It seems like a setup question, but yes.

00:46:27.220 No, no, it's not a gotcha or anything.

00:46:28.540 But mostly because in conversations with Republicans or with conservatives or anyone on the right,

00:46:33.840 they tend to have this idea of states' rights when it comes to economic policies or things like health care, as you mentioned.

00:46:42.420 But then it comes to some of the more conservative social issues where they do want the federal government to be involved and have a standard.

00:46:50.720 Like, for instance, you know, there's a small but loud group of people who are on, you know, Trump's case about not wanting to pursue a federal ban on abortion.

00:47:00.180 Right.

00:47:00.380 I'm curious what your thoughts are on that.

00:47:01.540 Federal government has nothing to do with it.

00:47:04.040 The Supreme Court has ruled with it.

00:47:05.660 And I don't think you can legislate morality.

00:47:10.540 I think the problem with the abortion case is on the right side. 0.82

00:47:20.520 Forget about the baby for a second.

00:47:23.060 Mom.

00:47:24.560 Why is she in that?

00:47:26.380 She is most likely not in it in this situation because she's like, I want to shout my abortion. 1.00

00:47:32.400 Right.

00:47:32.640 They're in trouble.

00:47:35.260 Something has happened.

00:47:36.600 Something has failed.

00:47:37.940 They have no framework around them to help them.

00:47:41.760 We cannot just say to that person, no, because they'll go someplace else.

00:47:49.980 We have to care about the baby and the mother and help fix what's broken.

00:47:56.760 When somebody is using abortion for birth control, I don't even understand your moral sense.

00:48:07.040 But I understand 80%, I bet, of people who are having an abortion.

00:48:12.400 There's no law that will fix that.

00:48:14.580 None.

00:48:16.000 We have to find the way by working reasonably with each other.

00:48:20.800 You know, I went to GLAAD and met with GLAAD this years ago when Iran was throwing gays off of the rooftop.

00:48:29.720 I've always been for gay marriage.

00:48:31.380 I'm more libertarian.

00:48:32.900 I don't care.

00:48:33.840 Marry who you want. 0.75

00:48:35.240 Don't tell me and my church what I have to do.

00:48:38.040 And I'm not going to tell you what you have to do.

00:48:39.820 And I went to GLAAD and I said, look, we could argue all day long about wedding cakes.

00:48:47.420 They're throwing people off the roofs because they're gay.

00:48:53.060 This will be wildly unpopular with my audience and it will be wildly unpopular with your audience.

00:49:00.440 But why don't we come together and say, we disagree on a whole bunch of stuff, but this we agree on.

00:49:08.300 Life has meaning.

00:49:10.840 They wouldn't do it.

00:49:12.520 Interesting.

00:49:13.240 Okay.

00:49:14.600 Until we have the guts to stand up and say, look, this is going to be unpopular on my side.

00:49:22.260 It's going to be unpopular on your side.

00:49:24.080 But we're both reasonable.

00:49:26.500 Laws, when it's oppressive, when they're just forced on you, it feels oppressive.

00:49:37.660 We have to change the hearts and minds.

00:49:39.840 And the only way we're going to do that is by talking to each other and actually looking at the problem.

00:49:46.020 Not just saying, oh, it's the homeless.

00:49:49.120 That means, my father used to say, I'd say, you know, Dad, I want to talk to you about God.

00:49:53.700 Okay, we cannot talk about God.

00:49:57.600 What do you mean?

00:49:59.040 Let's call him first cause.

00:50:01.640 Because God means something different to you than it does me.

00:50:05.920 First cause, we don't have any images in our head.

00:50:10.700 So we start from there.

00:50:12.160 When we say, we want to talk about abortion. 0.95

00:50:14.000 It means something to you, means something to me, that's deeply seated in us.

00:50:20.640 We have to find our way to the compassionate core of the human experience.

00:50:27.700 How do we get there?

00:50:28.940 Like, what is your suggestion?

00:50:30.220 I have for so long waited for a fair interview on my side from somebody who doesn't agree with me.

00:50:51.020 I can get fair interviews.

00:50:52.460 I can get bad interviews from people who agree with me.

00:50:54.800 And I don't mind somebody reporting something and me going, well, I don't think that's exactly true.

00:51:03.260 But I can see how you got there.

00:51:06.080 There's no such thing as a, it's all a setup.

00:51:10.520 All of it is a setup.

00:51:11.600 Yep.

00:51:12.200 And you now know it because you're on the other side.

00:51:15.700 And I'm sure people on both sides right now with you, that's why when I, before we started,

00:51:21.780 the only thing I said to you was, you're in a safe zone.

00:51:24.060 I'm not trying to get.

00:51:24.800 I'm not trying to get you.

00:51:25.680 Um, that has to happen.

00:51:29.820 And the only way that happens is back to Jefferson, honest questioning.

00:51:35.900 I really want to know how you got there.

00:51:38.520 When, when, when we talk to each other and I've got an agenda, oh, you know what?

00:51:48.260 I've got some people coming over for Christmas.

00:51:50.540 I know exactly.

00:51:51.420 I'm going to say this and they're going to say that.

00:51:52.880 And then I can get them to that.

00:51:54.780 That that's not honest.

00:51:56.440 When you, when you say I'm not going to talk to you because I disagree, what I'm actually

00:52:02.280 saying is I'm smarter than you and you have nothing to teach me.

00:52:06.600 Yeah.

00:52:07.460 And ironically, that's actually the dumbest way to proceed because one thing that I have

00:52:13.740 noticed is as the left kind of avoids any debate or conversation with individuals they

00:52:21.300 disagree with, well, their ideas don't really get challenged, right?

00:52:26.480 Your ideas get challenged in a debate, in a good faith debate.

00:52:29.620 I'm not talking about, you know, gross, you know, rolling around in the mud type stuff. 1.00

00:52:33.940 But, you know, I like when my ideas are challenged because it forces me to consider the flaws or

00:52:42.000 a blind spot that I might have.

00:52:44.420 Yes.

00:52:44.740 You know, and that's so I want to make good arguments.

00:52:47.880 I think the, I think, I think the left is so weak right now.

00:52:53.380 So easy to take apart.

00:52:55.600 Yes.

00:52:55.980 You're right about that.

00:52:57.100 I've been thrown up against the wall for the last 20 years saying you're a racist.

00:53:02.220 You're a bigot.

00:53:02.880 You could only have that said to you if you're a good, decent person so long before you go,

00:53:08.520 am I, what am I doing?

00:53:10.120 That makes me appear that way.

00:53:12.840 What is it?

00:53:13.660 And you self-examine and you either fix or you become stronger.

00:53:18.240 No one's thrown the left up against the wall.

00:53:21.520 I don't think people have any idea how to defend what they think they're for.

00:53:27.540 I mean, it's, it's interesting because I've been, I've been forced to realize this when

00:53:33.500 I've been making arguments to my audience, to the left in regard to, hey, you know what?

00:53:39.860 We've implemented this criminal justice reform policy and it's actually not working out

00:53:45.480 the way we expected.

00:53:46.680 We need to tweak it here, recalibrate it there.

00:53:49.140 And maybe, you know, this policy could actually work out really well.

00:53:52.540 Let's fix these little gaps that we see.

00:53:56.220 And rather than consider that I'm coming at them in good faith because I want these policies

00:54:02.760 to work, all they do is just call you a grifter.

00:54:06.920 Okay, that's it.

00:54:07.880 And that's the thing.

00:54:08.720 You can call me whatever you want.

00:54:09.980 Call me a grifter if you want.

00:54:10.940 I don't care, yeah.

00:54:11.380 But please try to contend with what I'm saying.

00:54:15.900 Like, debate me on this.

00:54:17.640 I want to have an actual exchange.

00:54:19.420 If you just think that you're going to call me a grifter and move along and that's good

00:54:23.520 enough, that's not good enough.

00:54:25.360 Okay?

00:54:25.640 That makes you look weak.

00:54:27.200 There are so many times, I've said this for years, please, please tell me, not that I'm

00:54:34.820 wrong.

00:54:35.440 Tell me how I'm wrong.

00:54:36.300 I want to be wrong.

00:54:37.520 Exactly.

00:54:37.980 Yes.

00:54:38.520 I want to be wrong on some of these things.

00:54:41.800 But we don't do that.

00:54:43.280 So let me turn that question back to you.

00:54:47.320 Nobody trusts anything.

00:54:49.020 Right.

00:54:49.420 I mean, I'm a conservative.

00:54:52.980 The FBI is a danger to our society.

00:54:56.480 The Department of Justice.

00:54:58.260 Yes, it is.

00:54:59.520 And I used to be, oh, I don't trust any of it anymore.

00:55:04.800 And it's American and responsible to not trust blindly.

00:55:12.460 Right.

00:55:12.560 You know what I mean?

00:55:13.860 But when you don't have anything and you're not even sure the people you're talking about

00:55:19.000 are grounded in the Constitution, actually do not want a theocracy, do not want a fascist

00:55:27.120 state, do not want a communist state.

00:55:29.540 They do care and are willing to say, man, this kills me to say it.

00:55:35.980 But you have the right to believe that.

00:55:39.460 If you don't have that trust, how do we gain that trust back?

00:55:42.960 Honestly, we can talk about things like transparency, more accountability in the media, stuff like

00:55:52.380 that.

00:55:53.160 But I think a lot of what we're seeing in the country right now stems from economic frustration.

00:56:00.640 And you have to think about it this way.

00:56:02.340 When Americans feel like they have no stake in the game, that's where the nihilism comes

00:56:07.540 from.

00:56:07.780 When you feel like you have nothing to lose, that's what's going to give you the type of

00:56:14.440 mentality that's going to allow you to literally shoot and kill a UnitedHealthcare CEO in cold

00:56:22.920 blood, in broad daylight.

00:56:24.840 OK, we have some real problems in this country right now.

00:56:29.000 Right.

00:56:29.220 But that's.

00:56:30.600 And I'm not justifying that that happened at all.

00:56:33.640 But you have to think about what led someone like that guy to think it was OK to carry

00:56:39.760 that out in like in mourning.

00:56:42.080 OK, right.

00:56:43.120 But it doesn't.

00:56:43.820 In New York City.

00:56:44.780 I just want to be really, really careful because I know that I know what you're saying and I

00:56:49.160 agree with you, but I want to be very clear on what you're saying.

00:56:54.660 Nothing justifies.

00:56:56.060 No, no, I am not justifying it at all.

00:56:58.640 That was murder.

00:56:59.480 Right.

00:56:59.620 And even if I have deep criticisms of our health care system.

00:57:03.700 Me too.

00:57:04.100 OK, deep, deep criticisms.

00:57:05.740 Me too.

00:57:05.940 However, the idea that carrying out vigilante justice is the solution is laughable to me.

00:57:13.960 What happened yesterday did nothing to reform our health care system, didn't even inch us

00:57:20.080 closer to it.

00:57:21.400 And at the end of the day, it just led to the murder of one individual who happened to be

00:57:26.860 the CEO of one of the health care companies.

00:57:28.760 That's not going to fix or solve anything at all.

00:57:32.200 So but what I'm trying to get at is there's a reason why there has been this increase in

00:57:38.600 political violence in the country, which I'm also not justifying.

00:57:41.880 But I'm also not surprised by it because people feel like they have nothing to lose or more

00:57:48.080 importantly, nothing to look forward to, nothing to build upon.

00:57:51.680 So can I ask you a difficult question?

00:57:54.520 Yeah, of course.

00:57:55.080 I believe in the American way, not the system we have.

00:58:03.360 Right.

00:58:03.580 I believe in the founding ideas and I believe we can be that.

00:58:07.300 And I believe tomorrow can be brighter.

00:58:09.420 And I believe my children can surpass me.

00:58:14.060 It's going to be hard.

00:58:15.220 Very hard.

00:58:15.900 And in this, if we keep going this way, no.

00:58:20.540 But I do have optimism.

00:58:22.500 And I do believe the individual chooses to chart their course.

00:58:29.720 Some people need help, assistance, whatever.

00:58:32.980 We're not born on a level playing field.

00:58:35.760 We're all born equal.

00:58:37.360 We all have the equal chance.

00:58:38.980 But some of us need some help and et cetera, et cetera.

00:58:43.600 What I hear, OK, from the left is you can't do it because that group of people are in your

00:58:52.100 way.

00:58:53.260 You are black, whatever color. 0.99

00:58:56.840 You're a woman.

00:58:58.120 You're gay. 1.00

00:58:58.960 They hate you.

00:59:00.260 They'll stop you.

00:59:01.980 That leads you to a place of hopelessness.

00:59:07.020 I agree that there's a certain level of defeatist mentality on the left that I don't think is

00:59:12.700 necessarily helpful.

00:59:13.900 Right.

00:59:14.060 We have to think a little more strategically about what type of, you know, systemic obstacles

00:59:19.680 are standing in our way of helping people become what they want to become in life.

00:59:24.760 Right.

00:59:24.960 Get to where they want to get to in life.

00:59:26.720 Look, the Federal Reserve put out data in 2021, fourth quarter of 2021.

00:59:31.440 Showing that the top 1% of this country owned 30, almost 31% of the wealth.

00:59:37.040 I know.

00:59:37.520 Whereas the bottom 50% owned like 2.3% of the wealth.

00:59:42.440 Like it was insane.

00:59:43.600 Right.

00:59:44.060 Just insane.

00:59:44.860 So I give you those stats because there has been a growing problem in the country of more

00:59:51.520 and more of the wealth floating to the top.

00:59:53.680 And, you know, when we talk about waste at the Pentagon, understand that one of the biggest

00:59:59.000 redistributive policies that we have in this country that takes money from the bottom to

01:00:05.260 the top is the money that goes to the defense contract.

01:00:07.820 It's a tiny, tiny group of people who have a lot of sway over our political system because

01:00:12.340 of money in politics.

01:00:13.460 Yep.

01:00:14.260 And so our money gets redistributed from the lower end of the socioeconomic ladder, the

01:00:20.780 taxpaying, hardworking Americans to this tiny group of executives.

01:00:24.300 But I would say also, I mean, I'm not on the low end of the scale.

01:00:27.280 Yeah.

01:00:27.840 Also for me.

01:00:28.760 Yeah.

01:00:29.360 Exactly.

01:00:29.980 Middle class.

01:00:30.620 I mean, it's getting harder and harder for people to hold on to middle class status.

01:00:35.020 Yeah.

01:00:35.160 And I understand the frustration and anger in the country.

01:00:39.540 I mean, I feel it time to time when you see what's going on.

01:00:43.140 And so you think about the federal minimum wage.

01:00:47.180 It's $7.25.

01:00:48.620 I did the calculation earlier today because I was curious, like, what's the exact amount

01:00:52.900 of money?

01:00:54.120 I mean, you're not, you're barely making like $13,000 a year with that.

01:00:58.020 Right.

01:00:58.560 So there.

01:01:00.620 I hate to say this, but I'm such a state's rights guy.

01:01:03.760 Yeah.

01:01:03.980 Well, why should it be $7 in New York City?

01:01:07.580 That's like a dime.

01:01:09.080 Well, this is the thing.

01:01:10.100 I actually think the model that you see in Scandinavian countries makes a lot more sense.

01:01:15.400 They don't have federal minimum wages.

01:01:17.040 You know what they have?

01:01:17.840 They have unionized workers who get to negotiate working conditions and their pay with like,

01:01:24.960 you know, collective bargaining, which is much, makes way more sense.

01:01:28.680 So for me, Donald Trump choosing, you know, a pro labor, labor secretary was a big deal

01:01:36.400 because voting in favor of the pro act, which does away with the intentional obstacles that

01:01:43.320 prevent unionized labor from even forming is important to me.

01:01:48.020 And so I would rather have the workers have a say over what they're getting paid and what

01:01:53.200 their working conditions are.

01:01:54.140 So let me, let me push back on it because I, I actually, I know history.

01:01:59.560 Um, I actually think unions are important.

01:02:02.060 Yes.

01:02:02.840 I think business is important.

01:02:04.300 When one side gets the thumb on the scale, it's bad.

01:02:11.160 It is.

01:02:11.700 Okay.

01:02:11.940 Yep.

01:02:12.480 And, you know, FDR was very dead set against unionized federal workers.

01:02:19.380 You cannot negotiate against yourself.

01:02:22.580 Okay.

01:02:23.580 Uh, and knew that would cause all kinds of problems.

01:02:26.900 He was a big labor guy.

01:02:28.040 He was.

01:02:28.580 Yep.

01:02:28.800 Not in the federal government.

01:02:30.800 Okay.

01:02:31.240 Um, we have, I am all for, and especially now, I mean, I'm not a, um, universal basic

01:02:42.740 income guy, but I, I have been saying for 10 years, we have to talk about this because

01:02:49.080 there's about 10 people that all of the money is going to flow to, and you're going to be

01:02:55.620 a surf and a slave for the rest of your life because it's all going to change.

01:03:01.240 So I don't know what the answer is, but I do want a gig economy.

01:03:06.880 I want an economy that if I'm a mom and I only want to work these hours, I can check 0.99

01:03:13.380 in when I want check in, you know, saying limiting people's options is not good.

01:03:20.840 Balancing and making sure you're not getting ripped off on either side is better.

01:03:29.340 Absolutely.

01:03:29.820 So how do you achieve that when labor unions can give so much money to politicians?

01:03:40.380 We got to get money out of politics.

01:03:41.920 And I, I mean that I'm not just talking about corporate interests.

01:03:45.440 I'm also talking about the power that unions have both on a local level, um, and on a federal

01:03:51.960 level with the campaign donations that they engage in.

01:03:55.000 Right.

01:03:55.100 Like, but how do you do that?

01:03:56.160 You have the teacher's union, right?

01:03:58.060 Teacher's union, keeping kids out of school because it was a union.

01:04:03.100 There was no science.

01:04:04.540 We now know this.

01:04:05.320 How do you do that?

01:04:07.680 You have to pass.

01:04:09.020 I mean, look, Cenk Uygur through an organization that he founded called Wolfpack has been fighting

01:04:15.880 for a constitutional amendment to get money out of politics. 1.00

01:04:18.880 And it wouldn't just impact corporations.

01:04:20.680 It would impact any entity that engages in these current legalized bribes.

01:04:25.800 And I think that's the right course of action.

01:04:28.640 Now, it's difficult because you need lawmakers on a local level, like states to agree to a

01:04:36.340 constitutional convention.

01:04:37.700 And that's been an incredibly difficult thing to accomplish.

01:04:40.900 Uh, yes, exactly.

01:04:43.540 So, and, you know, there are a ton of Democrats who don't like the idea because they're worried

01:04:48.840 that it's going to be hijacked by, you know, Republicans and they're going to get their

01:04:52.980 way.

01:04:54.520 But I think that really, this is the only way that we're going to fix our broken system,

01:04:58.320 because otherwise all of these politicians, they're not working on behalf of the American

01:05:02.240 people.

01:05:02.620 They're working on behalf of the individuals who have bribed them.

01:05:05.300 It's that simple and we've seen how it's been playing out.

01:05:08.420 If we do away with money in politics and we pass laws banning members of Congress from

01:05:14.940 trading individual stocks, which in some cases it's obvious they're doing it with insider

01:05:19.920 information they're getting from their closed-door briefings.

01:05:21.880 No, no, no.

01:05:22.120 Nancy Pelosi is just a genius. 1.00

01:05:24.300 Genius.

01:05:24.940 Genius.

01:05:25.360 Yeah.

01:05:25.560 She just outperforms the S&P 500 consistently.

01:05:29.380 Crazy.

01:05:31.820 Well, yeah.

01:05:35.300 I am thrilled that you are here.

01:05:38.240 Thank you.

01:05:39.420 And I know there's probably a zillion things we disagree on, but you are a gracious and

01:05:47.240 very smart woman.

01:05:49.340 Thank you.

01:05:50.560 I'm proud to have you on the show.

01:05:52.220 Thank you.

01:05:52.740 It's been a pleasure.

01:05:53.460 Thank you for having me.

01:05:54.260 You bet.

01:05:54.480 Just a reminder, I'd love you to rate and subscribe to the podcast and pass this on to a friend

01:06:06.140 so it can be discovered by other people.

01:06:07.760 Bye-bye.

01:06:19.500 Well, yeah.

01:06:20.500 Bye-bye.

01:06:21.760 Bye-bye.

01:06:23.260 Bye-bye.

01:06:25.720 Bye-bye.

01:06:26.720 Bye-bye.

01:06:31.180 Bye-bye.

01:06:32.980 Bye-bye.

01:06:33.400 Bye-bye.

01:06:35.380 Bye-bye.

01:06:35.760 Bye-bye.

01:06:36.120 Bye-bye.

The Glenn Beck Program - December 07, 2024

Ep 237 ｜ 'Young Turks' Host： Democrats Need to WAKE UP ｜ Ana Kasparian ｜ The Glenn Beck Podcast

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