The Michael Knowles Show - Daily Wire Backstage Live at CPAC： The Fight, The Wins, The Future

00:00:00.100 Hey, Michael Knowles here, and do I have a treat for you.

00:00:02.720 The latest episode of Daily Wire backstage is right around the corner,

00:00:06.800 and you do not want to miss it.

00:00:08.200 Don't miss me, Ben Shapiro, Matt Walsh, Andrew Klavan, and the God King, Jeremy Boring,

00:00:12.480 as we discuss the latest news and cultural events,

00:00:14.780 all while enjoying some fine whiskey and cigars.

00:00:17.560 It is going to be all that and more.

00:00:19.780 Take a listen.

00:00:30.000 Well, folks, you know, I'm not famous for being a particularly optimistic sort.

00:00:46.260 If you've ever listened to my show, let's say morosity, depression,

00:00:49.980 that may be a feeling that's come over you once in a while listening to my show

00:00:53.340 where I describe what's going on in the country.

00:00:55.500 But I can safely say I have never felt more optimistic about the United States

00:01:00.880 than I do right now.

00:01:03.380 And that is thanks to President Donald J. Trump.

00:01:07.900 And one of the things that's sort of mysterious about President Trump

00:01:10.820 is the fact that he isn't really an ideological conservative.

00:01:14.660 Now, people like me, I grew up in the movement.

00:01:16.960 I grew up reading Thomas Sowell and Frederick Hayek and reading Russell Kirk.

00:01:21.600 I don't think President Trump has ever sat around reading those people.

00:01:24.680 I don't think he sits around at night and browses Edmund Burke or anything.

00:01:28.480 And so the question is, why is it that this man,

00:01:31.000 who is not truly an ideological conservative,

00:01:33.120 is the most successful conservative president of my lifetime, bar none?

00:01:37.660 It's a real question.

00:01:39.180 And I think to understand that, the thing that we need to understand about President Trump

00:01:42.800 is that more than anything else, more than anything else,

00:01:46.060 and in this era, needed more than anything else,

00:01:49.380 President Trump lives in the world of reality.

00:01:52.700 President Trump has been slandered by the media as somebody who creates fictions of his own

00:01:58.580 and sort of lives within those fictions and says a lot of words

00:02:01.580 that don't always match up with the truth and all that kind of stuff.

00:02:04.700 The reality is that President Trump, in his gut, lives in the real world,

00:02:09.940 which is why President Trump wins so often,

00:02:12.440 because if you are going to win, you have to acknowledge reality,

00:02:15.260 because reality always wins.

00:02:16.880 And this is what makes President Trump conservative.

00:02:20.140 Conservatism lines up really, really well with reality.

00:02:24.440 The reason that President Trump won the last election cycle is because

00:02:28.780 the Democratic Party, the left, completely disconnected themselves from reality,

00:02:33.160 completely disconnected themselves from reality in every possible way.

00:02:37.000 They ran screaming with their hair on fire, their blue hair on fire,

00:02:40.160 away from reality.

00:02:41.580 President Trump embraces reality with both arms.

00:02:46.800 When it comes to the world of economics, for example,

00:02:49.360 President Trump only cares about success.

00:02:52.440 He cares about economic dynamism.

00:02:54.040 He cares about American businesses being able to build and succeed.

00:02:57.620 And he understands that in order for all those things to happen,

00:03:00.620 you have to free American business from the shackle of regulation and government.

00:03:04.600 You have to allow businesses to innovate.

00:03:07.380 You have to allow people to rise and fall on their own merit.

00:03:10.040 And meritocracy has to be valued more than, say, identity politics and DEI.

00:03:14.820 President Trump knows that in his guts because he's a business person.

00:03:18.420 President Trump has had to make payroll.

00:03:20.320 Unlike literally every leader of the Democratic Party over the course of my lifetime,

00:03:23.580 he is not a career politician, which means he's always been answerable to reality.

00:03:28.460 And that means that when he unleashes another businessman, Elon Musk, inside the government

00:03:32.020 and says, go in there with a meat axe and start taking out programs,

00:03:36.520 that is what a businessman would do.

00:03:38.180 If you came into a business as a business person and it was rife with waste, fraud, and abuse,

00:03:42.840 you wouldn't sit around and run a commission on it.

00:03:45.820 You would start firing people.

00:03:47.600 You would go in and you'd start making changes.

00:03:49.980 You'd start breaking things and moving quickly.

00:03:51.860 And President Trump is doing precisely that.

00:03:53.720 You can see business optimism in the country is skyrocketing specifically because of that.

00:03:58.020 Meanwhile, the Democrats don't know what to do because they're cherished blue pipeline,

00:04:02.860 which is what the federal government is.

00:04:04.600 It is a permanent payment program for the left, the federal government.

00:04:08.720 They have permanent institutions that exist outside the government.

00:04:11.500 They take literally trillions of your taxpayer dollars and then they funnel all that money

00:04:15.780 out to their political allies inside and outside the government.

00:04:18.880 And Donald Trump came in and he broke the pipeline.

00:04:21.680 Why?

00:04:21.960 Because he lives in the world of reality.

00:04:24.200 When we're talking about foreign policy, President Trump lives in the world of reality.

00:04:28.800 When President Trump looks at the situation in Ukraine, he doesn't say,

00:04:32.540 well, you know what?

00:04:33.100 We're not going to set an endpoint.

00:04:34.620 We're not really going to set a goal.

00:04:35.980 We're just going to wing it.

00:04:37.000 We're just going to go along with this for years.

00:04:38.560 He says, listen, here's the reality.

00:04:40.560 The reality is that there is a grinding trench warfare situation in Ukraine.

00:04:45.080 There is very little shot that Ukraine is going to be able to win back Donbass in Crimea.

00:04:49.560 And we don't want Ukraine to actually fall to the Russians.

00:04:52.140 And so we know what an off-ramp looks like.

00:04:53.820 Now it's just a question of how do we get to that off-ramp.

00:04:56.140 That is what a practical person does.

00:04:57.980 That is a person who lives in reality.

00:05:00.320 That's not a person who wants to speak airy-fairy nonsense and nostrums about democracy and tyranny.

00:05:06.240 All that stuff sounds nice, but does it get the job done is the question that President Trump

00:05:09.920 is always asking.

00:05:10.940 Does it get the job done?

00:05:13.100 When it comes to the Middle East, President Trump has completely broken the mold.

00:05:17.640 The sort of ancient wisdom of the State Department, which has been wrong for 80 years in the Middle

00:05:22.340 East, is that the only way that you actually achieve peace in the Middle East is to make

00:05:25.800 the Palestinian issue front and center.

00:05:27.760 President Trump in his first term totally turned that on his head.

00:05:30.360 He ignored it, and peace broke out in the Middle East.

00:05:33.280 President Trump has now thrown onto the table a solution with regard to the Gaza Strip that

00:05:37.760 is breaking people's brains, and also happens to be the only plausible solution anyone has

00:05:41.860 proposed in about a century in this particular area.

00:05:45.080 Because it turns out that when you have a population group that literally held today a celebration

00:05:50.200 of dead babies in the Gaza Strip, babies they had murdered in the Gaza Strip, it turns out

00:05:55.020 that a two-state solution in which one of those states is actually run by those people is a

00:05:59.380 really bad idea.

00:06:00.500 And President Trump knows that, and he says it, because he lives in the world of reality.

00:06:04.800 And this is how you chalk up victories.

00:06:07.980 When it comes to China, President Trump is a realist.

00:06:09.760 He understands that China is globally an opponent of the United States, and that we need to stand

00:06:15.240 up to Chinese predations, stealing our IP, buying American land, funneling fentanyl precursors

00:06:20.220 through Mexico.

00:06:21.220 He understands on immigration, that a realistic nation cannot have an open border, you cannot

00:06:25.740 have a welfare state and an open border and pretend that that's workable.

00:06:29.720 President Trump understands that.

00:06:30.720 Now, all of this sounds commonsensical to all of us, right?

00:06:33.180 Because it is commonsensical.

00:06:34.820 But in Washington, D.C., commonsensical is not the way things have been run.

00:06:40.080 Instead, people have been so wedded, not to victory, not to winning, not to achieving

00:06:45.200 things, but to saying things properly in just the right way to get the right coverage in

00:06:49.900 the New York Times or in the Wall Street Journal or in whatever media outlet they are pandering

00:06:53.840 to, that they never actually think about what wins and what loses.

00:06:56.640 And then there's the matter of the reality of our daily lives.

00:07:01.260 President Trump understands that what most Americans want is not identity politics.

00:07:06.320 What most Americans want is not some bizarre notion about androgyny, where men can be women

00:07:11.640 and women can be men, and that we are sort of free-floating sets of feelings existing within

00:07:16.900 the meat suits that we wear around.

00:07:18.340 President Trump understands basic things that the left has completely abandoned and that he

00:07:22.640 was willing to say, stuff that was uncontroversial, you know, five minutes ago, like boys are

00:07:27.860 not girls, right?

00:07:29.060 Like these are controversial statements to make, but President Trump understands that that actually

00:07:33.200 has some pretty deep ramifications when you say things like boys are not girls, such as

00:07:37.920 perhaps men have a role to play that is different from women's role.

00:07:43.280 That does not mean that women shouldn't be in the workplace, obviously, and it doesn't

00:07:46.460 mean that men shouldn't help take care of the kids.

00:07:47.900 But it does mean that men being masculine is a good thing, and it means that women being

00:07:52.220 wives and mothers is a good thing, too.

00:07:55.360 And that no country that ignores these basic truths can survive and grow and thrive.

00:08:00.600 President Trump acknowledges and knows that the things that most Americans want, whether

00:08:05.480 they are Hispanics living down on the border of Texas or whether they're white Americans

00:08:10.000 living up on the border of Canada, those things are basically the same.

00:08:13.300 They want to be able to live in safety, free of crime, with prosperity, being able to hold

00:08:18.160 down a job in a growing, innovative, dynamic economy.

00:08:21.620 They want to be able to go to their church and worship God and share that with their community

00:08:26.340 without the government getting in their way.

00:08:28.380 These are all things that, again, sound so easy.

00:08:30.860 They sound so easy.

00:08:32.140 But the way that President Trump measures whether a thing is true or not is whether it works.

00:08:37.680 And that is why he has been so unbelievably successful.

00:08:41.320 Now, when it comes to us, what can we do?

00:08:43.640 This does say something to the rest of us.

00:08:45.020 You know, I think that I talk for a living, right, which is a really fun way to make a

00:08:48.140 living.

00:08:49.000 But the reality is that, you know, people come to me all the time and say, how do I make

00:08:52.780 a difference in politics?

00:08:53.620 And obviously, there are things that we all can do, right?

00:08:55.520 I spent the last election cycle campaigning with a variety of Senate candidates and with

00:08:58.920 President Trump.

00:08:59.420 I went out and I did things.

00:09:01.540 But the things that most of us can do, aside from all the normal political fighting that Steve

00:09:05.640 was talking about earlier, which is really important, the thing that is most important is

00:09:09.680 to live a reality-based life, to be a model to our children, to be a model to our community,

00:09:15.640 to build the social fabric that actually makes this country work, to create the businesses

00:09:20.560 that make the country function, to engage in everyday common virtue.

00:09:25.500 Because the truth is, the country is not just built by President Trump.

00:09:28.760 We love President Trump.

00:09:29.560 He's doing an amazing job.

00:09:30.540 He should continue to be healthy and well and continue to succeed day in and day out.

00:09:34.460 We're all praying for him.

00:09:36.080 But the country also runs because of the people who are doing the everyday things, whose names

00:09:40.800 we don't know.

00:09:42.280 You, people I know, all the people out there who are just living with their families and

00:09:48.020 bringing up their kids in the correct fashion in a country that is growing and thriving,

00:09:52.240 building those building blocks, taking those building blocks and actually day-to-day level.

00:09:57.840 President Trump is clearing the field for you.

00:09:59.840 He's clearing the field for me.

00:10:01.440 Right?

00:10:01.580 The Republicans, I hope, are going to do that.

00:10:03.400 But then it's our job to actually build.

00:10:05.680 And that's what we should be focused on, not just on politics over the next four years

00:10:09.640 or eight years or 20 years.

00:10:11.740 We should be focused on the building because that project, that's the project that never

00:10:15.520 ends.

00:10:16.080 The political fight will always be there.

00:10:18.100 There's no such thing as permanent victory.

00:10:19.880 There will be losses in the future.

00:10:21.280 But the one thing that we can do every single day is continue to build.

00:10:25.360 And thank God, President Trump, the reason I'm optimistic, President Trump has brought

00:10:28.340 us back to a world of reality where that building is possible.

00:10:30.920 And we should all build together.

00:10:32.360 Thank you so much.

00:10:35.320 And now, I want to take the opportunity to welcome out my buddies from The Daily Wire for

00:10:48.040 an episode of Backstage Live.

00:10:49.380 Thank you.

00:10:50.440 Thank you.

00:10:50.900 Thank you.

00:11:05.380 How are you, sir?

00:11:06.980 Good to see you.

00:11:07.880 I'm certain you did that wrong.

00:11:09.000 Hey, what's going on, guys?

00:11:20.540 No, I shouldn't.

00:11:22.180 No one should clap for Michael.

00:11:24.120 No.

00:11:24.320 It's just a...

00:11:25.320 Well, you're a man, so that makes sense.

00:11:30.500 I know we can drink this delicious 45-47 whiskey.

00:11:34.000 Can we smoke the Mayflower Cigars, too, or is that...

00:11:37.560 Are we...

00:11:38.380 Washington, D.C. is a little...

00:11:41.660 What's the worst thing that could happen?

00:11:43.060 Yeah.

00:11:46.440 Welcome to CPAC and Backstage Live.

00:11:49.060 You'll have a pass on the booth.

00:11:49.900 You'll have the whole bottle.

00:11:50.680 Yeah.

00:11:52.380 Thank you.

00:11:55.620 This is a show that we do once a month at The Daily Wire.

00:11:58.120 In fact, we're going to do it again on March 4th for the President's Joint Session of Congress,

00:12:02.400 where we get the whole team together and we talk about what's on our mind.

00:12:06.180 And so this will be a little bit different than the other panels that have happened throughout

00:12:09.140 the day, because we have to do ad reads.

00:12:12.960 It's okay.

00:12:13.600 It's how we buy the plane tickets to get out here.

00:12:15.860 What I want to talk about, though, first, right out of the gate, today is 30 days of

00:12:21.560 Donald Trump into his second term.

00:12:28.880 Which means even if you don't like Donald Trump, you're 30 days closer to it being the

00:12:32.520 end of Donald Trump.

00:12:32.840 That's true.

00:12:33.100 The Democrats must be thrilled.

00:12:34.540 I don't know.

00:12:34.980 I don't know if they are.

00:12:36.140 I want to talk about all the amazing things that have happened in this first 30 days.

00:12:39.740 One of the most dynamic and energetic beginnings of any presidency, certainly in my lifetime.

00:12:44.760 And since we've got all of our pals here at CPAC, let's just talk about how great it's

00:12:48.320 been.

00:12:49.380 Michael.

00:12:50.580 My favorite thing.

00:12:52.060 This is very difficult, because I loved when President Trump, Napoleon posted on Twitter

00:12:58.780 and True Social.

00:12:59.940 I thought that was great.

00:13:01.460 Loved that.

00:13:02.020 I loved when J.D.

00:13:02.840 Vance gave lectures on to mystic philosophy to that CBS News lady on television.

00:13:07.720 That was great.

00:13:08.320 But my favorite thing, I think, my actual favorite initiative for the first 30 days has

00:13:14.080 got to be the presidential pardons.

00:13:16.740 I loved, I felt politically it was very important for the J6 pardons to go through.

00:13:22.000 But my favorite pardons, though, my absolute favorite, the pro-lifers who were unjustly

00:13:28.360 imprisoned by Joe Biden and the Democrats.

00:13:31.000 They are American heroes.

00:13:33.160 I ran into one of them outside, John Hinshaw.

00:13:35.940 He might be in this room right now.

00:13:37.440 These are American heroes.

00:13:38.820 These are deeply virtuous people.

00:13:40.560 They were trampled on by their government.

00:13:42.820 And Donald Trump rectified a major, major wrong.

00:13:45.880 He deserves a lot of credit for it.

00:13:47.200 You know, if I were to say my favorite thing from Trump's term, well, number two, I'll get

00:13:55.420 to number one, but number two.

00:13:56.720 You only get one.

00:13:57.860 Well, I got to, my runner up, my runner up is Trump talking about, at least talking about

00:14:04.460 potentially taking back control of the Panama Canal.

00:14:07.360 That's a little bit of a deep cut, but I think that's an important thing.

00:14:09.500 That's good.

00:14:09.840 And Greenland, too.

00:14:11.240 Maybe we're taking Canada.

00:14:12.460 We'll see.

00:14:13.820 We got to get rid of the, move the Canadians somewhere else because we don't want the

00:14:16.860 A's, but we want Canada.

00:14:17.880 We want the land.

00:14:19.400 Not so much the people on it.

00:14:22.860 We'll move them to reservations up in the Arctic, and they'll be quite happy.

00:14:28.480 But my actual favorite thing is what I think is the end, basically the end, of the trans

00:14:35.800 agenda of gender ideology in this country.

00:14:37.800 You know, this is, the fight continues because the people that advocate for this butchery and

00:14:47.300 this insanity aren't just going to go away.

00:14:49.040 They're going to, they're going to find a way to, to continue victimizing kids.

00:14:53.480 And so the fight will continue in that way.

00:14:55.520 But look, we've got with Donald Trump in just a few weeks, we have banning men from women's

00:15:00.560 sports, we have putting an end to child castration in the hospitals, defining sex as man and woman.

00:15:08.900 And I think that the legal stuff is really important, but just the bully pulpit, having

00:15:12.940 a person in a position of authority who's willing to say the obvious thing, which is

00:15:17.480 that men are men and women are women, which, by the way, is something, is something that

00:15:21.240 everyone has always known.

00:15:22.680 Every single person in the world has always known that.

00:15:24.960 And, and, but for a period of time, a lot of people were afraid to say what they knew

00:15:31.220 to be true because the, well, and thanks to Donald Trump, thanks to a lot of people that

00:15:36.120 have been in the fight.

00:15:37.540 But what they needed was someone in a position of a power like, like Donald Trump to say this

00:15:42.960 obvious true thing.

00:15:44.580 And so I think it's the beginning of the end of gender ideology in this country.

00:15:50.440 Andrew Klavan, you have opinions?

00:15:51.920 Yeah, by, by far, my favorite thing about the Trump administration has been the absolute

00:15:57.200 decimation and destruction of the mainstream media.

00:16:01.200 There, I mean, it is, it has been like that scene in Game of Thrones where the woman has

00:16:07.220 to walk naked through the streets while people shout shame and throw rotten vegetables at her.

00:16:12.560 Except it's been better because it's been the mainstream media walking naked through the

00:16:16.300 streets.

00:16:17.220 And they've just been reduced.

00:16:18.660 And I knew this, the moment.

00:16:19.620 No one wants to see that, Drew.

00:16:20.500 The moment the results of the election came in, this kind of blanket of peace passed over

00:16:27.820 me because I realized what had happened, that we'd, we'd beaten them.

00:16:31.780 And that was death, Drew.

00:16:32.600 Yeah, that was, that may be death.

00:16:34.060 Yeah.

00:16:34.540 But it couldn't have happened without Trump.

00:16:36.580 It couldn't have happened without Trump.

00:16:38.200 But it couldn't have happened without us too.

00:16:39.840 And all the Joe Rogan's and all the podcasters and all the small media that grew up suddenly

00:16:45.080 and exposed them for what they were.

00:16:47.560 And the, and the benefits, the side benefits of this is it has put a little tiny bit of

00:16:53.800 steel in the Republican party.

00:16:55.940 These guys, you know, this, this place that we're in right now is surrounded by media, like

00:17:01.980 this glass, the steel bubble, I should call it.

00:17:05.160 And they think when the New York Times says something, it's the people talking.

00:17:09.540 They think, oh my gosh, it's in the New York Times.

00:17:11.540 My career will be destroyed.

00:17:13.020 And now they realize it's in the New York Times.

00:17:15.260 A bird is going to crap on it.

00:17:17.360 And no one's going to remember what anybody said.

00:17:20.500 So far, I've enjoyed this panel very much because we're living up to our sort of reputation

00:17:25.320 at the Daily Wire.

00:17:26.740 Your favorite thing about Trump is us.

00:17:30.180 And your favorite thing about Trump is your movie.

00:17:33.020 Yeah.

00:17:34.160 And Michael's just here for the booze.

00:17:35.840 That's true.

00:17:36.420 And the cigars.

00:17:37.380 And the Mayflower cigars.

00:17:38.240 Delicious Mayflower cigars.

00:17:39.600 Ben, the best thing about the first 30?

00:17:40.940 Well, so by far the best thing that has happened during the first 30 days was that exchange

00:17:46.120 that he had with the Afghan lady reporter, which is one of the great moments in all of

00:17:50.320 media history.

00:17:51.960 And if you haven't seen it, folks, you absolutely should Google it because it is legitimately

00:17:55.700 one of the funniest things that has ever happened in the history of the media.

00:17:58.740 There's a reporter from Afghanistan who asked President Trump a question in a very thick

00:18:02.960 accent, and he had no idea what she was saying.

00:18:06.180 And he said, your voice, it's so beautiful, so melodious.

00:18:08.740 I don't understand a word you're saying.

00:18:11.060 God bless and live long, live in peace.

00:18:14.240 And he's like, wow, he went like full Spock at the end.

00:18:16.880 Like, it was great.

00:18:18.200 So that was great, just as a moment.

00:18:20.120 And there have been many such wonderful moments, including, I don't care, Margaret, right,

00:18:24.260 from the vice president.

00:18:25.380 And there are a bunch of great memeable moments.

00:18:27.860 And of course, Elon is a walking meme, as you've seen.

00:18:30.860 But in terms of actual policy, I think the most important thing that President Trump

00:18:35.360 has done is he's actually, he has exposed the reality, which is that the amount of power

00:18:41.320 that has aggregated in the executive branch over the course of time is extraordinary.

00:18:46.240 And it is at the behest of the president of the United States.

00:18:49.000 So for two reasons, this is really important.

00:18:51.260 One, because the Democratic Party established over the course of the last hundred odd years,

00:18:55.240 really since Woodrow Wilson, that the executive branch was going to be the predominant branch

00:18:59.260 of American government.

00:19:00.040 And all power was going to be centralized in it.

00:19:01.840 Spending power, regulatory power, all of it.

00:19:05.080 And then they basically said, and Republicans can't touch it.

00:19:07.200 When we run it, we'll run it, and we'll put permanent employees in place so that when

00:19:10.940 you run it, you don't run it.

00:19:12.720 And President Trump came in, and he said, no, no, no, you've given all this power to

00:19:16.480 the executive branch.

00:19:17.280 Guess what?

00:19:17.820 Guess who's the president now?

00:19:19.160 It's me.

00:19:20.640 And long live the king.

00:19:22.620 And he literally put out an executive order saying, like yesterday, all of you people work

00:19:27.340 for me.

00:19:27.920 And here's your reminder.

00:19:29.040 The executive branch is a branch of government.

00:19:31.920 There is no fourth branch of government that is an unelected bureaucracy.

00:19:34.600 And thus, you work for my agenda.

00:19:38.440 And this is great for a couple of reasons.

00:19:40.100 One, because it means that he's going to be actually able to clean out so much of the

00:19:44.040 rod inside these institutions.

00:19:45.260 And that's what Doge is in large part.

00:19:47.400 But second, I think it sets up the predicate for if there is going to be a useful constitutional

00:19:52.160 fight, which I kind of like, then let that fight be about the prerogatives of Congress.

00:19:57.140 Let Congress try to actually go back to the original structure in a fair way.

00:20:00.640 Because for too long, Republicans have been playing by the markets of Queensbury rules

00:20:03.980 on this stuff.

00:20:04.660 Whereas I say, the rules apply when Republicans are in power.

00:20:07.120 And then they stop applying the minute a Democrat is in power.

00:20:09.300 And President Trump, as I said before, he lives in reality.

00:20:12.060 And for President Trump, there's no set of rules where there are two sets of rules, right?

00:20:17.340 There's either one set for everybody or there ain't no rules.

00:20:19.840 And he says there's one set of rules for everybody.

00:20:21.720 I'm the president.

00:20:22.380 And now all you people work for me or you're fired, which is just wonderful.

00:20:30.300 I have to say, my favorite thing about the presidency so far is just the sheer chaotic

00:20:34.660 disruption that Donald Trump represents.

00:20:37.640 He, you know, everything from saying, you know, that he's going to build Trumpistan in

00:20:40.780 the Middle East.

00:20:42.880 Maragaza.

00:20:43.440 Maragaza.

00:20:43.840 Maragaza.

00:20:44.460 Yeah.

00:20:44.980 Gazalago.

00:20:45.660 Gazalago.

00:20:46.680 It's a work in progress.

00:20:47.740 I love it because what it says is the way you guys have been thinking about this for

00:20:53.460 the entire lifetime of every person involved in international politics is wrong.

00:20:58.220 And it's not even necessarily that I agree with every single one of Trump's disruptions.

00:21:02.740 It's that I agree with the idea of the disruption itself that Trump represents.

00:21:06.320 Because only through disruption do you shake things up from the status quo and create the

00:21:10.400 actual opportunity for change.

00:21:12.060 And I think, I actually think President Trump sort of understands this.

00:21:14.580 I think he wields it.

00:21:15.420 I think half of the things that Donald Trump says, he doesn't exactly mean.

00:21:19.840 But what he understands is that in the act of saying it, he breaks everyone out of their

00:21:24.720 comfort zone and creates the opportunity for actual meaningful change.

00:21:27.920 And that's an enormous skill.

00:21:29.640 It's something that he's been doing in his business life for all of living memory.

00:21:34.420 Donald Trump's very old.

00:21:35.540 Not as old as Andrew Clayton.

00:21:36.780 But he's not a young man.

00:21:38.240 And he's very successfully done this.

00:21:39.800 He keeps people from being able to get to complacency.

00:21:41.960 He keeps people from believing that just because something has been the way, means that it

00:21:46.420 must continue to be the way.

00:21:47.820 And you see it particularly, I think, in places like Doge.

00:21:50.460 I think Elon Musk is the greatest living American.

00:21:53.140 I think that he is, we should clap for Elon Musk.

00:21:56.740 He's probably still here.

00:22:01.300 He's probably still here.

00:22:03.180 And any one of us at any moment could be the recipient of one of his children.

00:22:06.500 So it's like a really, it's a really important thing to say on Elon's good side.

00:22:12.780 I think Elon is the greatest living American.

00:22:14.720 I think that Elon is one of the only people in the world actively trying to build a future.

00:22:19.400 I think that for too long, the left has been the only ideological movement in the country

00:22:24.920 who believes that there will be a future.

00:22:26.700 And the future that they believe in is one that does not include us.

00:22:29.780 And for too long, people on the right have sort of given up on the idea of a future.

00:22:33.000 We've become a little bit black-filled, a little bit nihilistic, a little bit conspiratorial

00:22:37.600 and afraid that tomorrow must be worse than today and must, which is worse than yesterday.

00:22:42.740 Elon doesn't subscribe to that at all.

00:22:44.260 He not only believes that America's best days are ahead of it, he's actively working to make

00:22:48.840 that happen.

00:22:49.500 And that is what you want in the government.

00:22:51.420 We are going to take questions, and I believe that the place where we're going to take questions

00:23:02.900 is over in this, they told me it's down there, but I don't know where down there means.

00:23:07.020 But we're going to spend a lot of our time interacting with you guys because you bought

00:23:09.460 the tickets.

00:23:10.320 And we get to hear from each other, you know, all day, every day.

00:23:13.660 I could have told you all of their answers.

00:23:16.860 I know what they wanted in the green room, only green M&Ms for Ben.

00:23:20.700 Classic.

00:23:21.260 All the other M&Ms for Michael, he's not very discriminating.

00:23:24.400 We're going to take a lot of questions from you, but first, Ben Shapiro.

00:23:28.480 Well, folks, let's talk about how you stay healthy.

00:23:32.600 Okay, because let's be real about this, you need to stay healthy.

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00:23:40.560 happen for you.

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00:23:46.120 of fruits and veggies daily.

00:23:47.960 Imagine trying to eat 31 different fruits and veggies every day.

00:23:50.620 That sounds horrible.

00:23:51.540 It sounds like torture.

00:23:52.360 It sounds like a year in jail with Nancy Pelosi.

00:23:54.780 Well, Balance of Nature takes fruits and veggies, they freeze-dry them, they turn them into a powder,

00:23:59.100 and then they put them into a capsule.

00:24:00.720 And let me tell you, I can pop those directly into the protein smoothie, and that keeps me looking

00:24:04.940 like a Greek god.

00:24:06.300 I know it doesn't look like that from the outside, but I can promise you that I am absolutely

00:24:10.700 jacked.

00:24:11.200 Well, believe me or don't believe me, that's your choice.

00:24:13.980 But you should believe me when I say that you should take Balance of Nature, fruits and

00:24:17.280 veggies every day, and your body will do the rest.

00:24:19.080 Head on over to balanceofnature.com.

00:24:20.880 Use promo code BACKSTAGE for 35% off your first order as a preferred customer, plus get

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00:24:31.220 And thank you for helping, you know, like pay our bills and everything.

00:24:33.460 Can I say, Ben, that was, those were the most powerful remarks ever delivered on this

00:24:38.120 stage.

00:24:39.620 Wow.

00:24:40.420 Balance of Nature.

00:24:41.200 I thought it was really compelling.

00:24:41.900 Hey, you were sitting next to the man who called for the eradication of transgenderism

00:24:45.380 from our national polity.

00:24:47.280 Well, second.

00:24:47.800 Okay, it was second.

00:24:48.400 It was second.

00:24:48.620 Now eradicate ill health from your body forever.

00:24:52.660 Balance of Nature.

00:24:53.360 Balance of Nature.

00:24:53.680 So, one of the things that we like to do on backstage is move beyond just politics and

00:25:01.120 talk about culture, talk about religion, talk about the things that make our life meaningful.

00:25:06.640 One of the things that's been on my mind a lot in this really triumphant moment in the

00:25:09.700 last 30 days.

00:25:10.460 Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni.

00:25:11.780 How did you know?

00:25:14.020 Who are they?

00:25:14.580 One of the things that's really on my mind is that when you are in these triumphant political

00:25:20.600 moments, it can seem suddenly like your life is going to be good because we're winning in

00:25:26.140 the very important but somewhat abstract realm of politics.

00:25:29.900 But the truth is, your life may continue to be quite bad.

00:25:33.940 I was a picker-upper right here.

00:25:35.400 Listen, I'm good at that.

00:25:36.260 Everybody's in a good mood and Jeremy's like, and then you'll die.

00:25:38.280 And then you'll die.

00:25:38.800 And at the same time, your life may have been very good these last four years while Joe Biden

00:25:43.620 was president, even though things in our national politics were going quite poorly.

00:25:47.620 And so, I think it's important in these moments to reflect on what are the actual things we

00:25:51.860 can do in our own lives to ensure that we're living lives that are honoring to God, productive

00:25:57.820 for our family, productive for our country.

00:26:00.320 It can't just be that we're watching news on television.

00:26:03.620 It can't even just be that we're actively engaged in politics and being somewhat activist.

00:26:08.800 How are we to live our lives in light of the moment in which we live?

00:26:12.620 You know, there's a big debate that's been on the right, and it's become more emphasized

00:26:16.620 in recent years.

00:26:17.600 And it's actually a very old debate between the classical understanding of freedom and

00:26:22.120 the more modern understanding of freedom.

00:26:24.060 And the way that it's usually summarized is by Lord Acton, who says that freedom is not

00:26:28.320 the ability to do what we wish, but the right to do what we ought.

00:26:32.220 And I certainly subscribe to that view of things.

00:26:34.480 But what that means is exactly what Jeremy was just saying, which is that the ways in

00:26:39.520 which our freedoms have been restricted in recent years, by Joe Biden certainly, and by

00:26:44.220 many liberals, is that he denied us the right to do what we ought to do.

00:26:49.240 He said, if you go to your church, you're going to be spied on by the FBI.

00:26:52.980 He said that if you run a Catholic hospital, we're going to sue you, even if you're nuns.

00:26:56.600 He said, if you go pray peacefully in front of a Planned Parenthood abortion mill, we're going

00:27:02.060 to throw you in prison.

00:27:03.240 He was denying you the right to do what you ought to do.

00:27:06.700 You see this in the attacks on marriage, the attacks on education, the attacks on children.

00:27:10.500 We could be here all night listing these attacks on what we have a right to do.

00:27:15.420 Now we have the right to do those things.

00:27:17.200 President Trump has passed a number of executive orders that have really taken the government

00:27:22.620 out of the business of oppressing Christians and families and kids and all the like.

00:27:27.460 But that means that now we have to go to church.

00:27:30.520 That means we have to form our families.

00:27:33.120 That means we have to educate our kids.

00:27:35.320 You know, now we do have the right to do those things.

00:27:37.840 We do have our freedom back.

00:27:39.440 But that freedom doesn't mean anything.

00:27:41.240 It's kind of like with free speech.

00:27:42.600 Free speech doesn't mean anything if you don't have anything to say.

00:27:46.160 So you have to live out those substantive goods in your life.

00:27:54.000 I hate it when people clap for you.

00:27:55.740 I really do.

00:27:56.300 As we celebrate the victory of our 47th president, there's no better way to celebrate than to

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00:28:41.080 And, you know, I think that a great whiskey really complements a great cigar.

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00:29:14.900 True.

00:29:16.080 Well, I mean, it is this kind of trick about being a conservative, is that you believe that

00:29:21.580 the government should stay out of your business so you can be free.

00:29:24.280 But now you're free, what are you going to do, right?

00:29:27.240 Yeah, that's true.

00:29:27.500 It all comes down to us.

00:29:28.800 It's really not about, please do this, and please pass this program.

00:29:31.980 It's get rid of all that stuff so I can do the things that I want to do.

00:29:36.560 And the thing about Donald Trump is Donald Trump, you know, movements happen almost organically.

00:29:42.580 They almost happen by themselves.

00:29:43.680 They're like waves that come in.

00:29:45.520 And I work in the arts my whole life, and you see in the arts, there'll come a moment

00:29:49.260 when there's a Picasso or a Marlon Brando, somebody who changes the game, but that game

00:29:54.740 was already changing.

00:29:55.700 He just represents that change.

00:29:57.320 And that's true of Donald Trump.

00:29:58.900 Without him, it wouldn't have happened.

00:30:00.420 But at the same time, he is at the head of a movement that's organically happening.

00:30:05.280 And that movement has a lot to do with our old friend Uncle God.

00:30:09.580 The arguments that for hundreds of years have slowly, slowly drained the faith out of Western

00:30:16.460 culture have collapsed.

00:30:17.860 They've collapsed scientifically.

00:30:19.160 They've collapsed morally.

00:30:20.400 They've collapsed experientially.

00:30:21.780 And so God is now suddenly in with the intellectual crowd, as well he should be.

00:30:29.840 And I think that this is the moment for us, each of us, not all of us, but each of us,

00:30:34.640 to ask ourselves, who is this God?

00:30:37.460 And what does he want from me?

00:30:39.160 Because every single person, not just in this room, but walking on the face of the planet,

00:30:44.020 knows he is not yet the person he was made to be.

00:30:46.640 And I think that that's something, I don't know, I think about it every day, I pray about

00:30:50.960 it every day.

00:30:51.760 And I think that's something everybody should be doing, because we're all here to create

00:30:55.300 something.

00:30:55.940 Maybe it's a family.

00:30:57.040 Maybe it's just a way of looking at things.

00:30:58.920 Maybe it's a business.

00:30:59.820 Maybe it's, you know, works of art.

00:31:01.380 Whatever it is, we are all here to make stuff.

00:31:03.920 And you make stuff out of your heart.

00:31:05.480 And you make stuff out of who you are.

00:31:07.300 And working toward becoming who you are is something you can't do alone.

00:31:11.240 You've got to do it with God.

00:31:12.520 And I think this is the moment for us to reconsider what that means to believe and what it means

00:31:18.060 in our personal lives, and then act it out and live it out.

00:31:21.080 I also think about God every day and about how you're not yet the man that you were made

00:31:29.680 to be.

00:31:30.940 Every day, you pray about it.

00:31:31.940 Every day.

00:31:32.320 And he calls me, like at three in the morning.

00:31:35.280 Matt.

00:31:35.640 What was the question?

00:31:37.740 Bear.

00:31:38.560 Ben.

00:31:39.680 I mean, first of all, I'm having trouble getting over Drew calling God Uncle God.

00:31:43.840 I really am.

00:31:44.460 When you're as old as Drew.

00:31:46.100 Wow.

00:31:46.980 We've been around a long time.

00:31:48.040 We've been together a long time.

00:31:49.400 My goodness.

00:31:49.900 I never, it's rare that you spring a new one on me.

00:31:51.860 But Uncle God was definitely a new one.

00:31:54.140 So I think that one of the great dangers that conservatives face right now is that so many

00:31:59.780 of our institutions have been thoroughly corrupted by the left, that the temptation is to destroy

00:32:03.220 all of them.

00:32:03.720 And you see this in government.

00:32:05.800 A huge number of institutions in government are completely broken, need to be destroyed,

00:32:09.920 rebuilt from the ground up.

00:32:11.180 But my problem is that I see some people, Andrew Tate, who are attempting to take social institutions

00:32:17.400 and then destroy those social institutions as well.

00:32:19.880 Pretend that they are meritless.

00:32:21.060 That because there have been bad things that have been done to those institutions, now you

00:32:24.680 throw out the baby with the bath water and those institutions are themselves meretricious

00:32:28.400 and need to be destroyed.

00:32:29.860 And the substitute morality that is offered is actually amorality.

00:32:33.220 It's actually sin.

00:32:34.420 And that is a deeply disturbing and disturbed point of view.

00:32:38.600 The thing that we all need to do, I think, and what I hope to do in my own life, is not

00:32:43.300 to make excuses.

00:32:44.780 Okay?

00:32:44.900 This is the biggest thing.

00:32:45.800 And this, to me, is the essence of conservatism.

00:32:47.500 Stop making excuses for your own failure.

00:32:50.380 It is one thing to point to an actual wrong that is being done in the world and say that

00:32:55.160 this wrong needs to be corrected.

00:32:56.420 Because the world is filled with wrongs and it's filled with injustices and it's filled

00:32:59.580 with bad things that do need correction.

00:33:01.760 It is another thing to look at your own failure and then not say, what can I fix?

00:33:06.440 But instead look out there at, you know, the institution, I can't find a girl.

00:33:10.100 Thus, the institution of marriage is broken and thus I should treat women like trash.

00:33:13.900 Okay?

00:33:14.160 That is a terrible way to go about your life.

00:33:16.560 The answer to finding a good woman is to be a good man.

00:33:20.260 Right?

00:33:20.480 The answer to having a good marriage is to find a good woman and engage in a good marriage.

00:33:25.380 The answer to finding yourself a better church is to find yourself a better church.

00:33:30.380 If you don't actually like the church that you're going to, if it's been taken over

00:33:32.960 by Wokies, then the answer is not, well, I guess we're done with the church.

00:33:36.220 The church is stupid.

00:33:37.000 We're not doing it anymore.

00:33:37.800 The answer is to either form your own or to find a more traditional instituted church

00:33:42.480 that is not doing those stupid things.

00:33:44.640 And I think one of the great temptations of politics is to assume that politics can solve

00:33:48.380 everything.

00:33:48.800 You got problems in your life, economic, spiritual, marital, and politics is going to solve

00:33:53.400 all of those problems.

00:33:54.240 If only you can go after somebody out there and blame those people, well, then that gives

00:33:58.120 you the license to do really whatever you want.

00:34:00.580 And then the failures that spring there from are not your own fault.

00:34:02.960 And that, to me, is a sin.

00:34:04.240 It's a sin against yourself.

00:34:05.300 It's a sin against your society.

00:34:06.520 It's a sin against the God who created you, gave you free will, the ability to choose,

00:34:10.240 and the skills with which to do something productive in the world.

00:34:13.020 Yeah.

00:34:13.960 It's...

00:34:14.960 I was in a dialogue with someone online once who was talking about how because divorce

00:34:22.260 laws are punitive toward men, which is undeniably true, that marriage itself should be eradicated.

00:34:29.000 And this person kept saying over and over, my wife left me, and she destroyed my relationship

00:34:35.540 with my children.

00:34:36.340 She took the house.

00:34:37.540 She got half of my money.

00:34:39.100 I didn't want a divorce.

00:34:40.420 She chose to get this divorce.

00:34:41.820 And he had tons of followers.

00:34:43.000 He's creating tons of energy around this argument.

00:34:45.540 And I said, listen, there's no question divorce laws are punitive toward men.

00:34:48.960 They need to be changed.

00:34:50.140 All of the incentives around marriage have become deeply inverted to the detriment of our society.

00:34:55.740 These are real policy issues that need to be addressed.

00:34:59.100 I said, but I do think that you're throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

00:35:01.680 I mean, I'm sorry that this happened to you, that your wife left you for no reason.

00:35:04.540 He said, well, I mean, she had a reason.

00:35:05.900 I cheated on her.

00:35:09.000 And I said, oh, well, there you go.

00:35:11.500 Methinks the policy that you are actually against is the policy of you.

00:35:17.180 The policy of consequence, of just consequence.

00:35:19.460 And that doesn't mean...

00:35:19.900 One of the Ten Commandments.

00:35:20.500 That's the policy that he opposed.

00:35:21.640 Yeah.

00:35:22.760 Uncle God's policies.

00:35:23.760 But it is nevertheless the case that most of what your life will be is what you make

00:35:28.760 of it.

00:35:29.460 There will be parts of your life that are impacted by outside forces, absolutely.

00:35:33.720 And the beauty of politics is that we have the opportunity, especially in a country like

00:35:37.360 this one, to do something about those policies that impede our ability to live our lives.

00:35:41.560 But, you know, I was backstage talking to Mike Rowe.

00:35:43.460 He mentioned there are 8 million open jobs in this country right now.

00:35:47.760 There are 7 million working age men who aren't just unemployed.

00:35:52.640 They have removed themselves from the workforce.

00:35:55.520 They do...

00:35:56.060 They're not looking for a job.

00:35:57.560 They don't want a job.

00:35:59.480 They feel disenfranchised because they have been disenfranchised.

00:36:02.540 But they are also participating in their own disenfranchisement.

00:36:05.760 And one of the things I've learned in life, one of the things I've learned in business,

00:36:10.060 you know, sometimes people who've succeeded in business will tell you business is about

00:36:12.900 fail, fail, fail until you make it.

00:36:15.360 And that's not true.

00:36:17.680 Success in business is about fail, fail, fail, fail, fail.

00:36:22.000 And with a little luck, you made it along the way.

00:36:24.440 Anyway, it's much more...

00:36:26.420 It's less like getting to a destination and much more like being a batter in the major leagues.

00:36:31.160 If you get a hit three out of ten times in the major leagues, you will be in the Hall of Fame.

00:36:40.140 There will be statues of you in your hometown.

00:36:42.480 You did not get a hit 70% of the time.

00:36:46.060 And it's not as though once you did get a hit, you only hit from there on out.

00:36:49.760 No, it's that you missed, you missed, you got a hit.

00:36:52.360 You missed, you missed, you missed, you got a hit.

00:36:54.060 You missed, you got a hit, you got walked.

00:36:56.640 Most of the times when you got the hit, you still didn't score.

00:37:00.620 You got thrown out at second.

00:37:02.400 Or the batter right behind you was the third out.

00:37:05.560 And you basically got your hit and got on base for no reason whatsoever.

00:37:09.000 Sometimes you score and you didn't earn it.

00:37:12.000 Sometimes you pop it up, but the infield fly rule goes into effect

00:37:15.880 and no one even knows what's happening in the game anymore.

00:37:18.660 I lost the analogy, but I'm sure there was...

00:37:21.080 All that matters is that you get back.

00:37:24.040 You get back up and keep batting.

00:37:25.040 That's the only difference between...

00:37:26.660 It's not the only difference, but it's the fundamental difference

00:37:28.920 between people who make it in baseball

00:37:31.340 and people who do not make it in baseball.

00:37:33.500 And it is true in business, and it is true in your marriage.

00:37:36.160 It's true as a parent.

00:37:37.180 It's true in almost every aspect of your life.

00:37:39.620 It's your ability to take life as it is, not as you wish it would be,

00:37:44.320 to take the hard parts of life and to keep getting back up

00:37:47.140 and to keep doing your job.

00:37:49.020 Well, speaking of the hard parts of life, taxes, folks.

00:37:52.340 So, am I right?

00:37:53.420 Taxes suck, right?

00:37:54.440 They're bad.

00:37:54.800 That's why President Trump just fired everybody to the IRS.

00:37:57.340 He actually did.

00:37:58.100 He just fired, like, thousands of people to the IRS.

00:38:00.040 Well, unfortunately, you don't have a choice.

00:38:02.000 I'm sorry to tell you this.

00:38:03.000 April 15th tax day is just around the corner.

00:38:05.320 And don't think that just because Trump and Elon are going through

00:38:08.220 and basically making all these people unemployed

00:38:09.820 that you're not going to have to pay your taxes.

00:38:11.700 You eventually will.

00:38:13.200 But you don't have to worry about your tax issues with Tax Network USA.

00:38:17.180 Woo!

00:38:17.700 Did you see where I was going with that, folks?

00:38:19.240 Did I project it?

00:38:20.120 In any case, Tax Network USA has a preferred direct line to the IRS,

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00:38:59.680 or visit TNUSA.com slash Daily Wire.

00:39:02.960 Again, that's 1-800-958-1000

00:39:05.480 or visit TNUSA.com slash Daily Wire.

00:39:09.720 So, clap for the advertising.

00:39:12.100 That's part of the show.

00:39:12.880 Yeah, I mean, that's what we all love, correct?

00:39:15.580 We like to take questions from our Daily Wire Plus subscribers

00:39:18.760 during our Ben Key show.

00:39:20.380 They're the people who make it possible for us to keep,

00:39:22.400 alongside our advertisers,

00:39:23.440 to keep doing the work that we do over at Daily Wire.

00:39:25.880 But today we want to take questions from you guys.

00:39:28.620 Ben has a policy that if you disagree,

00:39:30.860 he would like you to come to the front of the line.

00:39:32.380 I have precisely the opposite policy.

00:39:35.260 The more sycophantish you are,

00:39:36.980 the more I want your questions.

00:39:39.020 So please, if you like me or even love me,

00:39:42.260 front of the line, we'll take our first question.

00:39:44.200 Awesome. Thanks, guys.

00:39:45.460 My name is Luke Rexing, and I am actually a subscriber.

00:39:48.360 So thank you for what you do.

00:39:50.160 I am also getting into cigars,

00:39:51.720 so I haven't tried one of those yet.

00:39:54.120 Tonight's the night.

00:39:55.100 Yeah.

00:39:55.920 Pass this back.

00:39:56.460 Baby? Yes.

00:39:59.680 Let's go. Thank you.

00:40:01.320 You can just Venmo me for about $15 for that.

00:40:05.000 Sounds good.

00:40:05.560 That's fine.

00:40:06.340 Whenever you have a moment.

00:40:08.000 Please be 18.

00:40:09.840 23.

00:40:10.960 I think it's 21 now.

00:40:12.320 Yeah.

00:40:13.180 But my question is,

00:40:15.060 as a young conservative who wants to focus on a new business

00:40:17.840 and an entrepreneurial spirit,

00:40:19.680 how should I go about integrating my views into my business?

00:40:23.800 Ben?

00:40:24.300 Well, I think it depends on the kind of business that you're founding.

00:40:27.140 So, I mean, there are certain things that are just baseline conservative,

00:40:29.180 like, be honest in business and don't try to cheat people, right?

00:40:33.080 In my faith, the Jewish faith, you may have noticed,

00:40:35.960 it says that the first thing that God is going to ask you after you die

00:40:40.260 is, were you honest in your business dealings?

00:40:42.440 That is one of the things that Judaism teaches.

00:40:44.040 As you know, we like the money.

00:40:44.940 In any case,

00:40:46.180 when it comes to actually forming a business,

00:40:50.660 you know,

00:40:50.980 the hard part of business,

00:40:52.000 and Jeremy can talk about this more than I can,

00:40:53.480 since he does a lot of the hiring and firing,

00:40:54.640 is actually being cold-blooded enough to look at what's working and what's not.

00:40:59.140 You're not doing anybody any kindnesses

00:41:00.740 by keeping people in the wrong position for too long.

00:41:03.880 That's the hardest part, I think, of doing business,

00:41:06.200 is the difficulty in extricating yourself emotionally from the business

00:41:09.080 to do the efficient thing.

00:41:10.760 But it is important that in order for your business to be a success,

00:41:13.840 in order to be able to employ other people

00:41:14.940 and provide goods and services at a market rate,

00:41:17.420 that you actually make those hard decisions.

00:41:19.500 And again, I think that that requires a certain level of emotional remove,

00:41:23.580 and you have to understand that you're actually, again,

00:41:25.740 not doing anybody any favors

00:41:27.000 by keeping them in a position where they ought not be.

00:41:29.820 And that does, I think, also include the reality

00:41:33.060 that you have to, I think, take the blame on yourself

00:41:35.600 if you hired the wrong person.

00:41:37.240 Usually, if an employee fails,

00:41:38.500 if somebody does something wrong at your company,

00:41:40.080 it's probably because you put the wrong person

00:41:42.120 in the wrong position to succeed.

00:41:43.440 That's sort of your job as a company,

00:41:44.920 is to put people in the right position to succeed.

00:41:47.180 And so that, I think, is the hardest part.

00:41:48.580 Can I also say one thing?

00:41:49.880 That you're integrating your values into the business,

00:41:52.780 and I don't know what your business is.

00:41:55.620 Maybe you said it.

00:41:56.440 I haven't been paying attention to the questions today.

00:41:58.420 No, I'm sorry.

00:41:59.620 But so integrate them as in, like Ben said,

00:42:02.940 you're living according to your values.

00:42:04.940 What I think you don't need to do and probably shouldn't do

00:42:07.340 is say, well, this is my business,

00:42:09.420 and I'm the, this is the conservative version of this business.

00:42:13.040 We're the conservative fill in the blank.

00:42:15.240 You don't need to be that.

00:42:16.120 Just do the business and do it well.

00:42:17.780 And if you're living according to your values,

00:42:20.140 then you're already, you know,

00:42:21.680 the conservative version of that business.

00:42:24.580 Sounds good.

00:42:25.260 Thank you, guys.

00:42:26.080 Thank you.

00:42:28.760 Hey, my name is Christy Clark,

00:42:30.680 and I'm actually asking this question

00:42:32.980 for my 14-year-old daughter,

00:42:34.460 who's at home watching right now

00:42:35.780 and absolutely loves y'all.

00:42:37.880 She watches you all the time.

00:42:39.360 I have to turn her TV off at night.

00:42:41.200 Matt, super uncomfortable movie.

00:42:43.920 Absolutely loved it.

00:42:44.860 I don't know how you sat there and did that,

00:42:47.900 but that was amazing.

00:42:49.720 It's because I'm a, as Jeremy's pointed out,

00:42:52.060 it's because I'm a sociopath.

00:42:53.200 It was insane.

00:42:54.080 That's how.

00:42:54.620 That's my secret.

00:42:55.820 But my question for my daughter, Belle,

00:42:57.600 is she wants to be just like you.

00:42:59.180 She's 14.

00:43:00.540 She's charging that way of doing this type of thing,

00:43:04.040 absolutely wants to do this in life.

00:43:06.060 And how does she get started,

00:43:08.860 even at 14, in the world that we live in,

00:43:12.120 where she is pro-Trump, pro-Republican?

00:43:15.580 What does she do at this age to be you one day

00:43:18.460 and take over Daily Wire, Ben?

00:43:23.340 Eventually, we'll be for sale, so she can do that.

00:43:25.300 But I think that, you know,

00:43:27.300 I started writing a syndicated column when I was 17,

00:43:29.320 so actually not that much older than your daughter is now.

00:43:32.020 And the key, I think this is true, by the way,

00:43:34.260 in virtually all businesses,

00:43:35.260 but it's certainly true when it comes to political commentary,

00:43:38.120 is you have to read an awful lot,

00:43:40.440 learn a lot an awful lot about the business,

00:43:41.800 and do a lot of work for free.

00:43:43.820 There's no such thing as a person who's success

00:43:45.680 in literally any business who was not a failure

00:43:48.700 for a very long time before they were a success.

00:43:51.160 Everyone who's an overnight success

00:43:52.680 was an overnight success 10 years in the making.

00:43:54.880 And so I started writing a syndicated column

00:43:56.320 making no money off of this for probably a decade

00:43:58.480 before I had, you know,

00:43:59.900 the famous Pierce Morgan interview.

00:44:01.040 That was like fully a decade

00:44:02.260 after I started doing what I was doing.

00:44:04.420 And that takes an awful lot of reading and writing.

00:44:05.960 And then the other thing that I would say

00:44:07.260 is that she should attempt,

00:44:09.340 and I think everybody should attempt,

00:44:10.620 to find a niche where you're a specialist in the thing.

00:44:14.020 And that can be an information niche.

00:44:15.400 Either you can know a lot about a particular topic,

00:44:17.120 or you can be willing to report on a particular topic.

00:44:19.960 And if you have a monopoly on that topic,

00:44:21.420 that makes you a marketable commodity, right?

00:44:23.120 Everybody's got an opinion on politics.

00:44:24.440 Everybody in the room

00:44:25.100 could be a political columnist, I'm sure.

00:44:27.200 But there's a difference between that

00:44:29.060 and being a person who does the research

00:44:31.600 and does the hard work that nobody else wants to do.

00:44:34.080 And one of my mentors, Andrew Breitbart,

00:44:35.340 used to say that if you have a cell phone

00:44:36.800 with a camera, you're now a reporter.

00:44:39.000 And that's one way that I encourage young people

00:44:40.520 to get started is you're in your town.

00:44:43.000 There are stories all around you

00:44:44.260 of things that probably require change.

00:44:46.520 You know, get those stories,

00:44:48.040 hook up with an outlet like ours,

00:44:49.140 we'll report it, and we'll make that a thing.

00:44:51.020 And that's a great way to get started

00:44:52.400 in this particular business.

00:44:53.180 You know, one of the great advantages

00:44:55.060 if you want to be successful in media

00:44:56.420 is that, and we're testament to this,

00:44:58.780 it requires no talent to do media at all.

00:45:02.220 So if your daughter has talent,

00:45:03.380 then she's already a step ahead

00:45:04.960 of like 95% of the business.

00:45:06.100 It might be at a disadvantage, though.

00:45:07.060 If she actually has talent.

00:45:08.760 You know, to your point, Ben, on reading,

00:45:11.460 one thing I would say,

00:45:12.560 especially if your daughter's 14,

00:45:14.140 which is great, love that.

00:45:15.520 I was a political junkie

00:45:17.600 from the age of at least six.

00:45:19.400 I was like campaigning for Bob Dole

00:45:22.000 in my first grade classroom, all right?

00:45:23.760 I was more excited about Bob Dole

00:45:25.400 than Bob Dole was.

00:45:26.980 But, so I'm all about it.

00:45:28.600 However, now it's very easy

00:45:30.660 to become famous or infamous at a young age

00:45:33.260 because of social media and cameras.

00:45:36.060 And she should resist that urge

00:45:37.980 because you have to read like anything

00:45:41.360 because no one reads anything anymore.

00:45:42.740 So if you read one book,

00:45:43.740 you will know much more than most people.

00:45:45.720 However, if you want to have a view of politics

00:45:48.400 that is solid, that is stable,

00:45:50.840 that will deepen over time, of course,

00:45:52.500 but that is grounded in something,

00:45:54.620 you have to read like a billion books

00:45:56.760 and it's just not possible to do that at age 14.

00:45:59.400 So I would recommend figuring out what she thinks,

00:46:02.160 get the book learning,

00:46:03.240 get a little practical learning.

00:46:04.760 I think working on a congressional campaign

00:46:06.460 is the best political education out there.

00:46:08.860 I worked on campaigns as a teenager

00:46:10.620 and in my 20s,

00:46:11.680 it taught me a lot that you can't learn in books.

00:46:14.040 And then when she's ready,

00:46:15.920 you know, I don't know, 16, 17,

00:46:17.580 maybe a little later,

00:46:18.360 maybe 28, 29,

00:46:19.500 then she can make a big splash

00:46:21.020 and she'll be ready to go

00:46:22.080 and she'll have something

00:46:22.760 that distinguishes her from everybody else.

00:46:27.680 Hi, my name is Blake Markson.

00:46:30.020 I'm a subscriber.

00:46:31.740 And my question here,

00:46:34.440 I'm a college student

00:46:35.380 and I'm just,

00:46:36.480 I've been,

00:46:37.020 throughout my education,

00:46:37.800 I've like questioned DEI

00:46:39.800 and a lot of subjective business measures.

00:46:42.700 So what I'm wondering

00:46:44.660 is how you guys

00:46:45.860 would challenge these viewpoints

00:46:47.220 and kind of move throughout

00:46:49.200 like my educational process

00:46:50.840 because I'm a sophomore right now

00:46:52.340 and not really liking everything

00:46:53.800 that I'm doing right now.

00:46:55.120 Yeah.

00:46:55.640 One thing I would say

00:46:56.680 is that

00:46:57.160 it can be really easy

00:46:59.660 to be tempted

00:47:00.280 toward

00:47:00.820 some sort of absolute answer

00:47:02.780 on a question like this.

00:47:03.980 You know,

00:47:04.120 some people will tell you

00:47:04.980 just keep your head down,

00:47:06.200 get your degree,

00:47:07.380 you're paying to be there,

00:47:08.640 the most important thing

00:47:09.500 is not to rock the boat.

00:47:10.860 You need something from them

00:47:11.940 in exchange for your money

00:47:12.820 and your time.

00:47:13.480 Go get it.

00:47:13.960 That's the only reason you're there.

00:47:15.180 Other people will say

00:47:16.040 you should just be fighting

00:47:17.160 all the way,

00:47:17.740 defending your rights.

00:47:18.540 Campuses are ground zero

00:47:20.120 for all the worst things

00:47:21.300 that are happening in our culture.

00:47:22.380 Be an activist.

00:47:23.140 But the truth is

00:47:23.920 you actually have to live your life

00:47:25.380 and none of the people

00:47:26.240 giving you advice

00:47:26.900 on this topic do.

00:47:28.200 And only you know

00:47:29.040 what you actually want to get

00:47:30.760 out of this experience in college.

00:47:32.640 Only you know

00:47:33.280 what kind of career

00:47:33.980 you want to build in your life

00:47:35.160 on the other side

00:47:35.920 of your time in college.

00:47:37.820 Some of them much more dependent

00:47:39.380 on getting that degree

00:47:40.340 than perhaps others are.

00:47:42.480 I think the best thing

00:47:43.240 you can do in this regard

00:47:44.040 is live according to your lights.

00:47:45.180 The one thing I'll say

00:47:45.920 you should not do

00:47:47.000 is live your life out of fear.

00:47:49.660 If you find yourself

00:47:50.560 living your life out of fear,

00:47:52.100 you actually can't make

00:47:53.060 the cynical calculation

00:47:54.180 of I will live my life

00:47:55.420 out of fear

00:47:55.940 but on the other side of it

00:47:57.440 I'll be very, very successful.

00:47:59.240 That's a deal with the devil

00:48:00.140 that you can just never walk back.

00:48:01.720 But that doesn't mean

00:48:02.440 that you always have to be in the fight.

00:48:04.340 It doesn't mean

00:48:04.700 that you have to be reckless

00:48:05.640 in every situation.

00:48:07.820 I will say in my own life

00:48:09.120 I've made the choice

00:48:09.980 from a young age

00:48:11.480 probably before I could

00:48:12.180 make it consciously

00:48:12.900 that I was just going to say

00:48:14.240 what I believed

00:48:14.820 in every situation

00:48:15.840 and come what may.

00:48:17.920 And you know

00:48:18.420 I'd like to say

00:48:19.380 that it's worked out well for me.

00:48:21.040 I've gone through

00:48:21.520 a lot of real difficulties

00:48:22.960 because of that decision.

00:48:25.460 I don't necessarily think

00:48:27.120 that that is the most virtuous decision.

00:48:29.340 I think it's the most Gen X decision

00:48:30.880 but I don't know

00:48:31.740 that it's the most virtuous decision

00:48:33.180 although it can contain virtue.

00:48:36.760 Sometimes though

00:48:37.400 it can contain hubris

00:48:39.260 and recklessness

00:48:39.860 and all sorts of other things.

00:48:41.920 So I think that rather than looking

00:48:42.960 for like an absolute answer

00:48:44.260 to the question

00:48:44.900 the very best thing

00:48:46.120 that you can do

00:48:46.800 is actually know yourself

00:48:48.240 know what you're trying

00:48:49.360 to accomplish

00:48:49.920 know what fights

00:48:50.900 are worth your time

00:48:52.300 to be in

00:48:53.020 and go fight those fights.

00:48:55.040 And if it happens

00:48:55.520 if you're like me

00:48:56.140 it'll be all of them

00:48:56.900 and you'll never get a college degree

00:48:58.440 and you won't make any money

00:48:59.140 until you're 30

00:48:59.720 and that's fine.

00:49:00.920 And if you're like Ben

00:49:02.660 you know you'll be writing

00:49:03.680 a syndicated column at 17

00:49:05.760 and now be Ben Shapiro.

00:49:07.260 You know I would like to add

00:49:08.440 just one more thing.

00:49:10.000 Don't lie.

00:49:11.140 You don't have to get into every fight.

00:49:12.760 You don't always have to speak up

00:49:14.160 if it's not important

00:49:15.560 if it's not that big a deal.

00:49:17.140 But don't let them make you lie

00:49:18.200 because some of them

00:49:19.100 will hunt you down

00:49:19.960 until you have to

00:49:21.100 until you either have to lie

00:49:22.540 or tell the truth.

00:49:23.580 Oh I totally disagree with this.

00:49:24.540 You totally lied.

00:49:25.580 No wait.

00:49:26.360 Let me finish before you.

00:49:28.740 Whatever he says

00:49:29.580 because he doesn't know

00:49:30.320 what he's talking about.

00:49:31.460 Every lie takes something

00:49:33.580 out of your soul.

00:49:34.440 Every single one.

00:49:35.500 And the bigger lie

00:49:36.240 the bigger the piece

00:49:37.260 of your soul it takes.

00:49:38.560 Isn't worth it.

00:49:39.320 Not for a minute.

00:49:40.300 He's very old.

00:49:41.120 You should totally lie.

00:49:41.880 So the way that this works

00:49:42.680 is that when I was at UCLA

00:49:43.740 you speak up in class

00:49:45.820 and then they had these things

00:49:46.740 called blue books.

00:49:47.380 The blue books

00:49:47.740 were the anonymous test

00:49:48.560 that you took.

00:49:49.060 You would write by hand

00:49:50.360 in those days

00:49:50.820 and you I know

00:49:51.800 it's a long time ago

00:49:52.660 and you would write

00:49:53.200 a student number

00:49:54.180 not an actual name

00:49:54.960 on your blue book

00:49:55.460 and then you write

00:49:56.180 like a comma

00:49:56.600 and you get the A.

00:49:57.900 Obviously

00:49:58.220 because what difference

00:49:59.200 does it make

00:49:59.580 what you write

00:49:59.860 inside the blue book?

00:50:00.740 So that's where you lie.

00:50:01.520 Look in his eyes.

00:50:02.460 Do you want to be like that?

00:50:03.540 No.

00:50:04.160 Look at my wallet.

00:50:04.920 Do you want to be like that?

00:50:08.020 Live according to your lights.

00:50:10.520 Thank you.

00:50:11.020 Hey gang my name is Yehuda

00:50:13.940 and it's so special

00:50:15.220 to be here with you.

00:50:15.960 I'm also a Daily Wire Plus subscriber

00:50:18.080 and I must say Michael

00:50:19.420 I disagree with you

00:50:20.420 and I agree with Matt.

00:50:21.720 Kids should be at weddings.

00:50:24.460 Listen I'm not saying

00:50:25.840 Wait you said they shouldn't be?

00:50:26.860 I said

00:50:27.520 I didn't say

00:50:28.380 they should never be at a wedding

00:50:29.720 but sometimes

00:50:30.600 you throw on the tuxedo

00:50:32.860 you have a few Coca-Colas

00:50:34.660 it's a late night wedding

00:50:36.280 and I don't want

00:50:37.060 the little wedding kids.

00:50:38.060 A wedding for children

00:50:38.600 that's why marriage exists.

00:50:39.920 In like Pakistan

00:50:40.720 not in America

00:50:41.520 There's a total lib over here.

00:50:44.360 That's a lib position.

00:50:45.480 Look at what you started.

00:50:46.540 Look at this.

00:50:47.260 On a more serious note

00:50:48.420 on a more serious note

00:50:49.560 over the years

00:50:50.040 it has become increasingly clear

00:50:51.680 that the mainstream media

00:50:52.660 is acting as an arm

00:50:53.840 of the Democratic Party

00:50:54.880 and as anti-American factions

00:50:58.720 although I repeat myself

00:51:00.080 this has come to a crescendo

00:51:01.840 during the last few election cycles

00:51:03.420 as well as during

00:51:04.200 the COVID pandemic

00:51:05.040 something I witnessed personally

00:51:06.640 as a medical doctor.

00:51:08.180 The most recent attempt

00:51:09.020 to equate free speech

00:51:10.700 to Nazi-era fascism

00:51:12.140 sets a new egregious level.

00:51:13.900 It would not be hard

00:51:16.100 to trace these media trends

00:51:17.380 to foreign groups

00:51:18.180 aggressively using our media

00:51:20.020 to undermine and sabotage

00:51:21.400 the United States.

00:51:22.620 With some investigation

00:51:23.360 we can easily find

00:51:24.660 which parties are complicit

00:51:26.060 in these efforts.

00:51:27.140 My question is

00:51:27.940 should we conduct

00:51:29.140 such an investigation

00:51:30.060 and furthermore

00:51:31.220 if we do

00:51:31.920 what actions should we take

00:51:33.720 based on the data we find?

00:51:36.460 Well I mean it depends

00:51:37.440 if you're talking about

00:51:38.200 foreign actors

00:51:39.000 who are actually funding

00:51:39.720 American media.

00:51:40.560 So yes I think

00:51:41.160 there should absolutely be

00:51:42.440 congressional investigations

00:51:43.800 presumably the House

00:51:44.740 Foreign Affairs Committee

00:51:45.440 looking into funding

00:51:47.380 of various enterprises

00:51:48.500 and the propaganda

00:51:49.300 that emerges

00:51:49.940 from those enterprises.

00:51:50.900 If you're talking about

00:51:51.860 the Democratic Party

00:51:52.820 working in cahoots

00:51:53.700 with the legacy media

00:51:55.680 I'm not sure

00:51:56.100 that you need an investigation

00:51:56.940 with that I think

00:51:57.880 you just need retinas

00:51:58.960 and a prefrontal cortex.

00:52:00.640 I mean basic logic

00:52:02.680 suggests that

00:52:03.260 the human centipede

00:52:04.080 that is the relationship

00:52:04.940 between the Democratic Party

00:52:06.280 and the media

00:52:06.820 is an ongoing bleep show.

00:52:08.720 So I don't think

00:52:09.960 that requires an investigation

00:52:10.920 and I don't think

00:52:11.560 it's a big scandal.

00:52:12.220 I think that the truth is

00:52:13.120 that the legacy media

00:52:13.800 and this is something

00:52:14.160 Drew said earlier

00:52:14.820 so Drew this is where

00:52:15.660 you're right.

00:52:16.000 You were wrong before

00:52:16.420 but now you're right.

00:52:18.060 What Drew said earlier

00:52:19.140 is right.

00:52:19.480 The legacy media

00:52:19.960 has absolutely destroyed itself.

00:52:21.480 What this last election cycle

00:52:22.560 did was expose

00:52:23.300 the legacy media

00:52:24.020 beyond all repair

00:52:24.960 and that was really exposed

00:52:26.840 not even by COVID

00:52:27.580 which was truly terrible

00:52:28.560 or BLM

00:52:29.140 which was also truly terrible

00:52:30.120 but by Joe Biden

00:52:31.200 dying on stage.

00:52:32.020 When Joe Biden died on stage

00:52:33.220 in that moment

00:52:34.020 the legacy media

00:52:34.860 was destroyed for all time

00:52:36.080 and I don't think

00:52:37.380 that they're ever going

00:52:38.040 to be able to recover it

00:52:39.200 and you can see it

00:52:39.700 in the numbers.

00:52:40.300 People do not trust

00:52:41.440 the legacy media.

00:52:42.680 It's irrecoverable.

00:52:44.620 The Washington Post

00:52:45.420 is never going to have

00:52:46.460 a majority of Americans

00:52:47.260 that believe it's

00:52:47.700 trustworthy again.

00:52:48.380 So I'm less worried

00:52:49.120 than I've ever been

00:52:50.200 about the power

00:52:51.080 of the legacy media

00:52:52.000 and I've spent most of my life

00:52:52.820 worrying about the legacy media.

00:52:53.860 You know Ben

00:52:54.340 you said something there

00:52:55.600 you mentioned

00:52:56.460 human centipede

00:52:57.680 you were evoking images

00:52:59.600 that are disgusting

00:53:00.900 and obscene

00:53:02.140 and I want you

00:53:03.000 to get your head

00:53:03.760 out of the gutter

00:53:04.480 and I want you

00:53:05.840 to get your minds

00:53:07.600 on the gutters

00:53:08.540 when I tell you

00:53:09.340 about Leaf Network

00:53:10.680 right now.

00:53:11.640 Okay?

00:53:12.780 LeafFilter.com

00:53:14.320 Thank you so much.

00:53:16.080 Good night folks.

00:53:17.700 LeafFilter.com

00:53:18.860 slash backstage.

00:53:19.880 Does anyone here

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00:53:50.880 If you're like me

00:53:51.880 you're brimming

00:53:52.820 with virility

00:53:53.540 but for whatever reason

00:53:54.580 you don't want to get up

00:53:55.340 on the ladder

00:53:55.760 and clean the gutters

00:53:56.440 all the time

00:53:56.980 I got your solution.

00:53:58.760 30% off

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00:54:02.520 slash backstage.

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00:54:08.900 Can I say

00:54:09.360 Bravo.

00:54:10.800 Bravo.

00:54:11.520 It's in times like this

00:54:13.100 that I'm really glad

00:54:14.020 that I'm so bad

00:54:14.700 at doing ad reads

00:54:15.380 because I don't have

00:54:16.120 to do this

00:54:17.380 ad read on stage

00:54:19.460 at CPAC.

00:54:20.300 Spoiler alert.

00:54:21.880 Hi my name's

00:54:25.600 John Hinshaw

00:54:26.420 Mr. Knowles

00:54:27.180 reference may be

00:54:28.200 for

00:54:28.480 I am one of the

00:54:31.000 Washington pro-lifers

00:54:33.000 who was sentenced

00:54:34.000 to 21 months in jail

00:54:36.300 and we thank

00:54:37.440 President Trump

00:54:38.340 for pardoning us

00:54:39.380 so that we're free

00:54:40.660 and we can be here.

00:54:42.240 What I wanted to

00:54:50.540 try to get a sense of

00:54:52.040 is

00:54:52.700 well

00:54:53.080 what I'm feeling

00:54:54.080 a sense of

00:54:54.960 is

00:54:55.520 there's really

00:54:56.480 an opportunity

00:54:57.280 for the United States

00:54:58.540 of America

00:54:59.140 to have a full

00:55:00.760 discussion

00:55:01.420 about the horror

00:55:03.300 of abortion.

00:55:05.200 We started to have it

00:55:07.260 in the 70s

00:55:08.120 I'm an old man

00:55:08.900 I remember it

00:55:09.760 but a lot of people

00:55:10.500 here don't

00:55:11.220 there started

00:55:12.420 a discussion

00:55:13.340 and then Roe v. Wade

00:55:14.880 happened

00:55:15.320 and aside from

00:55:17.160 all the lives

00:55:18.040 that were lost

00:55:18.880 and all the women

00:55:19.720 that were destroyed

00:55:20.600 there was also

00:55:22.080 the complete

00:55:22.880 cutting off

00:55:23.880 of discussion

00:55:25.220 about abortion

00:55:26.440 and the media

00:55:28.480 has kept it that way

00:55:29.660 our courts

00:55:30.540 we've never been able

00:55:32.640 even in the

00:55:33.580 Dobbs decision

00:55:34.660 the developing

00:55:36.500 child

00:55:37.200 before birth

00:55:38.120 is only

00:55:38.560 briefly

00:55:39.240 referenced

00:55:40.300 in all the other

00:55:42.380 court cases

00:55:43.120 it's about

00:55:43.960 some specific

00:55:44.800 legal

00:55:45.540 angle

00:55:47.040 to the issue

00:55:48.000 the heart

00:55:49.160 of the issue

00:55:49.720 which is

00:55:50.260 a developing

00:55:50.940 child

00:55:51.560 before birth

00:55:52.460 and this

00:55:53.820 I sense

00:55:54.460 is the time

00:55:55.300 this is the time

00:55:56.180 for this country

00:55:57.240 to take up

00:55:58.640 that discussion

00:55:59.420 and

00:56:00.580 even

00:56:01.980 when I'm

00:56:02.760 in disagreement

00:56:03.380 with President

00:56:04.220 Trump

00:56:04.720 as I am

00:56:05.440 on the IVF

00:56:06.500 it is an

00:56:08.800 opportunity

00:56:09.260 for discussion

00:56:10.100 and so I even

00:56:11.420 thank him

00:56:11.900 for that

00:56:12.480 so I wanted

00:56:13.320 to get some

00:56:13.840 of your feedback

00:56:14.440 on that

00:56:15.160 yeah

00:56:15.420 look

00:56:15.840 I think

00:56:16.520 I totally agree

00:56:17.720 with everything

00:56:18.080 that you said

00:56:18.600 and

00:56:19.160 it's easy

00:56:20.820 to forget

00:56:21.320 that just

00:56:21.780 even several

00:56:23.080 months ago

00:56:23.600 certainly in the

00:56:24.080 last couple

00:56:24.460 of years

00:56:24.820 we were told

00:56:25.860 even by conservatives

00:56:26.820 that our victories

00:56:28.860 you know

00:56:29.380 the great victory

00:56:30.260 of repealing Roe v. Wade

00:56:31.580 one of the great

00:56:32.420 human rights victories

00:56:33.800 of all time

00:56:34.500 was actually a bad

00:56:35.720 thing politically

00:56:36.340 because we were

00:56:36.840 going to pay for it

00:56:37.580 we were going to

00:56:37.840 pay the price

00:56:38.540 with some great

00:56:39.600 backlash in the polls

00:56:40.720 and the women

00:56:41.180 of America

00:56:41.720 would rise up

00:56:43.160 to punish us

00:56:43.860 for protecting

00:56:44.840 babies from slaughter

00:56:45.800 and that didn't happen

00:56:46.980 and the reason

00:56:47.620 that it didn't happen

00:56:48.460 is because it turns out

00:56:50.200 as many of us

00:56:51.280 as we have all

00:56:51.920 been saying

00:56:52.340 people like you

00:56:52.820 have been saying

00:56:53.200 the pro-life argument

00:56:54.540 is a winning argument

00:56:55.960 it is a winning argument

00:56:57.440 and as long as

00:56:59.640 you're just honest

00:57:00.620 the only way

00:57:01.360 to win the argument

00:57:02.180 when you're pro-life

00:57:03.920 is to be brutally honest

00:57:05.540 and to show

00:57:06.880 it's one thing

00:57:07.740 you know

00:57:07.980 if we are claiming

00:57:08.900 that there is a genocide

00:57:10.820 of children happening

00:57:11.860 that 60 million

00:57:13.880 human beings

00:57:14.720 have been slaughtered

00:57:15.560 by abortion

00:57:16.060 if that's what we claim

00:57:17.540 which is what we claim

00:57:18.540 because it's true

00:57:19.280 then there should be

00:57:21.400 passion

00:57:22.080 and even anger

00:57:22.980 behind our words

00:57:24.080 and if there isn't

00:57:25.200 then why would anyone

00:57:25.900 take us seriously

00:57:26.620 because it's like

00:57:27.260 we don't even believe

00:57:28.020 what we're saying

00:57:28.560 so we are not the ones

00:57:31.220 the pro-abortion side

00:57:32.580 they're the ones

00:57:33.780 who have to cover

00:57:34.420 everything they say

00:57:35.360 in euphemisms

00:57:36.160 they have to be very careful

00:57:37.380 about every word

00:57:38.160 they choose

00:57:38.760 and the euphemisms

00:57:39.680 constantly change

00:57:40.820 because they can't

00:57:43.040 talk simply

00:57:44.000 and clearly

00:57:44.560 about what the thing is

00:57:45.800 and we win the argument

00:57:47.380 simply by being clear

00:57:49.240 about it

00:57:49.520 because the pro-life argument

00:57:50.460 is as I said

00:57:51.460 it's the most winning argument

00:57:52.660 of all time

00:57:53.100 the pro-life argument

00:57:54.140 is simply this

00:57:54.920 that it is always wrong

00:57:56.980 to intentionally kill

00:57:58.860 innocent human children

00:58:00.840 that's it

00:58:02.280 and I defy

00:58:05.080 any pro-abortion person

00:58:07.200 any so-called pro-choice person

00:58:08.880 to engage with that

00:58:10.720 are you saying

00:58:11.720 that there are times

00:58:12.580 when it is actually okay

00:58:13.800 to intentionally kill

00:58:15.320 an innocent human child

00:58:16.280 and that's what they don't

00:58:17.460 want to engage with

00:58:18.260 and as long as we're honest

00:58:19.400 about it

00:58:19.740 then we win the argument

00:58:20.380 and this is everything now

00:58:22.220 what you're talking about

00:58:23.080 is everything

00:58:23.560 having the argument openly

00:58:24.880 because the law

00:58:26.340 is not going to stop it

00:58:27.520 it's not going to be able

00:58:28.860 to stop it

00:58:29.420 with the technologies

00:58:30.160 with the medications

00:58:31.000 it'll still be going on

00:58:32.460 unless people see

00:58:33.840 unless they open their eyes

00:58:35.100 and see what they're doing

00:58:36.220 it's the only way

00:58:37.400 there are always going

00:58:37.980 to be murderers

00:58:38.620 there are always going

00:58:39.320 to be people who kill people

00:58:40.380 but at least we can make it

00:58:41.660 apparent to people

00:58:43.720 that if you're a good person

00:58:44.780 you don't do it

00:58:46.000 and that's an argument

00:58:47.280 we can win

00:58:47.840 and we have to win

00:58:48.560 we have to win it now

00:58:49.540 hi my name is Erin

00:58:56.680 I'm a college student

00:58:57.700 college is woke now

00:58:59.360 so what would you say

00:59:00.940 to me

00:59:01.660 as trying to

00:59:03.040 represent who I am

00:59:04.440 just like you guys

00:59:05.180 do every day

00:59:05.720 I couldn't quite hear

00:59:08.260 that

00:59:08.440 I couldn't hear

00:59:09.060 a word you said

00:59:09.660 you have a beautiful

00:59:12.040 mellifluous voice

00:59:13.160 I meant

00:59:13.900 college is woke

00:59:15.000 and I want to

00:59:16.400 pursue what I love

00:59:17.640 just like you guys do

00:59:18.640 what do you do

00:59:19.680 when you have that

00:59:20.580 thought in your head

00:59:21.420 it's like

00:59:21.860 pause

00:59:22.960 I need to keep doing

00:59:24.820 what I love to do

00:59:25.700 well I think that

00:59:26.440 I'm very famously

00:59:28.440 anti-college

00:59:29.440 I think that most people

00:59:31.660 should not go to college

00:59:32.920 thank you

00:59:34.420 I think that

00:59:35.760 you know

00:59:36.680 if you want to be

00:59:37.160 a heart surgeon

00:59:37.860 I think there's a strong case

00:59:39.400 that you should go

00:59:40.560 to college

00:59:41.400 but I think

00:59:43.000 most people

00:59:43.760 who are getting

00:59:44.580 you know

00:59:46.100 bachelors of fine arts

00:59:47.480 should not be getting them

00:59:49.260 and you might say

00:59:50.280 that in a better world

00:59:51.680 than this

00:59:52.360 those degrees

00:59:55.860 are useful

00:59:56.680 to society

00:59:57.360 back when we taught

00:59:58.780 things like

00:59:59.240 the western canon

01:00:00.300 back when we taught

01:00:01.320 things like

01:00:01.740 philosophy

01:00:02.420 perhaps a liberal arts degree

01:00:04.040 actually did prepare

01:00:05.540 you know

01:00:06.680 people who aren't

01:00:07.620 going to go into

01:00:07.960 very specialized fields

01:00:09.080 nevertheless

01:00:09.580 those degrees

01:00:10.440 and that experience

01:00:11.080 could prepare them

01:00:11.900 for their life

01:00:13.000 as productive citizens

01:00:13.900 we don't live

01:00:14.480 in that world anymore

01:00:15.360 you're not going to study

01:00:16.560 the western canon

01:00:17.320 if you go to college

01:00:18.180 and so unless you're going

01:00:19.080 to do something

01:00:19.500 very particular

01:00:20.140 I would go get a job

01:00:21.440 instead

01:00:21.820 the thing that you have

01:00:22.640 to do in this life

01:00:23.280 God said

01:00:24.080 you know

01:00:24.680 everybody likes to focus

01:00:25.400 on that

01:00:25.780 on the seventh day

01:00:26.820 you will rest

01:00:27.380 but the part that he said

01:00:28.120 right before that

01:00:28.780 was six days

01:00:29.840 you will toil

01:00:30.440 go to work

01:00:31.620 you know

01:00:33.160 I see your point

01:00:34.580 Jeremy

01:00:34.960 which is that

01:00:35.680 for 99% of colleges

01:00:37.660 and in 99%

01:00:38.780 of classes

01:00:39.300 maybe even

01:00:40.040 within colleges

01:00:41.040 you're not going

01:00:42.540 to be able

01:00:42.800 to get that

01:00:43.160 great education

01:00:43.940 I disagree

01:00:44.820 with my fellow

01:00:45.600 conservatives

01:00:46.200 they sometimes say

01:00:47.400 only go to college

01:00:48.420 if you're going

01:00:48.820 to study engineering

01:00:49.660 or if you're going

01:00:50.500 to study business

01:00:51.160 or something

01:00:51.520 I think that's

01:00:52.200 the exact opposite

01:00:53.120 reason to go to college

01:00:54.200 you should just

01:00:55.160 get a job

01:00:55.760 or an apprenticeship

01:00:56.460 or go to trade school

01:00:57.560 to learn a job

01:00:58.600 that's great

01:00:59.080 that's awesome

01:00:59.660 there's totally

01:01:00.860 a place for that

01:01:01.580 if you want

01:01:02.480 to get a university

01:01:03.140 education

01:01:03.760 the point of it

01:01:04.640 is not instrumental

01:01:05.720 or utilitarian

01:01:06.760 it's not just

01:01:07.960 to make some money

01:01:08.760 or something like that

01:01:09.520 the point is

01:01:10.400 to get at the truth

01:01:11.440 and the way you do that

01:01:12.320 is to immerse yourself

01:01:13.820 in philosophy

01:01:14.840 and in literature

01:01:15.680 and history

01:01:16.420 you can still do that

01:01:18.140 at some universities

01:01:19.100 there are good ones

01:01:20.020 I mean there's Hillsdale

01:01:21.040 Ave Maria

01:01:22.040 Franciscan

01:01:22.900 you know there are

01:01:23.280 a handful you can name

01:01:24.200 even at the big

01:01:25.080 brand name schools

01:01:26.020 there are at least

01:01:27.260 a few professors left

01:01:28.480 and then

01:01:29.180 my final point on this

01:01:30.500 if you find yourself

01:01:31.300 at a woke college

01:01:32.060 that doesn't have

01:01:33.080 great classes

01:01:33.820 and at the very least

01:01:35.840 you can understand

01:01:37.520 that every man

01:01:38.440 is my teacher

01:01:39.000 and I can learn

01:01:39.560 something from him

01:01:40.300 one of the greatest

01:01:41.420 not for 250,000

01:01:42.840 freaking dollars

01:01:43.440 books are free

01:01:44.160 that's true

01:01:44.660 listen

01:01:44.980 but teachers

01:01:46.200 you really do need

01:01:47.120 teachers and mentors

01:01:47.980 and things

01:01:48.500 I agree

01:01:49.140 quarter million bucks

01:01:50.200 you know

01:01:50.540 find scholarships

01:01:51.380 and things like that

01:01:52.200 but all of that

01:01:53.280 to say

01:01:53.800 if you're at

01:01:54.660 the woke college

01:01:55.500 you're making

01:01:56.280 a financially

01:01:56.920 reasonable decision

01:01:57.900 you can benefit

01:02:00.320 greatly

01:02:00.840 from being around

01:02:02.160 people who are

01:02:02.840 radically leftist

01:02:03.880 because you can

01:02:04.740 understand their

01:02:05.480 arguments

01:02:06.020 much much better

01:02:07.100 than they understand

01:02:07.960 your arguments

01:02:08.660 it will give you

01:02:09.820 an advantage

01:02:10.400 that is how we

01:02:11.780 win back culture

01:02:12.560 it is how we

01:02:13.880 make the best

01:02:15.200 of our

01:02:15.700 hold on a second

01:02:17.840 is he

01:02:18.260 or just don't go

01:02:19.660 to college

01:02:20.040 yeah

01:02:20.920 next question please

01:02:23.480 hi my name is

01:02:27.100 Alora Van Tassel

01:02:28.180 I'm the oldest

01:02:29.540 of six kids

01:02:30.420 so my parents

01:02:31.560 definitely understand

01:02:32.800 the difference

01:02:33.320 between a man

01:02:34.040 and a woman

01:02:34.480 so thank you

01:02:35.800 Matt for the movie

01:02:36.680 I want to ask

01:02:38.340 if you have

01:02:38.800 more tips

01:02:39.640 on standing up

01:02:40.920 against confirming

01:02:42.460 the people around

01:02:43.640 me who continue

01:02:45.000 to push the

01:02:45.700 gender ideology

01:02:46.700 keep in mind

01:02:47.760 I live in a

01:02:48.680 deep blue state

01:02:50.020 that is still

01:02:50.940 their media is

01:02:51.980 still controlled

01:02:52.660 by the left

01:02:53.460 so it is important

01:02:55.800 never to acquiesce

01:02:57.260 in this

01:02:57.620 truly it is

01:02:58.940 really really

01:02:59.660 really important

01:03:00.400 and you are

01:03:01.600 not doing

01:03:01.980 anybody any

01:03:02.500 favors

01:03:02.820 harsh truth

01:03:03.720 is still

01:03:04.280 better than

01:03:05.040 kind falsehood

01:03:05.860 and telling

01:03:07.980 somebody who

01:03:09.000 is obviously

01:03:10.100 suffering from

01:03:10.800 a mental

01:03:11.160 condition

01:03:11.660 that in

01:03:13.340 reality

01:03:13.800 they are a member

01:03:14.200 of the opposite

01:03:14.600 sex is not

01:03:15.220 doing them any

01:03:15.760 favors at all

01:03:16.720 you wouldn't do

01:03:17.400 it in any other

01:03:17.980 circumstance

01:03:18.420 you would never

01:03:18.900 say to an

01:03:19.360 anorexic person

01:03:20.120 actually you know

01:03:20.780 what you are

01:03:20.980 totally right

01:03:21.640 you are really

01:03:22.140 fat when they are

01:03:22.800 actually underweight

01:03:23.680 by 40 pounds

01:03:24.440 you would never

01:03:25.280 ever tell somebody

01:03:26.160 who is suffering

01:03:27.000 from severe

01:03:27.800 depression

01:03:28.200 that actually

01:03:29.100 maybe you are

01:03:29.420 right maybe

01:03:29.720 suicide is the

01:03:30.360 proper answer

01:03:30.980 maybe you are

01:03:31.740 thinking this

01:03:32.140 through properly

01:03:32.680 and so the idea

01:03:33.700 that you should

01:03:34.160 confirm somebody

01:03:35.120 in what is an

01:03:36.200 unhealthy delusion

01:03:37.200 is wrong

01:03:38.360 now is that

01:03:39.200 going to make

01:03:39.500 friends no

01:03:40.440 is that person

01:03:41.100 going to necessarily

01:03:42.420 want to go out

01:03:42.860 to dinner with you

01:03:43.400 no but they are

01:03:44.040 going to remember

01:03:44.620 in the darkness

01:03:45.660 of the night

01:03:46.280 that there was

01:03:47.220 somebody who was

01:03:47.860 telling them the

01:03:48.480 truth and that is

01:03:49.780 really really important

01:03:50.840 because if no one

01:03:51.780 tells them the truth

01:03:52.440 then they are never

01:03:52.860 going to understand

01:03:53.560 that the other

01:03:54.060 answer

01:03:54.440 was always there

01:03:55.420 which is that

01:03:55.840 maybe this is not

01:03:56.540 a body problem

01:03:57.420 maybe this is

01:03:58.360 actually a brain

01:03:59.300 problem

01:03:59.760 and that requires

01:04:01.960 different thinking

01:04:03.540 about these issues

01:04:04.440 entirely

01:04:05.060 and of course

01:04:05.740 Matt is the expert

01:04:06.780 on this particular

01:04:07.600 topic because

01:04:08.400 not only did he

01:04:09.340 make a movie

01:04:09.980 but I have heard

01:04:10.440 he is a woman

01:04:10.820 but

01:04:11.420 I mean

01:04:14.500 look I think

01:04:16.000 Ben

01:04:16.320 covered it well

01:04:18.320 I mean the most

01:04:19.400 important thing

01:04:20.160 and also to go

01:04:21.040 to Drew's point

01:04:22.100 earlier about

01:04:22.800 never lie

01:04:24.220 and so

01:04:24.760 you know

01:04:27.380 you don't have

01:04:28.040 to go looking

01:04:28.840 for confrontation

01:04:30.900 we tend to be

01:04:32.560 confrontational people

01:04:33.440 it's part of our job

01:04:34.380 we're kind of wired

01:04:35.780 that way

01:04:36.340 and so

01:04:36.980 if you are

01:04:37.600 and you want

01:04:37.900 to go out

01:04:38.320 and look for that

01:04:39.380 then I mean

01:04:39.960 God be with you

01:04:40.880 but you don't have

01:04:42.100 to do that

01:04:42.700 and you don't have

01:04:44.080 to go jumping

01:04:44.580 on every grenade

01:04:45.220 that you find

01:04:45.780 in the room

01:04:46.280 but it's just

01:04:47.680 don't play the game

01:04:49.000 don't acquiesce

01:04:50.260 don't play the language

01:04:51.500 games

01:04:51.960 you know

01:04:52.200 that was the

01:04:52.680 the big mistake

01:04:53.780 that was made

01:04:54.580 culturally

01:04:55.620 even among

01:04:56.880 some conservatives

01:04:57.680 back several years ago

01:04:59.060 where they started

01:05:00.080 playing the language game

01:05:01.360 and they said

01:05:01.700 well I just want

01:05:02.140 to be polite

01:05:02.700 and once we

01:05:03.620 once we start

01:05:04.460 putting politeness

01:05:05.500 over the truth

01:05:06.600 then you've already

01:05:07.780 lost

01:05:08.240 so don't do that

01:05:10.480 and you'll be fine

01:05:11.800 I think

01:05:12.060 hello my name

01:05:17.000 is Jeremiah

01:05:17.500 and I just wanted

01:05:19.120 to ask a question

01:05:19.860 on behalf

01:05:20.360 of Ben Davies

01:05:21.280 Michael Knowles

01:05:22.840 why do you pretend

01:05:23.960 like your show

01:05:24.740 is your own show

01:05:25.560 when clearly

01:05:26.420 Ben Davies

01:05:27.120 is the host

01:05:27.820 wow

01:05:29.020 wow

01:05:30.860 fighting words

01:05:31.660 did we just find

01:05:33.300 the one Ben Davies

01:05:34.580 fan at the entirety

01:05:36.000 of CPAC

01:05:36.780 that is

01:05:38.120 you know

01:05:38.980 sometimes people

01:05:39.920 infiltrate these events

01:05:41.160 you know

01:05:41.820 the leftists

01:05:42.860 or this kind

01:05:43.660 of disreputable

01:05:44.460 or all these

01:05:45.100 kind of people

01:05:45.560 and I found

01:05:47.040 my least favorite

01:05:48.100 infiltrator

01:05:48.840 and that is

01:05:49.320 the fan

01:05:49.780 of Ben Davies

01:05:50.480 though he does

01:05:52.260 run most of the show

01:05:53.040 if I'm being

01:05:53.480 totally frank about it

01:05:54.500 he runs a lot of it

01:05:55.380 I also wanted

01:05:56.280 to ask

01:05:56.700 what your favorite

01:05:57.400 funny Trump story

01:05:58.660 is

01:05:59.020 well my favorite

01:06:00.160 what story

01:06:00.520 funny Trump story

01:06:01.460 my favorite

01:06:02.180 funny Trump story

01:06:03.380 like a personal

01:06:04.320 Trump story

01:06:05.080 or I haven't

01:06:06.880 really interacted

01:06:07.600 with the man

01:06:08.140 all that much

01:06:08.920 however

01:06:09.680 there was

01:06:10.360 one great time

01:06:11.440 when I

01:06:12.920 well I can't say

01:06:14.060 I wrote a book

01:06:14.580 but I did a book

01:06:15.380 called Reasons

01:06:16.420 to Vote for Democrats

01:06:17.420 a Comprehensive Guy

01:06:18.300 we have scholars

01:06:19.680 in the audience

01:06:20.300 I see

01:06:20.740 that's great

01:06:21.260 a blank book

01:06:23.040 Ben Shapiro

01:06:24.860 blurbed it

01:06:25.420 as thorough

01:06:25.900 and anyway

01:06:26.920 I go

01:06:27.580 I did it

01:06:28.360 we sold a bazillion copies

01:06:29.660 I ended up getting

01:06:30.320 a big book deal

01:06:31.000 out of it

01:06:31.480 then I ended up

01:06:33.000 on television

01:06:33.900 on cable news

01:06:34.620 one morning

01:06:35.120 and the most important

01:06:37.620 viewer of the Fox News

01:06:38.840 morning show

01:06:39.460 was watching

01:06:40.340 from the White House

01:06:41.180 that was President Trump

01:06:42.840 and he endorsed the book

01:06:44.120 and it was really really great

01:06:44.960 and people wrote about it

01:06:46.340 in the newspapers

01:06:46.880 but the thing they didn't

01:06:47.980 write about is

01:06:48.640 he also quoted

01:06:50.880 the thing that I said

01:06:51.800 right beforehand

01:06:52.480 I think I was talking

01:06:53.040 about his Syria policy

01:06:54.040 or something

01:06:54.520 but the way he quoted it

01:06:56.240 made it seem like

01:06:57.300 I was the president

01:06:58.420 it was like Michael Knowles

01:06:59.700 my administration

01:07:00.560 is bombing Syria

01:07:01.740 and all that

01:07:02.060 and I thought

01:07:02.480 man this is really cool

01:07:03.440 the president

01:07:04.220 is making it sound

01:07:05.240 like I'm the president

01:07:06.380 that's a really gracious

01:07:07.640 thing for him to do

01:07:08.380 and then he plugged the book

01:07:09.460 so from my personal standpoint

01:07:11.080 that's my favorite

01:07:11.900 funny Trump story

01:07:12.800 but I don't know

01:07:13.980 there are about

01:07:14.380 10 billion others

01:07:15.480 for everyone else

01:07:16.520 in the room

01:07:16.980 thank you

01:07:18.520 g'day guys

01:07:21.740 I'm Geordi from Australia

01:07:22.960 with these noisy folks

01:07:24.300 up the front

01:07:24.760 I'm a casual subscriber

01:07:26.780 by the way

01:07:27.300 so when Matt has a movie

01:07:28.720 we are subscribed for that

01:07:29.840 question to Michael Knowles

01:07:32.740 you offered me

01:07:33.660 some whiskey just before

01:07:34.580 do you have a spare glass

01:07:35.420 up there?

01:07:36.520 of the 45, 47 whiskey?

01:07:39.580 yes please

01:07:40.040 do we have an extra glass?

01:07:42.420 do we have like a cannon

01:07:43.880 that I could blast

01:07:44.560 I haven't had a single sip

01:07:45.480 there you go

01:07:45.880 this is your whiskey now

01:07:46.880 thank you

01:07:47.420 I'll put it

01:07:48.040 do we can someone

01:07:48.800 here we are

01:07:49.420 wow this is great

01:07:50.600 we're giving people booze

01:07:52.300 we're giving them

01:07:52.980 is this legal?

01:07:53.800 this is certainly not legal

01:07:55.080 I'll walk it down

01:07:56.580 you know conservatives

01:07:58.980 we're people people

01:07:59.980 the libs

01:08:00.800 there you are sir

01:08:01.820 enjoy

01:08:02.820 I love it

01:08:06.760 this is

01:08:07.180 you know

01:08:07.440 it's like a family man

01:08:08.700 did you get his ID at least?

01:08:10.520 yeah

01:08:10.900 he's like 45 or something

01:08:12.160 I mean

01:08:12.480 I don't know

01:08:13.000 how many laws

01:08:13.980 are we going to break

01:08:14.640 during this show?

01:08:15.800 yeah yeah

01:08:16.140 if this kid asks for cocaine

01:08:18.240 the answer is no

01:08:19.600 the answer is no

01:08:21.200 can I get a cig?

01:08:26.000 any zins?

01:08:27.000 I need someone

01:08:27.800 to give me a zin actually

01:08:28.900 hello

01:08:30.600 everyone's tossing

01:08:31.820 you're all fine

01:08:32.980 no no

01:08:33.480 it's okay

01:08:34.100 my name is

01:08:36.120 William Ripsover

01:08:37.020 I had a question

01:08:39.320 for Matt

01:08:40.200 or Michael

01:08:40.820 as a

01:08:43.120 younger

01:08:44.020 man

01:08:44.680 I was wondering

01:08:45.640 what

01:08:46.560 saint

01:08:47.540 you try

01:08:48.320 hardest to model yourself after

01:08:50.360 and as a young man

01:08:52.200 what saint did you most

01:08:53.540 look up to?

01:08:55.600 you know

01:08:55.760 I

01:08:56.020 I'll go

01:08:58.180 to the

01:08:58.780 to the New Testament

01:09:00.180 and

01:09:00.760 Saint Paul

01:09:01.500 has always been

01:09:03.400 probably the saint

01:09:04.240 that I've felt the most

01:09:05.480 connection to

01:09:07.460 I wanted to choose that

01:09:09.300 as my confirmation name

01:09:10.460 but Paul Walsh

01:09:11.420 just didn't

01:09:12.500 I didn't think it sounded right

01:09:13.400 so I couldn't do it

01:09:14.600 but the thing I like about

01:09:16.780 Saint Paul

01:09:18.140 I mean obviously

01:09:18.860 some of the most

01:09:19.500 beautiful

01:09:20.120 words

01:09:22.500 some of those

01:09:22.980 beautiful insights

01:09:23.680 ever written

01:09:24.240 can be found

01:09:24.920 in the Pauline epistles

01:09:26.200 but also

01:09:27.680 I guess I kind of

01:09:28.760 I can feel a certain

01:09:30.660 connection to the fact

01:09:31.520 that Paul was

01:09:32.320 when you read

01:09:33.100 the Pauline epistles

01:09:34.000 he was quite

01:09:35.800 blunt

01:09:36.760 in the way that he

01:09:37.780 talked to people

01:09:38.780 in the way that he

01:09:39.360 addressed issues

01:09:40.880 and

01:09:41.380 and to me

01:09:42.660 it's a real rebuke

01:09:43.980 of the kind of

01:09:45.520 nicey nice

01:09:46.740 Mr. Rogers

01:09:47.620 sort of

01:09:48.400 Christianity

01:09:48.820 that we've gotten

01:09:49.580 fed to us

01:09:50.320 force fed to us

01:09:51.580 over the last

01:09:52.380 several decades

01:09:53.100 because then when you go

01:09:54.300 and even if you read

01:09:55.180 the gospels

01:09:55.760 and you read the way

01:09:56.800 that Christ

01:09:58.200 dealt with

01:10:01.100 hypocrites

01:10:02.240 and

01:10:02.800 dealt with corruption

01:10:04.520 you also find

01:10:05.880 that it's quite

01:10:06.380 a bit more

01:10:07.120 aggressive

01:10:07.640 and blunt

01:10:08.760 and direct

01:10:09.280 not mean spirited

01:10:10.560 certainly

01:10:10.960 not hateful

01:10:11.860 there's no contempt

01:10:13.600 in it

01:10:14.020 but

01:10:14.840 it's calling

01:10:15.800 the sin out

01:10:16.660 and rebuking it

01:10:17.600 directly

01:10:18.420 and

01:10:19.040 which is the thing

01:10:19.900 that I love about

01:10:20.720 my confirmation

01:10:22.380 saint is Thomas

01:10:23.540 but I don't know

01:10:24.260 which one it was

01:10:25.200 because

01:10:25.980 because I was a punk

01:10:27.500 kid

01:10:27.840 I was 13

01:10:28.520 I became an atheist

01:10:29.540 and

01:10:30.500 I don't remember

01:10:31.420 if I picked Thomas

01:10:32.160 because I was doubting

01:10:33.060 or because I had

01:10:34.140 heard vaguely

01:10:34.940 of this man

01:10:35.580 Thomas Aquinas

01:10:36.340 and I heard he was

01:10:37.360 a smart guy

01:10:37.980 and I thought I was

01:10:38.520 smarter than I was

01:10:39.300 but it all really

01:10:40.040 comes full circle

01:10:40.800 because doubting Thomas

01:10:42.200 he's called doubting

01:10:43.500 but of course he says

01:10:44.480 let us go with the Lord

01:10:45.960 let us die with him

01:10:47.020 that's a great show of faith

01:10:48.060 and Saint Thomas Aquinas

01:10:49.320 is one of the most

01:10:50.900 intelligent people

01:10:51.660 ever to live

01:10:52.180 and was right about everything

01:10:53.400 and was certainly

01:10:54.280 a lot more correct

01:10:55.380 about ultimate things

01:10:56.640 than some punk

01:10:57.480 13 year old atheist

01:10:58.520 who happily came out

01:10:59.460 the other end

01:10:59.960 and by the way

01:11:01.580 Thomas means twin

01:11:02.480 so I think I can claim

01:11:03.360 them both

01:11:03.820 at least I choose to

01:11:04.800 thank you very much

01:11:06.100 hello

01:11:08.540 my name is Harley

01:11:09.640 I'm a huge fan

01:11:10.780 but I wanted to ask

01:11:13.280 what do you have to say

01:11:14.720 about the gender ideologists

01:11:16.580 that use intersex people

01:11:18.460 as a pawn

01:11:19.460 for their trans agenda

01:11:21.060 it's a massive category error

01:11:23.120 so when you're talking

01:11:24.480 about people

01:11:24.800 who are intersex

01:11:25.480 these are people

01:11:26.740 who have some sort

01:11:28.880 of genetic disorder

01:11:29.760 in which they develop

01:11:30.700 differently than

01:11:31.560 say XY genetics

01:11:32.460 because the SRY gene

01:11:33.500 has crossed over

01:11:34.220 for example

01:11:34.740 or where they develop

01:11:36.340 secondary sexual characteristics

01:11:37.760 that are not in line

01:11:38.440 with their genetics

01:11:38.920 this does not make them

01:11:39.820 a separate sex

01:11:40.380 any more

01:11:40.980 than a person

01:11:41.760 who is born

01:11:42.320 with a third arm

01:11:43.200 would constitute

01:11:43.840 a separate class

01:11:44.740 of human being

01:11:45.380 called the third arm people

01:11:46.660 a genetic defect

01:11:48.260 is not the same thing

01:11:49.380 as suggesting

01:11:49.900 that there is

01:11:50.400 an entirely separate sex

01:11:51.500 sex is defined

01:11:52.300 by the actual

01:11:53.640 reproductive

01:11:55.120 resource

01:11:57.280 that is being created

01:11:58.260 either the

01:11:58.860 either the egg

01:11:59.480 or the sperm

01:12:00.020 or the large cell gamete

01:12:01.900 or the small cell gamete

01:12:02.840 that is actually

01:12:03.600 how you define

01:12:04.180 sex biologically speaking

01:12:05.400 so suggesting

01:12:06.380 that because somebody

01:12:07.880 has a birth defect

01:12:08.980 in which it's unclear

01:12:10.060 to the outside eye

01:12:11.280 what their genetics

01:12:12.100 might be

01:12:12.620 that this somehow

01:12:13.280 means that a genetic man

01:12:14.740 who has all the

01:12:15.760 normal characteristics

01:12:16.660 of a genetic man

01:12:17.440 could theoretically

01:12:18.220 be a woman

01:12:18.840 that's just an asinine

01:12:20.480 category error

01:12:21.240 and people are lying

01:12:22.080 when they attempt

01:12:22.680 to equate intersex

01:12:24.200 with for example

01:12:25.720 a person who is

01:12:26.360 a genetic male

01:12:26.940 who claims that

01:12:27.480 they are actually a female

01:12:28.340 guys thank you so much

01:12:29.900 for spending time

01:12:30.560 with us tonight

01:12:30.980 enjoy the rest of CPAC

01:12:32.220 and enjoy the next

01:12:33.400 four years

01:12:33.920 they're going to be great

01:12:34.680 thanks everybody

01:12:36.120 thank you

01:12:37.760 see you guys

01:12:38.880 thank you

The Michael Knowles Show - February 20, 2025

Daily Wire Backstage Live at CPAC： The Fight, The Wins, The Future

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