The Matt Walsh Show - Ep. 1526 - Democrats Shill For Big Pharma In RFK Jr Confirmation Hearing

00:00:00.000 Today on the Matt Wall Show, Democrats humiliate themselves in RFK Jr.'s confirmation hearing as

00:00:04.220 they desperately defend the multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical industry.

00:00:08.000 Our country suffers its first major airline disaster in many years. We'll talk about what

00:00:12.240 we know so far about this terrible situation and what we don't. And a former president of Kenya

00:00:18.400 has a more America-first view of U.S. foreign policy than most U.S. politicians do somehow.

00:00:22.920 We'll talk about all that and more today on the Matt Wall Show.

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00:01:52.640 There's a civil trial going on right now in the state of California that hasn't gotten much

00:01:57.500 attention at all. For the most part, the corporate press doesn't want to talk about it, probably

00:02:00.740 because it would upset some of their biggest advertisers. But if you have any interest in

00:02:04.700 learning more about how the alleged science concerning vaccines actually works in this

00:02:08.860 country, it's one of the most important cases that's ever been tried. I'm talking about a product

00:02:14.060 liability lawsuit that's underway against the pharmaceutical giant Merck. The litigation relates

00:02:19.120 to allegations that Merck concealed serious side effects of its Gardasil vaccine, which

00:02:24.340 promised to protect people from getting HPV, a virus that can lead to cervical cancer in

00:02:28.200 women. And Merck, of course, denies the allegations, and the jury hasn't returned a verdict yet.

00:02:32.280 But even without a verdict, the fact that this case has even made it to trial in the first

00:02:37.060 place in and of itself is worth talking about. Concerns about the Gardasil vaccine have been

00:02:42.420 widespread for nearly two decades since it was first introduced into the market. So here,

00:02:46.340 for example, are two news clips from 2008 and 2009 related to the first version of the vaccine.

00:02:53.420 Watch. But the vaccine Gardasil is coming under scrutiny. Gardasil prevents the spread of human

00:02:59.980 papillomavirus, also known as HPV. HPV is a sexually transmitted disease that can cause cervical cancer.

00:03:08.400 We're learning Gardasil, which has been given to millions of young women, has been the subject of

00:03:13.060 more than 7,800 adverse event reports. Some side effects range from nausea to paralysis,

00:03:20.060 and 10 deaths have been reported. Although, according to the CDC, those have not been linked

00:03:25.160 to the vaccine. A vaccine for four types of HPV was approved in 2006 in the hope it would save

00:03:31.100 thousands of lives. But now there are some big questions about its safety.

00:03:35.780 Three weeks after Amanda Ratner received the HPV vaccine, she experienced pain at the injection site 0.57

00:03:41.660 and fell ill. She's gone from the position of being a competitive varsity lacrosse player in high

00:03:46.980 school to somebody who's chronically ill. Now, put aside for a second whether Gardasil was indeed

00:03:53.120 dangerous or whether Merck lied in its advertising. Those are questions that I don't pretend to be an

00:03:57.500 authority on. That's for a jury to decide. That's why it's at trial. The really interesting question

00:04:02.740 is why it took until 2025 for anyone to resolve definitively the question of whether this vaccine

00:04:09.160 is actually as safe as advertised. The fact that the judge has allowed this case to go to trial means

00:04:14.280 that the allegations, at a minimum, probably aren't frivolous. So how was this vaccine, which has been taken

00:04:21.060 by countless people, allowed to escape this kind of serious scrutiny for so long? That fact alone,

00:04:27.240 the existence of an information blackout on such an important vaccine is, of course, just one of many

00:04:33.000 harrowing unexplained failures of the public health establishment in this country. If you pull up one

00:04:38.960 of the complaints against Merck, which was filed by the law firm Wisner Baum, you'll find a lot of other

00:04:44.060 very disturbing allegations, too. One woman, the main plaintiff in the case, alleges that she's been

00:04:48.280 confined to a wheelchair since the age of 16 because of the vaccine. There are also allegations that Merck

00:04:53.660 paid doctors and nonprofits thousands of dollars to promote the vaccine, as well as claims that

00:04:58.320 Merck lied about the vaccine's contents. Now, normally, allegations like this never see the

00:05:03.180 inside of a courthouse because the pharmaceutical industry enjoys a broad liability shield, and this

00:05:08.580 case is a rare exception. Now, I mentioned the lawsuit over the Gardasil vaccine because it came up

00:05:14.240 yesterday during the confirmation hearing for Donald Trump's nominee to be the next HHS Secretary,

00:05:18.520 Robert F. Kennedy Jr. That's because RFK Jr. worked with the law firm that brought the case

00:05:24.320 against Merck, and he stands to benefit financially from the outcome. In other words, RFK Jr. played a

00:05:29.560 role in finding the plaintiffs for this very rare and very important lawsuit that's currently in progress

00:05:35.120 against big pharma. But here's how Elizabeth Warren questioned RFK about it. Watch.

00:05:42.020 I'm asking about fees from suing drug companies. Will you agree not to do that? You're asking me to not

00:05:52.120 sue drug companies. No, you can sue drug companies as much as you want. I'm not going to agree to not sue

00:06:00.240 drug companies or anybody. I'm asking you to commit right now that you will not take a financial stake

00:06:07.680 in every one of those lawsuits so that what you do as Secretary will also benefit you financially down

00:06:15.180 the line. I'll comply with all the ethical guidelines. That's not the question. You and I, you have said

00:06:21.700 You're asking me, Senator, you're asking me not to sue vaccine pharmaceutical companies. No, I am not.

00:06:28.280 Yeah, you are. That's exactly what you're doing. Look, no one should be fooled here. As Secretary of HHS,

00:06:37.300 Robert Kennedy will have the power to undercut vaccines and vaccine manufacturing across our

00:06:44.580 country. Now, what's extraordinary about this moment is that Elizabeth Warren has built her

00:06:51.880 entire career around the lie that she's a populist, or at least someone who's extremely skeptical of

00:06:57.620 entrenched corporate power, particularly when it's held by banks. But in this case, Warren is pretty much

00:07:03.860 indistinguishable from a lawyer for big pharma. She's berating RFK Jr. because he took big pharma

00:07:09.980 to court over the HPV vaccine. And even though he stated that he won't pursue any lawsuits while he's

00:07:14.460 in government, it's not enough for her. She wants him to commit to renouncing lawsuits that he's already

00:07:19.720 participated in or that he might pursue after leaving office. And he won't agree to that.

00:07:23.540 I mean, she's getting emotional in her defense of the multi-multi-billion dollar big pharma industry.

00:07:32.000 And I'm not going to speculate on Warren's motivations. You can point to various campaign

00:07:36.240 contributions she's received from the pharmaceutical industry, as many people already have.

00:07:42.440 Actually, on second thought, I am speculating that Elizabeth Warren is a bought and paid for

00:07:46.560 shill for big pharma. Not speculating, but actually outright accusing her of it.

00:07:50.340 But still, the truth is, this is a much larger problem than Elizabeth Warren. Throughout the

00:07:55.820 hearing, RFK Jr. was repeatedly attacked by Democrats simply for questioning the safety

00:08:00.520 and efficacy of various drugs that are widely prescribed. These are drugs that we're assured

00:08:05.000 are effective, even though there are very real reasons to doubt that. In particular, Kennedy was

00:08:09.560 hit over his skepticism of SSRIs. He was hit on this, I think, in the most unfair and disingenuous way.

00:08:20.340 And this was a hearing full of unfair and disingenuous attacks. But this, to me, was the worst.

00:08:26.560 So here's Tina Smith of Minnesota in one of the most egregious moments from this hearing. Here it is.

00:08:32.260 In an interview in 2023 and again in 2024, you blamed school shootings on antidepressants. You said, and this is a quote,

00:08:43.220 there is no time in American history or human history that kids were going to shoot schools and shooting their classmates.

00:08:49.920 It really started happening coterminous with the introduction of these drugs, with Prozac and with other drugs.

00:08:56.840 So do you believe, as you've said, that antidepressants cause school shootings? This is a, should be a simple question.

00:09:02.760 I don't think anybody can answer that question. And I didn't answer that question. I said it should be studied.

00:09:07.540 I said it should be studied along with other potential culprits, like social media.

00:09:14.900 But I don't know. I would never make, because there's no science on that, Senator.

00:09:19.560 Well, there is, Senator. I mean, excuse me, there is, Mr. Kennedy.

00:09:23.540 Thank you for the promotion.

00:09:24.400 The science shows that there is no link between school shootings and antidepressants.

00:09:29.640 And in fact, most school shooters were not even treated with antidepressants.

00:09:33.440 And of those that were, there was no evidence of association, you know.

00:09:37.080 I don't think you can say that, Senator, because HIPAA rules, nobody knows.

00:09:43.160 Now, RFK's response at the end of that clip is obviously the right one.

00:09:46.740 We remember the, you might remember the 2023 mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine.

00:09:51.280 The shooter killed 18 people at a bowling alley in a bar.

00:09:54.340 We still don't know what, if any, drugs he was taking at the time of the incident.

00:09:59.020 So anyone who says, well, we've been determined that there's no link between the drugs.

00:10:02.780 Isn't, you don't know that.

00:10:04.520 You absolutely don't know that.

00:10:06.620 The same is true of the trans-identifying mass shooter here in Tennessee.

00:10:09.660 The Tennessee Star has reported, citing a search warrant, that Vanderbilt had prescribed SSRIs to the shooter.

00:10:14.540 But we don't know if the shooter was actively taking those medications, because neither the police nor Vanderbilt will tell us.

00:10:20.960 And therefore, it wouldn't show up in any studies that purport to show how many mass shooters were on SSRIs.

00:10:25.980 But this is the norm, you know, when it comes to these academic papers on SSRIs.

00:10:31.480 And as I previously discussed, there's another way that these studies hide the number of mass shooters who are on SSRIs.

00:10:38.620 Basically, they include inner-city violence in their tally of mass shootings.

00:10:43.500 So if a bunch of gang members in the south side of Chicago shoot up a birthday party or something, or shoot up some other gang members on a street corner, that gets added to the tally of mass shootings.

00:10:54.240 And because those kinds of shootings happen every day in places like Chicago, for reasons that have nothing to do with SSRIs, like turf disputes and gang wars and drugs and everything else,

00:11:02.880 the authors of these studies can make it seem like SSRIs don't cause mass shootings.

00:11:08.880 But they're really just obfuscating the central question by flooding the data set with unrelated information.

00:11:15.360 The core question, which is whether SSRIs cause otherwise law-abiding young students to shoot their classmates, remains unresolved in medical literature.

00:11:25.920 Because it's no surprise, and it's no secret, that young, angry males who grow up in the hood with no father figures and get involved in gangs and drug dealing by the age of 12 would then turn to violence.

00:11:38.480 I mean, there's no mystery there.

00:11:39.540 We all get that.

00:11:40.700 We understand what that is.

00:11:43.440 But there is a mystery as to why a child who has never been violent, who was not raised by a street gang, who is financially stable,

00:11:52.700 would one day casually execute a dozen classmates for no reason that he can even articulate.

00:12:00.620 Why is that happening?

00:12:02.360 And why is it that so often these kids are on psychiatric medication?

00:12:08.100 There are definitely reasons to think that SSRIs could play a role in this kind of violence. 0.98

00:12:12.300 For one thing, you can look at the warning label on the drugs.

00:12:16.580 You can pick up the bottle, look at it.

00:12:19.180 The drug companies themselves tell us that there could be a link that says it on the bottle that these drugs can actually increase the risk of suicide and violent behavior in some cases.

00:12:33.440 The drug makers are telling us outright that these drugs can put violent thoughts into your head.

00:12:40.020 Okay, they can make you think violent things that you wouldn't have thought otherwise.

00:12:46.100 They can make you want to lash out violently against yourself or other people.

00:12:50.820 The pharmaceutical companies are telling us that directly.

00:12:53.820 And yet, when that thing happens, they will insist that the drug that they said can cause it to happen must not have caused it to happen.

00:13:02.480 It's a very interesting thing that they can give all these drugs to kids that say on the bottle this can cause violent thoughts, thoughts of suicide.

00:13:12.360 And then that exact thing happens with a kid who's taking the drug, and yet we're never allowed to draw any link.

00:13:25.220 Shouldn't we ask the pharmaceutical companies, well, you're the ones who put this stuff on the bottle.

00:13:29.500 Where are you getting that information?

00:13:33.020 You must be getting it from somewhere.

00:13:34.500 Or you can also look at these studies that show that SSRIs can increase the risk of violence in people who aren't depressed at all.

00:13:42.620 A few years ago, for example, researchers in Denmark reviewed experiments going back to the 1960s.

00:13:47.740 And they found that when healthy volunteers, meaning people with no mental health issues, were given antidepressants,

00:13:53.280 the drugs doubled their risk of suicidality and violence.

00:13:58.340 So why did that happen?

00:14:00.740 Why might SSRIs make healthy people violent?

00:14:05.400 The honest answer is that we have no idea.

00:14:11.220 I mean, how can a drug put a thought into someone's head?

00:14:14.600 We have no clue how that can happen.

00:14:19.080 And yet we give these drugs to millions of people anyway.

00:14:23.000 Just a few years ago, we learned that there's actually no clear link between low serotonin levels and depression.

00:14:29.100 This was the central claim that justified the mass adoption of SSRIs in this country.

00:14:34.740 And it's false.

00:14:37.100 So we have no idea what these drugs are actually doing.

00:14:41.540 Maybe we should pump the brakes then a little bit.

00:14:44.080 That's what RFK tried to say yesterday.

00:14:46.000 And here's the response he got.

00:14:48.820 I know people, including members of my family, who've had a much worse time getting off of SSRIs than they did, than people have getting off of heroin.

00:14:58.580 And the withdrawal period is, I mean, and it's written on the label.

00:15:04.400 I have some experience with this myself, Mr. Kennedy.

00:15:08.380 This is personal for me.

00:15:10.160 When I was a young woman and I was struggling with depression, thankfully, I had the resources to help me get through it, including a new generation of SSRI uptake inhibitors, which helped to clear my mind, get me back on track to being a mom and a wife and a productive, happy person.

00:15:29.000 And I'm really grateful for that therapy.

00:15:31.240 So I have some experience with this.

00:15:32.800 And I think that everyone should have access to that care.

00:15:36.500 And your job as secretary is to expand access to care, not to spread lies and misinformation.

00:15:44.520 Do you think physicians, when they make that prescription, ought to have access to good science?

00:15:49.540 Of course they do.

00:15:50.460 And that's all I believe, too.

00:15:51.900 And you and I are in agreement, Senator.

00:15:54.940 Now, usually you expect that in a confirmation hearing, the worst thing that can happen is that the nominee says something disqualifying.

00:16:01.320 But in this case, the senator said something disqualifying.

00:16:05.500 Because let me be extremely clear about this.

00:16:07.940 If you need psychiatric drugs in order to function, then you are not fit to serve at the highest levels of government.

00:16:16.520 And we don't know.

00:16:17.580 Is she still taking the psychiatric medication?

00:16:20.220 She said that she did.

00:16:21.300 Is she still?

00:16:22.020 Not sure.

00:16:22.740 We need clarification on that.

00:16:24.680 Because if she is, she shouldn't be in office.

00:16:26.440 You know, if you need psychiatric medication, you're not qualified to teach elementary school students or operate heavy machinery, for that matter.

00:16:34.560 You simply cannot claim that you're competent to govern if you need to regularly take psychoactive substances.

00:16:42.340 So am I saying that every lawmaker on antidepressants should be removed from office?

00:16:46.940 Yes.

00:16:48.080 I'm absolutely saying that.

00:16:50.020 And that should be common sense.

00:16:52.840 You just said you need drugs to make your mind clear.

00:16:55.800 Well, and you're running the country?

00:16:59.140 What?

00:16:59.580 Now, more importantly, RFK is obviously right about SSRIs.

00:17:05.680 When the peer-reviewed journal Molecular Psychiatry, one of the most prominent journals in the field, admits that depression isn't actually caused by a serotonin imbalance, which is what happened in 2022,

00:17:15.280 it's obviously worth taking a close look at a class of antidepressants that's entitled Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors.

00:17:21.140 If a comprehensive review finds that we were wrong about these drugs for decades, then maybe we need some more information and studies before we prescribe them to millions of people, including children.

00:17:31.900 But, of course, this is a pattern in the healthcare industry.

00:17:34.100 Drugs are approved all the time when they don't actually work, at least not in the way that we understand or we're told.

00:17:41.180 As RFK Jr. said yesterday, it was a similar story for Alzheimer's drugs.

00:17:44.960 Some of these drugs received a lot of funding and fast-track approvals, only that turned out to be completely useless.

00:17:51.140 In one case, the data supporting these drugs was actually faked. Watch.

00:17:55.820 The gold standard means real scientific research with replication of studies, which very rarely happens now at NIH.

00:18:07.500 We should be giving at least 20% of the NIH budgets to replication.

00:18:12.520 We should make sure that all the science is published with the raw data.

00:18:17.460 We should make sure that the peer reviews are also published.

00:18:21.140 We, and, you know, and I'll give you a quick example.

00:18:25.240 20 years ago, NIH scientists did a study on amyloid, on Alzheimer's, which they said it was caused by amyloid plaque.

00:18:36.400 After that, NIH shut down studies of any other hypothesis.

00:18:41.440 20 years later, we now know that those studies were fraudulent.

00:18:44.760 NIH has funded 800 studies on a fraudulent hypothesis, and we've lost 20 years in figuring out how to cure for Alzheimer's.

00:18:55.000 And that's just one example I could give you hundreds.

00:18:57.760 We need to end that.

00:18:59.020 We need to end the old boy system. 1.00

00:19:00.660 We need to have replicatable science.

00:19:03.720 Now, at this point, you can probably tell that this hearing did not go very well for Democrats.

00:19:09.520 Later on, they tried to attack him for pointing out that Lyme disease has some very conspicuous origins.

00:19:14.820 Apparently, we're supposed to think post-COVID that it's some sort of outlandish conspiracy theory to believe that Lyme disease could possibly have anything to do with government labs injecting ticks with various exotic diseases.

00:19:24.200 And then there was this moment where one Democrat tried to make the point that RFK Jr. doesn't believe that germs can cause disease.

00:19:31.680 Then he refuted what she was saying, so she just read it into the record anyway.

00:19:37.120 Watch.

00:19:38.740 What do you think is causing the avian influenza?

00:19:41.180 This will go to my office.

00:19:42.780 I think the H5N1 virus is.

00:19:45.440 So that's good to hear, because in a recent book, I will submit this for the record because we don't have that much time.

00:19:50.940 Mr. Kennedy has questioned the scientific basis for germs causing disease and the power of vaccines and antibiotics.

00:19:57.740 I've never questioned that, Senator.

00:20:00.020 Well, I will submit that for the record.

00:20:03.160 So these hearings are all like this.

00:20:04.720 They're not actually about getting any kind of thoughtful answer from the nominee.

00:20:07.200 It's all drive-by soundbites.

00:20:09.300 Doesn't even matter what he says.

00:20:11.380 But even by this low standard, there was one moment in yesterday's hearing that managed to stand out.

00:20:15.460 This moment comes to us from Bernie Sanders.

00:20:17.220 Sanders began by asking RFK Jr. whether health care is a human right.

00:20:22.240 And he said no, because no one, especially gluttons or habitual smokers, is entitled to anyone else's labor.

00:20:29.860 And then Sanders resorted to berating RFK Jr. for his support of anti-vaccine apparel, specifically anti-vaccine onesies.

00:20:37.240 So behold, one of the great moments in modern congressional history.

00:20:41.700 You have started a group called the Children's Health Defense.

00:20:48.660 You're the originator.

00:20:50.440 Right now, as I understand it, on their website, they are selling what's called onesies.

00:20:55.140 These are little things, clothing for babies.

00:20:58.740 One of them is titled, Unfaxed, Unafraid.

00:21:03.320 Next one, and they're sold for $26 apiece, by the way.

00:21:05.960 Next one is, no vax, no problem.

00:21:10.640 Now, you're coming before this committee, and you say you're pro-vaccine.

00:21:14.820 Just want to ask some questions.

00:21:16.240 And yet your organization is making money selling a child's product to parents for $26,

00:21:24.660 which casts fundamental doubt on the usefulness of vaccines.

00:21:29.420 Can you tell us now that you will, now that you are pro-vaccine, that you're going to have your organization take these products off the market?

00:21:39.700 Senator, I have no power over that organization.

00:21:42.020 I'm not part of it.

00:21:42.960 I resigned from the board.

00:21:44.100 That was just a few months ago.

00:21:45.660 You founded that.

00:21:47.020 You certainly have power.

00:21:48.640 You can make that call.

00:21:49.660 Are you supportive of this?

00:21:51.600 I've had nothing to do with leadership.

00:21:53.480 Are you supportive of these onesies?

00:21:54.820 I'm supportive of vaccines.

00:21:56.220 Are you supportive of this clothing, which is militantly anti-vaccine?

00:22:01.600 I am supportive of vaccines.

00:22:03.960 I want good science.

00:22:08.360 So this is a level of seriousness that Democrats are applying to these confirmation hearings.

00:22:12.760 You've got Bernie Sanders screaming about onesies.

00:22:16.500 And also, I guess apparently they're on sale for $26.

00:22:20.620 So go check it out.

00:22:22.120 Buy some.

00:22:23.060 They barely even mentioned, of course, gender ideology or how RFK Jr. plans to end castration of children in this country.

00:22:29.880 They weren't remotely interested in his call for more transparent and accurate data and modern medicine.

00:22:34.220 Instead, one by one, Democrats ran interference for big pharma.

00:22:37.660 They talked about anti-vax onesies and demanded that RFK stop bullying Merck and the terrible oppressed pharmaceutical companies.

00:22:45.220 Because, you know, Democrats, like Bernie Sanders, like Elizabeth Warren, like to pretend that they stand against corporate greed and so on.

00:22:54.940 But you simply cannot pretend to be an avenger for the working class standing against corrupt billionaires if you will also defend the pharmaceutical industry to your dying breath.

00:23:05.480 There is no greater example of corporate greed in this country right now than what we have seen from big pharma.

00:23:13.480 This is an industry that we know for an absolute fact has pushed literal poison on people by the millions and done it all for no reason other than pure profit.

00:23:23.400 This is an industry that supplies actual castration drugs to 13-year-olds, an industry that got millions of Americans hooked on antidepressants on false pretenses based on a belief in a chemical imbalance that doesn't exist.

00:23:37.500 And there are dozens of other examples just like this.

00:23:39.680 And they are all things that Democrats don't want us to talk about and, in fact, have attempted to forcibly prevent us from talking about.

00:23:46.600 So, whatever reservations conservatives have about RFK Jr., it's very clear that he needs to be confirmed.

00:23:52.940 We have a real opportunity to install someone who is skeptical of the junk science that we've been relentlessly fed for decades on everything from SSRIs to Alzheimer's to gender ideology.

00:24:02.940 And after yesterday's debacle of a confirmation hearing, it's clear we need to take this opportunity now while we still have it.

00:24:10.080 Now let's get to our five headlines.

00:24:16.600 So, the big and horrifically awful story of the day, of course, is the plane crash in D.C.

00:24:22.620 An American Airlines regional jet collided with a Blackhawk helicopter as it was making its final approach into Reagan National Airport.

00:24:28.700 It was, from what I understand, about 400 feet above the ground at the time that the collision happened, which means that those passengers were, I don't know, less than a minute, 30 seconds probably, from being safely on the ground.

00:24:44.160 And instead, per the latest reports that I've seen, everybody on board the plane and everyone on the helicopter are all presumed dead.

00:24:51.660 67 people in total who have died in the first major airline disaster in the U.S. since 2009 and the biggest one now since, I believe, 2001.

00:25:05.060 61. Now, as I'm recording this, we still don't know exactly how this happened.

00:25:11.680 I mean, we know that it was a collision midair, but in terms of, like, how did that collision happen, why did it happen, there's still a lot that's not known.

00:25:20.140 The plane was coming in for landing.

00:25:22.500 The helicopter was crossing its path.

00:25:24.320 You know, I don't want to get into a lot of speculation, especially as you're listening to this.

00:25:31.940 It's likely that as you're listening to it, we know more than we did at the time that I'm saying these words.

00:25:39.000 So that, you know, there's only so much that can be speculated.

00:25:43.900 I will say that when the video first started circulating, you know, there's the, I guess it's the webcam video from the airport where you can see in the distance, you've probably seen the collision.

00:25:57.720 You could see the explosion in midair.

00:26:00.500 And when it first started circulating, it's obviously very startling and terrible.

00:26:04.900 And you get the feeling when you watch it that it looks intentional.

00:26:08.460 It looks like the helicopter just made a beeline right for the plane.

00:26:11.840 And a lot of people had that initial reaction.

00:26:14.900 I did, too.

00:26:16.040 It's just kind of a visceral initial reaction to it.

00:26:18.640 But I think from everything we know at the moment, which still isn't a whole lot, the possibility of it being intentional seems unlikely.

00:26:26.720 I mean, it would also be incredibly difficult to do that intentionally.

00:26:32.140 Although, I mean, I guess nothing can be ruled out at the moment.

00:26:35.440 It seems at this point the most likely scenario is that this was a confluence of errors.

00:26:40.480 There's major egregious mistakes made by some or all of the people involved.

00:26:47.220 You have air traffic control.

00:26:48.720 You have the helicopter pilot, the airplane pilot.

00:26:52.360 And in order to avoid this, you would need all three people.

00:26:55.080 I mean, really, it's more than three.

00:26:56.180 You need all three parties.

00:26:57.380 In order to avoid this happening, you would need all three parties to communicate correctly and clearly and then execute.

00:27:06.460 So it seems, again, just the most likely scenario that one party, probably at least two, maybe all three, failed in communication or execution or both.

00:27:19.560 And, you know, the thing is, I can speak for myself as a passenger.

00:27:27.640 I always get the most nervous when the plane is at altitude and it's 35,000 feet, you know, and you hit turbulence.

00:27:36.940 That makes me nervous.

00:27:37.920 I think most people are the same way.

00:27:39.840 When you hit, when you talk about like what are the scariest, for a passenger.

00:27:44.260 And you talk to a pilot, it'll be very, they'll tell you something else.

00:27:46.520 But for passenger, what's the scariest moment of a flight?

00:27:50.620 It's probably that.

00:27:51.860 It's when you're all the way up on the scale, you're above the clouds and the plane starts shaking and rocking.

00:27:58.940 And that's, for me, it's quite unsettling.

00:28:02.680 But the truth is that there's nowhere safer on Earth than a plane at 35,000 feet.

00:28:11.100 I mean, almost nothing can take down a plane at that altitude.

00:28:14.940 If you talk to pilots, I mean, they'll, you would need either an absolutely catastrophic, almost unheard of mechanical failure, or you would need like a missile.

00:28:25.180 And outside of those two things, the plane is going to stay in the sky.

00:28:29.100 Turbulence almost certainly won't do it.

00:28:31.880 And that's why there's, it's, it's, there has very, very, very, very, very rarely been plane crashes where the plane plunges out of the sky from thousands of feet.

00:28:42.880 But it almost never happens in the whole history of aviation.

00:28:47.580 It's very rare.

00:28:49.020 So most of the bad stuff can happen and does happen.

00:28:52.580 I mean, if it is going to happen, if the bad stuff is going to happen, it's usually going to be on takeoff and landing.

00:28:58.960 And that, and that, you know, kind of the cruel thing here is that's exactly when passengers feel the safest, probably.

00:29:09.520 I mean, I know, like in the, in the final 30 seconds of, um, of a flight, you know, when you can look down, you can see the ground.

00:29:18.340 It looks like you'd, you know, it looks, it's, uh, you're only a few hundred feet up.

00:29:21.960 That's, I'll start, I'll text my wife at that point before we've even landed to say, uh, you know, we, we landed safely.

00:29:27.720 Cause it feels like, it feels like, well, we're here, you know, what could possibly go wrong?

00:29:32.660 But the truth is, and again, if you talk to pilots about this, I think they would, they would affirm this, that that that's the danger zone.

00:29:40.660 I mean, that's, that's actually the, the most dangerous part of the flight.

00:29:45.040 And because, um, there's a lot more going on, there are a lot more balls in the air that have to be, have to be juggled.

00:29:53.060 And if something goes wrong, there's, there's no room for error.

00:29:56.260 There's no, it's, it's, there's very little that a pilot can do in those final seconds and minutes to adjust, to avoid something catastrophic.

00:30:05.500 Whereas if you're 35,000 feet in the, in the sky, you know, you have comparatively a long time to figure it out.

00:30:13.280 If something bad happens, but when you're landing, it's, uh, there's just not a lot of time.

00:30:18.540 And, um, so a lot can go wrong, uh, when a big jet is landing at a busy airport and a lot would have to go wrong for this kind of tragedy to occur.

00:30:28.340 Um, as you know, if you've been listening to the show for a while, that, uh, I, I have been worried about this exact thing.

00:30:40.320 You know, this is something that we've talked about on the show, um, several times over the last many months, even going back a year or more or more.

00:30:50.240 I think that, um, that the worry that I've expressed is that even though there has not been a major airline disaster in a very long time, or there hadn't been, that, uh, I was worried that we'd have one very soon.

00:31:07.580 And, and, and that's, it's, it's, it's only, it's not like some kind of prophecy or anything like that.

00:31:12.760 It's just because there'd been a lot of close calls that in the close calls don't get report.

00:31:18.620 I mean, they're reported, but they don't get a lot of attention.

00:31:21.560 Uh, I mean, there, there have been things that have happened that if things had just gone a little bit differently, hundreds of people would have died, but they didn't die.

00:31:29.960 And because they didn't die, it doesn't get major head, doesn't make the headlines.

00:31:33.120 Um, but there have just been a lot of close calls.

00:31:36.740 And so it doesn't take, you know, it's anyone who notices that and takes note of all the close calls would say the same thing.

00:31:44.640 Like, man, we're, we've come really close and it just stands to reason statistically that when you're coming that close that often of eventually, uh, you know, you're, you're going to come out on the wrong side of that.

00:31:59.000 And, and this is something that pilots, I've heard this also from pilots.

00:32:04.940 I mean, the pilots are the ones who obviously know.

00:32:08.100 And, um, many pilots have been talking about this, that we've been flying way too close to the sun with this kind of stuff for too long.

00:32:16.320 Um, and, uh, and now, and now here we are.

00:32:20.580 Um, so, you know, we'll be able to say more very soon, I think it'll be clear what, what happened sooner rather than later, maybe who's at fault, where the system broke down.

00:32:35.600 Um, I think the American Airlines CEO put out a statement where he not so subtly put the blame on the military for it, which is not surprising.

00:32:47.180 You're going to, you're going to have the finger pointing that goes, goes on back and forth, but, um, it's, it's pretty clear that there was obviously some, some major mistakes here.

00:32:58.980 And, and, uh, I would be surprised if the mistakes were all on one party's end of it.

00:33:06.320 So for now, I'm, you know, just feel terrible about this and for the families.

00:33:10.140 And, and, um, I worry about this, of course, every time you get on a plane, you worry about this.

00:33:16.340 But even more, like if my wife flies somewhere, this is, you're just, you just, you dread this exact scenario.

00:33:21.800 And, uh, um, it's horrible to think that it actually happened.

00:33:26.500 And now there are people who are experienced, experiencing in real life, you know, not just in their, in their worst nightmares.

00:33:31.740 Uh, there was a, there was a, a clip on, on social media last night.

00:33:38.840 I'm not going to play it, but, and I don't even remember what media outlet posted it,

00:33:45.560 but it was a clip apparently of a husband who was at the airport, whose wife was on the plane.

00:33:53.440 And he was, and at this point it was, it wasn't known if everybody had, had died or not.

00:33:59.340 And there was, there had even been reports that maybe some people had been recovered.

00:34:03.980 And so he's waiting there, obviously desperately hopeful that his wife was one of the people recovered.

00:34:09.620 It turns out that, you know, tragically nobody, uh, nobody was, no one survived.

00:34:15.400 But anyway, the reporter comes up and starts talking to this guy, you know, interviewing him.

00:34:21.440 And, and, uh, he says that he was texting with his wife.

00:34:24.280 She asks to read the text message.

00:34:26.660 I mean, just, I get that you're a reporter and you're doing your, you got to do your job.

00:34:33.540 You're reporting on this, but you also have to have some basic humanity.

00:34:36.300 And, uh, talking to the guy at all, I think is, is wrong.

00:34:42.260 This is just a time to have humanity.

00:34:44.020 Asking to see a text message is just way over the line.

00:34:46.480 I mean, just, just repulsive.

00:34:47.840 So we'll obviously continue to track this story and I'm sure there'll be a lot more to say about it.

00:34:52.880 Um, all right, let's, uh, kind of hard to go from that to the rest of the show,

00:35:00.440 but, um, I'm not going to try to just talk about the plane crash for the whole show

00:35:04.100 because that would require me to fill the time with an hour's worth of speculation,

00:35:07.420 which I don't want to do.

00:35:09.740 So we'll move to this here.

00:35:11.060 Here's an interesting clip that I wanted to play for you.

00:35:13.720 It relates back to a conversation we had yesterday.

00:35:15.540 We talked about the issue of foreign aid.

00:35:18.740 And, um, I gave my, my spiel, which I've given a thousand times about how we should cut off all foreign aid to every country

00:35:25.380 and let them stand or fall on their own two feet.

00:35:28.620 And if you can't exist without the United States supplementing your existence, then you don't deserve to exist.

00:35:33.520 You should, as, as I, and I say this with, without irony, if you can't exist on your own without U.S. foreign aid,

00:35:42.060 then really what should happen is you should be conquered by a stronger country and become their subjects.

00:35:47.240 I mean, that's what should happen to a country that lacks the will or ability to exist on its own.

00:35:51.440 They should be conquered and colonized because, because the other thing, if you're relying on foreign aid, 0.99

00:35:56.160 then you are already a colony.

00:35:58.420 You've already been colonized.

00:36:00.700 It's, it's, it's just colonized in this kind of modern, indirect way.

00:36:05.260 It's better to be colonized in a more honest and direct way, I think,

00:36:08.220 and have a, a, a better, greater country come in and rule over you because you cannot rule over yourselves.

00:36:15.100 Um, that's better than the modern form of colonization where a country funds your existence.

00:36:21.060 So you don't really have independence.

00:36:22.720 You don't have sovereignty.

00:36:23.780 You're not a sovereign nation.

00:36:24.740 But you also don't have the law and order and stability that you could have

00:36:29.440 if some greater country came in and, and governed you.

00:36:36.260 So I am unironically in favor of countries that can't exist without aid being conquered.

00:36:43.100 I, I, that's, that's the way of the world.

00:36:45.400 It's the way the world worked for thousands of years.

00:36:47.520 Um, and I think it's an absurdity.

00:36:50.420 I just think it's an absurdity to, to prop up, uh, failed states with taxpayer money.

00:36:57.600 I just think it's absurd.

00:37:00.620 Um, and by the way, I'm not saying that every country that receives aid would collapse without it.

00:37:06.140 Um, you know, we talked about, what was it?

00:37:08.500 We talked about, you know, we, we were talking about the, the, uh, Central American and South American countries.

00:37:15.620 And I said that we've got all these countries that they, they depend on the U.S. for foreign aid, right?

00:37:25.300 But then they want to turn around and get all big for their britches when we try to send illegals, illegal aliens back to them. 0.99

00:37:31.940 Um, and, and I got responses from people saying, well, they don't depend on, on U.S. aid.

00:37:38.580 It's just, it's, it's a, it's a very small part of their GDP is, is you, they don't depend on it.

00:37:44.240 Okay, well, so if they don't, great, then that's all the more reason that we should take the aid away.

00:37:50.600 Why, why, if they don't even depend on it, you're, you're telling me they don't need it and we're still giving it to them.

00:37:54.480 Why?

00:37:54.820 So, it's like you got two categories of countries, broadly speaking.

00:38:01.120 You have the countries that receive foreign aid and don't depend on it and don't need it.

00:38:05.840 For them, absolutely, let's stop giving it to them.

00:38:08.460 They don't even need it.

00:38:10.200 Then you have the countries that do depend on it, whose very existence depend on it.

00:38:16.840 And them also, we shouldn't be, for that reason, we shouldn't be giving them aid.

00:38:20.920 So, in either way, we're, we're left with, I don't think we should be giving foreign aid.

00:38:24.820 So, anyway, a clip went viral yesterday of a politician in Kenya, a former president, making essentially this exact point, or at least a very similar one.

00:38:35.240 Here it is.

00:38:36.640 People the other day crying, oh, I don't know, Trump has removed money.

00:38:45.100 He said he's not giving us any more money.

00:38:48.060 What do you want to hear?

00:38:48.780 Why are you crying?

00:38:49.500 It's not your government.

00:38:50.500 It's not your country. 0.88

00:38:54.820 He has, he has no, he has no reason to, to give you anything.

00:39:03.320 I mean, you don't pay taxes in America.

00:39:07.200 He is appealing to his people.

00:39:10.240 Shauri yenu bano.

00:39:13.720 This is a wake-up call for you to say, okay, what are we going to do to help ourselves?

00:39:18.560 Instead of crying, to, to, to, to, to, to, what are we going to do?

00:39:24.060 I am a troa, you a peza, sasa tutafanya na mnagani jameni.

00:39:26.560 What are we going to do?

00:39:27.520 Yeah, to, to support ourselves because nobody is going to continue holding out a hand there

00:39:35.320 to give you.

00:39:36.940 It is time for us to use our resources for the right things.

00:39:41.160 We are the ones who are using them for the wrong things.

00:39:44.300 Couldn't agree more.

00:39:47.060 He says, why are you crying?

00:39:48.220 It's not, it's not your government.

00:39:49.380 It's not your money.

00:39:50.220 They, they have no reason to give you anything.

00:39:53.120 You don't pay taxes in America.

00:39:55.160 He's appealing to his own people.

00:39:58.520 Yeah, that's exactly that.

00:40:00.180 Every word of that.

00:40:01.420 And this man, Uhuru Kenyatta, I'm sure I'm mispronouncing it, is his name.

00:40:06.080 And, and what he's saying is, he's saying something that most politicians in America won't say.

00:40:12.300 He has a more America first mentality than most American politicians.

00:40:17.760 That's the crazy thing.

00:40:18.620 So I don't know, I don't know anything about this guy or what kind of president he was,

00:40:23.260 but I, I respect the hell out of that.

00:40:27.360 He's saying Trump has taken care of his own people.

00:40:29.700 His people are Americans.

00:40:31.280 It's that simple.

00:40:33.060 If you don't pay taxes in America, why should you expect any tax money from America?

00:40:41.780 So my question is, why is it so hard for American politicians to say that?

00:40:45.560 Why can the former president of Kenya say that?

00:40:50.060 And, and you won't.

00:40:54.300 Uhuru Kenyatta can say, hey, American leaders, they got to take care of their own people.

00:41:00.900 So he'll say that, but the vast majority of actual American leaders will not say that.

00:41:09.880 That should really tell you something.

00:41:12.360 All right.

00:41:12.920 Donald Trump yesterday made another big announcement, another executive action that he's taking to address the immigration crisis.

00:41:18.560 Let's listen to that today.

00:41:21.180 I'm also signing an executive order to instruct the departments of defense and homeland security to begin preparing the 30,000 person migrant facility at Guantanamo Bay.

00:41:32.260 Most people don't even know about it.

00:41:33.780 We have 30,000 beds in Guantanamo to detain the worst criminal illegal aliens, threatening the American people. 1.00

00:41:43.200 Some of them are so bad.

00:41:44.220 We don't even trust the countries to hold them because we don't want them coming back. 0.80

00:41:48.240 So we're going to send them out to Guantanamo.

00:41:50.060 All right.

00:41:51.580 So he's going to send, uh, the worst criminal aliens to, uh, Guantanamo Bay.

00:41:57.840 Now, I mean, shipping illegal alien criminals to Gitmo is the, is the kind of thing that you would hear me suggest on this show half jokingly,

00:42:10.340 because I know that it would never happen and no American president would ever do that, even though they should.

00:42:16.460 And yet Trump is actually doing it.

00:42:18.540 He's, he's actually doing it.

00:42:20.700 It's, it's extraordinary.

00:42:22.420 And, uh, it's still, it's, it's kind of shocking.

00:42:25.580 Even though it's a totally sensible and good and correct policy, it's still shocking.

00:42:31.040 It's shocking because we have grown so accustomed to nonsensical and bad and incorrect policies.

00:42:38.240 Of course we should ship them to Gitmo.

00:42:40.240 Why even have Gitmo if we're not going to use it to imprison foreign nationals who terrorize American communities? 1.00

00:42:46.480 These foreign nationals who are a threat to American communities. 1.00

00:42:50.480 That's why you have Gitmo.

00:42:52.020 Gitmo is made for that.

00:42:54.740 Uh, so it's a great idea.

00:42:57.100 And I think Trump's first couple of weeks in office have really sharply revealed and demonstrated,

00:43:01.960 uh, if nothing else, just how God awful, abysmal our leadership has been in this country for so long.

00:43:09.660 Because most of what Trump is doing, and I've been saying this, most of what he's doing,

00:43:13.600 it's, you can call it right wing, you can call it conservative, but it's, it's really not.

00:43:19.240 It's just common sense.

00:43:21.740 And he's doing a bunch of stuff where you, you go, why weren't we doing that already?

00:43:28.240 Yeah, that makes sense.

00:43:29.800 Why were we already doing that?

00:43:32.400 And that is almost everything he's done.

00:43:34.880 It's just been that kind of thing.

00:43:36.020 The kind of thing that the normal Americans, like the kind of idea that just a normal person

00:43:45.600 would have and would say, well, why don't they just do this?

00:43:51.080 Like, well, we have Guantanamo Bay.

00:43:52.700 Why don't we just ship them there?

00:43:54.780 You know, if you've got a criminal alien who keeps coming into the country and we can't stop them, 1.00

00:44:01.140 you know, just ship them off to Guantanamo Bay.

00:44:02.540 It's like, it's like the, it's the kind, it's the kind of thing you'd hear on a podcast or you'd hear

00:44:05.320 just someone sitting in their living room.

00:44:08.300 And I mean, that is, that's a good thing.

00:44:10.920 Okay.

00:44:11.240 Not everything that someone says on a podcast or in their living room is a good idea and should

00:44:15.000 actually be enacted as policy.

00:44:16.360 But a lot of it is just common sense.

00:44:18.160 And, and then the answer you always get is, yeah, well, you know, it's not that simple.

00:44:22.180 It's like, that's, that's the answer we'll get from our leaders.

00:44:24.420 Most of the time from politicians, they'll say, yeah, I mean, that seems like a real sensible solution.

00:44:28.740 It seems like that would be a rational, practical way to handle this, but it's not that simple.

00:44:36.820 You can't really do that.

00:44:38.340 It turns out actually it is that simple.

00:44:40.600 Most of the time it is, it is pretty simple.

00:44:44.200 That's why I always say that most of the problems we face as a country and most of the problems

00:44:49.540 you face in your everyday life, most of them are not complicated.

00:44:55.460 Most problems are simple.

00:44:57.180 That doesn't mean that they're easy to solve, right?

00:45:01.360 They can still be hard to solve.

00:45:02.720 It can be, it can be hard to do, but it is simple.

00:45:06.940 It's like losing weight.

00:45:09.440 It's, it's not complicated.

00:45:12.080 It's hard.

00:45:12.880 It's difficult.

00:45:13.360 It requires focus and discipline.

00:45:16.360 And all these things that are hard for people, hard for me, hard for anyone, but it's, it

00:45:20.920 is simple though.

00:45:22.020 The answer is simple.

00:45:24.040 And I think that works, that works even on a national and international level.

00:45:30.460 There are things that are complicated, there are complicated issues, but a lot of these

00:45:33.400 issues are pretty simple.

00:45:34.840 How do we solve in general, the problem of rampant crime in the, in our communities, even the

00:45:43.400 type that is not committed by illegal criminals, but how about just the criminals that are here

00:45:47.800 legally?

00:45:49.260 How do we solve it?

00:45:50.060 What do we do about it?

00:45:51.680 I don't know.

00:45:52.060 I guess we should arrest all those people and just put them in jail and not let them out.

00:45:57.780 That's, that's one thing we could do.

00:45:59.260 It's pretty simple.

00:46:00.080 Well, and again, we'll hear from politicians, you know, but you can't really, why can't

00:46:05.440 we, why can't we just do that?

00:46:08.320 Would work.

00:46:09.580 You got someone who's dangerous, you put them in prison, they're not going to hurt anybody.

00:46:14.120 It is that simple, but you just have to have the will to actually do it.

00:46:16.980 And that's what we're seeing from Trump.

00:46:18.180 Let's get to the comment section. 0.97

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00:47:02.400 Okay, a few comments and a few messages here.

00:47:08.920 First one, responding to the story of the woman who was suing Lyft because she was too fat

00:47:13.100 to fit in the car.

00:47:15.540 Comment says, she ordered on the wrong app.

00:47:17.680 She needed the forklift app.

00:47:20.720 Yeah, you know, a lot of people have made that joke.

00:47:24.360 And I can't say that I approve or that I find it funny.

00:47:28.280 I can't say that I do on YouTube.

00:47:30.840 I couldn't say, I couldn't say that I find that to be a funny joke.

00:47:36.440 Can't say it.

00:47:38.860 You can say it.

00:47:39.700 I can't, you know, I'm just, I'm just raising awareness.

00:47:45.020 The only reason I read that, this joke is just to raise awareness that this, that some

00:47:48.800 people are making this joke.

00:47:49.760 A lot of people are making this forklift joke.

00:47:51.380 And I want to, I want to bring that to your, I want to raise awareness of it.

00:47:54.040 Uh, the worst part about this is that Lyft actually apologized and left their very respectful

00:48:00.760 driver out to dry.

00:48:02.500 Yeah.

00:48:02.860 I hope the driver sues Lyft also.

00:48:04.680 He, he, he has a case.

00:48:06.180 So Lyft should be getting, you know, Lyft's getting sued by the obese woman. 0.99

00:48:10.680 Now she gets sued by the Lyft driver too, because, and here's something I didn't mention

00:48:14.080 yesterday.

00:48:14.520 And a lot of people brought up in the comments too.

00:48:17.120 Seatbelts, right?

00:48:18.880 This is an open shut case, open and shut case just based on seatbelts alone.

00:48:22.760 There's no way that a woman of that, of those proportions could, could use a seatbelt 1.00

00:48:28.620 in a, in a normal car.

00:48:29.940 The seatbelt is not going to, is not going to make its way all the way around her.

00:48:33.400 So, which means he can't legally take her anyway, right?

00:48:39.460 You can't, if you're, if you do ride share, if you're, you can't even legally pick up, uh,

00:48:45.220 or if you can legally do it, I mean, different states have different laws in terms of seatbelts,

00:48:48.640 but it's a major liability at a minimum.

00:48:53.000 This is someone who cannot use a seatbelt.

00:48:55.020 So, uh, that should tell you everything.

00:48:57.300 And, and even the, you know, the payload capacity for a lot of four door sedans.

00:49:02.440 And I don't think we know exactly what the make or model was of this car, but we know

00:49:06.120 that the payload capacity for a lot of, it was a four door sedan.

00:49:08.260 And we know that for a lot of them, the payload capacity is like 800 pounds.

00:49:12.100 Well, the driver was an adult man.

00:49:13.860 We didn't see him in the, in the video.

00:49:15.920 So we don't know what he looked like, but if he was a slightly above average sized man,

00:49:20.420 at let's say 200 pounds, I don't know.

00:49:22.440 And if she, I actually read that she was 550 pounds. 1.00

00:49:25.340 That puts them at 750.

00:49:27.760 If she gets in that car, they're only 50 pounds away from payload capacity in the car, potentially. 1.00

00:49:34.020 And if he's carrying anything else, like in the trunk, any, any luggage or anything,

00:49:37.320 then, uh, they could very well be over the limit.

00:49:39.700 And besides, even if they did squeeze in under the capacity, the car, the payload capacity

00:49:46.580 is under the assumption that, you know, that you're going to have, if we say, well, it would

00:49:54.480 fit four or five adults.

00:49:56.680 Well, the, the assumption is that the adults are sitting in different seats.

00:50:00.880 Not that you can have four adults crowded into one seat on one side of the car, which

00:50:06.120 is what she's the equivalent of, uh, in terms of her weight. 1.00

00:50:10.620 Uh, let's see.

00:50:11.660 I would vote Teddy Roosevelt off Mount Rushmore.

00:50:16.760 He's a member of the same family as FDR who ushered in socialism and in so many ways that

00:50:21.380 it even taints his uncle.

00:50:23.240 Uh, that's insane.

00:50:24.380 Roosevelt stays.

00:50:25.220 Teddy Roosevelt stays on Mount Rushmore.

00:50:27.240 So if we got to kick someone off for Trump, uh, you know, you can make an argument that maybe

00:50:31.560 there's room, there might be room to carve another face in there, but maybe not.

00:50:35.640 Cause you know, the other thing about Trump is he's got that, you know, the head of hair

00:50:39.160 is quite, is, is substantial.

00:50:40.740 And so you got to have room for all the whole thing.

00:50:43.100 You probably would have to carve him over somebody.

00:50:45.040 And so you ought, you do have to vote somebody off the Island and it's not going to be Roosevelt.

00:50:47.900 Roosevelt is the most, one of the most bad-ass Americans period to have ever lived.

00:50:53.320 Okay.

00:50:53.700 This is somebody who almost died exploring the Amazon rainforest after he was already president.

00:50:59.020 And after he got shot while giving a speech and then stood up and finished the speech.

00:51:03.160 Okay.

00:51:03.540 After getting shot.

00:51:04.380 So, uh, he, he's staying, he stays.

00:51:09.000 I'm sorry.

00:51:09.540 It's Abe Lincoln.

00:51:10.080 Abe Lincoln's the one that's got to go.

00:51:12.240 I hate to say it.

00:51:13.720 10 years ago, the Daily Wire started a fight.

00:51:15.580 We took on the radical left's assault on truth.

00:51:17.680 We refused to bow to their delusions.

00:51:19.900 And today, because of our member support, we are winning.

00:51:22.440 On January 20th, Donald Trump signed an executive order banning the chemical and surgical mutilation

00:51:26.240 of children.

00:51:27.080 This is a massive victory that we led the way on.

00:51:29.620 A battle that other conservatives weren't even willing to fight a decade ago.

00:51:33.260 We took the heat.

00:51:34.040 We took the losses.

00:51:34.860 We took the risks.

00:51:35.520 And today, reality wins.

00:51:37.480 Truth wins.

00:51:38.220 We win.

00:51:39.060 But the fight is far from over.

00:51:40.520 The left is not giving up and neither are we.

00:51:42.560 Join us because this next decade, it's going to be even bigger.

00:51:46.040 Join the fight now at dailywire.com slash subscribe.

00:51:50.080 Now let's get to our daily cancellation.

00:51:51.360 Now, pretty much every time we've talked about Disney lately, it's been hard not to wonder

00:52:01.640 whether they're intentionally sabotaging their own brand for some unknown reason.

00:52:05.960 And that might sound like a crazy conspiracy theory.

00:52:08.460 But ask yourself this.

00:52:09.700 When was the last time that the spokeswoman for a major company told half of the company's

00:52:14.120 customers that they should suffer in pain for the rest of their lives and never know peace?

00:52:18.820 And then after the spokeswoman delivers that message as explicitly as she possibly can,

00:52:22.600 the company doesn't fire that spokeswoman or publicly repudiate her in any way.

00:52:27.360 In fact, they keep paying her.

00:52:29.700 That's basically how bad things have gotten at Disney.

00:52:32.220 The actress Rachel Zegler wrote a whole post about how Trump supporters should basically 0.99

00:52:36.480 burn in hell. 0.94

00:52:37.580 And on top of that, for good measure, she declared that Snow White, the movie she's doing a remake 0.98

00:52:42.140 of, is a terrible and misogynistic story.

00:52:45.420 So to fix that, they need to have a new girl boss, a main character who treats the dwarves 1.00

00:52:50.200 like they're her slaves.

00:52:51.500 And at no point in this process is she fired.

00:52:53.740 And you have to wonder, what kind of company would operate like this?

00:52:57.160 I mean, if it didn't deliberately want to tank its own reputation.

00:52:59.640 Maybe that's not Disney's ultimate goal.

00:53:01.940 I've seen some people suggest that maybe Disney only intends to tank specific projects,

00:53:05.520 the ones that it knows in advance are going to do poorly.

00:53:08.600 So for example, they know that Snow White is going to bomb, so they encourage Zegler to 0.98

00:53:12.280 torpedo the whole thing with politics, and that way when everything collapses, they can

00:53:15.720 blame Trump supporters instead of their own incompetence.

00:53:19.460 Think of it like a face-saving public relations strategy.

00:53:22.640 And that's an alternative theory.

00:53:24.140 Does it make a lot of sense?

00:53:25.420 No, it doesn't.

00:53:26.140 But this is the kind of theorizing people do in the face of this level of incompetence.

00:53:30.020 This particular conspiracy theory actually has another benefit, which is that it helps

00:53:33.160 explain the otherwise inexplicable statements that were made by the actor Anthony Mackie, the

00:53:38.820 star of Disney's upcoming film, Captain America, Brave New World.

00:53:42.820 What Mackie just did is so over the top and so clearly intended, you would think, to antagonize

00:53:48.340 potential fans of the film that you think there's got to be something else going on here,

00:53:53.940 which even though there probably isn't.

00:53:56.220 So perhaps they know that, I don't know, maybe they think Captain America, Brave New World

00:54:00.820 is going to bomb, so they decided to completely destroy it preemptively.

00:54:03.640 And then they had Anthony Mackie go out and say this, the viral moment is at the beginning

00:54:09.280 of this clip when he explains that Captain America, what it represents in his view, which

00:54:15.540 is an easy question when you're on a publicity tour for Captain America and somebody asks,

00:54:20.160 what does it represent?

00:54:21.460 You'd think that's a pretty easy question.

00:54:23.060 That's a softball. 1.00

00:54:24.720 How do you not just crush that as a home run answer?

00:54:28.740 But he doesn't.

00:54:29.600 And it's kind of extraordinary footage in its own right, but we'll play the whole thing

00:54:33.640 because really the whole statement is something to behold.

00:54:35.940 Here it is.

00:54:37.700 For me, Captain America represents a lot of different things, and I don't think the term,

00:54:43.380 you know, America should be one of those representations.

00:54:47.960 Like, it's about a man who keeps his word, who has honor, dignity, and integrity.

00:54:54.680 Uh, someone who is, uh, trustworthy and dependable.

00:54:58.900 Um, you know, it's, uh, it's, it's kind of, this is kind of like a, uh, an aspect of a dream

00:55:08.160 coming true.

00:55:08.940 You know, when I was a kid, you know, all of us as actors, I believe, want to get back

00:55:13.780 to that day before someone told you no.

00:55:16.980 When you look out your door and you see a five-year-old kid with a stick and he's slaying

00:55:21.540 dragons to save the princess in the tower, that kid really believes there are dragons

00:55:26.100 out there.

00:55:26.660 That stick is really a sword, and he's really trying to save that princess.

00:55:29.820 And then one day, somebody told him, no, there are no dragons, that's not a sword, and that

00:55:35.440 princess is not there.

00:55:37.360 And all of his little dreams were dashed.

00:55:40.000 So, you know, as an actor, I feel like our job is to get back to the day where we see

00:55:44.700 that dragon and we slayed that dragon to save that princess. 1.00

00:55:48.040 And, uh, that's kind of what this movie was for me.

00:55:52.740 So the money quote at the beginning, in case you missed it, was this, quote, for me, Captain

00:55:56.860 America represents a lot of different things, and I don't think the term, you know, America

00:56:00.220 should be one of those representations.

00:56:02.600 Yes, Captain America is not supposed to represent America.

00:56:05.380 That's according to the star of the upcoming Captain America film, just a couple of weeks

00:56:08.820 before his film comes out.

00:56:11.240 Now, it's, it's such an incredible moment that it's hard to think of anything to compare

00:56:14.260 to or how it could even possibly happen.

00:56:16.520 But you put yourself in this actor's shoes for a moment.

00:56:19.980 You've just emerged from an extended bender, which has temporarily destroyed your memory 1.00

00:56:24.000 and your capacity for high order thinking.

00:56:25.960 Even in that scenario, this is still an interview that you should be able to pull off.

00:56:30.420 Even if you don't know anything about Captain America, you still know that he's called Captain

00:56:35.060 America.

00:56:35.380 So it should be a pretty big clue all by itself.

00:56:38.520 And again, a really easy thing to talk about.

00:56:42.880 Saying that Captain America doesn't represent America is like saying Spider-Man has nothing

00:56:45.840 to do with spiders.

00:56:47.080 It's like right there in the name.

00:56:49.280 And of course, it gets even worse when you consider the fact that Captain America's costume

00:56:52.680 is the American flag.

00:56:54.100 And he was created specifically to promote American ideals ahead of World War II.

00:56:58.320 According to Wikipedia, which is the extent of my knowledge of Captain America, the very

00:57:02.000 first Captain America comic has him punching Hitler in the face on the front cover, which

00:57:06.100 is about as explicit a message as you can possibly get.

00:57:10.200 But somehow, Anthony Mackie, who's playing Captain America, missed it in his years of

00:57:14.780 preparation for this role.

00:57:16.020 This managed to escape him.

00:57:18.000 Then he explains what, in his view, Captain America is all about.

00:57:20.820 He says, when you look out your door and you see a five-year-old kid with a stick and

00:57:24.440 he's slaying dragons to save the princess in the tower, that kid really believes there

00:57:28.460 are dragons out there.

00:57:29.320 The stick is really a sword and he's really trying to save that princess.

00:57:32.600 And then one day, someone told him, no, there are no dragons.

00:57:35.060 That's not a sword and that princess is not there.

00:57:38.440 And all of his little dreams are dashed.

00:57:39.940 So as an actor, I feel like our job is to get back to the day where we could see the

00:57:43.360 dragon and slay the dragon and save the princess.

00:57:46.100 And that's kind of what this movie was for me.

00:57:49.040 Now, if you went back in time and showed that quote to Joe Simon and Jack Kirby, the two guys

00:57:52.640 who, according to Wikipedia, created Captain America, you have to imagine they'd be a little

00:57:56.460 bit confused.

00:57:57.420 It's such an incoherent, rambling response that it almost defies comprehension.

00:58:01.000 And it's as if he's doing everything he possibly can to avoid talking about Captain America.

00:58:06.100 He appears to be talking about how he wants to go back to being a child where he apparently

00:58:12.020 believed at the age of five years old that he was slaying actual dragons with a stick in

00:58:17.220 his yard.

00:58:17.940 And then he suffered a traumatizing experience when someone informed him that there were

00:58:22.580 no actual dragons in his backyard.

00:58:24.340 And his whole acting career has been an extended effort to undo that psychological trauma.

00:58:28.880 Now, from some other reporting, it seems like he really wanted to play Spider-Man a few

00:58:34.340 years ago, but he ended up with this.

00:58:36.540 But it's all the same to Anthony Mackie.

00:58:38.420 Whatever role he gets, he'll find a way to tie it back somehow to his childhood fantasies.

00:58:42.240 And that's what this movie is all about, in his view.

00:58:45.780 Now, in this case, someone at Disney apparently came to the realization that something had to

00:58:48.900 be done.

00:58:49.600 So they made a desperate attempt at damage control, which, as far as I know, never happened

00:58:53.620 with Rachel Zegler.

00:58:55.620 So maybe they haven't completely given up on this new film.

00:58:57.920 So this effort at damage control produced this new statement from Anthony Mackie, which

00:59:01.640 reads, quote,

00:59:02.700 Let me be clear about this.

00:59:03.880 I'm a proud American, and taking on the shield of a hero like Cap is the honor of a lifetime.

00:59:08.400 I have the utmost respect for those who serve and have served our country.

00:59:11.500 Cap has universal characteristics that people all over the world can relate to.

00:59:16.080 So he still doesn't seem to understand the character.

00:59:19.240 And then he makes things even worse with his follow-up, which doesn't even make sense.

00:59:23.700 Quote,

00:59:23.900 Now, of course, that's not the point.

00:59:40.440 Race had nothing to do with it.

00:59:42.180 And it's not why people responded so negatively to his initial statement.

00:59:46.160 The point is that Anthony Mackie is embarrassed by the explicitly patriotic nature of the Captain

00:59:51.380 America character.

00:59:52.420 He doesn't want to ascribe any uniquely positive traits to America or Americans.

00:59:58.020 Even his cleanup PR damage control statement, he still doesn't want to do that.

01:00:02.420 He can't bring himself to say, hey, Captain America embodies the American ideals of courage, honesty, and fortitude.

01:00:09.700 Easy thing to say.

01:00:10.940 That's a crowd pleaser.

01:00:12.520 But he can't say it.

01:00:13.860 He can't bring himself to say it.

01:00:16.060 Because that would just be too complimentary towards his own country.

01:00:19.080 And as a Hollywood liberal, the thought of being complimentary towards his own country sickens him.

01:00:24.020 So how did Disney end up here yet again with yet another actor playing the title role for a major IP, despite hating that IP and everything it stands for?

01:00:34.180 Well, either Disney exclusively hires actors who are completely incapable of behaving like high-functioning, intelligent adults when they're doing their PR tours for their films and who are so full of bitterness and hatred for their audience that they can't even pretend to respect them.

01:00:47.920 Or something else is going on here, meaning there's some kind of deliberate, nefarious conspiracy in which Disney wants to sabotage its own products.

01:00:57.200 And at this point, whichever theory you're partial to, it really doesn't matter.

01:01:00.620 Either way, there's really no reason for anyone to go see Captain America now, as it is a film that is not in any way about America, or about captains, I guess, or anything like that.

01:01:14.280 Instead, it's apparently about dragons and sticks.

01:01:17.600 And that is why the new Captain America film and its openly anti-American lead actor are today canceled.

01:01:23.760 That'll do it for the show today.

01:01:24.460 Thanks for watching.

01:01:25.000 Thanks for listening.

01:01:25.940 Have a great day.

01:01:26.720 Godspeed.

01:01:30.620 Godspeed.

The Matt Walsh Show - January 30, 2025

Ep. 1526 - Democrats Shill For Big Pharma In RFK Jr Confirmation Hearing

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