Ep. 162 - Donald Trump Doesn’t Kneel
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Summary
On this episode of The Michael Knowles Show, host Michael Kosta joins us to talk about what s going on in our culture, politics, and marriage. Plus, we answer your marriage and political questions. Thanks to our sponsor, Upside.
Transcript
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This Men's Mental Health Month, CAMH is confronting a silent crisis.
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Did you know men account for 75% of all suicide deaths in Canada?
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I cannot believe that the culture would do this to me right before my wedding.
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It's right before my wedding and the culture is trying to kill me with all this winning.
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Not only, you saw it made me sick and tired last week.
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the United States sends a clear message and backs it up with action.
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Meanwhile, Donald Trump triggers the left into attacking the American flag again.
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I don't know why they keep doing this, but great.
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Then Patrick Coffin joins the show to give me and the world advice on marriage.
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You know, there's a lot of confusion these days.
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I'm Michael Knowles and this is The Michael Knowles Show.
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Before we get into what's going on on culture and the politics
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and get to our guest and answer all your questions,
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Donald Trump is spiking the football because the NFL announced yesterday that they would
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no longer allow these players to kneel down and that this had always been the rule, but
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now they weren't enforcing it for the last two years.
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And so they will not allow players to protest the American flag on the field at the NFL.
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The NFL has put, the owners have voted unanimously to approve a new national anthem rule that says,
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if you're not going to stand, stay in the locker room.
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If you have a protest, your team's going to get fined.
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I don't think people should be staying in locker rooms, but still, I think it's good.
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You have to stand proudly for the national anthem.
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You have to stand proudly for the national anthem.
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And the NFL owners did the right thing if that's what they've done.
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If that is the story, do you feel like you pushed this story forward and you pushed this to a conclusion?
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And, you know, that's something ideally could have been taken care of when it first started.
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But if they did that, they're doing the right thing.
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They shouldn't be in the country if they hate it so much.
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If they hate the country so much, they should not be here.
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The country gives them a lot of privileges, a lot of opportunities.
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And if you hate it, if you want to disrespect it and you complain about it and whine about it all the time, leave.
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It's kind of harder to sneak into those other places because every other country enforces its own immigration laws, unlike the United States.
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Also, I'd like to point out here, people say Trump is a narcissist.
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He only wants is about himself and this and that.
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What Donald, what Barack Obama would have said if it were some, some issue that he had participated in.
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He'd say, well, listen, I want a million Barack's and Michelle's.
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All the future leaders of America are going to be a million Barack's and Michelle's.
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He just sees everybody in the light of himself.
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But Brian Kilmeade asks Donald Trump, says, Mr. President, do you take credit for this?
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And he's, and Trump is right about that, by the way.
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The New York Times is so angry, they ran a big headline today about how the NFL kneels to Donald Trump.
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The NFL kneeled to the American people who stopped watching their programming.
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The NFL realized if it wanted to stay on TV and have people keep buying their products,
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they would have to stop spitting in the face of people's country, which they love.
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This actually didn't have a lot to do with Donald Trump.
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What Donald Trump largely is, we talked about yesterday on the show, how Donald Trump is a people person.
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He's living in reality, and he sees the present pretty well, so it looks like he's seeing the future,
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And what he does is he sees what people are saying, and then Donald Trump is this big, gigantic microphone.
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He is just a huge microphone for what's going on in the culture, and that's why it resonates.
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That's why when he says it, people say, oh, he's saying what we're all thinking.
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That's why he gets 50,000 people to go to his rallies.
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That's why he goes there, and he's tapping into the zeitgeist.
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He's tapping into what's going on in the culture and amplifying it, but it didn't originate with him.
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I'm glad that the NFL wants to keep its money and stop, you know, giving the one-finger salute to its audience.
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But now we have some skittish conservatives who are up in arms about this.
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The left only cares about free speech, by the way, when it suits their purposes.
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So they don't care about free speech at universities.
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They don't care about free speech defended by the government.
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All they care about is free speech for millionaire athletes during one particular sort of athletic broadcast.
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But now some conservatives are up in arms about this.
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David French, whom I like personally, but he's lost it with this op-ed.
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The op-ed is called Conservatives Fail the NFL's Free Speech Test.
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And this line of thinking is so wrong and detrimental to the conservative cause and to the defense of free speech.
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And really, I'm mostly just peeved at David right now because he published it in the New York Times.
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You write for a great publication called the National Review.
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Don't put it in the New York Times, for goodness sakes.
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Here is his argument, and I'll explain why it's wrong.
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And then he goes on a little bit and he says that, you know,
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conservatives are saying that it's different when it's about the flag.
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Because it's about the flag, the censorship is even worse.
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So what David is saying is that conservatives talk a good game on free speech,
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but also we don't want our national athletes to spit on their country.
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but we're also criticizing this particular speech,
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an attack on the flag, because it is nonsensical.
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Because you're using the rights defended, enshrined in our constitution,
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protected by our communities and our governments and our law enforcement,
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that you're using those rights to attack those rights,
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to attack the source of those rights, which is the country,
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the star-spangled banner, the flag, which is a symbol of the country.
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and that's the only thought that ought to be stopped.
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So as a matter of free speech, the players, they can protest the flag all they want.
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and they can't do it because the NFL will disappear.
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Do they have any rights to air what they want to air during their broadcast?
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hey, you can't use our product to showboat your anti-American trash?
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I wonder if David will write another column in the New York Times about this one.
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If actors in Hollywood movies, they're filming the movie, you know,
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You say, what if a Hollywood actor inserted his own political views in a Hollywood movie
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and said, you have to put that in the final movie or you're abridging my free speech?
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There are writers, there are directors, there's the studio, the distributors.
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We have a product and we don't want you to, we're hiring you to do a job.
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We're not hiring you to run your mouth about anti-American nonsense.
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These guys, these millionaire athletes who get paid to run around on grass and throw a
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ball back and forth and enjoy the wonderful prosperity that this country has to offer,
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that we take a time off, you know, once a week and just watch grown men run around and
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They are hired to do a job, which is to run around and throw that ball.
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They are not hired to voice their political views.
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They can go to Twitter later and say, I hate America.
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And that's what they're saying, by the way, when you protest the American flag, you're saying,
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Take it to Twitter, do whatever you want, but you can't do it on our dime.
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And by the way, there's nothing contradictory about disagreeing with the content of the speech,
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particularly when the content of the speech undercuts free speech itself.
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That's the only thought that ought to be stopped.
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I don't know if they're being obtuse or pretending, or they honestly don't see that distinction,
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but there is a thought that stops thought that's categorically different.
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And by the way, the NFL has a right to make its TV shows and which is what it is.
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This is a TV broadcast paid for by advertisers under the NFL and Hollywood movie makers have
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the right to make their movies and employees don't have the right to take over, hold that
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entire production hostage and air their anti-American dribble.
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That has nothing to do with free speech at all.
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Before we get to Patrick, I've got a really good guest.
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Before we get to him, I do want to talk about Trump canceling the Korea summit,
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And so, you know, we've seen, they've been building this up for a long time saying, oh,
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maybe, you know, Trump will get the Nobel Peace Prize.
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They're all saying Trump really wants that Nobel Peace Prize.
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They cast a little coin at one of the White House gift shops or something.
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Here is the letter that Donald Trump sent to Kim Jong-un.
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I will explain why, why this really should give us a lot of confidence in the guy and
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in Pompeo and in John Bolton and the foreign policy advisors around him, because this move
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Dear Mr. Chairman, we greatly appreciate your time, patience, and effort with respect to
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our recent negotiations and discussions relative to a summit long sought by both parties, which
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was scheduled to take place on June 12th in Singapore.
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We were informed that the meeting was requested by North Korea, but that to us is totally
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Dig, you know, you, you asked for it guys, but hey, we don't need to talk about that.
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I was very much looking forward to being there with you.
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Sadly, based on the tremendous anger and open hostility displayed in your most recent
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statement, I feel it is inappropriate at this time to have this long planned meeting.
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Therefore, please let this letter serve to represent that the Singapore summit for the
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good of both parties, but to the detriment of the world will not take place.
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You talk about your nuclear capabilities, but ours are so massive and powerful that I
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I felt a wonderful dialogue was building up between you and me, and ultimately it is only
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Someday I look very much forward to meeting you in the meantime.
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I want to thank you for the release of the hostages who are now home with their families.
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That was a beautiful gesture and very much appreciated.
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If you change your mind having to do with this most important summit, please do not hesitate
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The world, and North Korea in particular, has lost a great opportunity for lasting peace
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This missed opportunity is a truly sad moment in history.
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Sincerely yours, Donald J. Trump, President of the United States of America.
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Whoever wrote the letter, I don't, you know, presidents tend not to write these things
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themselves, and it's a no slight to President Covfefe, but whoever wrote it, whether it's
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Stephen Miller or somebody, Pompeo or something, really superb.
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It does have all of that, you know, he gets in there.
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And basically what he tried to do is move the goalposts.
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Kim Jong-un, Kim Jong-un, we're, you know, they're in dialogue about this meeting.
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And Kim Jong-un thought he could turn up the heat on Donald Trump, on the frog, on America
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frog, turn up the heat so we were going to get a bad deal out of it.
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Barack Obama with the Iran deal was so desperate for that deal to happen.
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He so wanted his second nuclear peace, nuclear Nobel Peace Prize.
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He was so desperate he would take any deal, even if the deal didn't give us anything.
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He was, he, they, Iran kept changing the terms of the deal.
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They said, hey, let all of our money free up in the banks.
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Iran captures American sailors, holds them hostage, takes humiliating pictures of them,
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Thank you for not releasing more video of our sailors being humiliated.
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I mean, absolutely pathetic because they couldn't accept a deal falling apart.
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The way you negotiate, the only way a negotiation works is if you're actually willing to walk
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If you're not willing to walk away, that isn't a negotiation.
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They say, Trump's not going to get that Nobel Peace Prize.
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Turns out Trump didn't give a darn about that Nobel Peace Prize, did he?
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A lot of people say I deserve one, but I just want the thing to happen.
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I want to accomplish the reality, not just the appearance of the thing, which the left
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I want the essence of the thing, which is a lasting peace and denuclearization of Korea.
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But just look at what we've gotten out of this.
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So we got this crazy, you know, back and forth media circus over this meeting.
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If it's actually over, we got three American hostages released, one of whom who's been held
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And North Korea demolished one of its nuclear test sites today in Punggiri, I think is vaguely
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But they actually demolished one of their nuclear testing sites.
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So we got two pretty big concessions out of it.
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And Donald Trump walked away because the worst thing that could happen would have been that
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He went down and he said, hey, Castros, I know that we've been fighting you for years.
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You almost destroyed us with nuclear weapons 50 years ago.
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But we'll give you whatever you want so that we have the appearance of a deal.
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The worst thing that could have happened is if we legitimized Kim, we allowed them to
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We could have ended up worse off than we were before.
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Now, because Trump was willing to walk away, we ended up way better off.
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We get those hostages back and we get a nuclear site demolished.
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And maybe there will be an opportunity in the future.
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He says, you know, you threaten your nuclear weapons.
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Just remember, we could blow you off the map in a second.
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In a New York minute, we could blow you off of the face of the earth.
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You know, there's, he has no fear of looking like a failure here.
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Patrick Coffin, for nearly eight years, hosted the top rated Catholic radio show in the country,
00:19:29.520
Catholic Answers Live and the podcast Catholic Answers Focus.
00:19:32.680
He's the author of the contraception, deception, Catholic teaching on birth control, as well as
00:19:37.800
sex au naturel, what it is and why it's good for your marriage.
00:19:41.660
And currently, he's the host of the Patrick Coffin Show.
00:19:50.420
You know, I really wanted to turn the Catholicism up to 11 as I prepare to wed.
00:19:55.220
I'm getting on a flight tomorrow to New York to begin my bachelor party.
00:19:59.180
So I guess that could, that could end up being my last show ever, I suppose, you know, depending
00:20:18.760
Should I leave a Michael shaped hole in the wall somewhere?
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You know, do you have any advice for me and the rest of the world on marriage?
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My, my favorite quote on marriage comes from our mutual literary mentor, GK Chesterton,
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who said, marriage is a duel to the death that no man of honor should decline.
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So, yeah, you, my friend, are about to embark on the highest adventure imaginable, and that
00:20:48.160
is the union of two sinners, each of which represent a mirror.
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I mean, your, your fiancee, soon to be your wife, God willing, will be your introduction
00:20:59.440
It's just like two giant, you know, two-sided mirrors.
00:21:02.400
And likewise to her, you're, you're in for, um, I call, I call them the three rings.
00:21:06.960
You, there's a lot of talk of the engagement ring and the wedding ring.
00:21:13.140
You know, uh, marriage is, um, it's the ultimate form of friendship between two sexually attracted
00:21:19.800
And when people ask me, let's say if they're, they're dating and they're, they want some
00:21:24.880
advice on whether or not they're compatible, I say, so are you, are you a boy?
00:21:34.440
But, uh, no, it's also, um, through the action of Christ, it's raised to the dignity of
00:21:40.060
So you're also getting that third party in there.
00:21:42.560
You know, uh, Bishop Sheen's wonderful 1951 book, three to get married tells the tale
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very, very well of the, the sacramental grace that you bestow on, uh, on your wife and she
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So you kind of, you are the sacrament together.
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It's, uh, it's all, they never tell you, it's a lot of fun.
00:22:04.620
And, you know, I keep saying, I've been having a lot of fun in the run-up to the wedding.
00:22:07.600
So I've been telling sweet little Elisa things like, you know, Hey, I think you're going
00:22:11.000
to make a great starter wife or, you know, I can't, I can't wait for my first wedding.
00:22:14.720
I can't, you know, I hope maybe it'll be less stressful on my second one.
00:22:17.660
And she does remind me, she says, you know, you're Catholic pal, which means you are stuck
00:22:24.080
There's no, but there's, there's a lot of, uh, uh, confusion about marriage these days.
00:22:28.420
I love that you bring up the suffering, which is, I think the most Catholic answer you could
00:22:39.940
Certainly by the logic of that Obergefell decision, uh, it seems that there's no reason to preclude
00:22:48.520
Uh, the, it, the nature of the whole thing keeps changing even within one man and one woman.
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The nature of the institution is quite different now, uh, over the last 50, 60, 100 years, people
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Feminism has reared its ugly pink hat plaid head.
00:23:06.980
Uh, you know, there are a lot of things that have affected marriage.
00:23:10.480
Um, is there any hope to bringing a consensus back to marriage or are we all going in our
00:23:17.400
I think there's a lot more hope than there is despair.
00:23:21.440
And the reason I say that is, um, there's a, a common myth that's floated around.
00:23:27.060
I've actually heard bishops repeat the myth and it's the 50, 50, uh, divorce rate.
00:23:32.540
So, you know, marriage rates 50%, it's not true.
00:23:35.360
That comes from a misunderstood, uh, garbled interpretation of a 1990 Lewis Harris poll.
00:23:42.360
And it failed to distinguish between people who had been married once and never divorced
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and people who had been multiply divorced in marriage and, and, and remarried.
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So imagine you're at a, you're at a, you're at a dinner party and, uh, there's 12 couples
00:23:55.380
And one of the couples is, uh, Liz Taylor and one of her husbands.
00:23:59.520
So how do you reckon the divorce rate at the table?
00:24:03.260
Uh, there's a researcher named Shanti Feldon who, um, has a book on this.
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And she says that for people just starting, have never been married before the divorce
00:24:12.920
Now it depends on, on where in the world that you, you know, cite that she's mostly dealing
00:24:19.900
Um, but I think you're right about, um, the Obergefell Hodges decision, uh, 2015.
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That was, that was a big seismic shift change in our culture.
00:24:30.620
And one of the interesting ironies to me, having debated it before, during, and after
00:24:36.260
that decision is rather than, um, a get into a conversation about homosexual behavior or
00:24:43.220
B be on the defensive and talk about real marriage or traditional marriage, ask the person who's
00:24:48.940
advocating for the redefinition of marriage, what his or her definition of marriage is like
00:24:54.660
Marriage is, and what you'll find is invariably their definition of marriage never mentions
00:25:06.640
Cause a lot of scrabble, a lot of violent backgammon apparently.
00:25:09.940
So yeah, their definition of marriage tends to be some combination of, well, it's a, it's
00:25:15.060
a warm, emotional, lifelong commitment between two people.
00:25:21.080
On your definition, why would you limit marriage to monogamy?
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And this is where it becomes the thin edge of the wedge.
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So I always encourage people who'd like to see marriage, uh, defined as it's been publicly
00:25:37.260
This, this definition, by the way, predates Judaism.
00:25:39.520
This is not a Bible based only, you know, Jesus pointy hat, Pope document, uh, kind of
00:25:47.980
That marriage is the lifelong union of one man and one woman till death, open to the adventure
00:25:56.180
Now, if you want to have a zebra, okay, you can argue for zebras, but it's not a thoroughbred.
00:26:04.120
Different in kind, uh, not just in, uh, in degree.
00:26:07.400
Well, they, they found to, sometimes people will say, they'll say, well, what about in,
00:26:11.500
in the old Testament, a, uh, you know, men had multiple wives and you say, okay, sure.
00:26:17.240
So I'll even, I'll even grant that over the course of history, union, uh, marriage has been
00:26:22.420
the union of a husband and wives, at least one wife.
00:26:26.800
And, you know, sometimes multiple wives, it is, that's still pretty strict.
00:26:31.980
And that still includes the complementarity of the sexes.
00:26:35.040
I love, you know, in that decision, in the big Supreme court decision that changed the
00:26:39.040
definition of marriage, justice Kennedy wrote, he said that, uh, the constitution offered
00:26:43.900
us a right to intimacy, which I, I never found that.
00:26:47.400
And then maybe it's, it's somewhere in article five or something.
00:26:53.240
But he, I loved in Scalia's dissent, the late, great, uh, justice Scalia, he said, uh, okay,
00:26:59.100
even if you find a right to intimacy, surely marriage constricts rather than expands the
00:27:06.420
opportunities for intimacy, ask the nearest hippie.
00:27:09.440
And it seems to be some of the illogic of their argument.
00:27:16.380
So I, so that, that part is all very confused out of this confused culture, because we can't
00:27:21.500
let more than 11 minutes go on this show without discussing Donald Trump.
00:27:25.560
Uh, but I'd like your perspective on it as a Catholic because, uh, evangelical, so out
00:27:30.440
of this confused culture, we elected Donald Trump, you know, and he's done a pretty good
00:27:36.240
Uh, evangelical Christians, fundamentalist Christians, that kind of variety of American
00:27:41.080
Christianity, they're getting a lot of flack because they've largely supported Donald
00:27:45.440
Trump and, uh, Catholics like me who have supported Donald Trump, uh, I don't know, we get a little
00:27:52.000
And I wonder if that's because the Catholic faith is different, uh, and makes different
00:27:56.440
claims than fundamentalist varieties and evangelical varieties.
00:28:02.560
And, and is it okay for a believing Christian who goes to church to support Donald Trump?
00:28:15.300
It's all, you can give a, yeah, all glib stuff.
00:28:18.060
No, I think you're, I think it's a very interesting question for a couple of reasons.
00:28:24.440
Uh, America in its founding documents is quasi Protestant.
00:28:28.780
It's secular, but there's a kind of a Christian soul to it.
00:28:31.700
If you read the works of, uh, uh, de Tocqueville and Chesterton's, uh, ruminations about traveling
00:28:37.440
here in America, uh, the Catholic faith is a kind of an exotic bird to most American Protestants.
00:28:44.280
They just don't get that someone can be a citizen of one country, uh, and not have a
00:28:51.840
And this is where John F. Kennedy made his, I think, disaster, maybe disastrous is overstating
00:28:57.100
it, but his 1960 speech to the ministers in Houston, where he basically promised to be
00:29:03.840
His faith would not inform his political decision decisions.
00:29:06.840
Well, uh, Catholics who are disciples of Jesus Christ do not believe that God especially
00:29:17.120
You know, this country was not formed without original sin.
00:29:23.400
And so Catholic citizens of all variety of political systems can coexist and flourish under
00:29:30.940
communism, under, uh, Republic, under representative government, under, you know, Canadian, um, or
00:29:38.440
So we're, we're not as wedded to one way of being a citizen in a, in the social political
00:29:45.040
And I think, um, therefore, uh, Catholics are, we're not wedded so much to who's in
00:29:53.600
that office because we don't put our trust in, in princes and, and so on.
00:29:57.180
Ultimately, I think, yeah, I think our, our, our point of loyalty, uh, is higher than the
00:30:07.580
There is among certain varieties of Christianity in America.
00:30:11.100
I think people, uh, endow the White House and the Oval Office with this quasi-religious,
00:30:18.240
uh, clerical, uh, status, which I don't even know if Catholics afford that status to the
00:30:23.820
Pope, you know, I mean, it really has a special, uh, religious honor to it.
00:30:28.780
And Catholics, we just say, you know, yeah, okay, this guy's in office.
00:30:32.640
He says some funny things sometimes, and there will be another guy after him and another guy
00:30:37.940
after him, and eventually it'll all go away because to quote John Maynard Keynes, which
00:30:42.200
I do infrequently, but I like this one quote, in the long run, we're all dead.
00:30:49.580
Then another guy will return and put a big bow on everything.
00:30:52.760
It's funny how, how, uh, worldview comes through in art sometimes.
00:30:55.780
You've probably seen this, uh, in various meme forms, forms online.
00:31:02.760
All due respect to my separated brethren out there listening and watching.
00:31:05.760
But, uh, it's a picture of, I first saw it with President Bush and he's at the White
00:31:12.400
So the Bible's on the, on the Oval Office desk and he's in prayer and above him, there's
00:31:17.220
Jesus, like the, the Mormon missionary Jesus with his hand on Bush's shoulder.
00:31:20.800
And there's Abraham Lincoln and there's, uh, George Washington.
00:31:31.540
The cloud of witnesses, they don't have to be presidents.
00:31:35.920
I think it gets to the point that, uh, every, everybody's got to serve somebody.
00:31:39.820
And I find when people reject aspects of faith, natural aspects of faith, they just
00:31:45.480
So they say, oh, how could you ever pray to the saints?
00:31:48.480
But then there's this deification of, uh, Abraham Lincoln or, or George Washington or
00:31:53.700
Very good men, you know, probably, probably they are saints, but you've got to believe in the
00:31:58.200
Uh, before I let you go, I've got a couple more minutes.
00:32:01.060
I, I want to ask you about a really important question.
00:32:14.200
I notice conservative guys tend to flock to those two passions and pursuits and especially
00:32:21.060
the Catholics, especially the, uh, why is that?
00:32:25.440
What is it about the conservative character and the Christian character, the Catholic character?
00:32:30.040
Because a lot, you know, certain Protestant groups, they say no drinking.
00:32:37.860
The Catholic side, you know, they pour a lot of wine.
00:32:39.860
What is it about the conservatives and the Catholics that make us, uh, like to have a
00:32:47.420
Uh, I heard a ribble joke from a former Southern Baptist and I'll share it with you.
00:32:51.480
Uh, it's, it's the observation that strict Southern Baptists are not permitted to have
00:33:01.120
So, uh, the Catholic worldview, uh, is very much focused on, uh, John 10 verse 10.
00:33:07.600
I came that you would have life and have it abundantly.
00:33:11.240
Uh, the, the scene at the wedding at Cana makes no sense whatsoever if what they're drinking
00:33:19.720
Uh, and also one of the Proverbs says, uh, you know, wine makes you happy.
00:33:28.740
So that's, that's to the, for the whiskey and the adult beverages in moderation, of course.
00:33:33.540
Now for the cigar smoking, I believe there is a, uh, almost biblical, uh, precedent for
00:33:41.180
And it runs like this under the old dispensation, God commanded the Hebrews to incense the temple
00:33:49.460
How much more in the new dispensation, the new covenant, should we incense the temple of
00:33:59.280
The body is a temple and the temple needs incense.
00:34:04.100
You know, I have to, I, I think it was, uh, yeah, it's going to be when I retire, when
00:34:10.520
Ben retires me finally and fires me, that's going to be my new line of, uh, that's going
00:34:14.460
to be my new line of work making thurible cigars.
00:34:17.200
The GK Chesterton, who I think we've only referenced 150 times in the last six minutes,
00:34:22.940
Chesterton said the Catholic church is like a thick steak, a glass of red wine and a good
00:34:28.900
And even in that first, uh, miracle at Cana, it's, uh, it's turning the water of ritual
00:34:37.340
And, uh, it's, and it's also obviously prefiguring the water and the blood, the, the Christ's
00:34:45.380
But there, there is, uh, such a joy that comes out of that, right?
00:34:55.480
And you're about to participate in that, in that, uh, great mystery, that great, uh,
00:35:00.760
And it's called matrimony, uh, I think for a profound reason, uh, matrimony makes mothers
00:35:07.900
And hence that connection with fertility and fecundity and union.
00:35:12.460
Um, and the wedding of Cana miracle is very interesting to me because he doesn't heal anybody
00:35:17.100
He just does it because it's a, like a, a supercharged, supernatural injection of joy into an already
00:35:25.000
And, uh, it's just one more reason to love being Catholic.
00:35:30.860
And at my wedding, I'm certainly following in the footsteps of that, uh, first miracle.
00:35:35.060
I suppose I'm going to have to lean in to that, uh, free flowing red wine and, uh, take one
00:35:40.200
for the, take, take one for the team, you know?
00:35:42.100
Uh, well, Patrick, that is, this is, I'm, there's no way I'm going to run for the door.
00:35:46.280
Sweet little Elisa might run and leave a sweet little Elisa shaped hole in the wall, but I'm
00:35:50.100
very excited to get married and I appreciate it.
00:35:52.000
When I get back, we'll have to do a cigar and scotch back on the West coast, your lips
00:36:05.020
And where can people find you on Twitter and Facebook and all that?
00:36:09.440
It's well, the public page is Patrick Coffin author and podcaster, demigod, something.
00:36:15.420
Um, and, uh, Patrick underscore coffin at Twitter and, um, coffin nation.com is a good
00:36:22.140
Well, I got to say, I've always loved your programs on the radio, on podcast.
00:36:25.360
It's really helped me think through faith and Christianity and, you know, and issues
00:36:34.180
And, you know, more, uh, more, uh, political and cultural and all that.
00:36:37.820
I've always enjoyed your, your programs and writing.
00:36:40.020
So I urge you to read Patrick's books and check out his shows.
00:36:46.920
We will move on to the mailbag, but I got to say goodbye.
00:36:50.680
I got a good mailbag today and we're going to have to fly through it because I got to
00:36:54.680
You know, I, I'm hanging out with Allie Stuckey later today.
00:36:57.780
She's coming by and I wonder how long she's going to excoriate me for how popish this show
00:37:05.900
And I'm going to get a, I'm going to get a good talking to from my Protestant friend.
00:37:10.200
If you're on Facebook or YouTube, go to Daily Wire.
00:37:20.200
You get me, the Andrew Klavan show, the Ben Shapiro show, $10 a month, $100 for an annual
00:37:25.260
None of that matters because when those NFL players, when they can't kneel, when little
00:37:30.640
rocket man just starts getting a one-way ticket straight to the moon, we blast him off the
00:37:35.220
face of the earth, these leftist tears are going to flow.
00:37:38.040
And I won't be with you for, you know, my honeymoon.
00:37:43.140
I am obviously bringing this to the beach with me, not to, to save me from the ocean,
00:37:53.320
Not a lot of time left, but we're going to fly through.
00:38:09.960
Dear Michael J. Knowles, or current resident of the Ben Shapiro broom closet, congratulations
00:38:17.400
My brother is getting married this Saturday and I'm delivering the best man speech.
00:38:21.380
If you have a younger brother, if you had one, or is there anything that you would want
00:38:26.700
And is there anything you would not want him to say?
00:38:37.980
I have very strong opinions about speeches at weddings because they're all terrible and
00:38:43.460
there are too many of them and there are terrible statistically 100% of the time.
00:38:51.580
I've helped people write speeches for weddings before and here's what I do.
00:38:56.220
They hand me a little piece of paper like this and I read through their speech and I cross
00:39:00.480
out every instance of the first person singular pronoun.
00:39:05.300
The, the best man now, sometimes made of honor gives a speech because you know, the glory
00:39:10.880
of Europe is extinguished forever in the age of chivalry is dead.
00:39:13.700
So the best man, well, let's say he gets up there and I'll say, you know, I couldn't
00:39:19.340
I remember when Johnny and I were doing something that I like to do with me and then he and
00:39:30.680
If you're giving the speech, talk about the couple, talk about the bride and the groom.
00:39:34.020
The next one is, and this should be a basic one, but this happens all the time.
00:39:39.220
If you're giving a speech about, uh, the bride or the groom, do not reference other people
00:39:46.200
I know that seems that you would think that would be basic etiquette.
00:39:52.840
I have been to many weddings, many weddings where the, the best man or the maid of honor
00:39:58.540
will talk about like past boyfriends and, oh, you should have seen the guy she was bringing
00:40:04.280
You know, I don't want to think about that on the wedding day.
00:40:11.320
Uh, don't talk about the bride and groom having sex with other people and keep it short.
00:40:17.360
This is not, this is supposed to be a toast and okay.
00:40:20.520
And then I've been to somewhere, the bride and the groom speak.
00:40:25.160
It's a, people want to see you as like a little figure on a cake.
00:40:32.060
The minute you open your mouth, you're going to shatter that fantasy.
00:40:34.460
This is a day of people doing nice things for you.
00:40:38.600
And then all of this, I mean, all these speeches now, the this father and the that father, traditionally
00:40:42.740
speaking, it's the father of the bride and the best man.
00:40:55.260
And, you know, focus on the stuff that matters.
00:41:01.480
Don't, don't put on a, don't put on a variety act up there.
00:41:10.320
I've noticed that you don't end your shows with stuff I like.
00:41:13.680
Is this because in Catholicism, if you like something, that it's probably a sin?
00:41:21.380
In all seriousness, stuff I like can help your audience get to know you.
00:41:25.520
For example, do you prefer fiction to nonfiction?
00:41:28.000
Do you enjoy any music from the 1900s that isn't in a musical or movie score?
00:41:33.420
Do you enjoy movies with leftist messages despite their messaging?
00:41:40.400
I have to push back a little on the Catholic thing because we do go into suffering and we
00:41:45.240
But I believe it was Puritanism, which was defined as the heart-stopping fear that somewhere
00:41:54.320
You know, the Catholic Church, they pour out the wine pretty freely at least.
00:42:00.340
So do I enjoy, do I prefer fiction to nonfiction?
00:42:04.320
I almost exclusively read nonfiction, which is tough because one of my very good friends
00:42:14.020
But I just don't read fiction that much, and I should because fiction is better than nonfiction
00:42:17.940
and it tells you more about the human condition.
00:42:20.180
I just don't get around to doing it too much because I'm too busy reading all these fun books
00:42:27.360
So do you enjoy any music from the 1900s, 20th century that isn't in a musical or movie
00:42:39.540
Most of the time, I usually just listen to classical or occasionally jazz.
00:42:44.100
Like I never listen to the rock station in the car or anything like that.
00:42:51.260
But yeah, if I'm hanging out or about to go out or, you know, having a little after dinner
00:42:55.740
or drink or something, yeah, I like music even up to like the 1980s.
00:43:02.700
That's like the most modern conservative guys get.
00:43:07.620
Well, I lost my place, so no one's out of here.
00:43:10.240
From Corey, dear Michael, I've found as I've taken more responsibility in my life and dug
00:43:14.860
more into what it means to be conservative and conservative values, I've found myself growing
00:43:19.320
stronger in my Christian faith as I saw a clear correlation.
00:43:22.720
Why is it that some conservatives try to separate themselves from the Christian faith that is
00:43:33.640
We can extend this a little bit, too, to Jews, non-religious Jews.
00:43:38.400
They don't see how all of these thoughts come back as early as Genesis, right?
00:43:46.060
I don't think that they are actively disagreeing with true religion and the religious basis
00:43:53.480
I just think they haven't thought through it, really.
00:43:56.240
It has frequently been said, I forget whose quote this is, maybe it's Chesterton.
00:44:00.320
All the quotes are Chesterton, is that no one has ever tried the Christian faith and found
00:44:05.060
it lacking or assailed the Christian faith successfully.
00:44:11.280
They try the Christian faith and they find it hard and they don't want to keep doing it
00:44:19.060
So if people say, I want low taxes, but I don't care about all that abortion stuff.
00:44:24.820
Ann Coulter once said to me, I was with a group of college students, and she said, when you
00:44:29.260
have two candidates, even if you personally don't care about abortion, when you have two
00:44:33.100
candidates who promise to lower your taxes, one is pro-life, one supports abortion, vote
00:44:41.860
And what she's saying is, the candidate who, the lower taxes comes from a defense of liberty,
00:44:49.360
an appreciation of liberty and life and one's role in the world.
00:44:53.340
And that comes from natural rights, which comes from natural law, which comes from the natural
00:44:57.520
law giver, which comes from the Christian tradition, which comes from, which then leads
00:45:02.200
on to bioethical thought, the human dignity, how we ought to protect life from the very beginning.
00:45:14.340
And so there's a coherence to that one guy's thought, the pro-life cut your taxes guy, that
00:45:19.360
there isn't for the pro-choice cut your taxes guy.
00:45:24.360
So there are plenty of conservatives who say, oh, I'm an atheist, or I don't think about
00:45:34.560
But when you start thinking a little bit about it, I think that that atheism is going to
00:45:49.140
Well, maybe I'll do like a Facebook live from the beach or something.
00:45:54.280
I am going to be a junior in college this coming academic year, but I'm unsure about keeping
00:45:57.820
my major in business administration, and I'm unsure of what I want to do when I graduate
00:46:02.660
I have many paths to choose, but I know that only one of them can be chosen.
00:46:07.520
Are there any tips you have for matters like this?
00:46:22.920
So I don't, you know, regardless of what the major is, I don't know that your major is
00:46:34.960
I've trained at very serious acting conservatories for a long time.
00:46:46.960
Moved to LA, was still working in both of those things.
00:46:54.840
Does any of that have to do with my Italian literature degree or my history degree or
00:47:05.800
You should not go into a lot of debt to just, just cuz.
00:47:12.440
You shouldn't go to law school just cuz, you know, because that's the next thing to do.
00:47:16.860
You should go to law school because you want to be a lawyer.
00:47:18.500
You should go to medical school because you want to be a doctor.
00:47:20.220
Uh, but if you can't plan these things out perfectly, so I don't, I wouldn't worry that
00:47:24.700
you have to plan everything out when you're a junior.
00:47:35.140
I've, I've been, uh, doing show business stuff and working in politics for as long as I can
00:47:46.180
And the more you do, you're gonna be able to figure out, hmm, maybe I'm good at this.
00:47:50.680
I should try to do, uh, this a little bit more.
00:47:53.600
Okay, maybe I'll take this class then because of that.
00:47:57.060
You're not gonna figure it out by philosophizing and thinking and abstracting everything.
00:48:07.960
Uh, well, I gotta hang out with Allie Stuckey and get yelled at first.
00:48:12.600
I'll be broadcasting all next week from New York.
00:48:17.180
Don't do anything that I wouldn't do, but it'll be my bachelor party.
00:48:20.020
So that will give you, I'll give you a pretty wide breadth.
00:48:26.600
The Michael Knowles Show is produced by Senia Villareal.
00:48:50.120
The Michael Knowles Show is a Daily Wire Forward Publishing production.