The Michael Knowles Show - 2024 VP Debate

00:00:00.000 Hey, Michael Knowles here. The latest episode of Daily Wire Backstage 2024 VP Debate is available

00:00:04.460 now. Join me, Ben Shapiro, Andrew Klavan, Matt Walsh, God King Jeremy Boring, as we discuss

00:00:09.820 the vice presidential debate, the Iranian attack on Israel, and the abysmal response

00:00:14.880 to the devastating floods across the Southeast. Don't miss it. Enjoy.

00:00:30.000 Well, folks, that ends the vice presidential debate. So here is the immediate takeaway. J.D.

00:00:45.500 Vance delivers one of the great debate performances that we've seen in modern history. Truly a stellar

00:00:49.760 performance from J.D. Vance. Now, for all the people who believe that he was weird on the left,

00:00:54.420 there was nothing weird about J.D. Vance's performance tonight. He looked not only cool

00:00:58.560 and collected. He looked kind and empathetic. He delivered what I thought was a truly articulate

00:01:03.300 defense of Donald Trump's policy positions. I may not agree with all those policy positions,

00:01:06.900 but he delivered a very articulate defense of them. He presented an incredibly non-threatening face

00:01:11.840 to the sort of Trump-Vance ticket. The goal for Tim Walls tonight was to make J.D. Vance look weird,

00:01:16.960 was to make the Trump-Vance ticket look dangerous and scary. That's what they were intending to do.

00:01:21.640 And J.D. Vance thwarted that by doing precisely the opposite. He played it cool. He played it low-key.

00:01:26.700 He was very friendly to Tim Walls. At some point, I thought to myself, man, I wish he weren't quite

00:01:30.640 so friendly to Tim Walls. I wish at some point he would jab Tim Walls a little bit harder. In fact,

00:01:35.180 there were many times when the two of them would talk about how they were sort of agreeing with

00:01:37.860 one another. But it was a very, very friendly debate from that perspective. That's very good

00:01:41.560 for J.D. Vance, who again, is trying to demonstrate to the American people that the

00:01:45.480 Trump-Vance ticket is not chaotic. It is not volatile. It is not scary. It's some people that you can trust.

00:01:51.420 Meanwhile, Tim Walls looked really awkward out there, particularly at the beginning of the

00:01:55.440 debate. I think he picked up some steam later on in the debate when they got to domestic policy

00:01:59.040 issues, on which there seemed to be both sides contending as to who could spend more. But at

00:02:03.480 the very beginning, Tim Walls was stumbling and bumbling all over himself. He got a few cutaways

00:02:08.400 that were pretty glorious of J.D. Vance giving the Jim Halpert from the office to the camera.

00:02:12.820 I'm like, is this guy really saying what he seems to be saying? Tim Walls made a couple of gaffes

00:02:17.900 that were particularly egregious. The one that is going to become the viral clip of the night

00:02:21.340 is the one where he was asked about the fact that, like everything else in his record, he's fibbed

00:02:25.260 about when he went to Tiananmen Square and where he was during Tiananmen Square. He had said that he

00:02:30.220 was in Hong Kong. That isn't true. He's fibbed about nearly everything. J.D. Vance really didn't call him

00:02:35.060 on a lot of that stuff. He's pretty kind in how he did call him on it. But Walls looked absolutely

00:02:40.220 like a deer in the headlights to be even asked the question. He started rambling about how he had grown

00:02:44.980 up in a poorer community. And then finally, he sort of stopped and said that he was a knucklehead.

00:02:49.920 And then he stopped again and then suggested that he misspeaks frequently. It was a really

00:02:55.140 bad look for him. And there was a lot of that tonight. He had these sort of awkward cadences,

00:02:58.920 strange pauses. He looked bewildered. A lot of the time, he's kind of writing a lot of notes,

00:03:03.720 a lot. He must have written a book tonight on that podium. He also looked extremely sort of

00:03:09.380 bewildered as to why he was up there. Big eyes, a lot of split screens that didn't look very good

00:03:14.280 for Tim Walls. At this point, Kamala Harris has to be thinking, why didn't she pick Josh Shapiro,

00:03:18.260 the governor of Pennsylvania? We all know he was a Jew. She didn't pick Josh Shapiro for that reason.

00:03:22.800 Shapiro certainly would have outperformed Tim Walls, who delivered what I thought was at best

00:03:26.520 a mediocre performance. Probably the only good aspect of the night for Tim Walls came in that

00:03:30.420 last sort of section where they're talking about January 6th. And Walls was trying to call J.D.

00:03:34.320 Vance on January 6th. I don't think that means a lot to people. It was also at the very end of the

00:03:37.880 debate. I don't think it scores a lot of points. For J.D. Vance, then, 10 out of 10 debate.

00:03:42.380 For Tim Walls, like a three out of 10 debate. For the moderators, zero out of 10. Again,

00:03:46.220 terrible moderation. These moderators said going in they were not going to do some sort of big

00:03:51.080 fact-checking routine. There was a point during this debate where J.D. Vance suggested correctly

00:03:55.820 that many of the people who are in Springfield, Ohio, are not legal immigrants. And he was talking

00:04:00.880 about how they've been given temporary protective status, which means that they didn't go through a

00:04:04.100 green card process. And the fact-checkers tried to fact-check him and suggested these were all

00:04:08.220 legal immigrants to the United States who were on the way to a green card. And he started correcting

00:04:13.720 them. He said, no, that's not what, and they cut off the mics. So they'd said, we're not going to

00:04:17.000 fact-check you. We're going to let you fact-check each other. Then they jumped into fact-check.

00:04:20.120 Every question was to Tim Walls some sort of question about Kamala Harris and Tim Walls and

00:04:26.660 Donald Trump. And then they would go to J.D. Vance. Instead of asking him to respond to what Tim

00:04:31.260 Walls had said, they would then ask him the single most inappropriate form of the question in an

00:04:36.500 attempt to sort of cudgel him into a corner. So the moderators did quite a terrible job tonight.

00:04:40.520 But J.D. Vance is a pro. He handled it extremely, extremely well. This does a few things for

00:04:45.100 Donald Trump. The thing that it does, number one, for Donald Trump is, again, it quiets fears that

00:04:48.880 this is a very volatile ticket. Number two, for J.D. Vance, it does a lot. J.D. is obviously looking

00:04:53.120 beyond just 2024. He's super young. He's my age. J.D. is 40 years old, which means he's going to be

00:04:58.560 at the center of American politics for years to come. This debate really enshrined that. The one thing

00:05:04.160 that Vance didn't really do tonight, and I was hoping for him to do, was to really cast Kamala Harris

00:05:09.540 and Tim Walls as radical. I don't think there was enough of that. I do think that Kamala Harris,

00:05:15.240 he banged on her about not getting things done, which, again, is a great approach. It's something

00:05:18.900 that I've been recommending for a really long time. She is the current vice president of the United

00:05:22.320 States. She is the person responsible for everything that is happening right now, and he

00:05:26.100 really focused in on that. But I don't think that he really drew enough contrast as to just how radical

00:05:30.300 Tim Walls is. I was sort of surprised that J.D. didn't bring up the fact that Tim Walls had said

00:05:35.000 that socialism is just another name for friendliness. I'm sort of surprised they didn't

00:05:38.880 bring up in more robust fashion Tim Walls' record on abortion. When he did bring it up,

00:05:44.380 he brought it up almost half apologetically. And that brings me to sort of the final point that I

00:05:48.140 have here, which is that when you listen to J.D. Vance's policies and where the Republican Party

00:05:52.200 now is under Donald Trump, there have been some pretty significant shifts. I mean, J.D. Vance is a

00:05:56.880 pro-life guy. His answers on abortion, however, were obvious dodges. I mean, he was obviously

00:06:01.400 attempting not to answer his own positions with regard to abortion. I get that. I get it. He's

00:06:06.960 running for the vice presidency. He has no intention, and Donald Trump has already said he has no

00:06:10.880 intention of signing into law any sort of federal law with regard to abortion. But J.D. could have

00:06:15.680 been much more aggressive in pushing back against Tim Walls with regard to abortion up until point

00:06:20.460 of birth. He tried to do it, and then he sort of backed off a little bit. His answer was about how

00:06:23.680 much sympathy and empathy he had for people who had had abortions, which is fine if you then go to the

00:06:27.920 next step. And you say, but that still does not justify the end of a baby's life in the womb.

00:06:33.880 That is something that I think is sort of non-negotiable for a lot of Republicans and

00:06:37.820 pro-life people, even if they plan on voting as I do for Trump and Vance. I also think that there's

00:06:43.540 a lot of talk about federal spending. J.D. obviously is a much bigger government guy. I think it's fair

00:06:47.700 to say after that particular debate that the era of semi-small government may be over. It's been over

00:06:53.620 for quite a while. I didn't hear a lot of talk about cutting the size and scope of government

00:06:57.600 in that debate. But again, that is really not on J.D. That's really on Donald Trump and the platform

00:07:02.180 that he's proposing. So all in all, a very good night for J.D. Vance. Does it shift the nature of

00:07:06.180 the race in any serious way? I don't think so. I think most people's opinions are set, but it does

00:07:10.440 shift a lot of opinions about J.D. Vance going forward. Great night for J.D. Vance. Good night

00:07:14.300 for the Trump-Vance ticket. Justifies Trump's pick of J.D. Vance in this race and really makes Kamala

00:07:19.720 Harris look like a dunderhead for having picked Tim Walls. Well, there was one big revelation from the debate.

00:07:24.920 Tim Walls is friends with school shooters. I thought that was interesting. Maybe he made

00:07:29.420 friends with them while he was handing out tampons in the boys' bathroom. I don't know.

00:07:33.180 I did want to steal one point from Michael Knowles before he has a chance to reiterate it.

00:07:37.620 Right. You're welcome. Just like I stole your idea for a board game, by the way.

00:07:42.100 Am I racist? Available.

00:07:42.500 This is how you can do a blank book next. This is outrageous. You can come out with cigarettes.

00:07:46.480 I do think that all of the Americans who are not super clued into politics that have been hearing

00:07:54.520 for weeks now that J.D. Vance is this weird guy were probably mystified watching that and seeing

00:08:00.120 this really cool, calm, collected, eloquent dude totally unrattled up there. The last word you'd

00:08:08.620 use to describe him is weird. Yeah. So as you, now I'm in fact, I'm pointing out.

00:08:13.340 You said it very well, what I said. Right. Yes. Well, it was I, because I had, I also thought it,

00:08:17.640 but then you said it. So it's both of our points. So in a way, the media set J.D. Vance up for a

00:08:22.620 victory here. And what they did too, I mean, the moderators were so bad. So bad. And what J.D.

00:08:27.960 Vance did so skillfully was, one, he treated them like the Haitians treated those cats and dogs. I mean,

00:08:33.360 he absolutely devoured them for dinner, but, but then importantly, he recovered. So instead of

00:08:39.240 allowing them to rattle him, he remained cool, calm, and collected. I totally agree with your

00:08:43.380 point, Ben. There were moments where I, as a rock ribbed Republican and conservative,

00:08:48.140 but wished that he had punched a little harder, thrown a little red meat. But J.D. Vance knew the

00:08:52.600 occasion. He knew that this debate was not a didactic exercise. He was not there to instruct people on the

00:08:58.700 bioethics of abortion or fertility treatments. He was there to win five to seven percent of voters

00:09:03.960 in crucial states. He knew where his weak points are. He knew where his strong points are. I thought

00:09:08.400 he did masterfully in handling those questions in a way that didn't compromise his principles,

00:09:13.640 but, but was reaching out. I mean, everything down to wearing a soft colored tie, you know,

00:09:18.900 it was about appealing to voters, countering the media narrative. I think he succeeded a hundred percent.

00:09:23.560 I think it's interesting to point out the way the moderators were bad because they didn't do

00:09:27.320 to Vance, what they did to Trump, which was cut him off and tell, say things that weren't true,

00:09:31.940 basically. What they did was they directed every question to an issue that was of interest to them

00:09:36.360 when that wasn't necessarily the issue, which is, to my point, journals should be completely removed

00:09:41.320 from the debate process. So, for instance, when they asked about the storm, they brought it around

00:09:45.720 to climate change. Right. But in fact, those storms have gone down since around 1900. They've dropped.

00:09:51.840 The number of people who've died in climate-related incidents has plummeted. So there's no reason to talk

00:09:56.700 about climate change. And I think that I would like to see Republicans stand up a little bit more

00:10:00.680 to what is being used as another, yet another reason to grow the government. I mean, if we don't

00:10:06.300 start to say these things aren't true, I don't know why people surrender to these lies. They do it

00:10:10.960 because of the press. There was a lot of stuff. Every time Walsh opens his mouth, he lies. I don't

00:10:15.220 think that guy can actually blink without lying. When he talked about Amber Thurman dying because of

00:10:20.520 Roe v. Wade was repealed, she died because she took the abortion pill. And then the case was

00:10:24.720 mishandled by the doctors, but not because of the passenger room. She also didn't go to the

00:10:29.260 hospital when she was supposed to. He didn't go to the hospital when she was supposed to. They didn't

00:10:31.880 do a DNC and all this. But I mean, still, that's a major, major lie. When he said that the number of

00:10:37.440 border crossings have dropped, that's a major, major lie. They've doubled almost, I think. And I think

00:10:42.140 that that kind of thing, that the fact that Tim Walsh gets away with it, it'll be interesting to see

00:10:46.920 over the days ahead whether that continues to stick. I also agree with you guys about J.D. Vance

00:10:56.240 handling himself beautifully. I expected it from him. He's just an articulate, educated guy. He

00:11:01.780 really, I wish I could put sometimes his soul into Donald Trump's body so that Donald Trump had that

00:11:06.420 personality and the charisma, but could bring out those kinds of specifics and the calm, cool,

00:11:13.240 collected attacks. I think you're right that his point was to win over women and to win over

00:11:17.940 people who might think he was a little bit weird. I don't think this is going to make any change

00:11:21.500 whatsoever. I just don't think there was enough in it. I was bored stiff after about 30 minutes.

00:11:26.060 Well, that's actually what's interesting to me about the debate. And I'll say something nice

00:11:28.520 about Tim Walsh too, even though I know it's unpopular to do so. This was a professional debate

00:11:35.860 from competent candidates. Do I think that Tim Walsh did as good a job as J.D. Vance? No. Do I think

00:11:41.500 J.D. Vance was a 10 out of 10? No, I think it was a 9 out of 10 though. I think that he handled

00:11:46.240 himself incredibly well. But this entire debate took me back to a different time in American

00:11:51.160 politics. It took me back to 2012 when Barack Obama and Mitt Romney had their debates and they

00:11:57.300 were incredibly competent, thoughtful, articulate debates. Now you had problems with the moderators

00:12:03.180 and very famously Candy Crowley may have cost Mitt Romney the election in one of the debates. But

00:12:08.380 since the 2012 election, we've not seen a debate in this country where you actually heard

00:12:16.160 substantive policy positions being put forth by the candidates who, broadly speaking, had command

00:12:21.060 of the issues, who knew exactly what they were trying to accomplish and accomplished it. I mean,

00:12:25.360 one couldn't help but wish that these two guys were running for president. Well, and to your point,

00:12:30.640 Jeremy, I mean, this is actually gets to your point, Ben, about J.D. J.D. is looking forward. He has

00:12:35.420 to be because President Trump could only get one term. Right. He's not the only one looking forward

00:12:39.000 though. Kamala Harris is a weak candidate. She's never won a single vote in a primary while running

00:12:43.280 for president. And Tim Walls, by current standards, is a young man too. And he's probably looking ahead

00:12:48.140 as well. By the way, Kamala Harris, can you imagine her in a debate with J.D. Vance? Oh my God,

00:12:52.200 he would just wipe the floor with her. Yes. If Donald Trump hadn't so trounced Joe Biden,

00:12:57.940 that Joe Biden literally had to remove himself from the election, we would have gotten J.D. Vance versus

00:13:03.520 Kamala. And it just would have been carnage. Bloodbath. Just absolute carnage. Now,

00:13:07.060 I will say for Walls, I do think that the question is what each side was trying to accomplish tonight.

00:13:13.600 So I think one of the things that Vance was trying to accomplish is what you guys are talking about.

00:13:17.440 And what I talked about also, because of course I'm right. And that is he was trying to look softer

00:13:21.320 to a broader audience. He was trying to soften that image from the sort of hard charging guy who's

00:13:27.820 on stage with people who are sometimes considered fringy to move offline and into sort of the

00:13:32.680 touch grass world. And I think that he succeeded admirably in that. But there was another thing

00:13:37.620 on the table that he really needed to do that I don't think actually got done. And that was

00:13:41.680 create a real perception that the Harris-Walls campaign is deeply radical. I don't think you

00:13:47.460 came away from that debate thinking the Harris-Walls campaign is deeply radical. I think you came away

00:13:52.100 from that debate thinking that there was a shocking amount of agreement on a stage for between Vance

00:13:56.660 and Wall. They kept saying to each other, I agree with you. I would agree with that except for.

00:14:00.200 And so that was left on the table. In that sense, I think that Walls actually got away with one,

00:14:04.760 meaning that I think that Walls had a dual purpose. His dual purpose was to cast J.D. and Trump as

00:14:10.460 totally out of bounds. You could never vote for them. They're so crazy. And he failed in that.

00:14:14.140 He failed in that. But I think that he did succeed in making himself and Kamala Harris appear to be

00:14:19.200 viable, somewhat center-left candidates as opposed to the radical communist that he probably is.

00:14:24.620 I mean, again, he is a person who literally said just weeks ago that socialism is another form of

00:14:29.960 neighborliness. That's crazy. Like, how does that not come up on the debate stage? And so in that

00:14:34.080 sense, I think that would that have radically changed the race? Probably not. And so I think

00:14:38.080 that the first rule of a VP debate probably is do no harm. So you can understand why J.D. didn't get

00:14:42.140 too aggressive because he's figuring, OK, if I go overboard, if I punch too hard, there's going to be

00:14:45.600 some backlash. I understand the strategy. However, it depends on how you think the race is going.

00:14:50.800 If you think that Donald Trump is currently winning the race, perfect debate for J.D. All you do is

00:14:54.540 don't make waves, perform really, really well, be really articulate. If you think that Donald Trump is

00:14:58.600 actually down in the polls right now, you've got to take a swing because Trump doesn't have another

00:15:02.200 debate coming. I don't I so rarely disagree with you, but I'm going to offer up an alternative

00:15:07.680 viewpoint. And that is this, that I have friends in Hollywood who are to the left of us on every

00:15:16.200 single issue who voted for Hillary Clinton, who voted for Joe Biden, who are strongly considering

00:15:24.920 voting for Donald Trump in this election. Why? Well, because reality on the ground has asserted

00:15:29.740 itself because the country is markedly worse than it was in 2019. And because they see in Kamala Harris

00:15:38.820 a sort of vapid, disingenuous character who they are afraid will actually be in practice what she

00:15:49.980 appears to be. And because there is that group of people, because of RFK Jr. giving independence

00:15:58.720 an excuse now, or a permission, it's a better word, not an excuse, permission to say that they're

00:16:05.440 pro-Trump. Because Mark Zuckerberg has given people permission to say that Trump was badass when he stood

00:16:12.680 up and said, fight, fight, fight in Butler, Pennsylvania after he took a bullet through the year.

00:16:16.860 You're seeing this shift where people, people feel empowered to consider Trump in a way that even

00:16:23.440 in 2016, they didn't, even in 2020, they didn't. But there is one group of people that Donald Trump

00:16:29.500 still has a major problem with, and that is suburban women. He does horribly with them. They see him

00:16:37.080 rightly as being very boorish. They see him rightly as being very crude. I'm not convinced that this,

00:16:44.900 like every other VP debate that we've witnessed in our lifetimes, will mean nothing. I think that it

00:16:49.860 very well could mean something. What it could mean is that J.D. Vance just gave that last holdout

00:16:55.100 group of people permission to vote for Donald Trump. And you don't have to move them seven points.

00:17:01.580 You don't have to move them 20 points. It's a very narrow race. If you make a one, two percent change

00:17:07.080 in that last holdout group of people who are so fundamentally, not fundamentally, but sort of

00:17:12.260 constitutionally opposed to Donald Trump, if you tell them, no, no, no, no, we're reasonable,

00:17:18.580 we're sensible, you can vote for us, you could have an enormous impact in the election. I think

00:17:23.200 that's what J.D. Vance was trying to do. And I think that he probably rightly has concluded

00:17:28.320 people already know they're radical and are already very worried about ascending them,

00:17:34.300 which is why even people in Hollywood are saying out loud that they might vote for Donald Trump.

00:17:37.260 You're right. But there's one work that needs to be done. Maybe he did it.

00:17:40.580 To your point, Jeremy, with Trump, the man is a wrecking ball. And it is probably one of the

00:17:45.340 greatest things about the guy. He's got other great features too, but he's just this wrecking

00:17:49.500 ball that comes in. And J.D. Vance is not a wrecking ball. That's part of why he balances out the

00:17:53.920 ticket. He is a scalpel. And he was surgically trying to carve out that little group that you're

00:17:59.680 talking about. And I think he did it in as much as it has any effect at all in the race.

00:18:04.180 I agree with all that. And that's obviously why on the abortion answer, it was killing me that he

00:18:12.200 was taking such an incessantly apologetic tone almost with that. I understand strategically why

00:18:17.760 he did it. And I understand why he wasn't being aggressive. I think that that was actually smart.

00:18:23.000 The man was literally wearing pink.

00:18:24.800 Right. And he did a couple of times. He even absolved Tim Walls. I think on immigration,

00:18:29.680 he said, well, I know that you agree, but I don't think Kamala Harris. No, he doesn't agree

00:18:33.220 on immigration. But what I would have liked to see maybe J.D. Vance do a little bit more is just

00:18:37.480 challenge the premise on some of these questions, which doesn't have to be an aggressive thing,

00:18:41.060 but whether it's climate change. He didn't challenge the premise of like, why are we talking

00:18:45.300 about climate change on this hurricane? It's got nothing to do with it. Abortion didn't challenge

00:18:48.560 the premise. Even the gun violence epidemic didn't challenge the premise. Childcare, you know,

00:18:55.200 we're talking about the childcare crisis. Well, the childcare crisis is a crisis mostly because we have

00:19:01.880 a bunch of people that are having kids and aren't married. And so get married and then have kids

00:19:06.280 and stay married. And the childcare crisis mostly goes away. Maybe on that last one, I understand

00:19:10.500 why he didn't want to make that point in this environment. But on a couple of the other ones,

00:19:13.900 I think, and he's obviously a really smart guy. It's like a strategic choice he made to not

00:19:18.180 challenge the premise on some of these things. And I'm not sure if it pays off or not.

00:19:22.480 You know what I really care about? I really care about my internet privacy. It's not because I don't

00:19:27.420 want the world to know all my terrible twisted secrets. I don't care. There's a far more important

00:19:31.560 reason. Some of you may not know this, but I happen to be an elite gamer. Basically, every

00:19:37.080 second I'm not on camera, I'm hitting clips and wrecking noobs online. Can you imagine the physical

00:19:43.280 and virtual danger I would be in if all of my online adversaries knew my true identity? Well,

00:19:48.800 that's where ExpressVPN comes in. When I use ExpressVPN, these tech companies can't see my IP address

00:19:55.080 at all. So my identity is anonymous. It's not only the very best for online privacy. Gaming online

00:20:01.040 with a VPN can minimize lag and enhance your connectivity when you're pwning the noobs.

00:20:06.980 Whether you play on PlayStation, Xbox, Nintendo, Switch, PC, or phone, ExpressVPN has you covered.

00:20:12.880 But I want you to know, ExpressVPN is not just for the geeks and nerds. If you're not protected,

00:20:17.920 big tech companies can track what you're searching for, the videos you watch, and everything you

00:20:22.740 click. Ben, you don't play games. What do you think of ExpressVPN?

00:20:26.640 What do I think? It's incredible. ExpressVPN is great. ExpressVPN, first of all, really easy to

00:20:35.280 use. I mean, one button, you click it, you download it, you click it again, it's now on, you don't have

00:20:39.520 to worry about it ever again, and it doesn't slow up your connection, which is the thing that I care

00:20:43.140 about because I'm also anonymously online destroying Drew while I play games or something.

00:20:48.500 I knew it. I knew it. It's time to take action and defend your rights. Take back your privacy

00:20:52.720 at expressvpn.com slash backstage. Visit the link to get an extra three months of ExpressVPN

00:20:58.860 service for free. Again, that's expressvpn.com slash backstage expressvpn.com slash backstage

00:21:08.340 to protect your data today. What I love the most about that ad read, I mean, other than the money

00:21:14.220 that will undoubtedly come my way, is that most people watching the ad assume that you are joking

00:21:20.380 about being a gamer? I know. And they probably even assume that you're joking about Ben not being a

00:21:26.320 gamer. And if they only knew the truth. It's all true. You know, one of the things that I think is

00:21:31.500 sort of amazing about everyone praising JD's performance, and again, I agree. I gave it a 10

00:21:36.360 out of 10, not a 9 out of 10. I think it was strategically brilliant. I think he did an amazing

00:21:39.580 job with it. The agenda that he is pressing in that debate sounds, with the exception of being

00:21:45.100 harsher on the border, like compassionate conservatism from 2000. It does. I mean, hate to break it to you,

00:21:50.520 but every element of that agenda sounds like compassionate conservatism from 2000. What if we

00:21:54.800 do more childcare? What if we restructure the healthcare environment so as to make healthcare

00:21:58.420 easier and more available? What if we do peace through strength? I was informed that Reaganism was

00:22:02.940 dead. I was informed that we were past the age of Ronald Reagan, and yet there I was sitting there

00:22:06.800 listening to the exact slogan from the Gipper himself, peace through strength. Despite all

00:22:12.720 of the radical changes that have supposedly broken upon the Republican scene, it turns out that except

00:22:17.540 for some trade policy, perhaps, and the border, again, both of those are important things. I agree

00:22:22.840 with one actually on immigration. I kind of disagree on some of the trade policy stuff. Except for that,

00:22:27.400 sounds a lot like kind of the Republican agenda for my entire lifetime, and in fact, the Republican

00:22:32.820 agenda that was actually largely dissociated from in 2010 with the Tea Party.

00:22:36.800 Again, there's a lot of big government talk. I understand that a lot of this is being done

00:22:40.020 because a lot of it's electioneering, and I understand you want to win. One of the things

00:22:43.180 that Trump did, and it was a smart political move, although it broke my heart as a fiscal

00:22:46.740 conservative, is when he said there would be no restructuring of the entitlements, and basically

00:22:50.540 anybody who says that, we should just know, okay? Republicans, anybody who says there's no

00:22:54.020 restructuring of the entitlements is lying to you. They're all lying. It's not true. There will be

00:22:57.400 restructuring of the entitlements, or we're going to go bankrupt. There will be either a massive

00:23:00.760 increase in taxes, a massive increase in inflation in order to pay off our national debt that we'll have to

00:23:04.980 use in order to pay off the entitlements, or a massive restructuring of the entitlements.

00:23:07.980 There is no choice. It's just a thing that's going to happen. With that said, they're all lying about

00:23:11.500 it, but again, we've heard so much about the Make America Great Again movement and how different it

00:23:18.100 is in a wide variety of ways, but in terms of just actual on-the-ground policy, it kind of looks

00:23:24.200 a lot. Like, a lot. Like John McCain circa 2008.

00:23:28.060 This is a hugely important point, and you're absolutely right about it. It wasn't true

00:23:32.220 necessarily when Trump started out, except for the entitlements. The entitlements was always the one

00:23:36.640 that stuck in my craw, because you're absolutely right. You're going to have to reform them.

00:23:40.840 But it is something that is true. The great benefit of Donald Trump was he allowed people to use

00:23:45.980 language again clearly so that we could say the things that we actually mean, that there is a problem

00:23:51.820 in the black community with violence. There is a problem in the Muslim community with violence.

00:23:56.360 The problem of fatherless children is enormous and has more to do with crime than anything else,

00:24:02.940 certainly than racism or anything like that. And one of the things about Trump when he started out

00:24:07.400 was he just said that stuff, and it was beautiful. And I think that moment has passed,

00:24:11.920 and I think is part of the reason that he's now acceptable, that you can walk down the street

00:24:16.160 in San Francisco with a Trump hat on and not get, you know, clocked. And I think that this is

00:24:21.620 that moment, the Trump moment has really passed. The thing about it is, is that in Europe,

00:24:28.100 these right-wing parties, or as they call them, the far-right, which just means right-wing

00:24:31.680 conservative parties, they take years to build themselves back up into acceptable parties.

00:24:38.000 They win a seat here, they win 10 seats here, they win 20 seats, and then suddenly you maybe get

00:24:42.300 one of them who takes over. Here you don't do that. It's win or lose, and people get frightened.

00:24:46.820 They get especially frightened by the press, and they start to back off. It goes back to what you

00:24:51.200 were saying about challenging the premise. I think we don't do it enough. I think when we start to do

00:24:55.500 it, when we get back to the Trumpian version of doing that, we will start to win in a bigger and

00:25:01.120 easier way. It's going to take somebody with a little bit more finesse, I think, than Donald Trump.

00:25:06.240 But there's also an importance to being wise as a serpent and innocent as a dove. In some ways,

00:25:12.280 Ben, I think your point is truer even than you're willing to grant, which is that you're right.

00:25:17.420 There are a lot of resonances to some of the policies of the Bush era. Now, there are some

00:25:20.800 big changes. J.D. and Trump, for that matter, call for more foreign policy restraints, certainly,

00:25:25.520 than we saw during the Bush era. That was a much more Wilsonian policy.

00:25:28.420 I will point out, that was not George W. Bush's campaign in 2000.

00:25:31.080 Correct, correct. He ran against nation building.

00:25:33.720 Isolationist.

00:25:34.260 Of course. But then, even you can consider George H.W. Bush or certainly Ronald Reagan. Ronald

00:25:40.040 Reagan was called bellicose and a war hawk and a cowboy. But of course, he did, in practice,

00:25:44.340 have a relatively restrained foreign policy. And he spoke a lot about free trade, but he also

00:25:48.700 called for tariffs when he felt it was strategically important. And even going further back than that,

00:25:53.400 one thing that's going to stick in the craw of some people tonight is that J.D. Vance appeared to

00:25:58.340 defend parts of Obamacare. Now, not all parts of Obamacare. He actually tried to hit Waltz on the

00:26:02.680 individual mandate, which was the beating heart of Obamacare. But I think he was being clever about

00:26:06.880 this. He was trying to be subtle about it. But it tells you something about politics and

00:26:10.980 conservatism, which is that when people get political wins, they really are wins. And you

00:26:16.180 can't go back in time. The Tea Party ran on fiscal conservatism. We didn't get any of it. It just

00:26:20.580 didn't work. Republicans have been running on fiscal conservatism, at least since Ronald Reagan,

00:26:25.300 and it's never worked. We keep getting deficits. We keep getting big spending. Reagan got screwed

00:26:29.520 over by Tip O'Neill, sure. And the Tea Party was traded out by the leadership. And, you know,

00:26:33.300 you can make a thousand excuses, but it's just that's how the political system works. So when

00:26:37.580 Reagan ran as a Republican, he said, look, I'm an old New Deal Democrat. I didn't leave my party.

00:26:43.280 My party left me. Now, that was a way of spinning his evolution, but he didn't really challenge

00:26:48.880 the New Deal. That was over. The old right used to challenge the New Deal. The new right didn't.

00:26:53.080 We don't really challenge Medicare. We don't really challenge Social Security.

00:26:57.660 And now, as Obamacare has become the system, we can't challenge it in as aggressive a way

00:27:03.240 as we previously did. And so, you know, it's a sad fact of politics.

00:27:06.680 But this is what's going to be interesting, okay? Because when MAGA came along, one of the

00:27:09.500 things that was shouted from the rooftops was, what has conservatism ever conserved, right?

00:27:13.900 What did the movement ever win? You won elections, but then he didn't do anything with that.

00:27:18.060 Now, listen, I'm a big fan of what Donald Trump did in his first term. I think that his foreign

00:27:21.800 policy was excellent. I'm a big fan of his judicial picks. I'm a big fan of his tax cuts.

00:27:26.020 I'm a big fan of his deregulatory policy. But if you're going to make the point that you're making,

00:27:30.300 I think that that does require a more mature view of politics than what is currently spouted and has

00:27:35.120 been spouted for many years in the commentariat, which is the idea that 100% of the loaf is always

00:27:40.700 on the table. You're right.

00:27:41.860 And I think that that creates a perverse incentive structure, even when it comes to many of the

00:27:45.700 candidates we run for higher office. One of the things that we saw from J.D. Vance is that that is a

00:27:49.660 person on the stage who's willing to take 80% of the loaf, or 70, or maybe 60% of the loaf,

00:27:54.240 in some cases, 50% of the loaf, because what he sounded like was a moderate. What he sounded like

00:27:59.260 tonight was somebody who on policy and in persona was quite moderate. In fact, if you compared his

00:28:04.880 performance tonight in the VP debate, which again, I think was extremely articulate to Mike Pence's

00:28:08.880 VP debate performance in 2020, I'll venture to say that Mike Pence was more conservative on the stage

00:28:13.900 than J.D. Vance was tonight on issues like abortion, on issues like spending, on issues like

00:28:18.280 Obamacare. Okay, so what that means is that when we make arguments about the art of the possible

00:28:23.180 and politics being the art of the possible, I think that we should, that everyone in our business

00:28:26.980 should stop being a little disingenuous about this idea that the people you like are 100%

00:28:32.160 gung-ho, going to fix everything tomorrow. That's just the way that it works. I think there are too many

00:28:35.840 people in the industry who lie about this. And then they suggest that when Republicans somehow fail

00:28:39.740 to meet that standard, it's because they're sellouts and they're cucks and all the rest of it.

00:28:43.000 Because by that standard, there are a lot of sellouts and cucks among the people we love.

00:28:46.740 But there's a really important lesson here from this that you're making, which is

00:28:50.280 Donald Trump spoke in a more moderate way than Mike Pence, than most Republicans in my lifetime.

00:28:57.420 J.D. Vance tonight spoke in a more moderate way. And yet think about the effect of Donald Trump's

00:29:01.500 presidency. While he downplayed abortion in the 2016 campaign, he downplayed marriage and all the

00:29:06.600 rest of it. Trump is the guy that got the originalists on the court that overruled Roe v.

00:29:10.740 Wade a half-century victory. So there is some wisdom. And the Democrats are really good at this.

00:29:14.960 The Democrats are really good at talking like moderates, moderations of virtue, but then

00:29:19.980 advancing their agenda. And in crucial ways, Trump did that. I trust that J.D. Vance would do that if

00:29:25.960 he found himself in the Oval Office. If he talks a way that is not immoral and not dishonest, but is

00:29:32.840 strategic and tactical and gets you over the finish line and allows a conservative agenda to flourish,

00:29:38.480 I'm all for it. I think this is true. I do think that, you know, it's a game of checkers. The times

00:29:45.240 when you get a triple jump are going to be very rare. You're usually moving one space at a time. And

00:29:49.640 that's always true. And you're absolutely right that it's bad to have a media that is constantly

00:29:54.380 encouraging people to sound extreme. You have to say...

00:29:57.500 If only they use their Nietzschean willpower, then we get everything they want.

00:30:00.560 Exactly. However, however, there are big victories. And it would be nice if we would think to conserve

00:30:06.280 them. For instance, you know, the Krauthammer rule that a really, a truly successful president

00:30:10.680 is when the guy after him, even if he's from another party, has to continue his policies. So

00:30:15.620 Reagan was a truly successful president because Clinton basically had to continue his policies. The

00:30:21.320 era of big government is over. And one of the ways he did that was reforming welfare. And when

00:30:26.740 they reformed welfare, we heard this was going to be a disaster. It was one of the most successful

00:30:30.360 policies that came out of the Clinton administration. And Obama just gutted it. We just let him gut

00:30:35.120 it. Nobody celebrated it. Nobody said this is a great thing. He gutted welfare reform. We

00:30:39.360 were right back where we started. I think the thing is, I really do believe that the great

00:30:44.640 society has to be destroyed. And I think you have to do that step by step because so many

00:30:48.880 people are eating off it, mostly in the government. Because mostly it's not doing anything for the

00:30:53.520 people, but it's doing a lot for the government. But you have to start to take that thing

00:30:56.580 apart. Another big victory was the overturning of Roe v. Wade. And that's why, again, I understand

00:31:03.660 all the strategic stuff, but I think there's a strategic mistake being made on the abortion

00:31:09.180 issue by Republicans. I understand that there are elements of our position as pro-lifers that

00:31:17.020 are unpopular. I get all that. We want to win the women over, suburban women. I understand all

00:31:21.580 that. But the leftist position on abortion is in fact barbaric. It is in fact deranged. It's

00:31:30.720 actually indefensible intellectually. There are so many landmines for the left on this issue

00:31:36.940 that they're able to just jump over because we don't guide them into it. And I've been waiting for

00:31:46.340 someone to do this. And I guess it's not going to happen this cycle. But in one of these debates,

00:31:50.420 sometime I would love for a Republican to just turn to the Democrat and say, okay, what we're

00:31:55.680 really talking about here, this is the fundamental issue here, is what is a person? When is a person

00:32:02.640 a person? That's your next movie. Right. Maybe it will be. When is a person a person? So turn to the

00:32:07.520 Democrat and say, this is what we're talking about. So at what point is the baby in the womb a person?

00:32:12.940 Can you answer that? And they won't be able to answer it. They're going to say,

00:32:16.920 Obama famously said, above my pay grade. Okay. So you can't answer. You don't know when the baby's

00:32:23.340 a person. And yet you're, so you're just saying, well, we don't know, but let's make abortion legal

00:32:29.660 through all stages of pregnancy anyway, which is, so even from your own position, by your own premise,

00:32:35.020 that's analogous to like throwing a hand grenade into a dark room, not knowing if there's a person in

00:32:39.660 there. Right. Well, guess what? If you kill a person in there, you're morally responsible for

00:32:43.680 that because even according to you, there might have been. So I understand that the difficulties

00:32:48.900 of maybe articulating some of this in this kind of environment, but we just let them off the hook

00:32:53.300 completely on this stuff and it drives me nuts. And we let them, we let them do this thing with the

00:32:58.060 bad, the hard cases that make bad law. You know, my, my 10 year old was raped by her uncle and all this

00:33:02.920 stuff. You know, the answer to that is okay, fine. But is it okay to abort a child because you want a

00:33:08.240 Capricorn instead of a Scorpio? Is it okay because you want a girl instead of a boy? Is it okay because

00:33:12.460 you have, you did a genetic test and now they can prove that someone's gay. Is it okay to abort

00:33:16.600 him? I want to know the answers to those questions. Those questions are never brought up on a debate

00:33:20.760 stage. See, I agree with you. I don't think we can win the, the votes that we need, but that doesn't

00:33:26.380 mean we can't win the argument. And J.D. Vance did it in, he talked about part of the partial birth

00:33:30.420 abortion. Right. And again, he kind of, and I thought, I mean, I'm saying all this, J.D. Vance did a

00:33:36.100 brilliant job. One of the most impressive debate performances I've ever seen. So I don't mean to

00:33:39.440 nitpick, but at the same time, he let walls off the hook and he said, well, I know we all agree

00:33:43.860 that partial birth abortion is wrong. We don't all agree. Every, every mainstream Democrat in fact

00:33:48.900 believes in partial birth abortion, which means just so everyone knows that you're killing the

00:33:52.740 baby as it is emerging from the birth canal. I agree. Look, as a, as a pro-lifer, I think J.D. is

00:33:58.660 ardently pro-life, but we're all watching that. We're thinking if this were a pro-life speech,

00:34:02.600 I'd be coming out of my skin. I do think J.D.'s view and the Republican view, and I think it's

00:34:07.260 a correct view, is that this issue in October and November is not going to win any of those votes

00:34:14.400 we have to win. And it's an important, it's to my mind, as important an issue as any there is.

00:34:19.380 But anytime abortion is being talked about, we're losing votes. If you're explaining you're losing,

00:34:24.120 it's a hard issue. It eludes people who don't have a serious bioethical framework. And so just like

00:34:28.740 the Israel issue is tough for the Dems, for instance, this one is tough for us right now.

00:34:32.380 But we don't have to explain, we can ask. I mean, I love what you just said, Matt, that

00:34:36.060 it isn't, uh, it isn't that we have, man, I lost what you said. I liked it.

00:34:43.080 I'm sure it was, whatever it was, it was right. One thing we can all agree on, I would say,

00:34:46.800 look, we're disagreeing on, but one thing we can all agree on, it's the most annoying part of

00:34:51.840 election season. And I'm not talking about the incessant TV ads. And I'm not talking about

00:34:57.860 the obnoxious political rants on social media. No, no, I'm talking about the leaves in your gutters

00:35:03.680 because it's autumn. You know, owning a house is great and all, but one thing I don't enjoy about

00:35:10.500 homeownership is the endless barrage of decay that accompanies all temporal things in this fallen

00:35:16.120 world. And nowhere is that truer than in my gutters. When my gutters can't divert water properly,

00:35:22.240 they send water down my walls and create fissures in my foundation, which could crack and collapse

00:35:28.960 and leave me homeless. If I'm lucky, if I survive without anywhere to lay my sweet head. That's why

00:35:34.980 I'm so happy to have leaf filter. Leaf filter uses award-winning patented technology to keep

00:35:40.900 everything out of your gutters, except rainfall. You know, I'm something of a cheapskate, not telling

00:35:46.540 tales out of school here, but there is no sense in being penny wise and pound foolish. Being a homeowner

00:35:52.060 is all about the long run. And in the long run, this is going to save you so much money, so much

00:35:57.240 hassle, so much heartache. Trust me, you want to take care of this right now. Don't let your home fall

00:36:03.180 apart. Don't get up on a ladder every week scraping out that leafy muck. Could you imagine these delicate

00:36:09.960 hands? Instead, spend more time doing things you love, like watching the Michael Knowles show or smoking

00:36:16.100 a Mayflower cigar. Trust America's number one gutter protection system. That, of course, is leaf filter.

00:36:21.440 Schedule your free inspection and get up to 30% off your entire purchase at leaffilter.com

00:36:26.720 slash backstage. You get a free inspection up to 30% off. L-E-A-F filter.com slash backstage.

00:36:34.960 See representative for warranty details. Promotion is 20% off, plus a 10% senior or military discount.

00:36:40.420 Only one discount per household. What you said that I loved was we may not be able to win the votes,

00:36:46.960 but we can win the argument. And in the end, the votes are going to follow the argument. We have to

00:36:51.200 fight. As I've said about abortion since the overturning of Roe v. Wade, we had no plan. The

00:36:56.620 right had no plan because it assumed that it was never going to win on overturning Roe v. Wade.

00:37:01.620 It's going to take a generational effort of winning the argument before those votes finally do change.

00:37:06.580 And what I object to is giving up the argument. I don't think that it is necessarily the case that

00:37:12.320 in order to win in November, we have to just pretend that we're not a pro-life party.

00:37:16.660 But I don't think that's what J.D. did. I agree with your point. But J.D. Vann said,

00:37:21.360 look, I'm pro-life. You know, we've got to do a better job at communicating. It's basically what

00:37:24.860 he said. Here's my problem with that. And again, I think we all agree J.D. did a great job. And we keep

00:37:29.960 using that, you know, kind of disclaimer at the beginning because he did. He did a really good job.

00:37:34.620 And so but there are some deeper issues that get uncovered in debates like this. And this is

00:37:38.660 one of them. You know, he the thing that he did that is that is a problem, I think, on this

00:37:43.620 particular issue. And again, I totally understand the tactic is when he says we have to do a better

00:37:47.740 job of communicating that immediately gets you into a democratic frame in which the problem is

00:37:53.420 that we need to convince individuals that they should not abort their babies. OK, that is not the

00:37:58.500 question at hand. I, of course, agree that we should convince individuals that they should not

00:38:02.500 abort their babies. We're big backers of, for example, Preborn, big sponsor of a lot of the

00:38:06.560 shows here who actually do that on like a case by case basis and show women ultrasounds of their

00:38:10.760 babies. You should check out Preborn. They're a really great charity. But when it comes to this

00:38:14.460 issue, the problem with saying that is that what you're actually doing is undercutting the very

00:38:18.160 basis of overruling Roe versus Wade. The basis of overruling Roe versus Wade is that in states there

00:38:22.940 should, in fact, be legislation. And that is not just a matter of convincing individuals. That is a

00:38:27.440 human rights issue. And so when you what we could say, there would be a sample answer would be,

00:38:32.440 listen, I'm going to be the vice president of the United States. The federal government's role

00:38:37.800 in abortion has been spoken on by the Supreme Court of the United States already, which is to say it's

00:38:42.280 extremely limited. This is an issue that has been kicked back to the states. And because there are

00:38:46.660 different state definitions, that's just the way that it is. I will argue in every case that children

00:38:52.360 deserve a right to life and people are going to disagree in various states. And that's the way

00:38:56.480 that our system works. That's not going to be as evocative an answer for maybe some of the women

00:39:02.020 that he's attempting to appeal to. But it is going to not undercut the argument that pro-lifers are

00:39:07.020 now going to have to make for a generation in the aftermath of that. And the problem with making it

00:39:10.820 into a question of individual willpower is that a question of individual willpower is the Roe versus

00:39:15.480 Wade framework. Because the argument they're making is, well, sure, I mean, you're saying individual

00:39:20.820 will and we get to make our, that's our argument, right? We should, then all abortions should be

00:39:24.760 legal and we should get to make the call. And also, it is from just a political perspective,

00:39:28.660 if you want to win the election, you do, yes, you need some suburban women. You also need pro-lifers

00:39:34.980 and that is your base. And you need to mobilize them and you need to make them feel like you're

00:39:41.340 their champion. And that's the really difficult needle that they're trying to thread. I'm glad

00:39:45.300 I don't have to thread it. I know it's very easy for me that I can just rant because I'm not

00:39:48.620 running for office. But I will say that there's, I am worried that there's a potential political

00:39:54.480 problem here in that a lot of pro-lifers are really demoralized right now. And I've been to

00:40:01.260 these pro-life events. I've gone to the fundraisers. We all have. And you talk to the pro-lifers,

00:40:06.040 you know, off the record, off camera. And that's what you get, that they're just feeling really

00:40:11.340 demoralized. Now, I've, everyone here has said the same message. If you're pro-life, vote for Donald

00:40:16.800 Trump. Vote for him. If you don't vote for him, you're voting for Kamala Harris. She's radically

00:40:20.020 pro-abortion. It would be an insane thing to not vote for Donald Trump. Go vote for him. Absolutely.

00:40:24.980 It will save babies. But even so, when you have a demoralized base, that's going to hurt you

00:40:31.860 politically. And so that's why we can't just completely ignore that fact. You got to give

00:40:36.980 the pro-life base something to hang on to. It is kind of a positive thing that Republican

00:40:43.720 politicians aren't willing to go the Obama route of like, I believe that marriage is between a

00:40:48.040 man and a woman. Oh no, wait, I evolved. You know, they actually, they actually are having a hard time

00:40:51.820 lying. And so they're coming up with all this stuff and they're bobbling the ball. But I do think that

00:40:57.220 we can speak to the radicalism of the left. I think we can question them. I think we can answer the

00:41:02.640 moderators with, with questions. We don't have to take on this. Oh, you know, a 10 year old rape

00:41:07.700 The truth is, and we all know this, America is one of the most radical countries of abortion in

00:41:12.740 the world. That's why when they said 15 weeks, like that was a shock. That's most of Europe.

00:41:16.240 That's most of Europe. Far left. And in some cases, full on socialist Europe. The only countries

00:41:21.580 that have our level of permissiveness around abortion are like North Korea, right? China.

00:41:28.140 Canada. Canada. The most radical countries in the world. Put them in a position of having to

00:41:34.220 defend their radicalism, even if you can't fully defend life in the ways that we have historically

00:41:39.580 done so as a party. We're going to take some questions from our Daily Wire Plus members.

00:41:43.560 If you're not a member, please head over to dailywire.com right now slash subscribe. We have

00:41:47.900 one of the biggest discounts that we're running all year long, 47% off using promo code fight 47 for the

00:41:54.240 47th president of the United States, which is what we hope Donald Trump will soon be. Not only do you

00:41:58.620 get to ask questions of us right now, if you're a subscriber, but you also get all of our amazing

00:42:03.780 content. And right now, for example, you could see the documentary that started at all. What is a

00:42:08.400 woman doing incredibly well on the platform as people are experiencing Matt for the first time

00:42:13.860 with his theatrical release of Am I Racist? You've got all that kind of content, plus the daily shows

00:42:19.380 available at dailywire.com, 40% off using promo code fight. First question from a DW member.

00:42:27.220 Why and how do you think that Trump and Harris are so close in the polls? And what does Trump need to do

00:42:32.560 to change? What does Trump need to change in order to lead in them?

00:42:37.400 So can I start with like a quick comment on the polls?

00:42:40.360 Yes.

00:42:40.600 So the polls themselves, I am not sure how much I trust them, which is a weird thing for me to say.

00:42:46.580 But when all the polls keep saying the same thing and they all keep saying that every single state

00:42:50.300 is margin of error, I start to think that pollsters are grouping, meaning that they are just being

00:42:54.000 risk averse. When you're looking at these polls, what they're doing is they're constructing what

00:42:57.320 they call likely voter screens. They're trying to figure out what the constituency of the voting

00:43:01.180 population in each state is going to be. And that means they get to play with the numbers.

00:43:04.360 There's something when it comes to scientific studies that are fake, it's called p-hacking.

00:43:08.120 And what that means is that you're actually screwing around with the interior stats to come up with

00:43:11.660 these statistically significant results you can get to publish. And when it comes to these polls,

00:43:16.160 I feel like there's some p-hacking going on. Because when I see every single poll in every single

00:43:20.500 swing state this tight, I start to think, I don't know, man, is that just a bunch of pollsters who are

00:43:24.900 afraid to say what they actually think is going to happen in this election? So first of all,

00:43:28.900 I'd recommend that we look at registered voter polls as opposed to likely voter polls. Because

00:43:32.480 again, those likely voter polls, they're so weird, right? I mean, you're seeing a poll that's showing

00:43:36.380 Donald Trump only losing union members by like seven to 10 points and only losing Hispanics by 14

00:43:42.480 points. And then he's tied with Kamala Harris. You're like, what the hell? There's no way he loses

00:43:46.160 Hispanics by 14 points and maybe comes close to winning union members and then loses the election in

00:43:51.180 the blues. Like, what are you even talking? But that's what all the polls are saying. And so all I can say

00:43:55.820 is I don't think anyone has a read on the election. Anyone. I don't think pollsters have a read. I don't

00:43:59.000 think I have a read. I don't think anyone has a read. I kind of swivel from having a gut feeling

00:44:03.540 that Trump is going to win when I think about what a terrible candidate she is. And when I think about

00:44:07.560 the fact that I think there is a hidden mail vote that looks at Tim Walls and Doug Emhoff and goes,

00:44:12.880 ugh, God, no, not that, anything. And then I swivel into, well, does Donald Trump have a get out

00:44:19.960 the vote campaign? Like, what does his get out the vote look like? Which to me is the single greatest

00:44:23.100 factor in the election? And I have no idea. I'm hearing conflicting information on the ground

00:44:26.320 from some who say, seeing a lot of Trump signs, people who are like, yeah, I haven't seen anybody

00:44:29.480 door knocking here for a year. So it's, I got no idea. I think that there are three plausible

00:44:36.120 scenarios and Trump loses two of them. Plausible scenario, number one, the polls are largely accurate.

00:44:43.680 It's a very evenly divided country. Trump has some good pickups among Hispanics. He has some good

00:44:50.200 pickups among working men and he wins the election. Option two, the polls are largely right. It's a

00:44:58.000 very narrowly divided country. Suburban women vote in greater numbers than men. Even though Trump makes

00:45:04.540 some gains, he loses the election, right? That's kind of the 50-50. There is kind of an outlier

00:45:10.560 possibility and it really only works in one direction. And that is with the near ubiquity now

00:45:16.420 of mail-in voting. Young people actually show up for the first time. Historically, young people

00:45:22.460 don't vote in our national elections and we always bemoan the fact. But it's actually quite a good

00:45:26.620 thing. Young people, as a general rule, should not vote in our elections. Elections are supposed to be

00:45:32.680 a little bit difficult to participate in because then there's a kind of self-selection that happens.

00:45:37.260 If you're the kind of young person, as I'm sure Ben Shapiro was, who the day he turned 18,

00:45:42.660 he found an election somewhere to vote in and he knew everything there was to know about all the

00:45:46.440 issues that were on the ballot and he knew everything there was to know about each candidate

00:45:49.400 on the ballot. He probably even knew the judges in California. Nobody knows the judges.

00:45:56.220 If you're that kind of young person, great, vote. You're the outlier. You're the exception to the

00:46:02.700 rule. And you'll take the initiative and you'll go register and you'll stand in line at your

00:46:07.840 precinct on election day and you'll go in and you'll register your vote. And that's great.

00:46:12.300 I'm glad that you vote. But what I don't want is for college campuses to become part of the left's

00:46:19.420 ballot harvesting operation because of now the ubiquity of mail-in voting. So it is at least

00:46:25.880 possible that for the first time we will see massive, almost parody-level voting among the very

00:46:32.940 young college-age population as we historically always have in older populations because we've

00:46:38.920 completely changed what it means to vote in this country. And if that is true, Kamala Harris will

00:46:43.760 win 49 or 50 states. So I have to say that I agree with everything you just said except for one

00:46:48.520 thing. I think there's also another possibility, which is that Trump will win by a substantial

00:46:52.940 margin, a much greater margin than the polls show because of the internals on the polls, which show

00:46:58.680 that most people agree with him on most of the big issues. And the groups that are moving in his

00:47:04.900 direction, like the unions and Hispanics, are actually substantial. And that could be a big

00:47:10.140 difference. So to me, that's the fourth option. I also agree with what you said that literally at

00:47:16.620 this point, no one knows.

00:47:17.980 But when you say that Trump could win by a large margin, I don't think that Trump could win in a

00:47:21.820 landslide. I think the only landslide possibility is that voting has just fundamentally changed in the

00:47:27.440 country.

00:47:28.040 Well, I don't know about a landslide, but I think a substantial, you know.

00:47:31.100 You mean he could win the blue wall states and he could win all the states?

00:47:33.520 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:47:34.460 Yeah, I mean, that's not totally.

00:47:35.980 But I think the important thing here is that it is true that whichever one you pick, you've

00:47:41.080 got a 50-50 chance of winning. And so you're probably wish casting or hate casting.

00:47:44.420 The one thing I will say is that there are polls right now that are showing that 51% of people

00:47:47.940 who vote in this election are going to vote mail-in, are going to vote early. And those people are

00:47:51.720 going to vote extraordinarily high levels for Democrats. And every, so I've been around campaigning

00:47:56.420 with a bunch of different Senate candidates. I was campaigning with Eric Hovde in Wisconsin the other

00:48:00.780 day. I was campaigning with Sam Brown in Nevada. I'm going to go campaign with David McCormick in

00:48:03.820 Pennsylvania and Bernie Moreno in Ohio. Every time I go out and campaign, there's one guy in

00:48:07.600 the crowd who raises his hand and says, I'm afraid that if I vote by mail, then they're going to steal

00:48:12.740 my ballot and dump it in the river. Like literally every single one of these campaign events,

00:48:16.040 somebody will say that. But what I keep saying to them is then vote by mail and then go vote your

00:48:20.160 provisional ballot, right? Because the reality is that one of the singly most damaging things that

00:48:26.140 Donald Trump ever did was to himself in 2021, when he suggested that because he had not won

00:48:31.860 the 2020 election, that no one should vote in the 2021 Georgia election because they were stealing

00:48:36.800 the votes and throwing them in the river. It turns out that he set in the minds of Republican voters,

00:48:40.820 this bizarre idea that if you vote by mail, there's somebody at the balloting place who's taking your

00:48:45.180 vote and chucking it out. Now, whether or not that's true, and I really do not think that there's

00:48:49.380 a high likelihood that that is happening on a mass scale, whether or not you think that's true,

00:48:52.700 it's the dumbest thing you could possibly tell Republican voters because then a lot of people

00:48:56.340 ain't going to vote. They're going to get on election day and they're going to have a cold,

00:48:59.340 they're going to have the gout, and they're going to be like, you know what? I can't vote today.

00:49:02.320 And does my vote really matter? It turns out Democrats do the only thing that matters,

00:49:05.880 which is they tell everybody to vote early and vote often.

00:49:08.760 The question, it's really a question of whether every political rule, all the political rules have

00:49:14.200 been completely thrown out. Are we living in a country now where like none of the political rules that

00:49:19.420 have governed this country since its inception apply anymore? Because if any of that stuff,

00:49:25.340 if anything makes sense in this country right now, then Donald Trump wins. Because you've got

00:49:31.980 the last president that dropped out of the race because he's senile. You put in this candidate nobody

00:49:37.940 knows anything about, and she's deeply unimpressive. You have Donald Trump has been almost assassinated

00:49:42.560 twice. You have multiple crises in this country and abroad. You have war overseas. You have

00:49:48.660 inflation here. People are literally underwater. Like their houses are underwater in multiple

00:49:54.540 different ways. And so all of that should mean that Donald Trump wins. And if he doesn't,

00:50:00.880 then that means we live in a country where like nothing matters.

00:50:04.520 Where they're eating dogs and cats.

00:50:05.980 Yeah.

00:50:06.560 Where they're eating dogs and cats and nothing matters. And it's just impossible to predict anything

00:50:09.880 anymore. And I'm not sure. I think that's right. He's actually almost been assassinated three

00:50:13.840 times. Because of Iran, you mean? Because of Iran. Yeah. Ben, I think you have something that you

00:50:19.160 want to tell the people. Do I? Well, I want to tell you about something we could all use some help

00:50:25.260 with aside from our early voting. And that, of course, is fitness. The reality is no matter how

00:50:29.320 much you work out, and I work out like a freaking beast, you're not going to be hitting your full

00:50:33.600 potential if you don't die it right. See all these snacks we have before us? Why do you think most of us,

00:50:38.280 not me, but most of us are not jumping all over them in some sort of National Geographic-style

00:50:43.260 feeding frenzy? Because most of us care about our diets. And because we use this, the lumen.

00:50:48.420 The lumen is like a nutritional coach in your pocket. You breathe into it. It analyzes your

00:50:52.260 metabolism. It lets you know if you're burning more fats or more carbs. You can do this in the

00:50:55.740 morning, before, after your workouts, whatever works for you. Again, I exercise pretty much every day.

00:51:00.900 I am ripped beyond all reason and measure. And I like to use it after working out to see the impact

00:51:05.640 of what I'm doing and how I need to eat for the rest of the day. Not only do you get that data,

00:51:09.260 Lumen will make you a personalized nutrition plan for the day based on those measurements.

00:51:14.000 That meal plan will not include 90% of the stuff on the table in front of me. Having information about

00:51:18.820 your health available at your fingertips, it's an absolute game changer for accountability and

00:51:22.360 optimizing your fitness. I love this thing. It really is great. I use it every day. It can even help

00:51:26.600 improve your sleep and energy levels. So if you want to take the next step and improve your snacking

00:51:30.500 and your overall health, go to lumen.me slash backstage. Get 15% off your Lumen. That's L-U-M-E-N

00:51:37.200 dot M-E slash backstage for 15% off your purchase. Ben, it actually does work out every day and you

00:51:43.760 actually do play video games. And dogs and cats live together. The whole world has gone mad. Michael,

00:51:49.600 how do the VP candidate's performances compare to each one's running mate? I thought that JD gave,

00:51:57.040 as we've all said, gave one of the best debate performances for either the VPs or the nominees

00:52:03.320 of anyone in my lifetime. I mean, it was up there with Reagan and even Reagan had some stumbles in

00:52:09.080 his debates. So I thought he just did phenomenally. I thought Walls did better than Kamala did.

00:52:15.120 I thought Kamala, she and Trump were basically a draw in the last debate. She helped herself a little

00:52:20.940 bit. Trump was good. You know, he obviously Trump in the Biden debate was extraordinarily good.

00:52:26.100 He knocked Biden out and Biden was extraordinarily weak. So I really, you know, not to be,

00:52:32.260 I don't want to praise the guy incessantly, but I just thought, especially compared to the degraded

00:52:37.860 sense of debates that we've had going back to the 2000s, I just think Vance did better than anyone

00:52:44.900 just about. Well, what Vance did is he gave a consistently good performance. It was reliable.

00:52:52.180 What he, what he did not do was ever have like a standout memorable moment.

00:52:58.820 Trump is full of the standout moments. I mean, you can go through a lot of them.

00:53:02.360 But this is actually a really good point, actually, because I do wonder what impact that has.

00:53:06.760 Meaning the way that we consume, we talked about this last time with the Trump versus,

00:53:09.620 versus Harris debate where we watched it. And I think the immediate takeaway was Trump did not

00:53:13.360 perform well and Kamala performed better than expected because we all sort of expected the

00:53:16.700 possibility she was going to completely word vomit for like the entire time. And she mostly

00:53:20.420 word vomited, but she didn't kind of vomit all over herself. So it wasn't particularly visible.

00:53:23.740 And meanwhile, Trump was chasing every rabbit down every rabbit hole is possible to find in a 300

00:53:27.820 mile radius. And one of the things that I said at the time, you know, again, being right always is

00:53:31.900 that when you, when you look at how debates are then viewed in retrospect, what you see are the

00:53:36.700 clips, right? And so a lot of the clips went viral. The biggest clip that went viral for Trump

00:53:40.540 was of course the eating the cats and the eating the dogs. It didn't seem to have any impact on the

00:53:43.440 race because everybody kind of understood what he meant, which is the way that things tend to

00:53:46.720 process. It certainly didn't seem to hurt him too much. But when it comes to this debate,

00:53:52.520 I think there's really only going to be maybe one serious standout moment. Democrats are going to

00:53:57.260 try to make the January 6th thing a standout moment for Walls. But the really only standout

00:54:01.160 moment was that moment where Walls looked for a second like a deer in the headlights when he was

00:54:06.180 asked about the China line. When that happened, Walls looked as though a trap door had opened out

00:54:11.600 from underneath him and he was Wile E. Coyote in the moment before he was about to plummet through to the

00:54:15.400 alligators below. But that was kind of the only one. I'm friends with school shooters, could go

00:54:20.060 viral on TikTok. Yeah, but nothing J.D. said in particular was sort of like, this is the moment

00:54:25.360 where J.D. just knocked this guy through a wall. And that's different too because it's obviously,

00:54:29.480 he's obviously mis-stroke, it's funny, but nobody. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:54:33.460 Why do you think, these are questions from our dailywire.com subscribers, if you're not one,

00:54:37.980 you could become one with promo code FIGHT and get 47% off. Why do you think the Dems oppose

00:54:43.520 labeling the cartels terrorist organizations? Because they're the government of Mexico.

00:54:48.960 You'd have to, it would have large implications. They're actually not terrorist organizations,

00:54:52.600 they're criminal organizations. It's a different category. I mean, they kind of are terrorist

00:54:56.860 organizations, it's just the terrorism is not directed directly at the United States population,

00:55:01.320 it's directed at the government of Mexico. I mean, they literally chop up police officers. Yeah,

00:55:04.700 but that's because it's a criminal state. I agree, there's a distinction. I don't think that's a

00:55:08.640 terrorist organization. I think of terrorism as targeting civilians to achieve political ends,

00:55:13.420 whereas these guys, in a way, they sort of target politicians to achieve personal ends.

00:55:17.660 For example, today, Iran launched at least 200 ballistic missiles at Israel, and that is terror

00:55:24.460 bombing. And the government of Iran is the largest state sponsor of terrorism.

00:55:29.500 But the Iranian regime is not a terrorist regime, because it is a regime. Its soldiers wear uniforms

00:55:38.340 and drive around in tanks, and therefore are a military. So while they can engage in terror bombing,

00:55:42.780 as they attempted to do today, in other words, we're perhaps a bit loose with the term terror.

00:55:48.780 The cartels are not, by the technical definition, terrorist organizations. They are national security

00:55:53.180 threats to us, and I believe they should be handled by our military. I don't know why we don't go in

00:55:58.860 with the military and bomb them to smithereens, but we don't have to call them a terrorist organization.

00:56:03.320 No, we can bomb all kinds of organizations. Right, yeah. I can bomb anybody.

00:56:08.280 America! Does the nice guy appearance between Vance and Walls seem to be genuine,

00:56:13.580 or do you think it was a play? Well, I think Vance probably has a slight anger problem,

00:56:20.540 and I think Walls is obviously killing women and burying them.

00:56:23.880 Wearing their skin in a suit. Right.

00:56:25.840 Do you think J.D. has a chance to be president after Trump's presidency, assuming that Trump wins?

00:56:32.280 Yes, of course. He has a chance to be president even assuming Trump doesn't win.

00:56:35.260 Yeah. I mean, he's super young. He's super, he's very good at this.

00:56:37.760 His chances are much lower if Trump doesn't win. Yeah, for sure. I mean, listen, you're the running

00:56:41.240 mate to anybody, and there's always this assumption that you are then going to be the next president,

00:56:45.600 and actually, it's kind of historically rare. I mean, it's been a while since this has happened.

00:56:50.860 Who has been the running mate on a failed ticket who became president?

00:56:56.660 Wow, this is a really good quiz question.

00:56:58.280 That's a really tough one.

00:57:00.080 Let's see.

00:57:03.280 Running mate.

00:57:03.740 On a failed ticket.

00:57:04.760 Can we even remember the vice president?

00:57:06.340 Golly, I can't, I don't know that I could, I was just thinking of Nixon.

00:57:09.560 I was thinking Nixon.

00:57:10.240 But no, he failed on his own run, and then he got it the next time, or, you know, a couple times later.

00:57:15.100 Uh, yeah.

00:57:17.220 Wow.

00:57:17.880 That is an excellent question.

00:57:20.100 You'd think somebody would have written a book about something like this.

00:57:21.900 Ben.

00:57:22.140 Oh, my God.

00:57:22.900 Why do the Democrats keep saying that Donald Trump is the candidate who benefits billionaires

00:57:29.480 when almost all billionaires are on Kamala Harris' side?

00:57:31.820 This would be the big question.

00:57:32.620 I think the reason the Democrats keep saying that is because they keep playing this class warfare shtick.

00:57:36.820 They also say that Trump's tax cuts benefited the rich more than anybody, which is a total lie.

00:57:41.040 It was actually a regressive tax cut.

00:57:42.520 It actually helped people in the middle class and the lower class by percentage much more

00:57:46.160 than it helped people at the top of the tax spectrum.

00:57:48.180 In fact, I was living in California.

00:57:49.340 He got rid of the SALT deduction.

00:57:50.660 My taxes went up, right, because I was still paying that 13% state income tax in the state

00:57:54.300 of California.

00:57:54.880 It wasn't deductible against my federal income tax, and my taxes as a non-billionaire but

00:57:59.240 as a rich person in California actually went up under Donald Trump's tax plan.

00:58:02.400 I think this is, by the way, one of the signal failures of the elite billionaire class, truly,

00:58:07.800 is that the divide between the billionaire class and the way they earn and then their

00:58:12.680 values is truly shocking.

00:58:14.060 Because if you look at it, there's a famous book called What's the Matter with Kansas?

00:58:17.080 That was written by Thomas Frank back in the 2000s.

00:58:18.960 And the sort of proposition was, why does everybody in Kansas vote red when they're all on welfare?

00:58:23.840 Because there's a heavy share of people who are on welfare.

00:58:25.680 And the answer, of course, was values.

00:58:27.000 It turns out that they went to church.

00:58:28.180 It turns out that even if you're on welfare, you really didn't want to be on welfare.

00:58:30.940 And it turns out people vote their values.

00:58:32.520 Well, one of the things that's happened, I think a lot of the disdain that common people

00:58:36.120 have for billionaires as opposed to, you know, wanting to be them and aspire to be them,

00:58:40.440 is the fact that billionaires, by and large, now imbibe from this well of terrible social

00:58:44.980 policies in which they hate church and they hate religious people and they hang around

00:58:49.040 at cocktail parties in Silicon Valley.

00:58:51.500 And they're like Sam Bankman-Fried over in the Bahamas setting up sex bods.

00:58:55.040 And you're like, well, those are weirdos.

00:58:56.740 Those are really, really strange people.

00:58:58.800 And so that's actually created the case for a class warfare on the right, right?

00:59:01.960 The reverse class warfare that you're now seeing on the right, the anti-billionaire

00:59:04.440 sentiment you see on the right, is not because Republicans or conservatives hate wealth or

00:59:08.120 wealth creation.

00:59:08.940 It's because they look at the billionaires in Silicon Valley.

00:59:10.980 And this is exactly, by the way, what happened to J.D. Vance.

00:59:12.920 Like on a personal level, this is what happened to J.D. Vance, right?

00:59:14.980 If J.D. wrote Hillbillyology, it was very popular with the Silicon Valley class, so much

00:59:19.160 so that he went to Peter Thiel and people in Silicon Valley and started companies with them.

00:59:23.540 And then he has said this.

00:59:24.640 He said, I hung out a lot with people in Silicon Valley and I found that they actually hated my values.

00:59:29.400 And it's one of the things that actually turned his politics toward this sort of more populist

00:59:33.040 anti-capitalism sentiment in a lot of ways.

00:59:35.820 And I don't think that's rare.

00:59:37.520 What does the Minnesota law on abortion actually say?

00:59:40.820 Is Vance right?

00:59:41.860 Why can't the moderator say something on that?

00:59:43.880 He repealed the requirement that doctors...

00:59:47.140 He, Walls.

00:59:47.780 He, Governor Tim Walls, as governor, intentionally repealed a requirement that made doctors provide

00:59:53.500 medical care to babies who are born alive surviving abortion.

00:59:56.340 And so there have been multiple cases.

01:00:00.040 I think it was something like eight reported cases of babies being born alive, surviving

01:00:04.500 abortion.

01:00:05.100 So they're there.

01:00:05.880 You know, like Governor Ralph Northam, Democrat in Virginia, saying the baby will be born and

01:00:09.680 made comfortable and then we'll have a conversation about what to do with him.

01:00:12.360 That actually happened.

01:00:13.560 And these babies died.

01:00:14.920 And then there were no reporting requirements that Walls removed those.

01:00:19.240 And so it's barbaric.

01:00:21.180 And it is a defense of infanticide.

01:00:22.980 It is for all intents and purposes, Walls saying, kill babies who survive abortion.

01:00:27.800 So Vance was totally right.

01:00:28.940 And that's the mainstream Democrat position, correct, is to not provide aid to these babies.

01:00:33.720 Because that's the position they have to take, really.

01:00:36.160 You know, politically, they have to take that position.

01:00:37.920 Because if they say we're going to provide medical care and aid to the babies, then you're

01:00:41.580 acknowledging, number one, the life of the baby.

01:00:43.800 And number two, the violence of the abortion that the baby just survived.

01:00:46.820 They can't acknowledge that.

01:00:47.840 So this is the mainstream position.

01:00:49.220 And infanticide is a mainstream Democrat position.

01:00:51.300 It comes down to also your description earlier of what partial birth abortion is, what late

01:00:57.120 term abortion is, that it is a delivery of the baby and then a killing of the baby during

01:01:03.680 delivery, which is why sometimes it misses and, crap, the baby's here.

01:01:09.320 Now what do we do?

01:01:10.060 By the way, that's the question.

01:01:11.520 I mean, the question that you asked is obviously the deeper question about abortion.

01:01:14.100 What is a person?

01:01:15.060 But the question that I just, that's super simple, that I wish somebody would just ask

01:01:18.380 somebody like Tim Walz on a stage is, would you veto a bill guaranteeing the life of

01:01:24.140 a baby born alive during an abortion?

01:01:26.880 Would you, would you veto that bill?

01:01:28.680 And then if he says, I would veto that bill, so why then, you know, you did in Minnesota,

01:01:33.780 right?

01:01:33.920 I mean, you actually did.

01:01:34.840 That's the thing you did.

01:01:35.840 Right.

01:01:36.380 Like, like, ask him straight up the question.

01:01:38.920 That, that, that's the thing I wish that the advance had done today.

01:01:40.880 Yeah.

01:01:41.000 Here we go.

01:01:42.740 And according to our crack research team.

01:01:45.420 Yes, this is exactly right.

01:01:46.640 In 1920, Warren G. Hardy won.

01:01:49.720 FDR was the running mate of the loser, James Cox.

01:01:52.620 I was going to, I was going to say that.

01:01:54.680 I had it.

01:01:55.620 And then he went on to win the presidency four times.

01:01:59.360 Four hundred times.

01:02:00.600 How do you think the purchase of over 200 radio stations by George Soros will affect the

01:02:04.240 election?

01:02:05.020 And why would the FCC expedite this?

01:02:06.920 It's a question that answers itself.

01:02:08.300 It actually, it actually is a propaganda, you know, instrument that they're giving him

01:02:13.460 because he's on their side.

01:02:15.340 That's all it is.

01:02:16.720 Will it affect the election?

01:02:18.140 It might, but probably not.

01:02:19.560 It's probably too late.

01:02:20.620 This question is for Michael.

01:02:21.960 Did J.D. Vance make Catholics proud?

01:02:23.700 The question is decidedly not for Matt.

01:02:25.740 Yes, forget about Matt.

01:02:27.280 Forget about that other Catholic.

01:02:28.600 He did.

01:02:29.360 He made Catholics very proud because he did a fabulous job.

01:02:31.360 And there was one moment that I thought was actually really masterful and helpful,

01:02:35.120 which is there are certain issues that are extraordinarily controversial that are probably

01:02:40.000 not appropriate to bring up in the weeks before a presidential election.

01:02:43.860 One of those is IVF, which the Democrats have tried to make great hay over.

01:02:47.960 And it's extremely, it's a relatively novel technology.

01:02:51.100 It's one that the Catholics are opposed to IVF.

01:02:52.900 The Southern Baptists have recently come out against IVF.

01:02:55.560 So it's not just the Catholics, but, you know, this is a new thing.

01:02:57.780 People are grappling with the meaning of bioethics and it's extremely emotional issue.

01:03:00.940 J.D. tonight said, we want more reproductive help and reproductive technologies and therapies.

01:03:09.600 And so he spoke in such a way that conveyed the true meaning of the Trump campaign, which

01:03:14.260 is we do want more reproductive help and family care and all the rest of it.

01:03:18.440 But he didn't lie.

01:03:20.240 He didn't contradict his beliefs and principles.

01:03:23.040 He didn't scandalize people with a controversial issue.

01:03:25.640 He didn't needlessly raise an extremely controversial issue.

01:03:28.260 I thought it was really well stated.

01:03:29.580 It's part of why I say Trump is a wrecking ball and we love him for it.

01:03:33.420 And J.D. Vance is a scalpel and we love him for that.

01:03:35.660 By the way, I will mention that that was the first mention I think that I've heard of a

01:03:39.120 presidential candidate actually invoking Christ on a stage.

01:03:41.860 Yeah, that's a good point.

01:03:42.880 In decades, right?

01:03:43.440 He did that in the middle of the debate.

01:03:44.480 He did it casually, which I thought was actually quite nice.

01:03:46.240 That's a very good point.

01:03:49.800 Another question from a DailyWire.com subscriber.

01:03:52.400 Can the Daily Wire please do something to focus on nerd culture?

01:03:55.520 There are millions of young men who don't know politics and love superheroes and video

01:03:59.280 games and the fact that we aren't making it known that we care about what they care about.

01:04:03.540 It's a crime.

01:04:04.420 They'll end up falling in with leftists who do appeal to them on these grounds.

01:04:08.920 I actually have played video games on the air.

01:04:11.540 I actually had.

01:04:12.620 Yeah, we know about nerd culture.

01:04:15.520 The 70-year-old who's read every book in the Western.

01:04:19.760 Who has been playing video games since they were invented.

01:04:22.540 I do a lot to appeal to nerd culture.

01:04:24.680 I will say, I did once do a nerd culture.

01:04:29.380 I talked about video games on the show.

01:04:32.260 I was defending gamers on the show.

01:04:34.960 And then the gamers spent the next three days yelling at me on Twitter, telling me, how

01:04:40.040 dare I speak on this issue?

01:04:41.700 I have no right to speak about it.

01:04:43.360 That didn't happen.

01:04:44.440 That's a thing that happened.

01:04:45.780 So, you know.

01:04:46.020 I will say this.

01:04:47.400 It's going around right now.

01:04:49.300 I think that our friend Liz Wheeler may have started it on the right, although it's also

01:04:52.780 going around on the left.

01:04:53.900 This idea that it is a total stone cold no.

01:04:56.880 Like, complete turn off.

01:04:58.420 Absolute non-starter for a guy to play video games.

01:05:00.880 Women hate video games.

01:05:01.920 They do.

01:05:02.900 And it is, I think that that's absurd.

01:05:05.220 Obviously, video games, like anything, can be abused and people can form unhealthy relationships

01:05:12.440 as they can in the entire sort of interconnected online world.

01:05:16.380 And people can devote far too much of their lives to video games.

01:05:19.600 But men should be allowed to have things that they like that women don't like.

01:05:24.000 But do you agree, at least with Liz's point, that video games give women the ick?

01:05:30.340 Well, unless it's like Bejeweled or something, which women play lots of video games.

01:05:35.700 Yeah, yeah.

01:05:36.000 They just play video games.

01:05:37.060 They just play video games that don't have, you know, story, depth, meaning, plot.

01:05:43.980 Actually, I, as someone who famously is not a video game fan, I do, I'm sympathetic to

01:05:49.020 that because the argument gamers will make, especially someone like me, is, well, you

01:05:52.900 say video games are for kids.

01:05:54.360 You're sitting around watching football on Sunday.

01:05:56.100 What's the difference?

01:05:56.640 I think there is a little bit of a difference, but I'm sympathetic to the argument.

01:05:59.680 I actually think that it is pretty similar.

01:06:01.340 And so my take on video games is similar to football.

01:06:04.720 I like watching football.

01:06:06.180 People can, men can have an unhealthy obsession with it where it becomes your whole personality

01:06:10.200 is football.

01:06:11.700 Disappear for the season.

01:06:12.400 Right.

01:06:12.680 And that's, that's, that's, that's unmanly.

01:06:15.620 That's, it's ridiculous.

01:06:16.620 It's unmanly.

01:06:17.440 Now your whole life is a game.

01:06:19.160 It's, it's okay to sit down and watch a football game.

01:06:21.340 I watch it as a family.

01:06:22.300 It's a family thing.

01:06:23.260 And so it's the same thing with video games.

01:06:24.420 If it becomes your whole life, it's the, if it's the focal point of you and your identity,

01:06:28.440 then that's a problem because no form of entertainment or recreation should be the focal point

01:06:36.460 of your existence, no matter what it is.

01:06:38.380 That doesn't mean that we don't engage in that stuff.

01:06:39.920 Yeah.

01:06:40.220 I have to say your Ravens looked amazing.

01:06:43.320 35 to 10.

01:06:44.340 They finally came on.

01:06:45.460 But they looked like super.

01:06:46.800 Oh, and the, and the touchdowns.

01:06:48.820 Yeah.

01:06:49.440 They scored them.

01:06:50.380 They killed Flacco, right?

01:06:51.600 Killed Flacco's.

01:06:52.480 Well, he plays for the Colts now.

01:06:53.480 Oh, yeah.

01:06:54.040 Sorry.

01:06:54.980 Why are Kamala and Tim bringing to attention the fact that they are gun owners?

01:06:59.460 Won't that be controversial among their base?

01:07:01.200 No, because they're lying.

01:07:02.980 Well, actually, this is a fascinating thing, actually.

01:07:05.820 If you want to know where the parties believe the American people are, watch where they converge.

01:07:09.680 Yeah.

01:07:10.060 Right?

01:07:10.220 It really is interesting.

01:07:10.920 Like, if you've watched the debate tonight, again, one of the points I've been making

01:07:12.960 is they kept saying they agreed with each other.

01:07:14.400 So where do they agree with each other?

01:07:15.620 Where do they think the American people are?

01:07:16.880 So if you were to follow the arguments tonight, here's where you think they are.

01:07:20.380 Hawkish on the border.

01:07:21.620 Yep.

01:07:21.740 Hawkish on foreign policy, right?

01:07:23.580 Both of them converge on them.

01:07:24.500 We need steady, strong American leadership in the Middle East.

01:07:27.800 And both of them are making that argument.

01:07:29.660 Kamala Harris's guy falsely, right?

01:07:31.540 He's lying.

01:07:32.360 But on entitlements, both of them seem to be pretty pro-entitlements.

01:07:36.380 On abortion, they both seem to be running away from the pro-life position, unfortunately,

01:07:41.620 as we've been talking about tonight, at least publicly.

01:07:43.640 And on guns, both of them are running to the, guns are really kind of great.

01:07:48.920 Like, we all like guns, don't we?

01:07:51.180 And so, apparently, that's where both parties actually think the American people are.

01:07:55.960 And that is kind of a fascinating case study.

01:07:58.120 Did you notice there was a really interesting, I think most people missed an answer, when

01:08:02.260 they tried to pin J.D. on some particular shooting with a particular father's culpability over

01:08:08.940 guns where this kid got the gun.

01:08:11.540 And J.D.'s answer highlighted a subtle difference between a conservative view and a, like a libertarian

01:08:17.380 view or a liberal or leftist view, where he said, well, in that specific case, I would

01:08:22.380 defer to local law enforcement.

01:08:24.280 I think they probably know their community better than some one-size-fits-all policy,

01:08:30.500 you know, say, machine guns for everybody or something nationwide.

01:08:33.640 That was, I think, indicative of his more traditional kind of conservatism.

01:08:37.800 And I also think it played.

01:08:40.440 How do you think the longshoremen strike will impact the election?

01:08:43.560 I think if they continue to soft-soap the unions, it'll be really bad for the Democrats.

01:08:49.020 I mean, this is going to, you know, there'll be toilet paper shortages and food shortages

01:08:52.560 and things like that.

01:08:53.280 If Biden goes around bumping into walls and saying, well, we have to have the people talking

01:08:57.720 with the, you know.

01:08:58.560 I don't know.

01:08:58.900 This feels like a setup to me, honestly.

01:09:00.600 It feels like a setup.

01:09:01.340 Yeah.

01:09:01.800 It feels to me like Biden-Harris have already gone to the unions and then they've gone to

01:09:05.820 the employers and they basically are going to, you know, walk out.

01:09:08.880 Look at the strike that we just averted.

01:09:11.920 Look how.

01:09:12.360 And we did it on behalf of our union workers because they know that they're really trailing

01:09:15.740 with unions.

01:09:16.520 This whole thing feels, it smells like a setup.

01:09:18.340 That's it.

01:09:18.800 If you're right, then it's because Joe Biden wants Kamala Harris to win.

01:09:24.240 And I'm not at all going to do that.

01:09:26.240 There's one really terrifying thing that could happen in the coming weeks and months with

01:09:31.680 the Longshoremen strike, which is that it will be much more difficult to get Mayflower

01:09:35.660 cigars, which is why someone should probably stock up on them right now, everybody out there.

01:09:40.160 If it's a setup, it would be fitting because the union boss looks like the love child of Archie

01:09:47.940 Bunker and Tony Soprano.

01:09:49.600 And he's, you know, he seems to be in the tank for the Democrats.

01:09:53.400 But I don't know.

01:09:54.860 You know, the head of the Teamsters comes out for Trump in this election.

01:09:58.280 Maybe something really is changing.

01:10:00.640 That's kind of been on my mind, but you may be right.

01:10:03.100 It's hard to know.

01:10:03.480 One thing that's on my mind, and I want to leave everyone with this thought, elections

01:10:09.300 are incredibly consequential.

01:10:10.900 We talked about it tonight, the changes in both parties as a result of elections, the

01:10:15.800 change in our national politics just because of the success of Obamacare.

01:10:21.400 Not a success as a policy, but a success in becoming national policy.

01:10:27.020 So elections matter.

01:10:29.240 This election matters.

01:10:30.600 I have a lot of people that I know, like multiple people that I know, who are so afraid

01:10:35.240 of Kamala Harris ascending the presidency that they've begun canning.

01:10:39.480 And this is one of the things that I love about conservatives is that they think that if

01:10:43.520 the end of the world comes, they can perhaps avert the worst impact of the collapse of our

01:10:50.240 society by having enough peach preserves in the pantry, right?

01:10:55.780 It's charming.

01:10:56.600 And it is, of course, always possible that we could lose all of this.

01:11:02.460 You know, we're not promised tomorrow.

01:11:04.040 We're certainly not promised that tomorrow will be good.

01:11:06.220 We're certainly not promised that our complex government structures will hold throughout

01:11:12.360 society.

01:11:13.060 Throughout history, they change.

01:11:14.900 Often, often it's cataclysmic.

01:11:17.380 Often people suffer greatly and for long periods of time when great empires fall.

01:11:23.020 All of that is on offer.

01:11:24.180 However, we could we could lose the country.

01:11:27.080 I don't think that it's particularly likely.

01:11:29.840 I think that should Kamala Harris win and make no mistake, Kamala Harris could be the

01:11:34.620 next president of the United States.

01:11:35.860 It is you can feel in your gut that maybe Trump is going to win.

01:11:39.140 You can think that maybe people aren't paying attention to the media.

01:11:41.620 I've got a sneaking suspicion that people aren't going to put up with this, but they might.

01:11:46.040 Yeah.

01:11:46.540 Kamala Harris might win.

01:11:47.320 It could be a worst case.

01:11:48.600 Like I said, young people could vote because of the ubiquity of mail-in voting.

01:11:51.620 She could win 50 states.

01:11:53.160 It could be a complete sea change in the country.

01:11:55.860 And if that happens.

01:11:58.700 Well, we'll just have to wake up the next day and get back to fighting and the fight

01:12:02.060 will get harder.

01:12:03.000 There will be substantial policy that comes out of a Kamala Harris ascension that will

01:12:09.280 set us back.

01:12:10.160 It will be terrible.

01:12:11.080 There could be what even seem like worst cases that they could take the Senate, do away with

01:12:18.060 the filibuster, add two states, try to create sort of permanent one-party rule in the country.

01:12:23.420 They could censor us greatly.

01:12:26.000 Truly bad things can happen.

01:12:28.560 And many bad things will happen if she is elected president, but it will not be the end

01:12:33.160 of history.

01:12:33.680 There is every possibility that the short-term pain of a Kamala Harris ascension could lead

01:12:41.900 to a kind of national restoration, not through her presidency, but because of her presidency.

01:12:48.300 Her presidency could be like Jimmy Carter in the 70s that leads to Reagan in the 80s because

01:12:53.600 it was so bad that it shook even all those new people who seem like they'll never change

01:12:57.820 the way they vote.

01:12:59.300 Should you be cavalier about that?

01:13:00.960 No.

01:13:02.080 When people like Dick Cheney or David French or others say that they're willing to vote

01:13:09.400 for Kamala Harris because of all of the unique evils of Donald Trump and because they want

01:13:15.280 to save the Republican Party, many of their criticisms of Donald Trump aren't wrong.

01:13:21.540 What they're fundamentally wrong about is their assessment of the left, right?

01:13:25.460 They're sort of rightly observing that things are happening on the right that they're uncomfortable

01:13:29.620 with and they're being, I think, pretty Pollyanna about, but people will suffer if Kamala, like

01:13:36.640 it is a certainty that Kamala ascending will lead to suffering.

01:13:39.640 There's a certainty that Kamala winning will lead to the destruction of many advantages that

01:13:44.860 our values have in the culture.

01:13:46.840 And so even if we think that, is it possible that Kamala winning could, in a longer view of

01:13:51.380 history, redound to the good of the country?

01:13:54.780 Maybe so, but that's not the...

01:13:56.700 Yeah, that's for Providence to sort out.

01:13:57.780 That's for Providence to sort out.

01:13:59.080 What's before us is the election.

01:14:00.540 And in the election, we have to do the thing that's given to us to do.

01:14:02.840 What's given to us to do is to vote for Donald Trump.

01:14:04.920 Not because Donald Trump is great.

01:14:06.940 I happen to not think Donald Trump is great.

01:14:08.440 We have disagreement on this panel about how great he is or isn't.

01:14:12.560 He is better than Kamala Harris.

01:14:13.980 He is, the people he will appoint to run the federal bureaucracy are far superior to the

01:14:20.800 people who she will appoint to run the federal bureaucracy.

01:14:24.020 The judges that he will help move through the Senate are far, far superior to the judges

01:14:28.260 that she will help move through the Senate.

01:14:30.520 We've lived through four years of Donald Trump, and we know that despite his somewhat unique,

01:14:34.840 I think he has some unique character flaws, he also has many unique advantages that we've

01:14:39.540 seen redound to the benefit of the country.

01:14:41.920 That's what's been put before us.

01:14:43.180 So I'm not trying to say the election isn't important.

01:14:45.820 I'm not saying don't vote.

01:14:46.720 On the contrary, I think you have a moral obligation to vote, and I think you have a

01:14:49.700 moral obligation to vote for Donald Trump.

01:14:51.340 But we can't approach the election as though this is the last election of our lifetime.

01:14:55.280 That kind of language is both demoralizing instead of motivating.

01:15:02.640 People think it's motivating, but I think it's actually demoralizing.

01:15:05.540 It keeps people from engaging in the political process, because if you think it's all over,

01:15:09.820 then there's really no reason for you to go to the polls.

01:15:11.700 But it's not just that it's demoralizing.

01:15:15.440 It's also a kind of amelioration of your responsibilities, because if you do the thing

01:15:20.480 you're supposed to do and go vote on November 5th for the Republicans, and we lose, your

01:15:26.580 responsibility didn't end.

01:15:28.240 You just have a responsibility the next day to fight the harder fight.

01:15:31.560 And we're going to wake up and do that.

01:15:33.920 I hope we wake up on November 6th.

01:15:35.480 I mean, I think we're joking if we think we're going to wake up on November 6th and even know

01:15:38.680 who the president is.

01:15:39.340 On December 15th, I hope we wake up.

01:15:41.720 Somewhere in mid-December, we'll have a president.

01:15:44.000 And I hope that it's Donald Trump.

01:15:45.780 And if it is, we're going to wake up and we're going to know that we have to hold Donald Trump

01:15:49.660 accountable in some ways.

01:15:50.620 We have to support Donald Trump in some ways, and we have to continue to fight the fight.

01:15:53.500 Have to drink a lot of champagne, smoke a lot of cigars.

01:15:55.900 And if Donald Trump is not the president, the fight's going to be harder.

01:15:59.700 It may not be, you know, we may not live in the world that we want to live in.

01:16:02.460 We may not be faced with the kinds of challenges we had hoped to be faced with.

01:16:05.920 We may be faced by even harder challenges.

01:16:08.080 And if that's the place God puts us in the world, then we just wake up and we go and

01:16:11.480 do that thing.

01:16:12.260 You can't live your life as though you have no agency.

01:16:16.700 You can't live your life as though the end of agency is, you know, 33 days from now.

01:16:23.900 You're still fully you, and you still have responsibilities going into whatever is next.

01:16:28.940 And that's really been on my mind to communicate because I see, well, I see people canning peach

01:16:34.660 preserves, but it's more than that.

01:16:36.000 I just see people thinking like somehow Kamala winning is the end.

01:16:41.460 And it may very well be the end of some things, but it's not the end of everything.

01:16:45.260 It's not the end of the responsibility that God's given us.

01:16:49.440 When the Bible says that God establishes government, that must mean us.

01:16:56.740 Because sort of uniquely in human history, it's a government of the people.

01:17:02.680 We are a functioning part of the government in a democratic republic.

01:17:09.500 And that means that all the reasons that God established kings and queens of old are still

01:17:14.560 in play when he established this country.

01:17:16.900 And many of those responsibilities now are with us, not just with the people who are in

01:17:22.940 that top chair, and those responsibilities continue for as long as we're here.

01:17:27.460 Thank you for joining us tonight for the Daily Wire backstage.

01:17:30.200 We'll see you, I think the next time we'll see you is election night.

01:17:34.300 And so remember what I told you tonight, it's the last election of our life.

01:17:39.180 Be afraid, be very afraid.

01:17:41.080 And can your peaches.

01:17:42.300 Can your peaches.

01:17:43.400 We'll see you then.

01:17:43.880 We'll see you then.

The Michael Knowles Show - October 02, 2024

2024 VP Debate ｜ Daily Wire Backstage

Episode Stats

Length

Words per Minute

Word Count

Sentence Count

Misogynist Sentences

Hate Speech Sentences

Summary

Transcript