The Megyn Kelly Show - Biden's Mental Fitness, and Kavanaugh Assassination Threat, with Rand Paul, Rich Lowry, and Ryan Grim ｜ Ep. 339

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00:00:30.980 Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show, your home for open, honest, and provocative conversations.

00:00:42.160 Hey, everyone, I'm Megyn Kelly. Welcome to The Megyn Kelly Show.

00:00:45.440 For today's episode, while we were planning to spend the full show taking a deep dive into a controversial but important conversation

00:00:51.940 about President Biden's mental fitness, and we are still going to do that.

00:00:56.780 But first, we're following all the developments in the assassination threat against sitting Supreme Court Associate Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

00:01:05.660 A California man, now he's charged with attempted murder.

00:01:10.680 Law enforcement says the guy showed up at Justice Kavanaugh's home with a gun, ammo, a tactical knife, a screwdriver, a crowbar, zip ties, and duct tape.

00:01:21.360 According to The Washington Post, Justice Kavanaugh and his family were at home.

00:01:26.360 The justice has two young teenage daughters.

00:01:28.920 Imagine how terrifying that must feel.

00:01:30.820 This is almost 2 a.m., right?

00:01:32.880 Everybody in the house is asleep.

00:01:34.180 They must have gotten a call saying,

00:01:35.200 We just arrested a man for attempted murder of you, a sitting Supreme Court justice.

00:01:41.760 Senator Rand Paul says the White House and the Democrats have been actively encouraging crazy people to go to the homes of the justices to intimidate them and gin up hate as we await their critical decision on, among other cases,

00:01:54.260 Dobbs, the case that asks them to decide whether Roe versus Wade should be overturned.

00:01:58.800 That's the one we saw a leaked opinion of, which suggests they're prepared to overturn Roe, but the decision has not yet been released.

00:02:07.960 Last night, protesters showed up yet again outside of Justice Kavanaugh's home.

00:02:12.780 They don't care.

00:02:13.940 Only their message matters to them.

00:02:16.780 Senator Paul joins me now.

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00:02:52.920 Senator, great to have you back in the program.

00:02:55.060 Thanks for having me.

00:02:56.300 This is beyond, you know, after weeks now of Democrats ginning up hate and upset.

00:03:03.580 Now we see it's not, I'm not saying their rhetoric led to this lunatic from California coming, but the leaked opinion certainly did.

00:03:09.860 Whoever the leaker is, he's got some explaining to do because he says he was upset about Roe, about the draft opinion in Dobbs and meant to kill Justice Kavanaugh.

00:03:18.060 What do you make of it and what do you make of the total blackout of this story by the press?

00:03:21.820 Well, you know, I think it's quite predictable.

00:03:24.220 I said from the very beginning, I've been worried about the justices' safety, and I've also been worried about allowing these crowds to gather outside their houses.

00:03:32.420 One, it's reprehensible that someone should have released their addresses.

00:03:36.560 It's also reprehensible that a lawyer, in all likelihood, a clerk that works for a Democrat-appointed justice, and they've narrowed it down, I hear, to a couple of names, that this person would release this knowing that what they're unleashing is every crazy in the whole country wants to come, you know, in protest.

00:03:56.360 So there's a lot of things going on here that should be differently.

00:04:00.220 One, the person who released this should be punished, disbarred, and if there is a legal crime committed here, absolutely prosecuted.

00:04:07.580 But it's also reprehensible that the White House has said very little, if anything.

00:04:12.300 You know, the White House has said, oh, they have the right to protest.

00:04:15.000 Well, I disagree.

00:04:16.140 You have the right to protest in a public place, in a public venue.

00:04:19.420 In front of someone's house, chanting, screaming, using a bullhorn when people are trying to have their own privacy and perhaps even to sleep, I think is disturbing the peace, and I think you should be arrested and carted off.

00:04:32.760 I don't think they should have let 500 people gather outside of Justice Kavanaugh's house.

00:04:37.040 I think the more people that gather, the more chances there are for someone to infiltrate that crowd who is armed.

00:04:43.100 And we're just lucky this man was caught in advance, and he sort of turned his own self in.

00:04:49.160 So, but we're just very lucky that this didn't result in violence.

00:04:54.480 There's a law against this, you know, in the district where he lives.

00:04:58.180 There's a law against coming out outside of the Supreme Court Justice's house and protesting.

00:05:02.320 It's not being enforced.

00:05:03.960 And let me just, before I get on to the specifics of this case, because you're right, the guy turned himself in, which is kind of disturbing, you know,

00:05:11.440 because he walked past two marshals, as I understand.

00:05:14.220 He walked past two U.S. deputy marshals.

00:05:16.160 They spotted him getting out of a cab in front of the justice's home around 1.05 a.m.

00:05:19.680 He walked right past them down the street with murder on his mind.

00:05:24.360 It wasn't until he stopped and said, I'm going to call 911 and confess I feel suicidal and homicidal that anything was done to this guy.

00:05:31.640 So the security system doesn't seem so good.

00:05:35.380 It's sort of intriguing to think of the hypocrisy to the whole country, I think, is rightfully,

00:05:41.440 aghast at the horrible murders that happened in Uvalde, Texas.

00:05:45.880 And I'm thinking of ways, how could we stop these kind of things from happening?

00:05:49.520 Well, we should also be thinking about how could we stop, you know, the assassination of a justice from happening?

00:05:55.140 How could we stop violence and intimidation of justices from happening before it happens?

00:05:59.900 And we know, we know what we should do.

00:06:02.420 They should enforce the law.

00:06:04.160 So if you want an 18-year-old that ends up being a mass murderer to stop,

00:06:07.600 it means you need to arrest them in advance when they commit crimes.

00:06:11.040 If they kill the neighbor's pets, if they are threatening other students,

00:06:16.460 they have to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

00:06:19.280 Now, they get their day in court, they get a lawyer, but they should be prosecuted.

00:06:22.900 But the same goes for this.

00:06:24.140 Instead of turning the other way and the White House saying, oh, protests, you know, nothing to see here, peaceful protest.

00:06:30.300 Well, no, what we need to do is use the laws on the book, prosecute these people, have them removed, but they're not doing it.

00:06:39.120 And it is going to lead to violence, and that's why, you know, we ought to do something.

00:06:44.720 The person who leaked this did this with the intention of intimidation, and their leak is going to be related to the violence.

00:06:52.100 They need to be prosecuted to the nth degree, to whatever possible crime that if there is a crime there, they need to be prosecuted.

00:07:00.680 At the very least, they should be fired and disbarred.

00:07:03.940 Yeah. And you know what?

00:07:05.100 Any future contributorship on MSNBC, et cetera, is done now.

00:07:09.200 It's done.

00:07:09.980 You don't do something that directly places the life of a U.S. Supreme Court justice in danger,

00:07:14.920 almost gets him and his family murdered, even in today's society, and wind up with a paying deal on MSNBC.

00:07:20.780 That's not going to happen.

00:07:21.920 The outrage over that will be too loud for them to ignore.

00:07:25.340 Let's hope.

00:07:26.300 Let's hope that that's not their end result, is that the left embraces them.

00:07:29.860 But this is sort of the hypocrisy that goes on on the left.

00:07:33.200 The left is horrified when someone on their side is somehow intimidated or shot at.

00:07:38.840 But it's amazing the comments that have gone on for years about the shooting at the ball field with Steve Scalise,

00:07:45.260 done by a left-wing lunatic, you know, for years.

00:07:49.860 You know, I was attacked for political reasons by someone who, you know, attacked me from behind,

00:07:57.100 had six ribs broken, had part of my lung removed, suffered for years from this.

00:08:01.580 And on the Internet, the left wing thinks it's funny.

00:08:04.880 They think it's hilarious.

00:08:05.880 And they encourage people on a daily basis to come and finish the job.

00:08:10.260 And so it is amazing when you see the left and see the double standard.

00:08:15.400 They don't seem to be too concerned about the justices' lives because they're only showing up at conservative justices' houses.

00:08:22.060 If the shoe were on the other foot and this were a more liberal justice, I think you might at that point see some sympathy from the left and the left-wing media.

00:08:29.320 So what do you make of it?

00:08:30.840 Because the White House put out a written statement,

00:08:33.300 President condemns the actions of this individual in strong terms, grateful to law enforcement.

00:08:37.740 He's made consistently clear that judges and other public officials should do their jobs without concern for their personal safety or their families.

00:08:45.300 Any threats of violence or attempts to intimidate judges have no place in our society.

00:08:48.820 Okay, let's say like a written statement.

00:08:51.860 I mean, I wonder what you think.

00:08:54.220 Ben Sasse is out there saying he needs to get out there and personally and forcefully condemn violence and threats against the sitting Supreme Court justices.

00:09:03.960 But it needs to be more than just condemning the one shooter.

00:09:07.540 We need to condemn all 500 people that are out in front of a house.

00:09:11.260 They shouldn't be allowed to be there.

00:09:12.960 Look, our attorney general had a difficult case in our state involving the police and involving a shooting, and there were 100 people on his lawn.

00:09:21.840 We can't allow that to happen.

00:09:23.680 I think they finally were arrested for being on the lawn, but you really have no right to stand on the sidewalk with a bullhorn and disrupt someone's privacy really at any time, but particularly all night long.

00:09:35.660 They should not be allowed to do this.

00:09:37.740 It should be disturbing the peace at the very least.

00:09:39.960 It won't be a very significant penalty, but they'll be arrested and removed, and the more they continue to do it and show contempt for the law, the longer the sentencing would get.

00:09:48.660 But we should enforce the law.

00:09:50.300 If you don't enforce the law against some of these more minor crimes, what they do is they lead to bigger and bigger and bigger crowds where there's more of a danger of someone actually concealing themselves within the crowd that's going to commit violence.

00:10:03.160 Yeah, the guy said that, just for people who haven't read the morning paper, he said that he came to kill.

00:10:11.920 He called Montgomery County Emergency Communications Center, 9-1-1.

00:10:16.240 He said, I'm suicidal, and I've come to kill a specific Supreme Court judge.

00:10:20.020 He had the Glock 17, two magazines, ammo, pepper spray, tactical knife, hammer, screwdriver, crowbar, zip ties, duct tape, along with other gear.

00:10:27.500 He said he came from California, and he said,

00:10:30.420 I am upset over the leaked draft of the Supreme Court decision on Roe v. Wade.

00:10:35.620 The case is called Dobbs.

00:10:37.320 Also upset about the school shooting in Uvalde, and also upset thinking this justice might support looser gun laws.

00:10:44.180 His plan was to kill Justice Kavanaugh and then himself, according to the FBI affidavit, thinking that it would give his life purpose.

00:10:50.900 When asked how he found Justice Kavanaugh's home address, the complaint states he said he would kill him and decided to kill him after finding the justice's Montgomery County address on the Internet.

00:11:03.980 Now, it's posted, and this group Ruth sent us, which continues to protest outside of his house and encourage others to join them, says today in a tweet,

00:11:12.640 Stop blaming us for disclosing Kavanaugh's address.

00:11:15.400 Just search Twitter.

00:11:16.420 It's all out there, including second homes and summer villas, et cetera.

00:11:19.600 There's no remorse for adding to that.

00:11:23.100 There's no remorse for continuing to go to the guy.

00:11:26.080 Like, maybe the night that he almost got murdered and his teenage daughters almost got murdered, you don't show up.

00:11:31.300 Maybe that's the day you take a night off from protesting.

00:11:34.800 Well, you know, look, Google and YouTube will take down a video of me saying that cloth masks don't work,

00:11:40.540 but they're unwilling to take down the address of a Supreme Court justice.

00:11:44.300 And really, this is above and beyond even the law.

00:11:46.700 They have the ability as private companies to take things down, but they're not.

00:11:51.600 So, you know, wouldn't you think that they would care about intimidation and possible violence?

00:11:57.100 You know, they should be voluntarily taking down the addresses of Supreme Court justices as well as politicians.

00:12:03.240 I mean, putting those addresses up there just puts people at risk.

00:12:06.520 Think about it.

00:12:07.060 In a country of 330 million people, how many people out there are looking for, you know, have some sort of mental illness,

00:12:13.060 looking for a way to commit suicide by committing a murder and having the police shoot them or having their sort of day in fame as they commit suicide?

00:12:20.980 It's unfortunately not a few people.

00:12:23.480 It's more than a handful of people.

00:12:25.100 You would think it might be to the tune of hundreds of people that might fit in that category.

00:12:29.980 And when you announce where you can go and how you can, you know, do this, it's an invitation to crazies.

00:12:36.280 And no, I think we need to do a better job, both right and left, of being of the mind that this kind of stuff should not be broadcast.

00:12:44.740 And really, ideally, the private entity should step up and, you know, Twitter claims that they want to, you know, that they're against violence.

00:12:54.020 But if you go on Twitter and on any day, you can read hundreds of people tweeting that the person attacked me should come back and finish the job.

00:13:02.560 The person that attacked me from behind broke six of my ribs, damaged my lung, that that person should come back and finish the job.

00:13:09.860 Many of these people are actually so-called celebrities that enjoy and think that this is just hilarious.

00:13:16.120 The problem is they may think it's hilarious.

00:13:17.880 But what about the crazy person who reads that and says, well, I think I will be.

00:13:21.320 I'm the one to go over there and finish the job if somebody will post his address.

00:13:25.020 So this is it's it's disgusting.

00:13:27.420 But, you know, it's a it's definitely a double standard where the left doesn't seem to care if they don't like politics.

00:13:32.840 Right. That's right. Because, you know, we just went through a month of them trying to blame Tucker Carlson for the Buffalo mass shooting, which was racistly motivated because they think Tucker spews things on Fox News that they claim are racist.

00:13:46.260 They won't condemn this, all of this hate and angry rhetoric directed specifically at a sitting justice.

00:13:55.400 I mean, Brett Kavanaugh has been one of the main guys named, right, because they know that Justice Alito, Justice Thomas, Justice Gorsuch, they're probably not wavable.

00:14:03.960 They're the hardcore conservatives of the court.

00:14:05.920 The buzz has been about Amy Coney Barrett and Justice Kavanaugh in particular on whether they could be pushed out of the five person majority.

00:14:12.640 And so it's it's specific and there's only nine total.

00:14:18.140 There's only six conservatives. There's only five allegedly in the majority.

00:14:21.180 We know their names and there's only two who have been focused on as the possible wobblers.

00:14:25.260 And like day after day, we've heard the stuff we heard from Chuck Schumer, the stuff we heard from Jen Psaki.

00:14:30.900 It's fine to protest out there. Just don't be violent. It's fine to protest.

00:14:33.860 Chuck Schumer later apologized for this remark. But listen to what he said.

00:14:36.920 This is soundbite one. I want to tell you, Gorsuch.

00:14:40.280 I want to tell you, Kavanaugh, you have released the whirlwind and you will pay the price.

00:14:51.580 You won't know what hit you if you go forward with these awful decisions.

00:14:57.760 He didn't apologize. He just said he he didn't say it the way he wanted to.

00:15:01.340 And then he had the Chicago mayor who tweeted out this is a call to arms.

00:15:06.900 The draft Dobbs decision. So this is a lot more targeted and pointed than the stuff they condemn routinely as leading to violence.

00:15:16.780 Yeah. And the thing is, is that, you know, we went through this whole debate with the impeachment, you know,

00:15:20.980 when they attempted to impeach Trump the second time and said he incited violence.

00:15:25.300 The thing is, is we played a clip or his team played a clip of basically every Democrat senator in in office currently was,

00:15:34.780 I think, in the clip saying repeatedly fight, fight, do this.

00:15:37.820 And it was metaphoric language. But then some of the language is completely inexcusable.

00:15:42.920 Schumer's language saying we will unleash the whirlwind, naming justices specifically who are going to unleash the whirlwind and saying that they won't know what hit them.

00:15:52.060 I mean, all very, very visual type of encouragements or incitements to violence.

00:15:58.200 And now I think, you know, and they had the gall then to say that, you know, Trump saying go fight peacefully for your country is somehow a specific incitement.

00:16:08.460 But somehow Schumer's incitement of the Supreme Court didn't matter at all.

00:16:12.740 Yeah. No, I think all sides need to tone it down a little bit.

00:16:15.740 And we need to we do need to protect the justices. And I think think about it now, what's going to happen when this ruling comes out?

00:16:22.600 They're already talking about bringing the National Guard into the streets.

00:16:25.040 We have never in our country, to my knowledge, brought National Guard into the streets because of a Supreme Court ruling.

00:16:31.420 And this all leads back to one person. One person started this.

00:16:35.540 Otherwise, you know, a lot of times a controversial ruling comes out and then they're gone for a couple of months.

00:16:40.260 I presume they're not going to be in D.C. and we're gone somewhere else, but they go away and then the public can debate and discuss this.

00:16:48.660 But the person who unleashed this has unleashed a real storm and they deserve punishment.

00:16:53.920 And I hope they find them. And, you know, many people think it's down to, you know, somewhere between five and 10 people that possibly could have done this.

00:17:02.380 Some people have insinuated that it might be one or two people that it's down to or that they already know the name of the person.

00:17:09.820 A lot of insiders believe that we will get that. We will finally be told who leaked this document.

00:17:16.440 Do you have any idea? Obviously, you're speaking with people who may be in the know.

00:17:20.380 Do you have any idea when we might know?

00:17:22.680 The people who talk about this, who, you know, have worked over there and, you know, know the inner workings of the Supreme Court,

00:17:30.540 they say that, you know, they're going that if they would suspect that they won't release the name until after the ruling because they don't want to distract from the ruling.

00:17:39.400 And then when the name is released, it'll be released in a very, very subdued way.

00:17:44.440 Not like, you know, we're going to do a press conference to do it, but that something will happen to this person,

00:17:49.160 that there will be either formal firing charges or something will happen.

00:17:54.640 But the Supreme Court doesn't want to be consumed. And this is conjecture on my part.

00:17:59.240 They don't want to consume with the media circus. They want to do everything they can.

00:18:03.160 Possibly they don't want to be part of the news. They don't want to be in the middle of something like this.

00:18:07.340 But a lot of people believe they know who the person is already and that there is evidence pointing that direction.

00:18:14.280 I don't have any specific knowledge other than just sort of hearing the scuttlebutt.

00:18:18.000 But I hope they do catch the person and I hope that person is severely punished.

00:18:22.680 When you hear the scuttlebutt, just to press you a bit, is it from people who would have reason to know?

00:18:26.860 Or is it just people who are members of the Supreme Court bar or Supreme Court watchers who are like, oh, this is how it's likely to go?

00:18:31.680 It's just people who might or might not know. I don't know. They talk to people.

00:18:35.660 Well, everybody's got sort of theories. It's, you know, inside baseball kind of stuff.

00:18:40.020 But I think that I guess all I can say is that I don't have enough to actually name any names or anything.

00:18:46.480 I just think that it's it's my hope that they will catch the person who did this and that really the violence,

00:18:52.120 the person that was caught yesterday, a potential assassin,

00:18:55.600 was encouraged by someone at the Supreme Court who released this document.

00:18:59.940 And it really goes to trust and honor. And I'm not a lawyer, but apparently part of the oath of taking the bar

00:19:06.820 is that you will be an upright, honorable person and that it is against the oath of the bar to have done this.

00:19:14.900 And the lawyers I know are saying that this person should be in all likelihood will be disbarred.

00:19:21.040 And then others are saying that it's actually a crime to sort of obstruct the proceedings of the Supreme Court.

00:19:26.640 We'll see where that bears out.

00:19:28.800 I can't imagine right now the tension at the Supreme Court as the justices, you know,

00:19:33.280 go into the office and work on these major rulings that they still have yet to issue.

00:19:37.520 They come out on Mondays and try to work together on, OK, what's your dissent going to be?

00:19:41.920 What's, you know, what's the majority going to be? Not just on Dobbs, but someone and have to be in the presence of these clerks.

00:19:46.700 And we all know it was likely a clerk. And in particular, as you point out, potentially one of the liberal justices clerks.

00:19:52.760 And Justice Kavanaugh has got to walk amongst them thinking one of you may have placed the life of my family and me in danger.

00:20:01.680 I think to be I think if you actually interviewed the people on the left on the Supreme Court, though,

00:20:07.940 I think the actual justices are probably all horrified by this.

00:20:12.060 That's why I think there probably will be punishment, because, you know, like this group, this Ruth sent us. 0.99

00:20:19.000 Think of the irony of that. Ruth Bader Ginsburg actually was friends with Scalia, even though they were from opposite points of view.

00:20:25.960 Apparently, they had dinner together, their families played cards together.

00:20:30.560 It wasn't travel together anger that you see.

00:20:33.680 So it is ironic that a group that thinks they're representing Ruth Ginsburg sends a murderer to a justice's house.

00:20:39.260 How ironic and horrible and really just despicable.

00:20:43.660 Can I ask you about the original topic we were going to discuss before I let you go?

00:20:47.580 And that is today we're taking a deep dive into the the mental well-being of our sitting president.

00:20:53.840 And, you know, most people in polite society don't like to touch this because it feels it feels rude.

00:21:02.320 It feels kind of mean. But he is the sitting president.

00:21:05.580 And we've seen increasing signs that President Biden may be deteriorating mentally.

00:21:11.660 So, number one, is it a fair subject for to delve into?

00:21:16.580 And number two, do you share these concerns?

00:21:18.900 Well, I think it's hard not to watch the press conferences, not to watch the missteps, the misstatements.

00:21:25.900 And particularly where it's most apparent is in foreign policy.

00:21:29.800 You know, there were misstatements saying that we were sending troops to Ukraine.

00:21:33.620 There were misstatements saying that we were demanding that for regime change in Russia.

00:21:38.920 These aren't small sort of gaffes.

00:21:41.900 These are major foreign policy misstatements that could actually lead to war.

00:21:48.980 And so I've said repeatedly that I think that he needs to be very, very careful.

00:21:53.960 There's many, many people around the president who control and try to help him with things to say.

00:21:59.720 He should not be unscripted when talking about foreign policy and probably should always speak from notes.

00:22:05.340 Is he capable of speaking from notes?

00:22:07.520 Most of the time he appears to be.

00:22:09.000 Most of the trouble seems to be when it's extemporaneous and he doesn't have sufficient notes to go by.

00:22:14.340 Whether or not this is actual decline, whether or not this is Alzheimer's, whether or not this is some typical, you know, slowing down of age.

00:22:23.620 It's hard to make any kind of medical diagnosis.

00:22:25.920 But it's also hard not to watch the gaffes and think that something's going on.

00:22:31.560 And for the for the health of the country, I think we do need to be and those around him need to be very, very careful about not making statements that might lead to war or lead to an accidental war, which would be a horror.

00:22:46.640 Should he be forced to take a cognitive test as, you know, Trump took one?

00:22:51.540 Well, I'm not big on using force related to health care much.

00:22:56.240 And so, no, I think that individuals make their own health decisions, even a president.

00:23:01.780 But I think it is open for criticism when you see things that appear to be either confusion, particularly if they have consequences of sending signals to our adversaries or enemies around the world.

00:23:16.080 It is important. And, you know, you start to wonder if you're the leader of China or a leader of Russia, do we take it at face value what he says?

00:23:23.620 And you would hope maybe they'd wait a few minutes until his aides can correct him.

00:23:27.320 But let's it's just not a good thing.

00:23:29.800 It's really not a good thing to have misstatements like that made in foreign policy.

00:23:34.140 So and the other side kept saying, oh, we're going to get stability and, you know, moderation.

00:23:39.180 And instead, we've gotten a lot of confusion from this side and a disastrous economy.

00:23:43.760 So I think there'll be a big judgment rendered, but it'll be rendered in November in the election.

00:23:48.620 Yeah, it'll be a political judgment.

00:23:50.420 Senator Rand Paul, always a pleasure speaking with you.

00:23:52.520 Thank you for coming on.

00:23:53.900 Thank you.

00:23:55.000 Up next, we begin that deep dive into the mental fitness of America's commander in chief.

00:23:59.820 We've put together a comprehensive look at it for you with some great, great guests.

00:24:03.660 And we will be right back with that.

00:24:09.180 Now, we begin a deep dive into President Biden's mental fitness.

00:24:15.260 A recent poll from the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University found

00:24:18.820 a majority of Americans are concerned about the president's fitness for office.

00:24:23.940 Some say it's not appropriate to question the president's mental ability, although most

00:24:27.800 of those people likely had absolutely no problem doing that to President Trump.

00:24:31.900 However, we're talking about the leader of the free world, so it's fair game.

00:24:35.680 We're going to tackle the political ramifications for the president and the Democrats.

00:24:39.800 Is this a problem that the president's first major television interview since February was

00:24:45.360 addressed when he went on Jimmy Kimmel last night, where he faced nothing but a slew of

00:24:51.080 hard, tough hitting?

00:24:53.360 Just kidding.

00:24:54.240 They were all softball questions.

00:24:56.080 Watch.

00:24:56.620 Can't you issue an executive order?

00:24:58.840 Trump passed those out like Halloween can.

00:25:00.580 Yeah, sure.

00:25:02.040 Isn't that something that could happen?

00:25:03.780 Maybe it's just that Americans aren't as knowledgeable as they should be, or maybe there's a death 0.60

00:25:10.040 star pumping false information into our brains.

00:25:13.600 Fox, right?

00:25:14.040 Why are you so optimistic?

00:25:15.260 You have sensitive documents that you need to flush down the toilet.

00:25:18.480 Do you do that?

00:25:19.620 Is that done in your office toilet, or is that done in the bathroom, in the personal bathroom

00:25:24.020 area?

00:25:24.620 Roe versus Wade.

00:25:25.980 Boy, these things just keep coming at you, don't they?

00:25:28.040 We're also going to speak with a doctor from UCLA who is a pioneer in brain health research.

00:25:35.160 This is the real, the real expert.

00:25:37.460 When he watches the clips of the president whispering, slurring, slipping on steps, what

00:25:41.120 does he see?

00:25:42.180 But first, as we all know, the president has long been known for his gaffes, slip ups, mistakes,

00:25:48.960 bloopers, whatever you want to call them.

00:25:50.420 But they've been there for a long time.

00:25:51.560 We are prepared to take you on a look back, a walk down memory lane at some of his most

00:25:57.780 uncomfortable moments.

00:25:58.740 There are way too many to get in a little package, but we've given you some highlights,

00:26:02.480 including some more recent ones, which have many asking, is our president OK?

00:26:11.780 I, Joseph Robinette Biden Jr., do solemnly swear.

00:26:15.100 Joe Biden was 78 years old on January 20th, 2021, the oldest man ever to take the presidential

00:26:22.500 oath of office.

00:26:24.240 One year older than Ronald Reagan when Reagan left office at 77.

00:26:28.420 Long before that, though, Joe Biden was known for his gaffes.

00:26:32.500 In 2006, then Senator Biden faced widespread criticism, for example, when he stereotyped Indian

00:26:38.820 Americans.

00:26:39.300 You cannot go to a 7-Eleven or a Dunkin' Donuts.

00:26:45.100 Unless you have a slight Indian accent.

00:26:47.200 He stepped in it again during his 2008 presidential race when talking about then-Senator Barack Obama.

00:26:53.580 I mean, you got the first sort of mainstream African-American who was articulate and bright

00:27:02.380 and clean.

00:27:04.880 Later, as Obama's vice president, he was caught on an open mic calling Obamacare a big effing

00:27:10.400 deal and really turned heads with this remark.

00:27:13.620 I promise you, the president has a big stick.

00:27:18.640 During his 2020 race for president, he got angry at voters.

00:27:23.480 No, you haven't.

00:27:24.640 You're a lying, dog-faced pony soldier. 0.97

00:27:26.600 I'm a damn liar, man.

00:27:28.000 And you want to check my shape on him, let's do push-ups together. 0.91

00:27:30.860 And told stories people aren't exactly sure are, well, true.

00:27:35.780 And Corn Pop was a bad dude.

00:27:37.780 But now, a year and a half into the most stressful job in the world, the uncomfortable moments

00:27:42.960 have become more concerning.

00:27:45.720 There's the bizarre whispering.

00:27:46.780 I got them $1.9 trillion relief so far.

00:27:52.700 I wrote the bill.

00:27:53.940 Pay them more.

00:27:55.380 I think it's time to give ordinary people a tax break.

00:27:59.480 I'm your commander-in-chief.

00:28:00.680 He was filmed slipping over and over again while trying to walk up the stairs of Air Force

00:28:05.300 One and seemingly getting lost on his way back to the White House.

00:28:10.220 In recent months, he has referred to Vice President Kamala Harris as president and first lady.

00:28:15.720 He confused the immigration policy, Title 42, with the mask mandate.

00:28:19.840 He lost his train of thought and slurred during key remarks.

00:28:24.380 Much more informed on the motives of some of the political players and some of the...

00:28:42.840 We're going to seize their yachts, their luxury homes, and other ill-begotten gains of Putin's

00:28:48.220 kleptocracy.

00:28:50.500 Yeah.

00:28:51.500 Last November, the White House physician reported Biden is, quote,

00:28:54.940 fit to successfully execute the duties of the presidency.

00:28:58.540 But many, including CNN chief medical correspondent Sanjay Gupta, who looked over Mr. Biden's medical

00:29:04.480 report, noted it did not seem to include a cognitive test.

00:29:08.320 They mentioned neurological exam, but that was more in terms of testing motor strength and

00:29:13.080 sensation and things like that.

00:29:15.140 President Trump had something known as the Montreal Cognitive Assessment.

00:29:19.240 It's sort of a screening test for dementia.

00:29:22.500 And, you know, there was no mention of that sort of thing here.

00:29:25.780 In February, Congressman Ronnie Jackson, who served as White House physician under Presidents

00:29:30.520 Trump and Obama, sent a letter to Mr. Biden stating, quote,

00:29:35.180 Your mental decline and forgetfulness have become more apparent over the past two years.

00:29:40.140 Among other examples, the letter pointed to the moment when the president forgot the name

00:29:44.200 of the Pentagon and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin.

00:29:47.940 I want to thank the former general, I keep calling him general, the guy who runs that outfit over there.

00:29:57.500 Congressman Jackson is calling for the president to take a cognitive test and to release the

00:30:01.740 results publicly.

00:30:02.740 Dr. O'Connor spent six pages talking about useless stuff that no one cares about and did

00:30:08.040 not address the elephant in the room, which is, is this man cognitively fit to be our president?

00:30:13.180 In a recent New York Magazine article about Democrats quietly searching for an alternative

00:30:17.340 to Joe Biden in 2024, top aides claim the president has, quote, shown no signs of slowing down

00:30:24.640 mentally.

00:30:25.580 It's just his falling poll numbers they're worried about.

00:30:28.360 And Mr. Biden himself has dismissed concerns when directly asked about this issue.

00:30:32.820 Why do you suppose such large segments of the American electorate have profound concerns

00:30:38.880 about your cognitive fitness?

00:30:41.880 I had no idea.

00:30:43.160 He has held few press conferences and only occasionally takes questions.

00:30:47.160 And he's often holding pre-prepared cue cards for himself.

00:30:51.100 His last formal sit-down interview with a news organization was in February.

00:30:55.280 And when the president approached the press at this year's White House Easter egg roll,

00:31:00.580 an aide dressed as the Easter bunny ran interference, moving the president away from

00:31:04.760 the reporters.

00:31:05.680 And he listened.

00:31:07.580 When the president does go off script, his comments can have major foreign policy consequences.

00:31:12.740 In an out-of-the-blue ad-libbed remark at the end of a speech in March,

00:31:16.900 Mr. Biden shocked the world when he said Russian President Vladimir Putin should be removed.

00:31:21.440 For God's sake, this man cannot remain in power.

00:31:26.740 Forcing top White House aides to immediately, quote,

00:31:29.500 clarify the president's comment.

00:31:31.880 People like Senator Rand Paul say the fact that this president cannot clearly communicate

00:31:36.040 U.S. foreign policy goes right to the heart of this issue.

00:31:39.840 Well, you know, a lot of times when you're around somebody who's in cognitive decline,

00:31:43.960 you find yourself trying to help them with the sentence, trying to help them complete it

00:31:47.380 and saying, oh, no, that's not what you really mean.

00:31:49.280 Let me help you complete the sentence.

00:31:51.200 But we shouldn't have to do that for the commander in chief.

00:31:53.560 And it is actually a national security risk.

00:31:57.740 This country deserves a leader who is mentally fit.

00:32:00.460 But do we have that?

00:32:02.000 It's the duty of all Americans to ask that question.

00:32:04.420 And they are entitled to answers.

00:32:06.960 Joining me now, Rich Lowry, editor in chief of National Review and Ryan Grimm,

00:32:11.280 Washington bureau chief for The Intercept.

00:32:14.460 All right, guys.

00:32:14.960 So great to have you here.

00:32:16.260 I think the package is really illuminating right on some of the highlights or lowlights,

00:32:21.040 depending on how you look at it.

00:32:23.040 And it's one thing he's always been a gaffe king, as we pointed out. 1.00

00:32:26.040 But there's definitely something else happening now as you see him doing the word searches

00:32:30.700 and, you know, forgetting where he is and forgetting the name of like the Pentagon.

00:32:36.220 Like that's kind of a big one.

00:32:38.340 And I think a lot of people are genuinely alarmed.

00:32:40.500 The polls show that so, Rich, have you I mean, you've you've opined that this is worthy of

00:32:46.000 looking into is is it pure politics in your view or is there actually something that could

00:32:50.760 be potentially endangering the country?

00:32:54.220 Well, obviously, it matters what the capacities are.

00:32:57.580 The president of the United States and I'm not a doctor.

00:32:59.680 I'm curious what your doctor will say.

00:33:01.920 But I have as many people have had, you know, personal experience with dementia and Alzheimer's

00:33:07.640 with with a loved one.

00:33:09.140 And the key indicators are things like getting in fender benders all the time.

00:33:13.400 We don't know that.

00:33:14.140 Right.

00:33:14.260 He's not driving a car, not knowing who president of the United States is.

00:33:17.600 Most of the time he's he's fine on that.

00:33:19.380 And really not just forgetting, but real confusion, which maybe at times you've seen with with

00:33:26.840 Biden, but you'd have to be closer to know.

00:33:29.660 So my diagnosis from a distance would be this is a 78 year old man.

00:33:34.100 He's a 78 year old man and he's aging.

00:33:36.620 And it happens to all of us.

00:33:38.440 Once you're over 50, how you struggle with with names.

00:33:41.260 It happens to me all the time.

00:33:42.540 I can just describe in great detail how someone looks, what their career has been.

00:33:46.120 I can't come up with the name.

00:33:47.240 And by the time you're nearly 80, that's gotten much worse.

00:33:51.440 And he's in a job that has incredible pressures that visibly ages people who are much younger

00:33:58.340 and more robust.

00:33:59.560 We remember W going gray, Barack Obama going gray.

00:34:03.680 And this is a guy who's never, as you pointed out, Megan, was never a clear and very buttoned

00:34:08.860 up communicator to begin with.

00:34:10.440 So you put that all together and it's a somewhat disturbing picture.

00:34:13.900 I don't I don't think necessarily he's an Alzheimer's patient.

00:34:17.240 But it's it's it's disturbed disturbing.

00:34:19.580 We all kind of see it, even though the media doesn't want to talk about it.

00:34:23.120 Ryan, Rich raises a good point that given his job, he's kind of shielded from a lot of

00:34:29.360 these symptoms that would show us if he's deteriorating in that way.

00:34:33.400 And yet we still see it.

00:34:34.520 So, in other words, you know, driving the car.

00:34:36.500 Well, he doesn't have to do that.

00:34:37.900 Most of his communications are filtered through staff, you know, through his aides.

00:34:42.640 We don't get direct access to him.

00:34:45.180 Most of his public communications now are on prompter.

00:34:48.520 So we don't actually have the full picture about his forgetfulness and his ability to

00:34:53.480 sort of pursue a linear thought.

00:34:55.460 He's he gives precious few interviews.

00:34:57.700 You know, the last one was to Lester Holt in February.

00:34:59.660 This one is to Jimmy Kimmel, where, you know, it's going to be a joke.

00:35:03.900 And indeed, it was.

00:35:06.420 Yeah.

00:35:06.960 And in fact, one one tiny correction to Rich, because who I agree with on the point of of

00:35:13.320 the age, he's actually 79.

00:35:14.700 He'll be 80.

00:35:16.140 He'll be 80 in November.

00:35:17.640 So and I think that that is there you are.

00:35:20.740 I'm over 50.

00:35:21.520 I messed these details up.

00:35:22.580 See, the point about the car is interesting, but I think Rich's point about the confusion

00:35:30.220 is kind of a more interesting one like that, that being a major symptom.

00:35:34.320 And, you know, none of us should really try to get too into the diagnostic component of

00:35:39.860 this.

00:35:40.780 But we're allowed to because we're not we're not doctors.

00:35:43.500 The doctors are the ones who have an ethical obligation to do it.

00:35:46.180 That's just kidding.

00:35:46.860 We're not trying.

00:35:47.180 So I guess we should try to diagnose.

00:35:48.880 Yeah, it gives us permission to make a really specific diagnosis.

00:35:51.960 That's right.

00:35:53.300 Perfect.

00:35:54.180 Perfect.

00:35:55.580 You know, like he said, we haven't seen a ton of that type of concerning confusion.

00:36:01.280 It's limited to, you know, here and there, like, is he lost getting back into the White 0.66

00:36:06.320 House or or something along those lines, whereas more often you see the recall problems, which,

00:36:11.320 you know, which all of us, you know, face as we get as we get older and which he faced,

00:36:16.840 you know, as a much younger person, like like both of you has said, this has been a gaffe

00:36:20.820 prone clown of a politician for a very long time.

00:36:24.580 It was the joke about Biden for decades was was his was his gaffes.

00:36:29.600 And so, you know, now now he's under that much more pressure and he's advanced in age that

00:36:34.740 many more decades.

00:36:35.940 I think the the political question maybe is, what do you do about it?

00:36:39.700 And to me, this is a this is a political question that therefore needs to be resolved by

00:36:45.140 basically by the American people.

00:36:46.920 And so through basically through elections, you know, during the Trump years, I I thought

00:36:52.680 and I still continue to think that he's got issues.

00:36:55.420 I don't necessarily think that he's, you know, cognitively impaired in a traditional

00:37:00.480 sense.

00:37:01.300 But but you watch the guy talk and you're like that something's something's off there.

00:37:06.800 But I never thought necessarily that that meant that he should then, you know, be removed

00:37:11.820 from office in a kind of extra electoral way.

00:37:16.320 And so I think that like that as a fundamental question is one that we have to ask.

00:37:22.200 And I don't think you want, you know, Congress or cabinets to start intervening until it becomes,

00:37:30.620 you know, so dangerous that all of our lives and the lives of the global population is at

00:37:36.960 risk.

00:37:38.320 Well, I mean, there's some evidence we're inching there.

00:37:40.780 You know, Trump did take a cognitive test.

00:37:43.200 I think it's called.

00:37:44.580 So his his talking about that cognitive test gave me no more confidence in him.

00:37:51.860 But he kept bragging that he had aced this test was like, oh, yeah, it was one of the

00:37:57.380 funniest things of the Trump years.

00:37:58.700 Here you go.

00:37:59.240 Talk about that.

00:37:59.980 It's like my my I aced the cognitive test T-shirt.

00:38:03.580 Like you'll go person, woman, man, camera, TV.

00:38:12.280 So they say, could you repeat that?

00:38:15.240 So I said, yeah.

00:38:16.460 So it's person, woman, man, camera, TV.

00:38:22.040 OK, that's very good.

00:38:23.960 If you get it in order, you get extra points.

00:38:26.340 If you're OK, now he's asking you other questions, other questions.

00:38:30.960 And then 10 minutes, 15, 20 minutes later, they say, remember the first question, not the

00:38:36.420 first, but the 10th question.

00:38:38.460 Give us that again.

00:38:39.460 Can you do that again?

00:38:40.540 And you go person, woman, man, camera, TV.

00:38:46.260 I think it was called the Montreal test.

00:38:48.460 And he had to get like over 26 out of 30 is passing and Trump got 30 out of 30.

00:38:53.200 And it's things like draw a cube.

00:38:58.140 There's something like counting backwards from 100 by sevens.

00:39:02.700 That's actually not that easy.

00:39:05.500 But anyway, he aced it.

00:39:06.960 But Biden hasn't taken that.

00:39:08.320 Go ahead, Rich.

00:39:09.460 Yeah, just in terms of the media hypocrisy, if you remember that incident when Trump was

00:39:14.280 giving a speech, I believe it was at West Point and he walked gingerly down the ramp

00:39:19.120 and it looked it looked odd.

00:39:20.940 It looked weird.

00:39:21.560 But that drove like a major news cycle.

00:39:24.180 You know, there are New York Times stories written about what's wrong with the president.

00:39:27.400 How why can't we get answers?

00:39:29.100 And he had this very funny riff about it at rallies where he just had new dress shoes that

00:39:33.960 had a very shiny, slick leather bottom.

00:39:36.600 And he was worried about the this ramp being slippery.

00:39:40.020 So he walks like really gingerly down it because he didn't want to fall down.

00:39:43.240 And he tells a story of calling Melania and saying, how do you like the speech?

00:39:46.820 And she's like, are you OK?

00:39:48.300 Do you know what?

00:39:48.980 You know what they're saying about you?

00:39:50.960 That you must have Parkinson's or some terrible condition.

00:39:53.100 So obviously, the double standard here is immense.

00:39:54.940 But I agree with Ryan, you know, ultimately, this is something for voters to decide.

00:39:59.560 If you look at the way the 25th Amendment works, it's a nightmare.

00:40:03.340 It's completely unworkable.

00:40:05.020 It would be a desperate crisis for the country if that were ever invoked.

00:40:09.820 And I don't think it'd be plausibly invoked unless the president is is actually in a coma

00:40:13.700 because he had the vice president in the cabinet, you know, voting about whether he's still

00:40:17.420 capable of being president.

00:40:18.700 And then he can object within four days.

00:40:20.720 Then they have to reconsider the question and whether they're rejecting his objection.

00:40:25.420 And if they do reject his objection, then it goes to Congress for two thirds vote.

00:40:28.700 It's just it's just a disaster of a mechanism.

00:40:32.200 So I can't see us ever, ever getting there.

00:40:34.520 The question will be, does does Biden run again?

00:40:37.440 And if he actually does, which a lot of people are kind of doubtful of, I am how much this will

00:40:42.720 figure into people's calculations about.

00:40:45.360 He keeps saying he will run.

00:40:47.400 And, you know, he's assuming he's in good shape.

00:40:50.160 He says he'll run if he if he feels the way he does now.

00:40:53.100 So we'll get to that in one second.

00:40:54.540 Like, what are the Democrats going to do?

00:40:55.740 Because they're definitely worried about not just him, but his replacement.

00:41:00.540 You know, they don't like their chances so much either way.

00:41:03.300 But before we go there, can I ask you about this, Ryan?

00:41:05.700 Like he he has made enough policy gaffes that you have to be a little worried.

00:41:11.260 That's what Rand Paul was saying, that he's he's basically on the verge of causing a real

00:41:15.080 foreign policy crisis with his loose lips and running mouth.

00:41:18.860 Now, maybe the Joe Biden of 20 years ago would have done the same.

00:41:22.280 You could make that case.

00:41:23.580 Right.

00:41:23.760 But, you know, with the we would respond in kind if if Putin unleashed a chemical attack

00:41:30.100 in Ukraine.

00:41:31.480 Wait, no, we wouldn't.

00:41:32.700 The United States would launch a chemical attack in Ukraine.

00:41:35.580 I don't think we would.

00:41:36.520 No.

00:41:37.740 You know, the statement he made about Taiwan and the Chinese.

00:41:40.680 Wait, well, that's a change in policy.

00:41:42.360 Oh, no, it's not.

00:41:43.320 Well, yes, it is.

00:41:44.200 Because normally we sort of stayed in a neutral, ambiguous place.

00:41:47.140 And you were clearly saying we're going to send troops in if they go into Taiwan.

00:41:50.720 And then there was the statement about Putin ought to be kicked out.

00:41:55.540 Right.

00:41:55.740 Like regime change, which are definitely not in favor of, at least not openly.

00:41:59.700 And all those things are those are sketchy things.

00:42:03.280 And there's a bunch of them.

00:42:05.200 And I think your your point about would Biden of 20 years ago be making these same gaps

00:42:10.160 is is an interesting one.

00:42:11.460 And I think the answer is yes.

00:42:12.700 Like, I think this is who this is who Biden has long been.

00:42:15.600 If you if you watch, you know, when he was chairing, you know, either the Foreign Affairs

00:42:20.700 Committee or Foreign Relations Committee or the chairing judiciary, like, you know, he

00:42:24.980 would he would just say things that were just kind of off the wall.

00:42:27.860 Now he's the president.

00:42:29.860 And so his off his off the wall remarks could have global implications.

00:42:34.500 But the globe now has, you know, what, six years of experience in pausing after an American 0.98

00:42:42.300 president speaks and asking the question of does this represent a change in policy?

00:42:47.800 That's a good point.

00:42:48.720 Or is this just an American president popping off?

00:42:51.560 That's not the that's not a good way to run an empire by any stretch of the imagination.

00:42:56.020 But at least the other countries, you know, have had that experience.

00:43:00.540 And now with, you know, with Biden, I think that all of the other world leaders are going

00:43:05.360 to, you know, they're not going to instantly react to something that that he says, just

00:43:12.460 just the way that they they were not reacting instantly to President Trump, they would be

00:43:16.860 back channeling, you know, to their counterparts, either state or defense and saying, hey, so

00:43:21.760 the president just tweeted this.

00:43:23.600 You know, what what does that what does that mean?

00:43:25.420 Whereas in Biden's case, it's just, you know, Biden just, you know, said this, you

00:43:31.100 know, this impromptu thing at a press conference.

00:43:33.640 What does what does that mean?

00:43:35.760 And so, like I said, neither of those ways are, you know, desirable to run a run a foreign 1.00

00:43:42.840 policy operation.

00:43:43.640 Trump was like a loose cannon.

00:43:45.260 But but Biden, you know, you just wonder if he's all there.

00:43:48.000 So it's like one guy is just impulsive and threatening in a way that may or may not be

00:43:51.740 real. And then you got the other guy who is is just he may not be all there, which Jim

00:43:57.120 Garrity over at National Review had a bit in his morning jolt the other day that raised

00:44:00.740 this point. And I thought it was a great one.

00:44:02.660 So we did a montage of it. But one of the other things that could be provocative to

00:44:06.660 foreign leaders. OK, I get Ryan's point of like they'll double check before they bomb

00:44:10.340 us before they think we're bombing them.

00:44:12.760 But weakness invites weakness is provocative, too.

00:44:16.300 If they don't think he's all there, like we saw that with Afghanistan, that weakness 1.00

00:44:20.000 provoked, you could argue, Ukraine and so on.

00:44:22.240 And what's up with the I'm not allowed to take questions.

00:44:26.840 I'm not supposed to be taking questions.

00:44:28.720 I shouldn't be talking to you when dealing with just the American media, which are a lot

00:44:32.760 less scary than Putin.

00:44:35.160 Here's a little montage.

00:44:36.440 This is soundbite five.

00:44:40.120 I'm not supposed to be answering all these questions.

00:44:42.200 I'm not going to answer any more question.

00:44:45.520 I guess we just have a couple of questions.

00:44:48.520 Just just just a couple.

00:44:50.180 Good luck. We're going to just last question I'll take and I'm really going to be in trouble.

00:44:55.260 The reason we're not going to have any time for questions now is these guys got to get

00:44:59.000 quickly on the plane and go out and do a major announcement in Ohio.

00:45:02.700 And you guys will ask me all about Russia and not about anything having to do with chips.

00:45:06.240 I'm not supposed to take any questions, but go ahead.

00:45:08.600 Mr. President, on Afghanistan.

00:45:10.680 I'm not going to answer Afghanistan now.

00:45:12.000 Can you say first?

00:45:13.520 I mean, to Jim's point.

00:45:15.940 Yes, a classic instance of reading his stage directions out loud and they clearly they want

00:45:21.900 to minimize access to him for fear of what he'll say.

00:45:26.760 And he's messed up scripted remarks where he's gone off script and said something, you

00:45:31.600 know, that we want Putin to go.

00:45:33.520 That's not U.S. policy.

00:45:35.160 And per Ryan's point, it is bizarre that twice running now we had U.S. presidents who haven't

00:45:40.260 reliably spoken to what U.S. policy is necessarily.

00:45:43.400 That's not a good situation.

00:45:44.620 But the lack of sit down, long sit down interviews with with mainstream legacy reporters, just

00:45:50.440 it all goes to the fear of what he'll say.

00:45:53.480 You know, the Easter Bunny was right.

00:45:54.740 We saw the Easter Bunny in real time, steering him away from reporters.

00:45:58.100 Get back here with the kids and just do the role.

00:46:00.040 Don't talk to anyone.

00:46:00.820 And I think the Easter Bunny's instincts suffuse the entirety of this this White House staff.

00:46:06.500 And another thing that's really notable is not just necessarily the cognitive decline,

00:46:10.520 but the Jimmy Kimmel interview, whether a moment or two there really, you know, would have

00:46:15.280 you concerned.

00:46:16.420 But the rest of it, what comes across is just this the sense of frail.

00:46:20.500 I mean, again, he's an old man. 0.98

00:46:22.600 He's an old man in a job that's incredibly punishing, that requires great reservoirs of 0.97

00:46:29.520 mental, intellectual and physical energy.

00:46:32.840 And and, you know, whatever his actual mental state is, clearly that at age 79, that's not

00:46:38.960 what it was at age 59.

00:46:40.480 It is getting depleted as we speak.

00:46:42.740 Mm hmm.

00:46:43.120 I always think about my mom.

00:46:44.740 God love her.

00:46:45.380 She's listening.

00:46:46.240 So forgive me, mom.

00:46:47.580 But she's 80.

00:46:48.840 She's basically his age.

00:46:50.600 And she can't remember names at all.

00:46:53.540 She always laughs like, you know, the thing, you know what I mean?

00:46:57.660 I mean, that thing, that thing that you tell me what I mean, what I because she wants me

00:47:02.460 to tell her what she means.

00:47:03.380 And I usually can.

00:47:05.040 But my mom's not leader of the free world. 0.59

00:47:06.700 So it's fine.

00:47:08.100 We had a funny thing.

00:47:09.040 I have my my dog, my bad, bad dog, Strudwick.

00:47:11.860 He's sweet, but he's bad.

00:47:13.200 And she cannot remember his name, which I'll give her.

00:47:14.880 That's a tough one.

00:47:15.480 Strudwick.

00:47:15.880 She calls him Shruti or Schroeder or slut or what she can't.

00:47:20.200 And she was visiting for Mother's Day.

00:47:22.960 And our housekeeper has been with us forever.

00:47:24.740 I love her.

00:47:25.160 Her name is Carla.

00:47:26.600 She was there and she's helping me with my mom.

00:47:28.740 And my mom's like, oh, get Strudwick out of the way. 1.00

00:47:30.840 Mom, you did it.

00:47:32.260 You got it for you.

00:47:33.480 How'd you get it?

00:47:34.560 She goes, oh, Carmen helped me.

00:47:37.380 So what's the derivation of where Strudwick come from?

00:47:42.940 You know what?

00:47:43.300 My husband's like uncle or great uncle, I can't remember which, was a guy named Strud Nash.

00:47:51.020 And he played for Carolina back in like the 30s or 40s.

00:47:55.280 And he went by Strud Nash, the Carolina Flash.

00:47:58.820 And we're like, that's too good not to recycle.

00:48:01.380 So we stole it for our dog and much to my mother's lamentation.

00:48:05.860 In any event, thank God my mom has no access to the nuclear codes.

00:48:10.540 And it doesn't matter whether she calls Carla Carmen or Strudwick slutty. 0.52

00:48:14.560 It's not going to hurt anybody.

00:48:16.620 The president, different story.

00:48:18.780 I'm going to pause you guys there because we have so much more to go over.

00:48:21.540 I really do want to get your take on the total media blackout almost.

00:48:25.260 I mean, it seems that way about this assassination attempt on Justice Kavanaugh, too.

00:48:30.100 And I know you guys have been covering that carefully.

00:48:32.100 So we're going to pick it up there and we're going to get much more into depth on the president

00:48:35.980 and what this means for Democrats in 2024 right after this when Rich Lowry and Ryan Grimm stay with us.

00:48:42.180 And remember, folks, you can find The Megyn Kelly Show live on Sirius XM Triumph Channel 111 every weekday at noon east.

00:48:49.120 And the full video show and clips by subscribing to our YouTube channel, youtube.com slash Megyn Kelly.

00:48:55.060 If you prefer an audio podcast, go over there, follow us and download the show on Apple, Spotify, Pandora, Stitcher, wherever you get your podcasts.

00:49:04.840 Go ahead and give us a five star rating and leave a comment in the Apple comments section.

00:49:11.100 I read them all.

00:49:11.660 You guys were fired up about that guest, Jason, from the All In podcast the other day.

00:49:17.540 He continues to tweet about the interview.

00:49:19.300 He's an angry person.

00:49:22.140 Anyway, check it out.

00:49:23.380 Check out our full archives with more than 330 shows.

00:49:30.860 He goes on Jimmy Kimmel last night.

00:49:32.820 And as we played before, he's asked no tough questions.

00:49:35.300 But there certainly were awkward moments.

00:49:38.000 To me, it seemed like he delivered his sort of standard lines that he delivers all the time.

00:49:43.180 Fine.

00:49:44.360 But when he actually had to think, you could see the same stumbling blocks that we've been showing the audience and talking about now for the past hour.

00:49:51.600 And here is one painful example.

00:49:54.960 No question about it.

00:49:55.860 So there's a lot of major things we've done.

00:49:57.660 But what we haven't done is we haven't been able to communicate it in a way that is, let me say it another way.

00:50:06.860 Well, see, that's kind of perfect.

00:50:08.140 Yeah.

00:50:08.320 We haven't been able to communicate it.

00:50:09.760 But look how the press has changed.

00:50:12.180 Look how the press has changed.

00:50:13.300 It has changed.

00:50:13.880 Oh, listen.

00:50:14.380 I get it.

00:50:15.040 I know you get it.

00:50:15.660 You overstand it.

00:50:16.720 You don't just understand it.

00:50:17.840 You overstand it.

00:50:19.700 But here's the deal.

00:50:20.760 One of the things is that it's very difficult now to have a, even with notable exceptions, even though really good reporters, they have to get the number of clicks on nightly news.

00:50:36.200 So instead of asking a question, anyway, it's just everything gets sensationalized in ways.

00:50:42.980 But I'm convinced we can get through this.

00:50:44.940 We have to get through it.

00:50:46.260 And one of the things, look.

00:50:47.680 I'm going to take a break and then we'll talk a little bit more.

00:50:49.760 Thank God.

00:50:51.460 Thank God he took a break.

00:50:52.560 Right.

00:50:52.820 It was like, throw the guy a lifeline.

00:50:54.760 That's how you wind up feeling a lot when you listen to Joe Biden, Rich.

00:50:58.340 Yeah.

00:50:58.660 And for a second there, he sort of thought, Kimmel, was he making fun of him when he said, oh, yeah, communication?

00:51:05.900 Yeah, I can see how that's an issue.

00:51:07.940 But he was trying to throw him a lifeline.

00:51:10.300 And yeah, this was the single worst minute clip from that interview.

00:51:14.380 And again, it just goes to there's some element of decline there, whatever the cause, whatever

00:51:20.080 the reason, maybe it's just just age.

00:51:22.480 But it's it's cringe inducing to watch.

00:51:26.480 And if you're a human being, makes you feel a little sorry for Joe Biden.

00:51:29.820 Well, I should point out that my mom does not have Alzheimer's and she doesn't have dementia.

00:51:34.400 You know, she just has normal aging as an 80 year old person.

00:51:38.040 So he does sound like her.

00:51:40.420 So maybe he doesn't have any, you know, disease of the mind either.

00:51:44.640 We'll get into that a little bit more when our doctor.

00:51:46.920 I mean, like this is the dementia doctor who's joining us today.

00:51:49.240 But in that one clip, Ryan, he lost track of what he was saying.

00:51:53.320 He made an abrupt shift to try to recover.

00:51:56.120 He used the wrong word.

00:51:57.580 He lost track again.

00:51:59.140 He meandered through his next thought.

00:52:01.200 He lost track yet again.

00:52:03.340 And then he was saved by the anchor.

00:52:05.920 And it was hard to watch.

00:52:07.880 And back to my point of like no confidence.

00:52:10.740 We're not the only ones watching this.

00:52:12.780 We have some really some really nasty enemies out there who are trying to assess right now

00:52:18.160 what they can get away with.

00:52:20.120 Right.

00:52:20.900 Like people in China. 1.00

00:52:22.660 And I worry about the perception of this guy as our leader.

00:52:27.380 I think there's plenty of cause for worry, but I don't think that's it.

00:52:30.280 Like, I don't think the Chinese sense of the United States is that if we have a president who's

00:52:37.760 asleep, the switch, that they're going to be able to just sneak into Taiwan.

00:52:41.440 Like, I think that they're very much aware that the kind of military industrial complex,

00:52:47.120 the kind of entire what what what Trump would call the deep state, you know, there is an

00:52:51.500 apparatus at work that has contingency plans for whatever China is going to attempt when

00:52:57.440 it comes to Taiwan that does not require Biden to watch it unfold and sit there and devise

00:53:04.600 a strategy.

00:53:05.300 You know, what what they're going to do in an event like that, for instance, is they're

00:53:09.540 going to put two or three scenarios in front of him.

00:53:12.720 And as Rich knows, this is how it works with Trump.

00:53:15.100 This is how it works with Obama.

00:53:16.700 And they're going to say, here are three plans.

00:53:18.760 Which one of these do you choose?

00:53:20.200 And, you know, the two of them are going to be absurd trying to, like, push them into

00:53:24.400 the one that the military wants to do anyway.

00:53:25.920 So and I think China understands that.

00:53:27.840 So I don't think that it's creating those types of national national security concerns.

00:53:33.880 But I but I do think I think people and voters particularly are are looking at this and aren't

00:53:41.220 seeing anybody in charge because the federal government has been stripped of a lot of its

00:53:46.920 capacity to kind of, you know, to perform the way that it used to under, say, the kind

00:53:53.980 of New Deal coalition.

00:53:55.880 But people still want to feel like there is somebody in charge, somebody who has ideas,

00:54:01.200 somebody who's who's trying things.

00:54:02.880 Janet Yellen is effectively not a public Treasury secretary.

00:54:06.920 You don't have you don't really ever hear from her that moments you do.

00:54:10.580 It's a it's a huge exception.

00:54:12.940 And so if you don't have the president and if you don't have the Treasury secretary out

00:54:18.200 there talking about the economy, talking about what they're trying to do when it comes to

00:54:22.220 gas prices, talking about what they're trying to do when it comes to the economy, then it

00:54:25.040 becomes left to, say, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer, you know, neither of whom are are,

00:54:30.620 you know, in your living rooms every day and neither of whom are necessarily, you know,

00:54:34.300 the most adept communicators either.

00:54:37.380 So I think that that domestically, it probably causes a bigger problem for Biden than than

00:54:43.040 internationally, because I don't think that foreign governments are going to think that

00:54:47.500 they can necessarily get away, you know, pull one over on the kind of military and national

00:54:52.620 security apparatus of the United States just because the president, you know, is having

00:54:58.720 a hard time piecing sentences together on Jimmy.

00:55:00.820 Well, it may require more more explicit statements like, oh, a minor incursion would be one thing.

00:55:06.200 I mean, you know, like that you could make a pretty strong case that that was very interesting

00:55:10.860 to President Putin and led in part to his decision to actually go in.

00:55:14.700 I don't know.

00:55:16.480 But, you know, it may not just be the weakness like we saw in Afghanistan.

00:55:20.140 It may be that coupled with which would that's an unusual willingness to telegraph something

00:55:26.020 like that, which we normally wouldn't say because we would know exactly the effect it would have.

00:55:29.840 And then no amount of walking it back is is going to have the the right effect on somebody

00:55:34.600 like Putin.

00:55:35.780 Let me pause it there because I do want to get back to that idea of what's it what's it doing

00:55:39.280 domestically.

00:55:40.380 Charlie Cook had an interesting thought about this.

00:55:41.960 I'll ask you about.

00:55:42.540 But before I do that, while we're on the subject of Kimmel, not one question on the

00:55:48.180 attempted assassination of a sitting Supreme Court justice, Rich, not one.

00:55:53.120 And that mirrors what we've seen from the press largely today.

00:55:58.600 Do you think it was the lead this morning on the morning shows?

00:56:03.100 You'd be wrong.

00:56:04.500 Nope, it wasn't.

00:56:05.360 It took according to News Busters, they then the morning shows collectively spent 25 minutes

00:56:10.620 on January 6th.

00:56:12.080 They spent eight minutes on Justice Kavanaugh or January 6th, which happened two years

00:56:16.480 ago that they're on that for 25 minutes.

00:56:19.640 The damn hearing hasn't even happened yet.

00:56:21.400 We don't even have any news from the hearing and eight minutes on Kavanaugh.

00:56:25.440 CBS and NBC didn't even mention it until after the 10 minute marks of the show.

00:56:29.960 Far from being the lead, it didn't even make the A block and similar on the print media.

00:56:36.300 The New York Times, not one story on the front page of today's New York Times on the attempted

00:56:42.680 assassination of Brett Kavanaugh.

00:56:44.740 Can you imagine if this were Ruth Bader Ginsburg or Sonia Sotomayor?

00:56:48.860 This is insane.

00:56:50.200 There's a footnote saying, see A20 for the story.

00:56:54.680 You go to A20, it's a small article, articles that were longer.

00:56:58.620 There's one, a journalist goes deep into Amazon, into the Amazon, and a deadly Korean ferry 0.98

00:57:05.340 accident gets more coverage in the Times than this.

00:57:10.540 What do you make of that?

00:57:12.060 It's astonishing.

00:57:13.040 You know, I was going to tweet yesterday, you know, the Brett Kavanaugh news cycle is

00:57:17.680 going to disappear as quickly as the Brooklyn subway shooter news cycle because the subway

00:57:21.980 shooter, you know, he said things about race, anti-white things that just don't play into

00:57:27.420 a narrative and the media wasn't going to be interested in talking about.

00:57:30.360 But then I was distracted by writing a column from Twitter.

00:57:33.040 So my job distracted me from Twitter yet again.

00:57:36.220 But then when I actually logged on last night, there was no Brett Kavanaugh news cycle.

00:57:40.380 It didn't even, it was barely a ripple all day long.

00:57:44.080 You know, CNN, it was, you got to, you had to scroll down, you know, six inches to get to

00:57:48.900 it.

00:57:49.020 Same thing in the New York Times homepage.

00:57:51.440 And obviously, as you point out, it didn't show up in the front page of print.

00:57:54.160 And this is an enormous, an enormous deal.

00:57:57.020 And it should play into the same, you would think, the same things that make January 6th.

00:58:03.320 You know, if January 6th is a big story for the media, this is the same type of thing.

00:58:06.360 Violation of norms.

00:58:07.420 You have this leak that's a flagrant violation of practices and tradition at the Supreme Court.

00:58:13.160 Political violence targeting one of our institutions.

00:58:15.200 You know, guys showing up to, with the intention, at least initially, to assassinate Brett Kavanaugh

00:58:21.860 and then lies spinning out of control.

00:58:23.860 The idea that the court overturns Roe, you know, there'll be no abortion rights in all

00:58:28.300 of America ever again.

00:58:30.120 But it just doesn't have the same ideological and political valiance as January 6th did.

00:58:37.000 So it doesn't, it doesn't show up.

00:58:38.760 And again, maybe we've talked about this again and again and again, but it continues to be

00:58:42.840 repeatedly true.

00:58:44.500 This is just another way that the credibility of the mainstream legacy media is, you know,

00:58:51.260 it's just eroded away before our eyes.

00:58:53.520 I realize that the New York Times not putting this on the front page and it not being the lead

00:58:59.240 or even one of the top stories on the major nets, Ryan, that's a big deal.

00:59:03.740 And that Jimmy Kimmel is a lesser deal.

00:59:05.940 But you have the sitting president of the United States for the first time in four months giving

00:59:12.600 an interview.

00:59:13.700 And it's the day most people who even have a toe in news.

00:59:18.380 Oh, cute cat.

00:59:20.480 Most people who even have a toe in it, right?

00:59:22.700 Never mind, technically work at an organization that has a massive news organization, ABC would

00:59:27.800 be, would be chomping at the bit to ask him about the day of news.

00:59:32.880 Like, oh my God, there was a, there was an attempted assassination.

00:59:37.040 Like that's, that's the first question we're going to ask him.

00:59:39.800 Not one.

00:59:40.880 You heard the questions about the toilet paper, like shoving papers down the toilet.

00:59:44.480 Is that, and I played you the nonsense meandering one.

00:59:48.020 It's such a dereliction.

00:59:49.560 I mean, you could even ask a softball question.

00:59:53.080 Like you wouldn't even have to be a tough one.

00:59:54.880 It's just raising that.

00:59:56.920 You could just raise the question and say, you know, what's, what's your response to

01:00:00.320 this?

01:00:01.740 So, yeah, I mean, you know, I'm like, like you said, Jimmy Kimmel is not a journalist

01:00:06.340 and, you know, we're not here to really lecture him on his journalism, but it is, I think it

01:00:10.420 is instructive.

01:00:11.220 And, and I also think it's fair to compare it to the news coverage around the plot, um,

01:00:18.340 to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer like that. 0.98

01:00:21.080 I got a ton of coverage.

01:00:22.820 Um, and so, you know, there, there's an initial impulse to say, well, plots are foiled all the

01:00:27.980 time.

01:00:28.400 People, you know, pop off and do crazy things and nothing happens and you can't cover every

01:00:32.960 non event that becomes a non event.

01:00:34.780 But that, that one, um, was a non event because, you know, it was rolled up and they were arrested

01:00:41.000 and nothing, nothing happened.

01:00:42.920 And we, we saw an enormous amount of, you know, press attention paid to it.

01:00:47.720 And then, and then we learned later that, you know, uh, federal agents or federal assets

01:00:53.660 played, you know, a huge role in kind of instigating the, you know, the, the nudge toward,

01:00:59.320 toward this plotting, which, which was kind of a playbook that they had developed with, uh,

01:01:04.420 uh, is Islamic extremists and, you know, who, who were not necessarily violent, uh, were

01:01:10.540 more likely just kind of mentally ill or deranged.

01:01:13.580 And you have FBI assets or agents come in and say, Hey, wouldn't it be cool if we blew

01:01:19.000 up this bridge?

01:01:20.280 Uh, and they, and you know, you, you, you dig even deeper into these and they, you see

01:01:24.340 the people pushing back the whole time and, and raising reasons why they might not do it.

01:01:28.960 And you see the FBI assets or agents overcoming those.

01:01:32.420 There was even one case where they're like, well, we don't even have any money.

01:01:34.960 It's like, well, I'll lend you the money and I'll lend you the money.

01:01:38.060 And I have a guy who will supply you.

01:01:39.660 So here's the money.

01:01:40.580 Here's the thing.

01:01:41.520 Just say, yes, please.

01:01:42.800 And this, like in this text chain so that we can, you know, then, then I'll round you

01:01:47.160 up.

01:01:48.080 Anyway, that's a, that's, that's, that's a different story, but.

01:01:51.260 Well, that's why there was no conviction.

01:01:54.140 Some of them were convicted, right?

01:01:55.480 Because they, they weren't all, they didn't all need to be kind of nudged into it.

01:02:00.620 But the point is it got an immense amount of coverage, um, compared to, compared to this

01:02:06.640 so far.

01:02:07.260 And maybe that, maybe this will be one of those stories that bubbles and then later boils

01:02:12.320 as they learn more, or we, we might just not hear anything more about it.

01:02:16.600 I don't know, Rich.

01:02:17.080 I thought I tried to give the media the benefit of the doubt and said, okay, I realize this

01:02:20.160 guy's obviously very troubled.

01:02:21.820 He's going to kill himself.

01:02:22.920 He turned himself in, you know, he called 9-1-1 saying I'm suicidal and I, and homicidal.

01:02:27.780 Um, I, that doesn't, that doesn't excuse this.

01:02:31.180 Anybody who goes to assassinate a sitting Supreme court justice is mentally unwell.

01:02:36.780 The fact that he was, that he made the call to actually tell 9-1-1 what he was about to

01:02:42.300 do doesn't make this a non-story.

01:02:44.700 I mean, that's a, that's a decision in a moment that could have gone the other way.

01:02:47.660 And Justice Kavanaugh could potentially be dead or worse.

01:02:50.560 His family, you know, who knows?

01:02:52.920 It, that does not make this a non-story.

01:02:55.340 It is still the lead in any respectable news organization.

01:02:59.000 Yeah.

01:02:59.260 I mean, when, when is the last time we talked about a Supreme court justice potentially being

01:03:03.060 assassinated or having an assassination attempt?

01:03:06.120 And it obviously is a, a function of this larger pressure campaign that has been waged against

01:03:12.640 the conservative justices who presumably, um, could be part of a, a five vote majority to

01:03:17.880 overturn Roe and is of a piece of publishing the addresses of showing up at their homes to,

01:03:24.020 to, to demonstrate.

01:03:25.300 So it's, it's, it's a story.

01:03:27.980 It's, it's whatever you make of it, you know, whether you want to be dismissive of it or more

01:03:32.000 alarmed by it, it's a story, it's news.

01:03:35.220 And again, we have news organizations that, uh, routinely, uh, ignore, um, stories that you'd

01:03:42.600 think would be newsworthy, which is one reason we've seen such proliferation of other sources

01:03:46.900 of news to, to fill the gap because they leave so much on the table.

01:03:51.140 Okay.

01:03:51.580 Back to president Biden.

01:03:53.020 There was, uh, I think it was a tweet from Charles CW cook of national review, Ryan, and

01:03:57.560 he wrote the following, the economy can change.

01:04:00.340 Foreign policy can shift perceptions of the opposing party can deteriorate.

01:04:04.480 But once people think you're old and mentally unfit, you're toast.

01:04:08.760 And that brings us back to the domestic problem.

01:04:11.240 We addressed briefly the international problem of president Biden's, you know, misstatements,

01:04:15.660 gas, et cetera.

01:04:16.380 But this is, uh, this is something different, right?

01:04:18.720 This is what do Democrats think of this?

01:04:21.740 What do Republicans and really most importantly, what do independents think of what they're seeing?

01:04:27.660 Sorry, I'm trying to stop my daughter from making her, uh, first appearance in the Megyn Kelly.

01:04:31.740 Oh yes, we want her.

01:04:34.500 We got a cat, we got a kid.

01:04:37.380 I'll go get, I'll go get my little slutty. 1.00

01:04:41.040 Yeah, exactly.

01:04:42.000 We've had a cat, a child.

01:04:43.820 Let's, let's get the dog in. 1.00

01:04:44.900 Let's get Stradwick in.

01:04:46.100 So I think when we go to Ryan's point, it, uh, when you're president, you have to appear

01:04:51.740 in charge, right?

01:04:53.860 There was a old model of presidencies in 19th century, pre media, you know, multimedia,

01:05:01.240 mass media age where no, no one heard, heard you, but no one barely knew what you looked

01:05:05.140 like, except for pictures on there.

01:05:07.400 She is pictures on, on posters.

01:05:11.100 Um, but this is a different time.

01:05:13.620 And there was a shift, you know, that started with TR where the president had to be the big

01:05:17.440 man.

01:05:17.760 And he, he was the guy with the bully pulpit and he was using it and you're hearing from

01:05:21.740 him all the time.

01:05:22.640 And just, I think Biden has trouble filling that stage now, uh, the, the way he is.

01:05:30.560 And there's also just one, one last thing on this.

01:05:32.740 Another disturbing function of age is that you, you get stuck in certain grooves of thinking,

01:05:38.980 certain ways of thinking.

01:05:40.820 And that Jimmy Kimmel, uh, clip, for instance, when he talks about getting clicks on the nightly

01:05:45.160 news, right?

01:05:46.500 This is the guy who's thought about the nightly news being the thing for, for his entire adult

01:05:51.180 life.

01:05:51.500 So even when he's thinking about the new media environment, that's the way he expresses it

01:05:55.520 in the old way.

01:05:56.720 It's like an old man's way of talking about the new media environment. 0.86

01:05:59.620 But I think we've seen this, uh, with Afghanistan where he's like, Obama got rolled by his generals.

01:06:04.900 I'm not getting rolled by mine.

01:06:06.540 I don't care what they say.

01:06:07.840 And boom, I'm just stuck in, stuck in this way of thinking.

01:06:10.460 It doesn't matter how it's working out.

01:06:12.440 This is, this is what I'm doing.

01:06:14.520 Trump did bad things at the border.

01:06:16.240 I'm reversing it all.

01:06:17.340 It doesn't matter what the consequences are, or I'm not going to adjust.

01:06:20.620 This is just what it's going to be.

01:06:22.220 We didn't spend enough supposedly on the stimulus in the Obama years, right after the financial

01:06:26.420 crisis.

01:06:26.780 So we got to go really big, ignore any concerns about going big.

01:06:30.300 And he did it with the COVID relief bill.

01:06:32.380 So there's a certain, uh, brittleness and staleness in your thinking, which, you know, we're all

01:06:37.540 subject to, we all tend to fight the last war.

01:06:40.560 But I think it's pronounced, particularly pronounced with this president.

01:06:44.080 You know, Ryan, I, first of all, I thought it was very interesting to hear Jimmy Kimmel

01:06:46.820 mention all the executive orders Trump did.

01:06:49.260 Uh, I'm old enough to remember Obama's pen and his phone.

01:06:52.200 So spare me.

01:06:53.280 Okay.

01:06:53.600 Because he really was a king like president for the last two years there, once he lost

01:06:58.380 control of Congress and his second term got bad for him.

01:07:01.120 In any event, um, the, I'd love to, I'm sure somebody's gone and, and compared the numbers,

01:07:06.000 but, um, on the subject of whether this behavior is going to cost Joe Biden politically, there's,

01:07:14.060 you know, you can read the tea leaves in the polls, uh, recent polling from Harvard Harris

01:07:18.060 poll for this is from last month, may, is he mentally fit to serve as president or do

01:07:23.120 you have doubts?

01:07:23.720 53% have doubts.

01:07:25.760 Uh, and that mirrors something from October of 2021, uh, same thing.

01:07:30.380 53% had doubts, uh, new polling from independence.

01:07:34.540 And that same poll, 61% of the independents have doubts that he is fit to serve in office.

01:07:40.480 62% say he is too old to be president.

01:07:44.640 Um, 72% of independence.

01:07:47.500 He is too old to be president in March of 2022, the wall street journal, uh, asked folks if

01:07:53.620 they think he's going to run for office, a majority, 52% say he's not going to run for

01:07:58.640 reelection.

01:07:59.120 So the, the public faith in his wellness is not there.

01:08:06.120 I, but I think that two things, one, much.

01:08:10.480 It depends on how people feel like the, how people feel like things are going like he

01:08:16.440 hasn't gotten noticeably worse since the summer of 2021 and his approval rating was well above

01:08:22.200 50 in the wake of the American rescue plan and heading into, uh, F Afghanistan.

01:08:27.420 And secondly is the partisan polarization.

01:08:30.380 Uh, people can believe all of those things if he, and I think one of the reasons that he

01:08:35.940 might, uh, decide to run is that if you put him up against Trump, people might still believe

01:08:41.920 those things.

01:08:42.640 And a lot of them are going to say, well, you know what, either so is Trump or he's,

01:08:46.620 or he's better than Trump.

01:08:48.140 And you, Ron Klain actually, uh, had a very telling, I thought, uh, post on Twitter right

01:08:54.360 after Macron won reelection, uh, in, in France, he said something like, well, would you look

01:09:01.660 at that?

01:09:02.160 A guy with a 30% approval rating wins a resounding reelection because the public hated his opponent.

01:09:09.540 And so he basically said out loud what, what the Democrats strategy is in a presidential

01:09:14.700 year, which is to say that the other side is awful.

01:09:18.240 And so whatever you may think of us, um, but you know, vote, vote for us.

01:09:23.180 But the first point is key too.

01:09:25.300 If he, if he can get the economy, you know, going again, if he can get, if, if we can stop

01:09:30.720 having, uh, you know, global, you know, food and fuel crises, uh, then I think people's

01:09:36.980 perception of him will, will actually improve despite, even if his, you know, kind of apparent

01:09:44.080 cognitive abilities don't improve.

01:09:46.220 But that's like saying, well, you know, if you could just get rid of your cancer, I

01:09:49.800 pronounce, I will pronounce you well, like you can, you can end this, you can end, you

01:09:53.440 can end wars.

01:09:54.500 Uh, you know, you can, there are things you can do, but he's not going to be able to end

01:09:58.900 inflation or these gas prices unless he institutes a dramatic shift in policy.

01:10:04.920 Well, probably not because Mohammed bin Salman is dedicated to regime change here in the United

01:10:09.880 States.

01:10:10.340 Uh, but after, after the Republicans take over the house, uh, then MBS has no reason

01:10:17.480 to continue jacking up gas prices.

01:10:19.700 And so I expect you actually will see prices come down substantially after the, after the

01:10:24.620 midterms, because that's, that's really what is, what is driving them.

01:10:28.780 Uh, and if you, if you can get a resolution, I'm not saying it's going to happen, but if

01:10:32.620 you did get a resolution to the war and you got gas and wheat and manure and other commodities

01:10:38.040 flowing again, uh, then you, you, you could, you could see things moving in a, in a positive

01:10:43.540 direction.

01:10:43.960 But then come 2024, Mohammed bin Salman still has his hand on the spigot, doesn't want Democrats

01:10:49.040 in power.

01:10:49.920 So I think you can probably expect to pay five or $6 a gallon again in 2024 so that he can

01:10:55.780 encourage you to bring Jared Kushner, his, his private equity man back into the White

01:11:01.760 House.

01:11:02.800 Rich, do you want to take that?

01:11:04.780 Well, I think that obviously something to the fact that if gas were a buck 50 a gallon

01:11:09.740 right now, you know, his, his approval rating would be five points higher or something like

01:11:14.780 that, whatever, no matter how bad he sounded on, on Jimmy Kimmel.

01:11:20.000 So I think the things Democrats got to bank on, I can't see in any way they turn around

01:11:26.180 the, the midterms court overturns row.

01:11:29.040 I do think that'll be a big deal, but, but won't change the fundamental trajectory.

01:11:33.460 It'll sort of be baked, baked into the cake, you know, after three weeks of intense debate

01:11:38.360 about it, you know, we'll realize the blue states are going to still have a legal abortion. 1.00

01:11:41.460 The red states are going to have some, some form of bands and probably popular in the

01:11:45.400 red states.

01:11:45.960 It's going to be hard to scare the blue states based on what the red states are doing when

01:11:48.760 nothing's changing on the ground there.

01:11:50.400 So they're going to lose the house.

01:11:52.000 They're very likely going to lose the Senate.

01:11:53.920 And then, you know, that that's typical, right?

01:11:57.100 That's, that's what happens.

01:11:58.780 And then you're the incumbent president and you hope the, the other side in Congress overreaches,

01:12:04.360 which isn't crazy.

01:12:05.760 It's, it's happened before, and then you hope with the passage of time, just events

01:12:10.280 kind of bounce in your favor.

01:12:12.260 And I think Biden bears responsibility for a lot of things that have gone wrong, but not,

01:12:16.840 obviously not totally, you know, he didn't invade Ukraine.

01:12:20.560 You know, he didn't create the pandemic that's created the supply chain disruptions.

01:12:24.720 So, so maybe things, things point up and then he's running against Trump and that would

01:12:30.140 be kind of a jump ball election.

01:12:32.440 On the other hand, you know, GDP growth first quarter, negative 1.5%.

01:12:38.020 I mean, it's, it's, it's some significant chance next year by next year, we'll have a

01:12:43.880 recession and it will look even worse.

01:12:46.660 So, you know, I don't discount some sort of bounce, bounce back, but it's, it's, it's far

01:12:52.420 from inevitable.

01:12:52.960 Mm-hmm.

01:12:54.640 Meantime, Democrats internally are talking loudly and now even to the press about what's

01:13:01.420 the backup plan?

01:13:02.700 What if, what if he does continue to deteriorate mentally and, or just in the polls, what's

01:13:09.960 the backup plan, right?

01:13:10.860 Like what's, what are the scenarios?

01:13:12.020 There was a piece in New York magazine about a week or two ago that's literally called,

01:13:16.080 there has to be a backup plan.

01:13:17.040 There's a backup plan, right?

01:13:18.020 And they are mentioning people like governor Phil Murphy of New Jersey, who barely won

01:13:24.300 his reelection race.

01:13:26.040 How's he going to be the savior?

01:13:27.520 Uh, of course, Pete Buttigieg, AOC, is she even 35?

01:13:32.440 Can she even do it?

01:13:33.060 I don't even know.

01:13:34.040 She would, she would be by the election.

01:13:36.720 Oh my God.

01:13:37.340 God help us.

01:13:37.920 But no, I, but that's not like, I don't think that's happening.

01:13:40.360 Okay.

01:13:41.000 I think it'll happen in our lifetimes, but not, not this much.

01:13:44.040 Bernie Sanders, Amy Klobuchar, wasn't she already, wasn't half these people already

01:13:48.180 rejected the last time, you know, she had the lady who was like, what, didn't she eat 1.00

01:13:52.220 her salad with a fork?

01:13:53.360 I don't remember.

01:13:54.460 Not a fork, a comb, a comb.

01:13:56.980 Fork would be normal.

01:13:58.100 She used the fork to stab her staffers. 1.00

01:14:00.360 No, no, no.

01:14:00.880 In New York City, you can't eat pizza with a fork, but you can't, can't eat yourself.

01:14:04.600 You get kicked out.

01:14:05.100 You get kicked right out.

01:14:06.040 In any event, these do not seem to me, Ryan, like the saviors that New York magazine thinks

01:14:11.280 they are, but what would be the backup plan if Biden continued to go South in one of those

01:14:15.640 departments?

01:14:17.160 I mean, you could throw Jay Inslee in there, uh, who was, you know, very interesting governor.

01:14:21.880 Uh, but like you said, we, we roughly know, you know, what the terrain would be based on

01:14:27.140 the last election.

01:14:28.560 It's not a particularly strong bench.

01:14:31.100 And most of them, like Sanders, for instance, has said that he would consider running again,

01:14:34.740 um, despite his age and despite having run twice, but only if Biden doesn't run.

01:14:41.720 And that's, that's how most of the Democrats are, are talking about it.

01:14:46.620 And the only exceptions would be say somebody who, who might run on a, uh, basically a messaging

01:14:53.080 campaign to kind of pull up, you know, make sure that all the issues are being discussed

01:14:57.280 in a primary party.

01:14:59.060 Right.

01:14:59.500 But they would run, run in the primary just to get, I mean, that was basically why Sanders

01:15:03.280 ran in 2016 because nobody else was running and he wanted somebody to talk about Medicare

01:15:07.140 for all and climate and the things that he, and that he, that he cared about.

01:15:11.400 But you're right that there, you know, there isn't, there isn't much of a bench, um, on the,

01:15:16.000 on the democratic side.

01:15:17.480 I mean, the, the biggest candidate that we didn't mention happens to be the sitting vice

01:15:22.120 president, Rich, you know, he's like, there's a couple of scenarios there.

01:15:25.800 He could, he could step down before the end of his term so that she was the sitting president

01:15:30.060 when she had to run.

01:15:31.600 Um, he could just say, I'm tired and I'm kind of old and I'm just going to pass the

01:15:36.800 baton to her.

01:15:38.120 And, uh, I don't know.

01:15:39.260 I mean, I guess there'd still have to be a primary.

01:15:41.000 He doesn't get to deign, you know, like just decide who his successor is, but the Democrats

01:15:46.740 have been in a very tough position getting rid of the, you know, the, the sitting vice president

01:15:50.440 who happens to be a person of color and a woman.

01:15:53.200 Yeah, absolutely.

01:15:53.760 So the way I look at it, if something happens where Biden is no longer president prior to

01:15:58.580 the end of his term and Kamala Harris becomes president, there'll be no primary.

01:16:02.480 And she's, she's a candidate in 2024.

01:16:05.120 If Biden just says he's not going to run again, I think there'd be a very open race.

01:16:09.460 And I think she'd be in a weak position.

01:16:11.740 She's just not, um, you know, stronger than, than last time around, obviously being sitting

01:16:15.720 vice president, but she's 30% approval on a lot of polls. 1.00

01:16:19.320 That's a, that's a rate you get when you've, you've botched some major policy initiative

01:16:23.760 or you've had some scandals.

01:16:25.540 She hasn't done either of those things.

01:16:26.940 Just people, people just don't like her. 0.93

01:16:28.680 You know, she just doesn't seem to have, uh, the touch.

01:16:31.460 And I doubt that, you know, when, when you don't, that usually doesn't change.

01:16:35.220 So I, I would see her having a hard time winning, uh, an open, uh, democratic nomination battle, 0.99

01:16:42.680 but just the, the alternatives here are so unpalatable.

01:16:46.320 There's a real desire to believe that, uh, or hope that Biden can, can run again and 24.

01:16:52.680 And I'm just, I'm just doubtful for some of the reasons we've, we've talked about however

01:16:57.200 bad he is now, it's not going to get better, uh, two and a half years from now.

01:17:02.260 So, um, and just the last point in terms of the plan, like, you know, we saw in the,

01:17:08.300 the New York magazine piece, you cited in its headline, there is no plan.

01:17:12.940 There's we're so beyond parties planning, right?

01:17:15.680 No one's in charge anymore.

01:17:17.160 The voters are in charge, you know, they decide, and there's no smoke filled rooms.

01:17:23.260 There are rooms without smoke and some, you know, Perrier on the, on the table, some bottled

01:17:27.960 water.

01:17:28.380 And even what anyone's discussing in those tables, there's, there's no way you can guarantee

01:17:33.580 the voters are actually going to buy it and go along.

01:17:36.260 Oh, wow.

01:17:37.180 Yeah.

01:17:37.460 I don't know.

01:17:38.260 I will say this, Ryan.

01:17:39.400 Um, there's no way there, this democratic party is booting Kamala Harris for Jay Inslee

01:17:44.400 or Phil Murphy.

01:17:45.300 I mean, if they go with like the straight white guys, I'm not sure.

01:17:49.380 I don't think they can get away with that given the way they talk about identity.

01:17:52.320 We'll see that, you know, it's a thing, things are evolving on the question of, uh, identity

01:18:00.120 and identity politics.

01:18:01.160 And we don't know where we'll be in 2024.

01:18:02.740 I think you're, I think she would get a primary, even if she is by some crisis, uh, sitting president,

01:18:11.340 uh, because it's an, she has shown herself to be a weak candidate that she's shown herself

01:18:18.800 to be beatable.

01:18:19.800 And if there's a weak, beatable candidate, who's the only one on the ticket, there's

01:18:24.100 just so much ambition out there that somebody's somebody serious, I think would take a run

01:18:28.340 at that.

01:18:28.720 And I think would very quickly find themselves neck and neck with her.

01:18:31.920 Uh, so, so I do think, I do think it's quite possible actually, and it could even, I don't

01:18:37.500 know if it would be a Jay Inslee type.

01:18:39.360 I don't know if they'd be able to overcome that identity question, but it's not impossible.

01:18:43.880 Uh, I wouldn't, I wouldn't, I wouldn't rule it out.

01:18:46.540 Well, that may be, it may be Biden's last best hope to lose the Congress, uh, in these

01:18:52.120 midterms so that some of his more extreme agenda is slowed down and the anger dissipates

01:18:58.040 a bit on, on, you know, in particular amongst independents, rich and Ryan, very interesting

01:19:03.100 discussion.

01:19:03.780 Such a pleasure.

01:19:04.420 Thank you for being here.

01:19:06.000 Take care.

01:19:06.940 Up next, an internationally recognized expert on brain health, on dementia, on Alzheimer's.

01:19:15.240 What should we be looking for?

01:19:16.560 I mean, forget Joe Biden.

01:19:17.820 What about us?

01:19:18.840 What should we be looking for to know what the early signs are?

01:19:22.940 And guess what?

01:19:23.820 There actually is something that we can do about it.

01:19:28.040 We have been discussing the mental fitness of president Biden.

01:19:33.840 It's a serious topic that requires serious people.

01:19:36.480 So we have brought in a world renowned expert on the topic of brain health.

01:19:40.580 Dr. Dale Bredesen is currently a professor at UCLA, and he is truly a pioneer in this field.

01:19:47.180 Doc, great to have you here.

01:19:48.260 Thank you for coming on.

01:19:49.360 Great to be here, Megan.

01:19:50.140 Thank you.

01:19:50.540 So this is, this is so interesting to me because we were just talking in the last segment about

01:19:56.740 how it's tough to say with the sitting president, whether it's Biden or Trump or anybody, how

01:20:01.960 well they're doing cognitively because they have so many filters between them and us, right?

01:20:08.380 Like the teleprompter and a team of people that controls their communications.

01:20:11.900 So it's, we start off sort of doing this with one hand tied behind our backs.

01:20:17.700 Right.

01:20:19.300 That's absolutely right.

01:20:21.020 And as you're aware, there's also the Goldwater rule, which, which states that psychiatrists

01:20:27.800 are not permitted to make a diagnosis on someone that they have not personally evaluated.

01:20:35.480 And of course, that applies for other physicians, such as neurologists, when you're talking about

01:20:41.100 something like cognitive decline.

01:20:43.700 So the best you can do, as you indicated, is to look for, you know, are there patterns?

01:20:48.280 Are there, are there concerns?

01:20:49.440 You certainly cannot make a diagnosis.

01:20:51.500 That's correct.

01:20:52.400 And we, we are not asking you to do that.

01:20:54.400 We wouldn't ask you to do that.

01:20:55.540 But can you tell us what signs would you look at?

01:20:58.340 You know, if I came to you and I said, this is, these are the symptoms that my mom is having,

01:21:02.960 what would you be interested in knowing?

01:21:05.480 Yeah, that's a great point.

01:21:06.720 And as you indicated earlier, it's something that we all should be thinking about.

01:21:10.080 And this is why we recommend, you know, just as we all know that when we turn 50, we should

01:21:14.260 get a colonoscopy when we turn 45, or if we're already past 45, we should all get a

01:21:19.740 cognoscopy, some basics to evaluate because you're, as you indicated earlier, there's a

01:21:25.120 tremendous amount that you can do.

01:21:27.320 But here's the thing, when you are developing Alzheimer's and it takes about 20 years from

01:21:33.080 the beginning of the pathophysiology to a diagnosis of Alzheimer's.

01:21:37.540 So as you're aware, President, President Reagan, who had so many huge victories, unfortunately

01:21:45.480 diagnosed in 1994, is likely to have the beginning of the changes in his brain in 19, about 1974,

01:21:52.820 statistically.

01:21:54.140 And therefore, you know, has served a wonderful presidency likely with Alzheimer's the entire

01:21:59.140 time.

01:21:59.640 So what you want to look for when people are getting Alzheimer's, they go through four phases,

01:22:05.980 but they present ultimately in two ways, about two thirds present what we call amnestically.

01:22:13.940 So in other words, the big problem is that they have trouble learning new information.

01:22:18.980 They may remember their first grade teacher, but they may not remember what they had for

01:22:22.440 practice.

01:22:23.300 The other about one third, it's a non amnestic presentation.

01:22:27.640 And so what they typically find is they have troubles with organization, they have troubles

01:22:33.360 with recognition, they have troubles with calculation, or they have troubles with word

01:22:39.360 finding.

01:22:40.460 And these are people that will say they have trouble with working a new iPhone, for example,

01:22:45.700 or having trouble organizing things at their job, or having trouble putting sentences together.

01:22:52.140 So those are the things that you tend to look for.

01:22:54.860 I think whether it's amnestic, whether it's non amnestic, those are the things that you

01:22:59.580 want to keep an eye out for.

01:23:01.420 So I'm sure a lot of people are thinking, well, that's every old person, you know, every old 0.99

01:23:05.120 person's got all that stuff that you just listed.

01:23:07.080 Is that true?

01:23:08.520 I'm so glad you brought that up.

01:23:10.200 Because, you know, this is just like when people said, you know, there's this thing called

01:23:14.460 pre diabetes.

01:23:15.700 And then before that, you have insulin resistance.

01:23:18.280 And well, just about everyone in the US has insulin resistance.

01:23:22.080 This is really telling us this is the new era of medicine, where we understand far ahead

01:23:28.780 of a diagnosis of one of these complex chronic illnesses, such as Alzheimer's disease or diabetes,

01:23:35.260 that there are changes that we are missing and that we haven't been looking at as physicians

01:23:40.500 in the years leading up.

01:23:42.520 So you're right, many people complain about memory disorders or about problems finding

01:23:48.540 the right word for years.

01:23:50.720 However, everybody knows someone who's 80, 90, often even 100, who's sharp as a tack.

01:23:57.740 And so the reality is, what we call Alzheimer's disease, which of course has ballooned in the

01:24:02.900 last 50 years or so, really should be a rare condition.

01:24:06.780 And if we all are looking early on and getting appropriate evaluations and looking at the

01:24:13.100 potential contributors to cognitive decline, we should not be seeing that.

01:24:18.420 And in fact, people should be staying sharp just as you are.

01:24:22.900 I'm 51.

01:24:24.060 I've never been, I didn't know I would, I was supposed to go for a cognitive test.

01:24:27.880 So how does one even do that?

01:24:29.380 Who does one call?

01:24:30.980 That's a great point.

01:24:32.320 So you can start with your physician, of course.

01:24:34.520 Uh, and you can look and ask your physician for a cognoscopy or for an evaluation.

01:24:39.680 And basically it's just three things.

01:24:42.120 There's a series of blood tests.

01:24:44.080 So you want to know if you have ongoing systemic inflammation.

01:24:48.200 For example, you want to know if you have some glycotoxicity, glucose problems.

01:24:54.560 Do you have insulin resistance?

01:24:56.580 Do you have prediabetes?

01:24:58.780 Do you have abnormalities in hormones such as thyroid hormone?

01:25:03.380 Do you have abnormalities in nutrients such as vitamin D?

01:25:08.060 Do you have any vascular disease or propensity to vascular disease?

01:25:13.080 So that's the first piece, which is blood testing.

01:25:16.040 The second piece then, uh, is to have a, uh, is to have a simple cognitive test.

01:25:23.120 And that can actually be done online in about 30 minutes, pretty easy to do.

01:25:27.620 So you want to see where you stand because, you know, as you can imagine, many people have

01:25:32.560 begun to lose a little bit and they don't really realize that this really does sneak

01:25:36.500 up on people.

01:25:37.400 So you'll want to know where you stand.

01:25:39.380 And then the third piece is if you're having symptoms or if you're having problems, uh,

01:25:44.780 if you've scored poorly, for example, on the test, then you also want to have an MRI

01:25:49.600 with volumetrics.

01:25:51.380 So you want to be looking at your hippocampal volume here.

01:25:54.480 This is an area heavily affected, even early in Alzheimer's disease.

01:25:58.440 You want to look at your gray matter volume and your temporal lobe, your parietal lobe,

01:26:03.080 frontal lobe, occipital lobe, those sorts of things.

01:26:06.740 Uh, so that's, it's relatively simple to do.

01:26:09.560 And again, we, as physicians have not done enough over the years, and this is one of

01:26:14.920 the reasons why there is so much Alzheimer's disease.

01:26:18.120 And we really should be catching this much earlier.

01:26:21.280 What we call Alzheimer's disease is really the fourth and final phase of an illness.

01:26:27.820 And just as we now understand pre-diabetes and insulin resistance, we understand much

01:26:32.600 more about pre-Alzheimer's disease.

01:26:34.900 And we're able to pick things up long before you have Alzheimer's disease and we're able

01:26:40.100 to do something about it.

01:26:41.360 So it really is time to change the way we think about this and make this the rare disease

01:26:47.260 that it should be.

01:26:48.800 So I'm surprised to hear that there's, that you can do something about it.

01:26:51.460 Like when someone gets a diagnosis, and I realize this is something different of early

01:26:55.920 Alzheimer's, you know, that's, I guess, a diagnosis.

01:26:59.500 They're like getting their affairs in order.

01:27:02.000 It's, it seems like a death sentence that you cannot get out of and your whole life

01:27:07.040 shifts.

01:27:07.640 But is that something distinct and different from the larger category of dementia and Alzheimer's

01:27:13.420 is underneath that.

01:27:14.960 And on your way to Alzheimer's, I don't think you call everything early Alzheimer's.

01:27:20.880 Yes, that's a great point.

01:27:22.900 So first you have a period that you're asymptomatic, but you can already see changes if you do PET

01:27:28.660 scans, for example, or if you do spinal fluid analysis.

01:27:31.980 And there are now just coming online, some blood tests that you can do.

01:27:35.500 So there are some early markers that you can look at.

01:27:37.920 And I think we're all going to be looking at these fairly soon.

01:27:40.500 That's, that is stage one.

01:27:42.300 The second piece is called SCI, subjective cognitive impairment.

01:27:47.020 And as you alluded to a few minutes ago, you know, lots of people feel this way.

01:27:51.400 I feel like things just aren't quite what they were.

01:27:53.960 I can't remember phone numbers the way I used to, things like that.

01:27:57.500 Your partner may, may notice it.

01:27:59.860 Your colleagues may notice it.

01:28:02.040 You certainly notice it.

01:28:03.440 And yet you're able still to score in the normal percentiles when you do cognitive testing.

01:28:09.340 Now, epidemiologically, that phase lasts about 10 years.

01:28:14.540 So as you can see, we have a huge window of opportunity, which is just not being utilized

01:28:19.920 efficiently.

01:28:20.540 The third phase is called MCI, mild cognitive impairment.

01:28:25.840 And it's really unfortunate that we physicians chose that term, mild cognitive impairment, because

01:28:30.960 it's like telling someone, don't worry, you only have mildly metastatic cancer.

01:28:35.940 It's a very late stage of the problem, and yet one that is still addressable.

01:28:41.460 But so many times we say to people, oh, don't worry, it's just, it's just mild cognitive impairment.

01:28:46.380 That's the one that precedes, and about 5% to 10% of those people each year will convert to full

01:28:53.840 Alzheimer's disease.

01:28:54.760 And you mentioned dementia.

01:28:57.080 Alzheimer's is the most common cause of dementia, and dementia is global cognitive decline.

01:29:03.300 And so you're right.

01:29:04.220 We want to get in as early as possible.

01:29:06.200 But having said that, we've published a paper that shows that, in fact, in a trial where we just took

01:29:12.600 people in those third and fourth phases, MCI and Alzheimer's, 84% of the people actually improved their

01:29:19.980 scores.

01:29:20.860 So we have this old-fashioned notion that, oh, there's just nothing to be done.

01:29:25.080 We might as well wait and wait and wait.

01:29:26.840 And this is really becoming outdated quickly.

01:29:30.000 We don't want to wait.

01:29:31.140 We want to get in early.

01:29:32.540 We want to get checked.

01:29:33.580 And just as you indicated, our presidents, and of course, this has been discussed many times in the past,

01:29:39.300 this is something we should be considering for all of our political figures.

01:29:44.260 And of course, we're aware of some that did have issues with cognition, such as President Woodrow

01:29:50.020 Wilson, FDR, of course, well-documented as well.

01:29:54.660 And of course, I mentioned President Reagan earlier.

01:29:58.780 And of course, as we all know, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, the White House physician, has evaluated

01:30:06.160 President Biden carefully and declared him fit for office.

01:30:10.500 So I think that's the best evaluation, someone who is actually there and doing a very thorough

01:30:15.180 evaluation.

01:30:16.260 But for the future, you're absolutely right.

01:30:18.380 We should be looking earlier and earlier for all of us, because we really do have the

01:30:24.020 ability to reduce the global burden of dementia, which is a huge issue.

01:30:29.280 So can I ask you about that?

01:30:30.100 Because Kevin O'Connor, the White House physician, did not do a cognitive test.

01:30:34.880 Or if he did, he refused to release the results.

01:30:37.840 Those were not he has not said.

01:30:40.020 And there was a letter from Republicans saying we need we need more answers, you know, given

01:30:46.000 what we're seeing.

01:30:46.720 And you could make the case that for any politician over the age of, let's say, 65, there should

01:30:51.840 be an annual one of these.

01:30:52.860 But I mean, in the president's, there's a reason he has taken annual physical exam for

01:30:56.580 the public, you know.

01:30:57.980 And I don't know why a cognitive test wouldn't be in there.

01:31:00.500 Even Sanjay Gupta was asking some good questions about that.

01:31:04.280 Yeah.

01:31:04.380 And as you recall, he specifically said, Dr. O'Connor, in his report, neurology was included.

01:31:12.400 And you're absolutely right.

01:31:13.560 He didn't include any scores.

01:31:15.240 And I don't know whether that was because all we heard in the previous administration

01:31:20.340 was 30, 30, 30.

01:31:22.220 And whether that turned enough people off that he decided he wasn't going to say something

01:31:26.540 or if it's because he feels that it's not appropriate.

01:31:29.720 And obviously, you know, that's up to him to divulge or not, you know, up to his own

01:31:35.280 Can I ask you about neurological exam?

01:31:36.800 Could that just mean, I'm a lay person, but could that just mean brain health?

01:31:42.740 You know, like I haven't had a stroke, you know, like my brain looks relatively healthy

01:31:47.120 versus a test of whether I'm starting to lose memory and starting to go down this path

01:31:52.660 of dementia.

01:31:54.460 So, no, every neurological exam includes evaluation of cognition.

01:31:58.920 Now, there are some, of course, he could have just done things like orientation and memory

01:32:03.560 and a few things, or he could have done something much more extensively.

01:32:07.140 And he kind of implied that there was something more extensive because he mentioned specifically

01:32:10.820 neurology there.

01:32:12.460 So, yes, I agree with you.

01:32:13.740 It hasn't been pointed out what actually the scores were.

01:32:17.080 It wasn't pointed out how detailed it was.

01:32:19.820 But clearly, it led him to feel that President Biden was fit for office.

01:32:24.200 Mm-hmm.

01:32:25.580 And how, let's say that that's true, okay, and as with Trump, you sort of, you just,

01:32:31.980 you never know whether it's being manipulated, what's happening with Trump and his like 30,

01:32:35.740 30, whatever, who knows.

01:32:36.880 But if it's true, and people are worried, and we just went through, you know, for an hour

01:32:43.060 and a half, we've been talking about, well, he's, he is forgetting words.

01:32:45.880 He is losing his train of thought.

01:32:47.360 He is searching.

01:32:48.260 He didn't, he forgot the name of the Pentagon.

01:32:50.280 He couldn't remember Pentagon.

01:32:51.340 He forgot the name of the defense secretary.

01:32:53.160 You could go down the list.

01:32:54.280 So, there's definitely signs.

01:32:56.040 But what, you know, what would you, at what point would you say that we need actually more

01:33:01.800 information?

01:33:02.220 You know, like, we as the American public must have more information.

01:33:04.800 I'm concerned.

01:33:06.960 It's a great point.

01:33:08.120 And of course, Megan, I think this is much more of a political point than it is a neurological

01:33:12.300 point.

01:33:13.520 Because from the neurology side, you can always ask for more information.

01:33:17.960 You can have a more in-depth cognitive evaluation.

01:33:20.940 As I mentioned earlier, you can do online evaluations.

01:33:25.020 You can also do the old-fashioned paper and pencil evaluations, which can be, you know,

01:33:29.700 four, six hours evaluating all the different regions of the brain.

01:33:34.220 So, you can get quite detailed if you want to.

01:33:37.680 And, you know, I think the question then is, you know, how do you push that?

01:33:41.680 When do you push that?

01:33:43.240 And how do you keep it from being, you know, a political football where every president who

01:33:49.180 comes in gets accused by the other party of being cognitively imperfect?

01:33:54.020 And so, I think this is a tough issue and is one that obviously at some point is going

01:33:59.880 to come before Congress.

01:34:01.800 So, we have just a couple of minutes left, but can you just give us some examples on what

01:34:05.640 could be done?

01:34:06.240 Because I know a lot of people, they don't go to 23andMe because they don't want to know

01:34:09.860 if there's a history of Alzheimer's, if they got something in them that makes them more

01:34:13.700 predisposed.

01:34:14.520 They just, they feel like that's, you can't stop it.

01:34:17.140 Why live in fear of it?

01:34:18.760 You know, what's going to happen is going to happen.

01:34:20.340 And you're really the doctor behind the science of, no, like it's fightable.

01:34:25.000 There are real things you can do.

01:34:26.500 Can you spend a minute on that?

01:34:28.620 It's a great point.

01:34:29.940 And, you know, people didn't even used to believe in prediabetes.

01:34:32.760 So, yes, this is a new era, Megan.

01:34:35.500 We're going from an old-fashioned kind of medicine, which is what I was trained in way

01:34:40.080 back in the 70s, that, you know, you make a diagnosis, you say what it is, and then you

01:34:45.880 write a prescription or you send someone to surgery.

01:34:48.040 21st century medicine is changing that.

01:34:51.740 Instead of what is it, it's why is it?

01:34:54.460 Why did you get these things?

01:34:56.340 And people are looking now at much larger data sets and looking at why did you get this

01:35:02.400 problem, whether it's Alzheimer's or whether it's frontotemporal dementia or whether it's

01:35:07.200 hypertension.

01:35:08.220 What are these things?

01:35:09.220 Instead of just giving you an antihypertensive, which is essentially a blind treatment.

01:35:13.420 So, as you indicated, there is a tremendous amount that can be done.

01:35:18.360 And so, first thing is to recognize, please don't wait.

01:35:22.540 Either get on prevention or get on the earliest reversal, because this does sneak up on you

01:35:29.440 when your doctor tells you, oh, you're just, it's normal aging.

01:35:33.340 Please do not listen to that.

01:35:34.860 It's not normal aging.

01:35:36.780 You should be doing better.

01:35:37.920 You should be able to do these things that you were able to do before.

01:35:42.740 The second thing is get an evaluation that includes the very things that I talked about

01:35:47.780 earlier.

01:35:48.840 And there are a number of places.

01:35:50.240 We've actually trained over 2,000 physicians in 10 different countries and all over the United

01:35:54.620 States.

01:35:55.480 So, please get evaluated.

01:35:57.380 You want to know if you have systemic inflammation.

01:36:00.020 You want to know if you have specific toxic exposures, chronic infections.

01:36:04.560 These things all are potential contributors to cognitive decline.

01:36:09.980 And then, as you indicated, you want to address those.

01:36:13.500 And there are so many things you can do.

01:36:15.740 And so, I know time is short, so I won't go into a lot of detail.

01:36:19.760 I've written a book about this called The End of Alzheimer's and another one called First

01:36:23.840 Survivors of Alzheimer's.

01:36:25.400 And it has all the details in there so that you can look to see how to do this.

01:36:29.960 On order today, Dr. Dale Bredesen, thank you for your amazing work in this area and for

01:36:37.060 coming on with us today.

01:36:38.920 Thanks for all you're doing, Megan.

01:36:40.620 All the best.

01:36:41.660 Wow.

01:36:42.120 That was a great discussion.

01:36:43.100 I'm inspired to read that book, right?

01:36:44.540 I want to have him back to talk about all the things that we can do to prevent dementia

01:36:49.920 and Alzheimer's.

01:36:51.320 One of my producers, Kelly McGuire, was saying during the break, one of the things that he

01:36:54.620 talked about was caffeine, like coffee.

01:36:57.520 Coffee's good for you.

01:36:58.340 It's good in this department of preventing this, so drink up.

01:37:02.100 We'll get into the specifics next time we have him on.

01:37:04.260 I think we're going to do a show on brain health.

01:37:06.740 I think that would be interesting.

01:37:08.380 But in the meantime, tomorrow, we've got Glenn Greenwald back in the program to help us recap

01:37:12.500 the primetime January 6th theater that's happening tonight, plus comedian Christina P.

01:37:18.940 That will be a fun exchange.

01:37:20.640 In the meantime, go ahead and download the show on Apple, Pandora, Spotify, and Stitcher for

01:37:23.860 free.

01:37:24.840 Give me a five-star rating, please.

01:37:26.000 That would help me out, as well as a review.

01:37:28.340 Letting me know your thoughts on the show.

01:37:29.960 Also, go to youtube.com slash Megan Kelly.

01:37:32.700 Thank you so much for listening.

01:37:34.280 See you tomorrow.

01:37:36.680 Thanks for listening to The Megan Kelly Show.

01:37:38.800 No BS, no agenda, and no fear.

01:37:41.340 See you tomorrow.

01:37:41.800 See you tomorrow.

01:37:42.380 See you tomorrow.

01:37:43.060 Bye-bye.

01:37:46.880 See you tomorrow.

01:37:51.680 Bye-bye.

The Megyn Kelly Show - June 09, 2022

Biden's Mental Fitness, and Kavanaugh Assassination Threat, with Rand Paul, Rich Lowry, and Ryan Grim ｜ Ep. 339

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