Ep. 446 - Let’s Stay Quarantined Forever
Episode Stats
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190.57649
Summary
On this St. Patrick's Day, almost everything is shut down across the country, including schools, businesses, and even liquor stores. Is this a symptom of a fundamental problem with the way our economic system is set up? And if so, what can we do to fix it?
Transcript
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Today on the Matt Wall Show, on this St. Patrick's Day, a very strange, very strange St. Patrick's
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Day in many ways, everything is shutting down. They're even shutting down the liquor stores
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on St. Patrick's Day, which is sacrilege. But with everything shutting down, it's expected
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that there will be a huge hit to the economy, of course. And today, I want to ask the question,
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why should it be so harmful to our society and our economy that people are staying home,
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spending time with their families, spending time with their kids, cooking their own meals,
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educating their own kids, and so on? It is harmful to our economy. Yes, I don't deny that. But
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isn't that perhaps an indication that there's a fundamental problem with the way that our system
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is set up, that those sorts of very healthy activities have to be discouraged? So we'll
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talk about that. Also, five headlines, including Tom Brady leaving New England to deflate footballs
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elsewhere in the country, and Bernie supporters are complaining, because that's what they do best.
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In this case, they're complaining about voter suppression, saying that voter suppression is
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what has caused Bernie Sanders to not do so well in the primaries. But what is voter suppression?
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Is it actually happening? And if it is actually happening, is it really a bad thing? I say,
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no, it's not. But we'll discuss that today on the Matt Wall Show, all of that coming up. But first,
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they know that we sent you. All right. So there's no question that the steps being taken by the federal
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and state authorities right now to contain the coronavirus are extraordinary. Schools are closed.
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Businesses are shut down. Now the federal government has issued guidelines calling for everybody in
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the country to stay inside as much as they can. Avoid gatherings of over 10 people for the next 15
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days. At least we'll talk more about that in the headline section. And it may well be true that these
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measures will have a devastating effect on the economy for years to come. It may also be true that
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they're necessary to prevent a catastrophic loss of life. It may be true that our choice right now
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is between potentially destroying our economic system or potentially destroying our health care
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system because it's not just about the mortality rate. It's also a matter of the capacities of our
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hospitals. If everybody becomes infected in one big mass and then you've got a 10 percent
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hospitalization rate, where are those people going to go? You know, it could it could lead to the
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breakdown of the health care system like we're seeing in Italy and other places. So all of these
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things are being weighed. Whatever the case, and however we feel about it, President Trump has
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indicated that it may actually be longer than 15 days, much longer, before things can return to
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normal. But here's a question that I don't see very many people asking. And that is this, should
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everything return to normal? Do we actually want things to return to normal? Now in order to answer
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that question, I think we have to first figure out why the temporary closure of schools and
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restaurants and other businesses has the potential to cause such havoc in the first place. For most of
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us, I think maybe to someone who's like an alien from outer space, who sees this going on and sees
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that people have to stay inside for a few weeks. And then if they were told that this alone is going
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to destroy society and destroy the economy, it might not be so obvious why that should be the
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case. You know, for most of us, the self-quarantine being observed across the country, and including
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in my own house, involves what? Involves, in some places, it's more extreme than this. But for most of
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us, it involves basically spending more time with our families, making fewer unnecessary purchases,
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teaching our kids at home rather than sending them off to government buildings for the majority of the
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day. Eating meals that we cook in our kitchen rather than eating fast food. Now these practices,
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it is feared, will wreak untold destruction. But these practices are also objectively good and healthy.
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And while they have the potential to ravage our economy, they also have the potential to make
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people happier and to give them more meaningful lives. Now, perhaps it's worth considering whether
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it is good that good things like frugality and self-sufficiency should be so bad for our country.
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And if it's not good that good things are bad now, then maybe we should next consider whether there's a
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better way to set up a society. A way that will not cause us to break out into hives and panic
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at the thought of millions of families eating dinner in their own dining rooms.
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Because that's what's going on right now. People are saying, well, we can't have all these people
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eating at home. The restaurants will go down. Unemployment. Which is true. I'm not minimizing
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the potential human costs that might be felt here. People will lose their jobs. Working parents will have
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to quit their jobs or spend exorbitant amounts of money of their, you know, exorbitant amounts of
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their income, which they really need right now, especially now, on daycare to accommodate the
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children who are no longer being going to school all day. Businesses will close. Nobody would suggest
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that these things are in and of themselves anything less than terrible hardships. Nobody is saying that
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these things in and of themselves are good. But these hardships, this is my point, these hardships are not
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ultimately the result of a virus or of a government shutdown. At bottom, they're the result of the way
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that we have chosen to structure society. Our economy, our lifestyles are centered around and have
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been for a long time, but not have not always been throughout human history. But for us have been for
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a long time structured around, centered around, dependent upon people buying lots of stuff, wasting almost
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every penny they earn as soon as they earn it. The vast majority of Americans, according to a recent
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study I read, the vast majority of Americans spend, you know, about 90% of their paycheck almost as soon
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as they get it. But that's, we need to do that in order for the economy to work. So it's centered
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around that, wasting all your money, sending your kids off to giant facilities to be taught by government
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employees, not being self-sufficient, not spending very much time at home. For the system to work,
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it is imperative that those who do radical things like save money, cook meals from scratch,
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even grow and raise their own food, educate their own children, it is imperative that they remain in
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a small minority. Because if suddenly everybody starts doing those kinds of things, or most of those
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things, the system can't sustain itself. And that's what we're facing right now, is that suddenly
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everybody's doing that all at once. And the system can't sustain itself. What does that tell you about
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the system? I think when this is all past us, you know, we're going to be urged to run out and save
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the system by spending, by going on spending sprees at Target and Best Buy and gorging ourselves on
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restaurant food and fast food and shoving our kids back into their chairs behind their desks in their
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classrooms in the government buildings with 32 other students in the same classroom, ushering
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mothers back into the workforce so that they can fulfill their sacred duties as cogs in the economic
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machine, and basically reverting back to a state of helplessness and dependence as a people.
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Now, after a while, it will be hoped, things will level off, things will stabilize. That is, until
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there's another national emergency that we will again be totally unprepared for and ill-equipped to
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handle because we refuse to make any adjustments to the way of life that left us so vulnerable and
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panic-prone in the first place. What if there's another way of living? Well, we know there's other ways
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of living. The way we live now is modern. It's new. It hasn't always been this way. It doesn't
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always have to be this way. And just, and I shouldn't have to stipulate this, but I feel like
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I have to, this is not a pitch for socialism, okay? This is that, it's not like there are only two
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options, socialism or our consumerist culture. Those are not the only two options. There are a lot of
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other options. This is not a pitch for socialism at all. That is manifestly the wrong answer.
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But, what if there's another way besides the way we live now? And I don't say this just because of
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the coronavirus. It's not like the coronavirus happened and all of a sudden I'm rethinking
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the way society is structured. I've always been saying this. Now, our inability to fend for
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ourselves in a time of crisis is a pretty big concern. I see people online worried, you know,
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that especially young people are practically going to starve to death because they can't order out or they
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can't go to a restaurant. Um, and I understand the concern. I don't think they're actually going
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to starve, but I understand because there are a lot of young people, especially who just don't know
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how to, the idea of them making their own meals for an extended period of time is, is just bewildering
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to them. They can't even imagine doing it. But I'd be saying this regardless of any pandemic
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because it seems like our sky high rates of suicide, drug abuse, depression, um, the fact
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that we spend so many hours of each day, 10 hours a day, I think the latest study says, mindlessly
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staring at glowing screens rather than living a real human life. All of these are indications that
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the current system may make us into relatively comfortable and wealthy people, but it is not
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making us into happy and well-adjusted and well-prepared people. So maybe this crisis can
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be a catalyst for fundamental changes to the way that we, we live, how we prioritize things.
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And those changes of course would have to be gradual, but I think they'd be worth it.
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And if we set out to make them, we might find that the next time we have to stay in our homes
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for a few weeks, we don't have to be so panicked about it. This is it right now. Um, the way that
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our free market economy works is that it is entirely consumerist that you, your most important duty is
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to be a consumer and to buy stuff. Remember after nine 11, uh, a lot of people were making fun of George
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Bush because he came out and he said, look, here's the thing you can do. Go out and buy stuff.
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And in fact, he said that several times throughout his presidency. That was a, that was a common theme
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he went back to go buy stuff. Well, it does seem pretty absurd that in an international emergency,
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you're saying our, our greatest duty right now as Americans is just go buy stuff.
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Well, yeah, that's at least that's with the way the system works now. That's, that's your,
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it's probably your most important duty, at least to keep the, as far as the economy is concerned,
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as far as our system is concerned, the most important thing you do is just buy stuff on black Friday,
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all the people running out, the hordes trampling each other for, for consumer electronics.
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They're patriots. They're, they're, they're, they're getting, they're keeping these things
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going. It doesn't have to be that way where we have to be dependent, no self-sufficiency,
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send our kids out of the home. You know, depending on government for education, depending on the
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marketplace for everything we could possibly ever need, because we can't make or create or do
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anything ourselves. Doesn't have to be that. That doesn't, that does not have to be the way a free
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market economy works. It is the way ours works. Doesn't have to be. So maybe that's worth rethinking.
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Well, um, moving on, we'll get to headlines in just a second, but you know, as we get into spring
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and it's a very, very strange sort of transition into spring now, but a lot of people still doing
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spring clean, cleaning and going through and getting rid of old things. Well, you know,
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part of the problem is at least, especially with my wife, getting rid of old things can be very
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difficult for, it's for me too. I'm, we're both pack rats, but for her, it could be hard because
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things have sentimental value. She doesn't want to get rid of that. She doesn't want to get rid of
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this. That's where legacy box can really help out. Legacy box is a way for you to easily and
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Um, whatever it is, whatever it is you have, you know, old VHS tapes or DVDs that are scratched,
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uh, photographs, you know, whatever it is you have. And we've, we've already done this. We had a whole
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box of, uh, of old, old things, old, uh, memories that were preserved in ways that, uh, were certainly
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not the most efficient and also not, not easily accessible. So we sent it over to legacy box and
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supplies last. That's legacy box.com slash Walsh. Okay. Going to headlines. Number one,
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the white house has already referenced, um, has, has already, as I already referenced,
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has, has issued new guidelines recommending that people stay home as much as possible for 15 days,
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avoid restaurants, avoid bars, avoid gatherings of over 10 people. So you can't have any more than
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10 people in a, in a crowd. So fortunately for the Biden campaign, they've already said that this
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means they can continue with their rallies. They're going to be safe. Um, that also means that I can
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proceed with my birthday party as planned because I'm a loser. That's the joke. If you didn't get it
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and it's not really a joke, but, um, there are still, as far as I can tell some serious questions
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like what happens after the 15 days are up, you know, Trump said this thing could last until
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July or later. If the virus is still spreading rapidly or even more rapidly in 15 days,
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is the quarantine extended? I think the answer right now is that nobody really knows because nobody
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knows exactly what's going to happen. We're in uncharted territory. Um, at least, at least in
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our experience as modern Americans, this is uncharted territory. By the way, I was also thinking
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this 10 person limit is a huge blow to Mormon Catholic and Orthodox Jewish families, you know,
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uh, because you have way more than 10 people in those houses. So some tough decisions will have to
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be made. And I mean, I think every family has to decide on your own. Maybe you draw straws to figure
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out who has to go stay in the shed in my family. We already do that once a week, which is a fun
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tradition, but something that maybe more families will have to think about. Number two, it was
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announced that all liquor stores in Pennsylvania will close indefinitely on St. Patrick's day.
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They're closing liquor stores on St. Patrick's day, which is a mortal sin, literal sacrilege.
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And, and I have to say, I don't get this one. Liquor stores are, are not places where large groups
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gather for periods of time. In fact, most liquor stores you go into, there's like a couple of
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people there. It's not, unless it's a special, well, like St. Patrick's day, but aside from
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special occasions, uh, you know, it's not, it's not like in most liquor stores, there's hundreds
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of people all packed in there. So you come in, you buy what you want and you leave. Why would we
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need to close a place like that? This seems to be adding unnecessary hardship. And I'm not just
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talking about hardship for people like myself who want to have access to bourbon, but, uh, more
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importantly, hardship for the people that work at these places. You're shutting them down. It seems
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like for no reason. Number three, Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York, uh, in the midst of all the
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shutdowns and social, social distancing, still went to the gym yesterday to the, I believe it was the
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YMCA. As the common folk are told not to do that, I guess Bill figured, well, I'm not common folk. I'm
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the mayor. I'm important. And he was asked about it on CNN today. On a personal note, I want to ask
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you how you're coping. Um, you went to the gym yesterday and Twitter lost its mind.
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I don't get it, but we'll move on with our lives. The gyms are all closed now, Alison.
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Yes. I know that the gyms are closed. Is there any sense that you were late personally to get
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your arms around what the sacrifice that's required? No, everyone is going to have to make
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sacrifice. But as our health commissioner said yesterday, people still are in new ways are going
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to have to get exercise. Uh, whatever scenario, we're going to tell people how to stay healthy.
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It may be a walk. It may be a jog, but obviously socially distanced until, unless we get to the
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point of literally ordering everyone indoors. So this is going in stages. Somehow people are going
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to have to stay healthy and sane through this. And it's going to take a lot of improvisation for sure.
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Mayor Bill de Blasio, we really appreciate all the information. We always like seeing you in studio.
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Thanks so much. Thanks so much, Alison. Really held his feet to the fire, didn't she?
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Well done, CNN. I mean, you, you really, you, you made him, you, you held him accountable there,
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didn't you? Um, Bill, Bill de Blasio is, and this is kind of a side note, but he's one of those guys
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who to me just seems unappealing and viscerally unlikable in, in every way. He's the kind of guy
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who gets on the elevator with you and you're immediately like, Oh geez, man, this guy just based on just
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for no particular reason, just something about him, his demeanor, his, his aura, his essence.
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Um, which makes you wonder how a man like this ever got elected. How could anyone have ever seen
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much less millions of people seen this guy and listened to him and thought, I need to vote for
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that. That's my guy. I, I am going to the polls for that guy. And it just once again supports my
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contention that too many people vote too many people have the right to vote. The franchise needs
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to be drastically limited and reduced and millions of people need to have their voting rights taken
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away. Bill de Blasio, his existence as a public official, as an elected representative, as an
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elected mayor, um, I think, uh, proves my point there. And that is my totally sincere and unironic
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position, by the way. I really do believe that. And we'll talk more about that in just a second.
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Number four, NBC universal has announced that four movies currently in theaters will be released
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for home viewing, uh, early. So I think they're coming out. In fact, this weekend, these are
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movies, these are movies that are in theaters right now. Uh, the hunt, the invisible man and
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Emma are all coming out on, uh, on, will be available on, on your TV. I think this is another
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example, another way, uh, that society is probably going to be permanently changed because of this
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crisis. And this is a smaller thing, though not entirely insignificant, but after universal releases
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these movies and they'll be available for 20 bucks for rent, uh, I, I'm, I'm guessing they're
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going to make a lot of money off of them and more studios are going to start doing it. And then it's
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hard for me to see how these studios revert back to the old way, the traditional way, uh, the way
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that's, they've been doing it for decades once all this has passed, because I think they're going to
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discover that they make a lot more money this way. And I know for me, maybe I'm, I imagine I'm
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probably not alone in this, but there are many times when a movie comes out, I see a preview and
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I think, Oh, that looks kind of interesting. I, I, I'd watch that, but I can't get to the theater
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because we can't find a babysitter or I just don't feel like going to the theater. So I don't watch
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it. And then when it finally comes out months later, I've already lost interest. Now, if that
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movie was available the day it came out for me to watch at home, I probably would have spent the
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money on the movie. And I think there are probably a lot of people in that boat. So we'll see what
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happens going forward. Number five, finally, Tom Brady announced today that he's leaving
00:21:11.380
the Patriots after what 20 seasons, he's going off somewhere else. Uh, he'll be leaving and playing
00:21:18.160
elsewhere. No word yet on whether he'll bring his own spy cameras and deflated footballs,
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or if they'll provide those for him. Probably they worked that out in the contractual phase.
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I'm not sure. And I guess now's a good time to go back. And, and, uh, as we remember Tom Brady and
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his career, I think now's a good time to go back and remember there's a great moment, a classic
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moment. Uh, his, his last official pass as a Patriot, this will live on forever. This is the,
00:21:44.360
his last official act and pass as a Patriot in a Patriots uniform in the playoffs. Let's go back
00:21:49.440
and remember how that went to end it. The two of them. Yes. I mean, it's, we'll never see this run
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again, Jim Brady's pass. It's intercepted and returned for a touchdown by Logan Ryan, the former
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Patriots. The memories, what great memories. I actually like Tom Brady. I'm a, you know, I,
00:22:13.580
I'm just being a jerk. It's my way. It's how I, it's how I show I care. Now, um, we'll get to you
00:22:19.860
a very important daily cancellation, but before we do, I want to tell you about paint your life.
00:22:25.180
This, I, I really can't recommend this highly enough. If you haven't done paint your life,
00:22:28.940
uh, I, I, I think it's, you should at least go to the website and check it out. I think it's,
00:22:32.720
it's a great thing. Uh, and what you do, and we, we did this as well. We found one of our favorite
00:22:37.200
photos of the kids, sent it over to paint your life. And, uh, they created out of that, a work
00:22:42.480
of art, a beautiful painting. We have it hanging in our living room. And, uh, you know, every time
00:22:46.480
someone comes in without fail, they stop and they ask about the painting. And usually I'll start by
00:22:50.940
telling them that I painted it. Uh, and then if they, if they buy that, I'll just go with it.
00:22:55.660
So sorry, paint your life. I take away the promotional opportunity there. Usually they
00:22:59.840
don't buy it. And then I'll admit that it was from paint your life. Um, if you want to give a
00:23:02.880
truly meaningful gift, you've got to try paint your life.com and have an original painting of
00:23:08.760
yourself, your children, family, a special place, a cherished pet, uh, whatever it is you go,
00:23:13.980
you send it to them. They, they create out of it, a true painting at a price you can afford.
00:23:19.500
And this is done by hand. This is not some computer gimmick. This isn't some Photoshop thing.
00:23:24.160
They do it by hand. They send it back to you. And here's another thing I really like about
00:23:27.500
paint your life.com is that they're very responsive through the process of painting your picture for you.
00:23:32.740
They're going to ask you, they're going to send you, uh, updates on how it's going, ask you how you
00:23:36.940
feel about it. If you want changes to be made to it, they'll make the changes. So they're very
00:23:41.120
receptive. It's very affordable. It's a beautiful painting. No reason not to do it right now is a
00:23:45.340
limited time offer. Get 30% off your painting. That's right. 30% off and free shipping to get this
00:23:50.420
special offer. Text the word Matt to 64,000. That's Matt to 64,000 text M A T T to 64,000.
00:23:59.320
Now for your daily cancellation today, we'll be canceling voter suppression, not the thing itself,
00:24:05.920
but the phrase, because as you know, I'm a big fan of voter suppression, but the phrase itself,
00:24:11.840
I'm, I think we're going to cancel. You're not allowed to say it anymore.
00:24:15.480
Exhibit A with, with crazy Bernie losing in the primary so badly, his surrogates are now all over
00:24:20.600
the TV claiming that his voters are being suppressed, that they, they would be voting,
00:24:25.320
but they can't because they're suppressed. This is kind of like a version of when you lose a game of,
00:24:30.120
of one-on-one basketball. And then after you already lose, you, you, you, you suddenly come
00:24:36.440
down with a, with an injured ankle that's been injured the whole time. And you say, oh yeah,
00:24:40.420
my ankle's actually been bothering me for weeks. It's been, yeah, it's been pretty, been pretty
00:24:43.680
tough. Good game. But you know, my ankle, it's a, if my ankle was better, I probably would have,
00:24:47.880
but good game. I'm not taking anything away from you. It's just my, with my ankles, that that's
00:24:51.000
the issue. It's probably why I lost, but great job. Um, now let's take a look
00:24:57.260
at, at, at what voter suppression looks like. What, what, what does voter suppression mean
00:25:04.260
to, uh, a Bernie Sanders surrogate? Let's find out first. Here's, uh, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
00:25:10.920
on Fox a few days ago, talking about the awful suppression that Bernie Sanders voters faced.
00:25:17.500
You did a campaign event at the university of Michigan had 10,000 people. It was like a rockstar
00:25:22.120
status. Uh, but those kids did not show up. At least if you look at the numbers, I mean,
00:25:27.400
just overall this, this race. So, so how can you say the progressive position is still prevailing
00:25:33.880
nationwide when Joe Biden is winning so much? Well, I think one thing that we, that isn't being
00:25:39.560
talked about is the rampant voter suppression in this country, right there in Ann Arbor, where we had
00:25:45.400
that, uh, rally, those kids were waiting three hours in line to vote in Michigan. And so when we
00:25:52.600
talk about who's turning out and who's not turning out, we absolutely. Just to be clear, you're saying
00:25:56.280
that you think voters didn't get to vote that wanted to vote in Michigan? Absolutely. You know,
00:26:00.200
obviously there's also more that we need to do in terms of turning out youth voters. It's, uh, we need
00:26:05.080
to make sure that we're inspiring young people to turn out, but when you do turn out, you should not
00:26:09.400
be waiting three, four, seven hours in order to vote. Okay. So voters are suppressed because they
00:26:15.720
had to wait in line. So what, what was, who was suppressing them? Other voters, the voters were
00:26:22.440
suppressing each other because they all happened to want to vote at the same time. Don't long lines
00:26:29.800
mean that lots of people are voting, which means that they're not being suppressed. Isn't that an
00:26:35.160
indication that voter suppression is not happening? That's like saying that long lines at a
00:26:39.320
Star Wars movie is evidence that people are being prevented from seeing Star Wars movies.
00:26:43.480
No, that makes no sense. And the thing is, if there were no lines, then, uh, AOC would be up there
00:26:50.080
saying, well, it's voter suppression. People couldn't make it to the polls, obviously. So if
00:26:54.360
there's a lot of people, it's voter suppression. If there's nobody, it's voter suppression. That's
00:26:57.820
what we learned. Now here's Philip Agnew, uh, Bernie Sanders advisor, explaining what voter suppression
00:27:03.840
means to him. The one thing I will say though, is we're, we were, I was also in Mississippi and that's
00:27:08.960
where we, we saw each other. And there were a number of black colleges who are on spring break
00:27:14.520
during election day. And so we're up against rampant voter suppression efforts that are pushing young
00:27:21.040
black folks out of the voting, um, out of the, uh, the booth and not allowing them access to the
00:27:26.400
franchise. And so I think across the board, um, the democratic party has a lot of work to do to make
00:27:32.880
sure that young black folks, that older black folks have access to the ballot box. And our campaign is
00:27:38.120
proud to actually being a, been a part of that, but we're up, it's an uphill battle and it's not just our
00:27:42.800
campaign. I think across the board, we've got a lot of work to do. Kids were on spring break. That's voter
00:27:49.200
suppression. The kids are on spring break. They chose to go on spring break. And so they're being, they're off in
00:27:54.840
Cancun or whatever, or Pensacola and they're being suppressed. They're on the, they're, they're
00:28:01.560
lounging on the beach, drinking copious amounts of alcohol. I'm being suppressed. Help me. I'm being
00:28:07.680
suppressed. Now, of course, if kids had class that day, we would also be told that that's voter
00:28:14.260
suppression. So classes, no classes, voter suppression, lines, no lines, voter suppression.
00:28:19.440
Everything is voter suppression. See, unless, unless this is what would not by, by the standards of AOC
00:28:26.060
or this guy, here's what you would need to do in order to not be suppressing voters. You would need
00:28:31.940
to go pick up the voters in your arms, cradle them like a baby, sing them lullabies and, and carry them
00:28:40.660
into the poll and then put them down in a comfortable chair in the voting station and pick up their hand
00:28:46.820
for them. And, and with their own hand, press the button that they want to press. That's basically
00:28:53.520
they need, if they have to expend any energy at all or do anything for themselves, they're being
00:29:00.020
suppressed. But here's an idea. Here's a thought. If you want to vote, make it a priority. Wait in
00:29:07.960
line. Schedule your time. Take off work if you have to. If it's that important, it's not like we vote
00:29:14.280
every day. It's something that comes up every two years. So you're telling me it happens every two years
00:29:20.220
and you can't figure a way to schedule around it. I don't buy it. We have all this early voting and
00:29:27.100
everything. And, um, we see what happens with early voting in the primaries. People vote early
00:29:30.800
for a candidate who, when it's time for the actual voting to start, is already dropped out of the race.
00:29:37.220
So, but we're told we need early voting because we need to give people months or weeks to vote because,
00:29:42.660
uh, they might not have time on the day of voting to, oh, give me a break. You, you got two years.
00:29:48.240
It's that important to you. You've got two years to, to, to schedule time for that day and you can't
00:29:53.880
do it. Really? You can't give your boss two years notice. Tell your boss two years ahead of time on
00:30:00.580
this particular day, I'm going to be taking off for 30 minutes. You're telling me he's going to tell
00:30:05.000
you, no, you can't do it. Um, if, if it's not that important to you, that's fine. Don't vote.
00:30:14.760
See, I'm not one of those people that says, how dare you not vote? You are, you are not,
00:30:19.560
you're betraying your civic duty. No, no, it's fine. You don't want to vote. Don't vote perfectly
00:30:24.320
fine. In fact, if you have any hesitation about voting, if there's any part of you that thinks
00:30:30.260
I don't want to vote because I that's, I'm giving up time that I could be spending watching TV
00:30:34.200
or whatever. If that's your thought process, don't vote perfectly fine. It'll be okay. In fact,
00:30:40.640
it'll be better without you. If it's not really a priority. I, again, I am someone who actually,
00:30:48.020
I want to suppress, suppress votes. I do. I want civics exams for all voters. I want the voters
00:30:54.080
to be taxpayers. I want them to be English speakers. Um, I think the number of people voting should be a
00:31:00.800
fraction of what it currently is. Voting is not, is not, is not a God given right for all people.
00:31:07.880
I say it again. Voting is not a God given right for all people. It was never intended to be.
00:31:15.240
That's never how it was supposed to be set up. And even now, see, when I say that, it sounds like,
00:31:21.820
it sounds like a heresy in the modern American mind because most Americans don't understand the
00:31:27.180
history of their own system or how it's supposed to work. But, um, even to the person who says, well,
00:31:34.160
how could you possibly say that? Voting is wonderful. Everyone should be voting. You don't
00:31:38.480
even believe that yourself. Do you think six-year-olds should be voting? Do you think a rapist in prison
00:31:44.700
should be voting? Now there are some people dumb enough to say that, yeah, even they should be
00:31:50.020
voting. But, um, most people would say, well, no, of course not them. Okay. So that means that means
00:31:58.100
that you agree that voting is actually not a right for everyone. You agree that there should be some
00:32:03.920
parameters put in place. You and I are on the same page. I'm saying it's not a universal God given
00:32:09.580
right. You also believe that whether you say it or not. So since we're on the same page that there
00:32:16.220
should be parameters put in place deciding who can vote, then what I'm saying is let's talk about what
00:32:22.200
those parameters should be. You know, it, should it just be that we're ruling out six-year-olds and
00:32:27.460
rapists? Um, I mean, are there other kinds of people who maybe shouldn't be allowed to vote?
00:32:33.840
Kinds of people like, for example, people who couldn't pass a sixth grade civics exam or people
00:32:40.400
who are not, um, uh, uh, taxpayers and are not contributing to the economy that way, or people who,
00:32:47.760
uh, can't speak English, right? So do we really need them to be voting? Is it better for the country
00:32:57.280
to have voting from those people? I would say, no, it's not. I would say it's clearly not better for
00:33:05.620
the country. And if it's not better for the country and voting is not a God given universal right,
00:33:09.800
which again, we agree it's not, then, um, why are we doing it? Why are we allowing it?
00:33:14.740
What, what, what, what do you think is, what's like the worst case scenario? If, if we made it so
00:33:20.000
that everyone who votes can pass a sixth grade civics exam, what's, what is the dystopian worst
00:33:26.800
case scenario of that? Oh my gosh, now we have reasonably informed and intelligent people voting.
00:33:31.380
It's the end of the world. Like what's, what's the, what's the downside? I don't even see it. I really
00:33:38.560
don't. Um, okay, let's go to, we're going to go to emails here in a second, but first here's possibly
00:33:46.960
the best news you're going to hear all day. And we could all use some good news right now using promo
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00:34:01.800
all of our live, uh, broadcast. You get a show library. You get the full three hours of the Ben Shapiro
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show. You get bonus content. You get access to the mailbag, which we're going to get to in a second
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here. Plus our new all access tier gets you into exclusive live online Q and a discussions with me,
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Ben Shapiro, um, and, uh, Michael Knowles, Andrew Clay, I almost said me and Matt Walsh,
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today. All right. So some emails, um, this, uh, well, both of these are, uh, why I'm wrong emails.
00:34:43.620
So, uh, this is from RD says, Matt, you're wrong that we should only listen to the experts on
00:34:49.200
coronavirus. This is exactly the kind of mentality you normally complain about. You're the one who
00:34:54.080
has said many times that you have every right to talk about something like ADHD and people who expect
00:34:57.740
you to have an MD to discuss it are just trying to shut down debate. I, I like that version of you
00:35:04.120
better. You were right about that. Trying to turn the national conversation into something that only
00:35:08.400
experts can engage in is elitist snobbery at its worst. Well, you're right, RD. I have, um,
00:35:15.740
complained about the mentality that says that you should have to present your resume before engaging
00:35:19.740
in a conversation about anything. I reject the idea that you have to be a certified expert
00:35:24.580
to have an opinion on any subject. But I also think that if we're in the middle of a crisis,
00:35:31.760
and that crisis involves a very specific scientific phenomenon like a virus, then you should have a
00:35:37.440
real understanding of viruses and a very firm base of knowledge and some experience in the field
00:35:41.840
if you're going to make public pronouncements about the virus and its relative threat to the public
00:35:47.140
and so on. So those two positions of mine are not in conflict. And I really don't think
00:35:53.020
it should be controversial. All I'm saying is you should know what you're talking about.
00:35:57.620
So if you're, um, if you're making statements about something like a pandemic, and especially
00:36:04.020
if you're, if you're making explicit or implicit recommendations to other people about how seriously
00:36:09.400
they should or should not take it, then you should know what you're talking about. Like that, I can't
00:36:14.380
believe you're not the only email like this. How could anyone disagree? But people do. I'm saying know
00:36:20.740
what you're talking about. People say, well, how dare you? I don't think you should know what you're
00:36:23.660
talking about at all. If we go back to the voting thing, it's like this people think it's, it's,
00:36:28.340
it's good to have ignorant morons, uh, you know, chiming in. It's, it's not.
00:36:36.240
Now imagine if somebody was diagnosed with cancer, do you think it would be responsible and reasonable
00:36:43.260
if I were to come along with no experience in, in oncology and no, um, expertise, uh, and you know,
00:36:52.420
no medical degree or anything with very little understanding of how cancer works.
00:36:57.360
And, uh, all the same, if I were to come to that person and dispense confident advice on the types
00:37:03.220
of treatment they should receive and how serious they should take their diagnosis, would that be
00:37:09.940
reasonable for me to do? Would that be responsible? Would you encourage that? And would the person with
00:37:15.860
cancer be, um, an elitist snob for saying to me, oh, you know what? I'm going to listen to the
00:37:21.080
doctors on this. So, uh, you know, maybe you should pipe down. No, I, I, I think pretty clearly.
00:37:29.080
And does that mean that I should never say anything about cancer? Does that mean that there
00:37:33.040
are no issues related to cancer that I could possibly have anything valuable to say about?
00:37:37.580
No, it just means that on the specific medical and scientific questions, I should leave it to the
00:37:43.360
people who understand the questions and the answers better than I do. Again, that should not be
00:37:47.660
controversial. You mentioned ADHD. You're right. I have many opinions about that. I have no problem
00:37:53.100
sharing them, but my opinions have little to do with the neurological or medical issues involved.
00:37:58.100
Now, if a, if a neurologist comes along and tells me about the differences in brain scans between
00:38:03.040
ADHD people and people without ADHD, um, I'll listen. You know, I'm not, I'm not going to argue with
00:38:08.140
them. They know that better than I do. I haven't really studied the issue that much, at least the
00:38:11.980
the neurological piece of it. Uh, and if a doctor wants to tell me about the diagnostic criteria for
00:38:17.140
ADHD, you know, if I'm making statements about that and a doctor says you're wrong, here's the
00:38:21.900
real criteria. Okay. I'll listen to that too. I'm not going to pretend to know more than the doctor
00:38:26.100
or the neurologist in their fields. But my point about ADHD is that even though there are diagnostic
00:38:32.700
criteria, and even if you can see it in a brain scan, which for my reading, actually in many cases,
00:38:37.860
you can't, but again, I'll defer to the experts on that. My point is that it doesn't prove that the
00:38:45.200
thing is actually a disorder. It doesn't prove that the people who have ADHD aren't supposed to
00:38:52.220
be that way. Because what the doctors are saying about the ADHD kid is not just he exhibits these
00:38:59.100
traits and he has this and that going on in his brain. What they're saying is he's not supposed to
00:39:04.860
be this way. We have to use drugs to change him. A kid is not supposed to act this way and think this
00:39:11.220
way and behave this way. And so we must treat it like a disease and try to change it. And that I
00:39:18.080
submit is not a medical opinion. That is an opinion about how, how humans are supposed to be,
00:39:24.380
which is a philosophical opinion. It's a very deep philosophical opinion. The question, if I were to
00:39:29.460
ask you, how is a human supposed to be? What is a human, how is a human supposed to think? Now, I'm not
00:39:36.940
even sure if that's an answerable question, but if it is an answerable question, it's not answerable
00:39:41.140
just to doctors. I think we all have an equal shot at taking a crack at that one and getting it right
00:39:46.160
because we're all people and we all have experience being human beings. Now, I say that the child with
00:39:53.360
ADHD is supposed to be that way. I say that's his personality. And if it doesn't, if it, if it
00:40:01.580
interferes at school, well, that's more a statement about flaws in the school system than it is a
00:40:08.240
statement about flaws in him. So my opinion is not medical, not scientific. All the science in the
00:40:16.440
world is not going to change my mind because it's irrelevant to the point. That's not the point I'm
00:40:21.280
making. It would be like if I was giving my view on the meaning of life and you were to say, oh yeah,
00:40:26.600
you're not even a scientist. So what? Why would a scientist have any greater insight into the meaning
00:40:33.200
of life than anyone else? Now, they might be able to tell me a lot of scientific facts about the nature
00:40:38.660
of life. Fine. But as far as its meaning, its purpose, I mean, who cares if you're a scientist or
00:40:44.680
not? You're not going to have any better chance at being right on that than anyone else would.
00:40:49.240
And so those are the differences. Finally, this is from Cody says, big fan of the show,
00:40:56.900
but you're wrong in regards to price gouging. The attached link does a concise yet thorough job
00:41:00.780
of explaining why this is not a bad thing. Also, it is troubling that you express more concern with
00:41:05.400
an individual selling an item to willing buyers at an agreed upon price as opposed to the state
00:41:09.360
literally taking what was rightfully his property at point of gun. Although I am an extreme liberty lover,
00:41:14.600
an anarcho-capitalist, I don't doubt that you also support individual sovereignty,
00:41:18.460
although maybe not to the same degree. It is important in times like this for us to not allow
00:41:22.540
fear to cause us to turn a blind eye at tyranny, which is exactly what occurred when the aforementioned
00:41:26.520
man had his property seized. And then Cody attaches a link with a 10-page document. Cody, I haven't
00:41:32.040
read your link yet. I admit I will. But of course, there's a difference, I think, between saying people
00:41:39.700
have the right to price gouge and saying that people are right to price gouge. Now, you seem to be
00:41:45.460
making the latter case, that it's the right thing to do. Now, or maybe I'm wrong about remaking that
00:41:53.260
case. And maybe the article that you're sending will get into this. But if you want to tell me
00:41:59.660
that there are situations where so-called price gouging by stores in an emergency or disaster is
00:42:08.620
necessary, and maybe in some cases actually good, then I might agree. I could see how that might be
00:42:15.980
the case. You could argue plausibly that a store increasing prices on a necessary item in a time
00:42:22.280
of emergency will ensure that it's available to more people. So if there's a shortage of clean,
00:42:27.480
healthy water in a disaster, and you've got a store with these big gallon jugs of water for 98 cents a
00:42:34.260
piece, well, what's going to happen? The first few people that come in are going to clean the whole
00:42:37.480
place out and get more water than they need. And then there are going to be other people who get
00:42:41.180
no water. And so maybe price gouging, I'm totally, I don't even know if this is the argument in the
00:42:46.200
link. I'm just saying this is an argument I could see for price gouging. But if you raise the price,
00:42:52.340
then it's going to mean that people are not going to buy as much, are more likely to buy only what
00:42:57.560
they need, and then that's going to leave some more for those who need it. And then we're spreading
00:43:01.180
out, spreading the wealth, you know, to use an unfortunate phrase. Um, okay. And so I could see
00:43:08.540
that. That's not what happened here. This was most assuredly not something that was done to ensure
00:43:14.700
that more people would have access to the thing that this guy bought. This was a guy who bought up
00:43:18.980
all the hand sanitizer, um, you know, in the stores in his state and surrounding states. He went around
00:43:25.620
about like 17,000 boxes of hands or 17,000 things of hand sanitizer, bought them all up so that he
00:43:31.420
could resell them at sometimes at prices that were, you know, uh, like for $70, like 10 times what they
00:43:37.840
would cost in the store. Now here's the point. This dude was doing exactly the thing that the
00:43:45.780
defenders of price gouging say we need to protect against. You see what I'm saying? This, the kind of
00:43:52.640
good price gouging that arguably a store could do would be done exactly to stop this guy from
00:43:58.360
doing what he did, which tells me that this is the bad kind of price gouging we're talking about for
00:44:02.960
sure. Um, you know, let's think about what if this was a really necessary item? I think the only
00:44:11.620
argument you could actually make against what the state did in this case by confiscating the hand
00:44:15.640
sanitizer from this guy is, is to say that, well, it's not really a necessary item because you have
00:44:22.700
soap. Soap is actually better to wash your hands with than hand sanitizer. So it's not like if people
00:44:26.660
don't have hand sanitizer, they can't wash their hands. If they have soap, they still can. So you
00:44:30.760
could argue it's not a necessary item. So what the state did was, was exorbitant. Uh, okay. Maybe
00:44:36.020
that's the case, but are there situations where the state would be correct in responding the way they
00:44:41.900
did. Is this a power or authority that in theory they should have? I would say yes. And for this
00:44:47.760
reason, imagine if, and this is not, not necessarily a, a, a long, a far-fetched hypothetical. What if
00:44:56.620
somebody goes around during a shortage, during an emergency, buys up all the baby formula in, in all
00:45:02.820
the stores and surrounding areas, hoards them all for himself, doesn't even have a baby himself, and then
00:45:08.080
resells it for, uh, exorbitant prices? Well, now you've got a situation where many families are going
00:45:17.040
to need formula. Uh, you know, you, you got mothers who don't breastfeed or can't breastfeed for one
00:45:21.940
reason or another, or they've already stopped breastfeeding and now they don't produce milk
00:45:25.000
anymore. They need that formula for their infants. And, uh, maybe they can't afford it at what it's
00:45:31.940
being sold by the price coucher. What do we do? Do we throw up our hands and say, well, finders keepers,
00:45:38.080
sorry, babies, you're out of luck. Guess you'll have to starve to death. Um, no, I, I, I don't think
00:45:44.940
that. I don't think we say, well, we don't want to infringe on this guy's liberty to buy all the
00:45:48.800
baby formula and, and become a millionaire off of it. We don't want to, we don't want to infringe
00:45:52.340
on that right. So we're just going to let the babies die. It seems clear that in that case, um,
00:45:58.800
if you argued against state involvement, you would be putting his supposed liberties, his supposed
00:46:05.080
right to buy whatever he wants and sell whatever he wants without restriction in every situation
00:46:10.220
over the needs of families to feed their children and the rights of babies to not starve to death.
00:46:15.880
And this is exactly where libertarianism breaks down in my opinion, because a right like the right
00:46:20.660
to buy and sell stuff is, uh, is important, of course, but you would want to make it sacrosanct.
00:46:28.200
Right. Where, where you would say that nothing could ever be a good enough reason to infringe
00:46:33.220
on that right. And I simply disagree. I think that there are times when, um, the right to
00:46:39.920
buy and sell stuff has to be subordinated to other rights. So the way I would break this
00:46:46.140
down, I guess, is that in situations like this, if somebody is buying up necessary items
00:46:51.140
that the community needs, really needs, then the state ought to step in, in situations like
00:46:57.480
that, you know, not under normal circumstances. And I think that hand sanitizer is a relatively
00:47:03.480
superfluous thing because you don't need it because you have soap. So probably I would agree
00:47:08.080
with you. The state was wrong in this case, but I'm not going to make a blanket statement that they,
00:47:12.160
that it would be always be wrong for them to do this. Because as I said, I could certainly see
00:47:16.140
situations where I think for the state not to get involved would be madness. Um, so that's where I
00:47:24.120
would, uh, believe that, but you're right. I'm not an anarcho-capitalist myself. So, uh,
00:47:28.860
maybe it's not surprising. I have this view. Thank you for watching everybody. Thank you for
00:47:34.580
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00:48:14.720
Hey everyone, it's Andrew Klavan, host of the Andrew Klavan Show. Doctors are working around
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the clock to find a vaccine for Trump derangement syndrome. So far, no luck. We'll take a look at
00:48:25.660
how the New York Times and other clowns are handling the crisis on the Andrew Klavan Show.