The Michael Knowles Show - Ep. 1642 - Superman Is Political, Says Director James Gunn

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00:00:37.800 As we finish up an extraordinary political year, Republicans have a lot to celebrate.

00:00:42.580 The Democrat brand has become entirely toxic.

00:00:45.760 And it is not just the conservatives saying it.

00:00:48.400 That is the description given by one of the most prominent Democrats in the country.

00:00:52.920 I'm Michael Knowles. This is the Michael Knowles Show.

00:00:56.980 Welcome back to the show.

00:01:15.980 James Gunn, the man behind the new Superman, says the movie is, in fact, political.

00:01:21.680 There's so much more to say.

00:01:22.520 First, though, go to TryArmRut.com slash Knowles.

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00:01:37.380 and now you're really hoping it comes in time.

00:01:40.300 Just, you know, off the top of my head.

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00:02:54.840 For those of you watching the show rather than merely listening on your iPod and your

00:03:01.320 MySpace and your Razor phones, whatever you listen to it on, or terrestrial radio, I am

00:03:07.480 in my home office right now.

00:03:09.280 So welcome, Shay Knowles.

00:03:10.840 I am here because Mr. Jeremy Boring, the god king of the Daily Wire, thought it would be

00:03:16.640 a really smart idea to tell the entire staff that they could have two weeks off around

00:03:21.280 Christmas, and he said, but if your supervisor says you can't have the time off, then you

00:03:27.460 got to listen to him.

00:03:28.740 And I don't know, I don't probably technically supervise anyone, but I said I wanted to do

00:03:31.880 my show on the 23rd. 0.98

00:03:33.660 But now I look like a big jerk. 0.99

00:03:35.260 Jeremy's the hero. 1.00

00:03:36.220 I look like a huge jerk because I'm making people work. 0.96

00:03:38.640 So anyway, the compromise was we'll do the show, but we'll do it from home. 0.99

00:03:43.320 So not everyone has to come into the office, but I have to do the show.

00:03:46.280 So 2024 has been one of the winningest years for conservatives in my life, and as it wraps

00:03:53.440 up, things are only getting better, and I'm not going to miss a show.

00:03:57.320 When I can hear top Democrats like Joe Manchin describe how the Democrat Party has become toxic.

00:04:05.960 Do you still consider yourself a Democrat?

00:04:08.680 I am not a Democrat in the form of what the Democratic Party has turned itself into, the

00:04:15.900 national brand, absolutely not.

00:04:18.620 And they know that.

00:04:20.100 They're all good people on both sides.

00:04:21.820 But what do you think is the reason for, you said you're not a Democrat.

00:04:26.520 What caused Joe Manchin to divorce himself from the Democratic Party?

00:04:30.260 Here's what I told them.

00:04:31.660 I said, you ought to figure out how you lost somebody like me.

00:04:34.760 I was born as a Democrat because of my grandfather's love of FDR.

00:04:40.340 I was a very strong Democrat because of my family's love of John Fitzgerald Kennedy.

00:04:46.100 I came through the whole iteration.

00:04:49.000 And I was a Democrat in West Virginia, and it has always been a 75, 80 percent plurality

00:04:55.220 of Democrats, registered Democrats.

00:04:57.060 But there was a split.

00:04:58.560 I was never in the liberal side of it.

00:05:00.760 I was never in the establishment side.

00:05:02.320 So I always had to fight my way through.

00:05:04.820 But what is the shift on social issues?

00:05:09.500 Yeah.

00:05:09.780 The brand got so bad.

00:05:11.600 The D brand has been so maligned from the standpoint of it's just it's toxic.

00:05:18.640 And the D brand is basically this.

00:05:21.080 The brand is toxic.

00:05:23.220 There are going to be people who say, look, Joe Manchin, he was never all that liberal.

00:05:27.180 He was never all that progressive.

00:05:28.900 Don't listen to him.

00:05:30.040 You know, he's a dyno, a Democrat name only.

00:05:32.820 Hold on.

00:05:34.360 The reason this is so shocking, the reason this is so encouraging for conservatives is

00:05:38.800 not because Joe Manchin was some big progressive.

00:05:42.140 He wasn't.

00:05:43.480 But he's a pretty popular guy.

00:05:46.000 He is a prominent Democrat politician.

00:05:48.280 He's been a U.S. senator for a long time.

00:05:50.700 And what he's saying is, look, the Democrats have been progressive for a long time.

00:05:55.260 I've still stuck with the party because the brand was strong.

00:05:58.140 Now the brand is toxic.

00:06:00.520 That's the key.

00:06:01.240 It's not as though the big change of events is the Democrats have become progressive.

00:06:04.940 The Democrats have been progressive since the 60s.

00:06:08.060 But the brand was still good.

00:06:10.780 Somehow the brand was still selling to the American people.

00:06:13.560 There were a lot of guys like Joe Manchin who would say, I'm proud to be a Democrat.

00:06:16.620 He says today, you know, you can barely get elected dog catcher if you're a Democrat.

00:06:21.280 The brand has become toxic, in part because of the progressivism, but even beyond ideology,

00:06:26.520 in part because of the corruption, in part because of the rank hypocrisy, in part because

00:06:31.940 they lost the common sense and they don't speak to the American people.

00:06:35.780 Even the New York Times is doing a little bit of soul searching here, emphasis on soul.

00:06:40.500 The Times has this piece out.

00:06:42.660 Spiritual Dems ask party to take a leap of faith.

00:06:46.900 As the Democrat Party wanders in the post-election wilderness after the bruising defeats of 2024,

00:06:52.900 some of its newer leaders are tapping into an ancient form of connection, religion.

00:06:57.600 And it goes through just a few examples that they name.

00:07:00.500 In Texas, a young lawmaker who could run statewide is urging his fellow white progressives to

00:07:05.120 embrace discussion of faith in politics.

00:07:07.740 In Georgia, a black pastor and U.S. senator is reclaiming religious language from those on 1.00

00:07:13.660 the right who he suggests have twisted it to their own ends.

00:07:15.600 In Pennsylvania, the Jewish governor, this is Josh Shapiro, his faith is a central part

00:07:20.220 of his public identity, which is why the Democrats wouldn't pick him for VP because they hate 0.91

00:07:23.760 the Jews now.

00:07:24.820 But anyway, he says that the Jewish governor there has made this evident in his campaign

00:07:29.640 advertising and his major speeches and even at a recent Christmas tree lighting.

00:07:34.240 If y'all have not seen National Lampoon Christmas Vacation, take it from this Jewish guy, 1.00

00:07:39.100 Governor Josh Shapiro said as he addressed a holiday celebration in Harrisburg.

00:07:43.260 First, put a pause there.

00:07:44.020 The New York Times can't help themselves.

00:07:46.540 They're not going to, Democrats manifestly are not going to fix their religion problem

00:07:50.320 if they do this.

00:07:51.960 They say he's at a Christmas tree lighting.

00:07:54.460 He's talking about the Christmas tree lighting.

00:07:56.120 And then they say at a holiday celebration.

00:07:57.720 What holiday do you think they're celebrating a Christmas tree lighting?

00:08:00.020 Guys, at the very, at the Christmas tree lighting, I think you're allowed to call it Christmas

00:08:03.540 and stop pretending that they're celebrating Kwanzaa.

00:08:07.080 Anyway, he says, you know, take it from this Jewish guy. 0.71

00:08:09.840 You better go out and rent that movie, National Lampoon Christmas Vacation.

00:08:13.600 This is smart of these Democrats to realize that they have a faith problem.

00:08:19.320 They have a religion problem. 0.73

00:08:21.360 This is smart.

00:08:22.500 It will be good for America if the Democrats can get back in touch with anything even resembling

00:08:29.200 true religion.

00:08:30.120 Because everyone has a kind of religion.

00:08:33.040 Everyone has to worship someone like Bob Dylan taught us, you know, but there's a big difference

00:08:36.980 between the worship of self, which is really what the Democrats come down to, or the worship

00:08:41.460 of weird sex through the LGBTism, or the worship of demons through the crystals and the new 0.96

00:08:46.680 age and the woo-woo, and true religion where you worship God, the one God.

00:08:52.880 Nevertheless, Democrats realize, okay, we have this religion problem. 0.67

00:08:56.040 The right has claimed religion.

00:08:57.540 We have lost religion. 0.59

00:08:58.380 We've been anti-religion. 1.00

00:09:00.600 So this is smart of these Democrats from an electoral standpoint.

00:09:03.800 It would be good for America because our country is predicated on belief in God.

00:09:08.280 This was what I was talking about at TPUSA.

00:09:10.120 I just got back.

00:09:11.280 I was at TPUSA's AmericaFest.

00:09:13.780 I'll get into more of that later.

00:09:15.540 It was an absolutely unbelievable convention.

00:09:20.300 It was the most impressive political convention, maybe with the exception of the RNC that took place

00:09:25.340 two days after Trump was shot.

00:09:26.740 Maybe with the exception of the $60 million RNC.

00:09:30.160 And even that gave a run for its money.

00:09:32.520 This was an incredible event.

00:09:34.040 My speech on the main stage at AmericaFest was on this point, coincidentally.

00:09:39.280 I said, look, we've brought a lot of people who used to be Democrats into the Republican Party.

00:09:45.900 This election, we brought in two Democrat presidential candidates, Tulsi Gabbard and Bobby Kennedy.

00:09:50.500 We brought in one in five black guys.

00:09:52.400 We brought in 46% of Hispanics.

00:09:54.220 We brought in a ton of women. 1.00

00:09:56.700 We brought in Joe Rogan.

00:09:57.960 He was a Bernie bro.

00:09:58.700 We brought Elon Musk.

00:09:59.700 He was kind of a lib.

00:10:00.460 We brought in a lot of people who would have called themselves Democrats not long ago.

00:10:06.180 And that's good.

00:10:06.960 I'm glad.

00:10:07.500 I welcome them and especially their votes.

00:10:09.100 But the fear of a big tent is that when you have a big tent, you lose the party identity.

00:10:16.240 So what do we believe?

00:10:17.140 And I said, the first thing we believe is that God exists and that we can know this with certainty.

00:10:22.600 And I'm not just up there Bible thumping, preaching to the choir.

00:10:26.240 I mean this as a matter of urgent national policy and something that the great men of our civilization have always known,

00:10:35.220 even the ones who were heterodox in their religion.

00:10:38.020 You can know a lot about God through revelation, through private experience, through all sorts of things.

00:10:43.220 But you can know the existence of God with human reason from the created world.

00:10:52.240 Our country is predicated on that idea, going all the way back to the founding fathers,

00:10:57.860 going back to the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence.

00:11:00.800 We have to agree on that in order to have a coherent conservatism.

00:11:05.620 There's so much more to say.

00:11:06.740 First, though, go to puretalk.com slash Knowles. 0.99

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00:12:14.240 As the Democrats do their soul searching, they realize that they need to get back to religion

00:12:17.920 or they're never going to win again.

00:12:19.620 The insight here is this point that I made at TPUSA.

00:12:23.500 What do we have to believe in order to be even remotely conservative?

00:12:26.880 We have to believe that God exists and that we can know that with certainty.

00:12:30.980 We can know this with certainty because you can know a cause from its effect.

00:12:36.500 When you observe an effect, you can know its cause.

00:12:38.980 We know this because if you look at Hamlet, you can know that Shakespeare exists.

00:12:44.300 You can know something about Shakespeare.

00:12:45.740 When you look at an object in motion, you can know with certainty that there is a mover

00:12:51.580 who put that object in motion.

00:12:53.300 There are many other arguments for God, but it doesn't require revelation.

00:12:57.280 You can know it using your reason from the natural world.

00:13:00.240 The reason this is so important for politics is man is made in the image of God.

00:13:04.140 So what we think about God is going to reflect what we think about ourselves.

00:13:08.280 And we're the people that make up the society.

00:13:11.320 So because we understand at least a little bit about God, we know that we're made in the image of God.

00:13:16.660 We know that we have will and reason.

00:13:19.180 Not every animal has will and reason.

00:13:20.720 We're actually the only one.

00:13:21.600 And most animals have instinct and appetite.

00:13:24.480 That's it.

00:13:24.980 But we have will and reason.

00:13:26.400 That's how we can think about justice.

00:13:28.520 That's why we can be held liable for our actions.

00:13:30.620 You don't put a pit bull on trial for biting a toddler.

00:13:34.340 But you would put a human being on trial.

00:13:37.160 At least we used to before the George Soros DAs let everyone off the hook.

00:13:40.580 But you do put a human being on trial in principle for acting unjustly.

00:13:44.540 And in fact, you have someone called a judge who judges him because we're capable of that abstract reason.

00:13:49.000 That really matters because the premise of self-government is that we have reason, that we can deliberate, that we can think about things abstractly, that we can have the kind of country that we are supposed to have.

00:14:02.700 So we have to agree on what is God.

00:14:05.080 We have to agree on what is man.

00:14:06.420 We have to agree on what is law.

00:14:07.680 It's an ordinance of reason for the common good.

00:14:09.420 And then we have to agree on what is politics.

00:14:11.760 And what is politics comes down to the family.

00:14:14.280 It doesn't come down to the individual. 0.73

00:14:15.720 Politics, some people say politics comes from the words for poly, many, and ticks, blood-sucking leeches.

00:14:21.720 But that's actually, that's a false etymology.

00:14:23.960 Politics comes down to the polis, the city-state in ancient Greece.

00:14:28.300 And it means public, what we do in public.

00:14:31.140 So an individual is not a public.

00:14:33.480 It's not a society.

00:14:34.940 The smallest society, the bedrock of politics, is the family.

00:14:39.680 That's why the libs, trying to upend our politics, are always attacking the family. 0.98

00:14:43.480 I said, look, I haven't even touched on policy yet.

00:14:45.860 I'm not talking about immigration. 0.68

00:14:47.440 We have to believe this on immigration. 0.93

00:14:48.880 We have to believe this on, I don't know, IVF.

00:14:51.100 We have to believe this on taxes.

00:14:52.380 No, no, no.

00:14:52.760 We can debate all those things.

00:14:53.820 But you have to have those basic premises in agreement.

00:14:59.740 Okay?

00:14:59.960 And there are going to be atheists and secularists and libs who disagree with that.

00:15:04.780 And I'm just telling you, it doesn't make sense to be a conservative if you don't agree with all that.

00:15:10.340 I'm not even saying you have to be a Christian.

00:15:12.160 I'm not even saying you have to believe in revelation.

00:15:14.280 You should.

00:15:15.000 But I'm not saying you have to in order to get this point about politics.

00:15:18.340 But you at least have to accept the fact that God exists.

00:15:21.660 Because if God doesn't exist, then you don't get the natural law.

00:15:24.540 If you don't get the natural law, you don't get anything even resembling our system of government.

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00:15:59.600 Now, glad the Democrats are getting the point.

00:16:02.380 I want to make sure the new Republicans get that point too.

00:16:04.360 In terms of AmericaFest, just briefly, it was the best one yet.

00:16:08.780 But I've had to miss a few of the AmericaFests and the Student Action Summits because my wife keeps being inconveniently pregnant when these events go on.

00:16:16.700 But I've been to a number of them over the years.

00:16:19.580 And the first one, I would say, was about 3,000 attendees.

00:16:23.780 It was very impressive.

00:16:24.900 The next one, I forget.

00:16:26.140 What was it?

00:16:26.520 5,000, 6,000 attendees.

00:16:28.140 Really, really impressive stuff.

00:16:30.560 Then I missed one or two in the middle.

00:16:32.580 Well, this year, it was 20,000 people.

00:16:37.440 And even beyond speaking on the main stage, I was doing all sorts of interviews and little breakouts, walking around, chatting with people.

00:16:43.680 We had a Mayflower cigar party afterward.

00:16:46.160 And I was even getting the pulse of people who were there.

00:16:49.560 Sometimes it was their first TPSA event.

00:16:52.220 Sometimes it was their 100th.

00:16:53.720 And I said, what do you think about it?

00:16:55.560 And they said, this is amazing.

00:16:57.160 One woman, she's of a certain age, probably in her 50s, maybe, probably in her 50s, she said she was previously a Democrat.

00:17:05.820 This is her first time.

00:17:06.420 And she said, wow, everyone's just so happy.

00:17:08.400 Everyone's so relaxed.

00:17:09.480 Everyone's so joyful.

00:17:10.560 And that's true.

00:17:11.320 And that's not always true at conservative events.

00:17:13.280 I think part of what made this America Fest so great, beyond Charlie Kirk's a genius, and he's just an amazing political organizer,

00:17:21.260 beyond the election year, though that was part of it, beyond just the years of growth it's had,

00:17:26.700 no one felt like they were forcing it.

00:17:31.580 You know, in a lot of political conventions, the speeches feel forced.

00:17:34.900 They feel like they're a little disconnected from reality.

00:17:37.700 They feel like they're wish casting.

00:17:39.360 You know, we're always winning, and we're so cool, and we're so great.

00:17:41.960 It just doesn't ring true.

00:17:43.560 It feels a little cringe.

00:17:45.000 This one, certainly by the standards of political conventions, did not feel cringe, did not feel forced.

00:17:50.160 Why?

00:17:51.440 Because it's real, man.

00:17:53.400 We really did win.

00:17:55.000 We really won everything.

00:17:56.680 Okay?

00:17:57.080 That's why so many people showed up.

00:17:59.540 That's why everyone was just relaxed and cool and happy.

00:18:03.560 It's real, guys.

00:18:05.940 And that gives us a wonderful opportunity to build on all that winning.

00:18:10.520 President Trump showed up.

00:18:12.240 I had to fly out.

00:18:13.000 I was only there one night.

00:18:14.020 But he showed up two days later, and he had this to say at TPUSA.

00:18:18.400 With a stroke of my pen on day one, we're going to stop the transgender lunacy. 1.00

00:18:25.020 And I will sign executive orders to end child sexual mutilation, get transgender out of the military and out of our elementary schools and middle schools and high school. 1.00

00:18:41.800 And we will keep men out of women's sports. 0.94

00:19:00.640 And that will likewise be done on day one.

00:19:08.920 Should I do day one, day two, or day three?

00:19:11.200 How about day one, right?

00:19:15.240 Under the Trump administration, it will be the official policy of the United States government that there are only two genders, male and female. 0.86

00:19:25.800 That's a one minute, ten seconds on the trans issue.

00:19:34.000 And this guy's got more fuel in the tank here.

00:19:36.040 He could probably go for an hour on this issue.

00:19:38.040 And the audience is going crazy for it.

00:19:40.000 Why?

00:19:41.460 Why?

00:19:42.340 Conservatives have been talking about this issue for years now.

00:19:45.180 As one of the early people on this issue, I think my first speaking tour was called Men Are Not Women and Other Uncomfortable Truths.

00:19:51.880 Why?

00:19:52.260 Because this is a signal issue.

00:19:56.100 And this kind of thing proves it.

00:19:59.620 I did that speaking tour, I think, in 2017.

00:20:03.960 Matt had the huge movie, What Is a Woman?

00:20:06.120 When did that come out?

00:20:07.660 2020, 2021?

00:20:09.700 Here we are, 2024.

00:20:13.060 And Trump is talking about, the president-elect is talking about this on the stage, and it's getting huge applause.

00:20:19.280 Why?

00:20:19.820 Why so much focus on this?

00:20:21.300 Because it's a signal issue.

00:20:23.720 It gets back to what I was just talking about.

00:20:25.420 I said you have to, your political movement has to understand that God exists, and that man, being made in the image and likeness of God, has will and intellect.

00:20:33.260 And the law derives from the natural law, which the intelligence that created everything has made, and which man, sharing in some of that intelligence, can perceive and think through.

00:20:45.840 And that there are just facts.

00:20:47.720 And man has two parts.

00:20:51.960 There's the male part and the female part. 0.94

00:20:54.080 Men and women, and we go together, we're complementary, but we're not indistinguishable.

00:20:57.940 This is basic stuff.

00:20:59.240 Trump realizes it's not just about keeping women's bathrooms for themselves.

00:21:07.560 That's an important issue.

00:21:08.300 It's a matter of justice.

00:21:09.220 It's not just about the sports leagues.

00:21:10.780 Most people don't really care about it, but it's a matter of justice.

00:21:14.160 It's that a political party that can't figure that out has lost the common sense.

00:21:21.360 That's what this is about.

00:21:22.160 It's a signal issue.

00:21:23.160 I think it was a big issue in 2024.

00:21:26.280 Yes, inflation was a big issue.

00:21:27.580 Yes, immigration was a big issue.

00:21:29.400 I think the trans issue was extremely important.

00:21:33.860 I think you talk to the one in five black guys who voted for Trump, and you say, hey, what are some of the things that made you vote Republican?

00:21:40.380 I bet you that issue is going to come up a lot.

00:21:42.600 You talk to 46% of Hispanics.

00:21:44.240 You talk to women, especially women of a certain age.

00:21:47.360 That is going to come up.

00:21:48.660 A signal issue.

00:21:50.100 So there's Trump.

00:21:51.500 He's the man.

00:21:52.280 He's totally crushing it at TPUSA.

00:21:54.320 At the same time, the House of Representatives finally passes a spending bill.

00:22:00.840 You remember they had that continuing resolution. 0.96

00:22:03.000 They had this awful 1,500-plus page pork-laden nonsense that enshrined a ton of political correctness into the U.S. code and was just total garbage. 0.70

00:22:12.500 That got shot down because Trump and Elon said to shoot it down.

00:22:16.400 But the bill that the House passed, though better, did not include a key provision that Trump wanted.

00:22:22.280 So the House passed this bill.

00:22:26.260 The Senate passed it 85 to 11.

00:22:28.840 However, a proposal to suspend the debt limit for two years, which is what Trump wanted because he didn't want to have to deal with the fight over raising the debt limit in the early part of his term.

00:22:38.840 That failed.

00:22:39.620 Thirty-eight Republicans joined with Democrats to vote against that.

00:22:43.300 So according to reporting from Burgess Everett of Semaphore, Trump is not happy that the spending deal doesn't include the debt ceiling, according to the person who spoke with him this PM.

00:22:53.680 Not clear he'll publicly try to stop the bill in the Senate, but Trump's not thrilled the bill doesn't contain his main ask.

00:22:58.960 So what does this mean?

00:23:00.260 This means Trump is now going to face this fight in March.

00:23:03.020 It's always this big fight.

00:23:04.080 Do you raise the debt limit?

00:23:05.120 We have a debt limit, but it's absurd because we always raise the debt limit.

00:23:08.080 So there's really no debt limit.

00:23:09.880 It just creates a moment of political crisis when the leadership of the House and Senate can twist arms in the Congress to get what they want.

00:23:19.460 And so Trump doesn't want to have to deal with that.

00:23:21.500 So he says, punt it.

00:23:22.480 Punt it off until I've enacted more of my agenda.

00:23:24.840 You're going to raise the debt limit eventually anyway.

00:23:26.560 Don't make me deal with this fight.

00:23:28.420 Just deal with it either under Biden or punt it so far into the future I don't need to worry about it.

00:23:33.180 And yet, Congress said no.

00:23:36.860 In part because they're more afraid of their constituents than they are of Trump.

00:23:42.840 That's the best read on it.

00:23:44.260 In part because they ideologically believe it looks bad, even though I think Trump's point is totally defensible, which is this debt limit's fake anyway.

00:23:54.600 Don't make me hold the bag for it.

00:23:56.140 In any case, the political takeaway is Trump does not really have a total lock on either the House or the Senate.

00:24:02.720 We used to think that, okay, he's going to face trouble in the Senate because they have six-year terms and some of them are kind of squishy and don't like Trump.

00:24:09.420 But he's got the House.

00:24:10.620 Mike Johnson's always hanging around Trump.

00:24:12.360 No, he doesn't have either.

00:24:14.120 Which means this seriously damages Trump's chance of being able to push through the mass deportations, which is a mainstream public issue.

00:24:21.460 It seriously damages his chances of draining the bureaucracy.

00:24:26.320 It seriously damages his chances maybe even of tariffs, depending on how Trump tries to institute the tariffs.

00:24:32.860 This really imperils his agenda.

00:24:34.920 I'm not saying that we should just lift the debt limit indefinitely.

00:24:38.180 It's not a limit, though, so it's a silly euphemism to use.

00:24:41.580 But the fact that Trump can't, through sheer tyranny of will, marshal these votes means that the actual controversial parts of his agenda, yikes.

00:24:53.260 I'm not so sure that the Congress is going to let that go through, no matter what the American people wanted.

00:24:58.100 Folks, 2025 is set to be monumental.

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00:25:14.600 The DW will bring you live, unfiltered coverage of this unprecedented new chapter.

00:25:18.840 But the fight is far from over.

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00:25:46.880 Further evidence that Trump's hold on the GOP is not as complete as some have thought.

00:25:54.060 Laura Trump, his daughter-in-law, has just withdrawn from consideration for the Senate seat to replace Marco Rubio after Marco Rubio becomes Secretary of State.

00:26:02.900 Rubio, Senator from Florida, is going to go be Trump's Secretary of State.

00:26:05.780 That leaves an open seat.

00:26:07.260 Governor Ron DeSantis has to appoint someone to fill that seat for now.

00:26:10.580 And Laura Trump, the president's daughter-in-law, who recently ran the RNC very successfully with Michael Watley, she had expressed some interest.

00:26:19.940 Well, she just tweeted this.

00:26:21.300 After an incredible amount of thought, contemplation, and encouragement from so many, I have decided to remove my name from consideration for the U.S. Senate.

00:26:29.100 I do have a big announcement that I'm excited to share in January, so stay tuned.

00:26:32.300 I remain passionate about public service.

00:26:33.960 Look forward to serving our country again in the future.

00:26:36.300 She wants to serve the country again, but how? 0.98

00:26:37.960 In the meantime, I wish Governor DeSantis the best of luck with this appointment.

00:26:42.940 So she's got a little point in here to say, it's DeSantis' choice, but I'm withdrawing.

00:26:48.100 So she says she's doing it willingly.

00:26:50.580 Some are speculating.

00:26:51.660 Maybe it's not willing.

00:26:52.440 Maybe she just thought she wasn't going to get it.

00:26:53.880 But this is further evidence that even today, Trump does not totally dominate the GOP.

00:27:01.640 Some people are going to celebrate that fact.

00:27:04.600 There are people in the GOP who still don't like Trump, despite him winning the popular vote for a Republican for the first time in 20 years.

00:27:12.560 Despite him winning, bringing in whole new swaths of voters who would never vote for someone like Mitt Romney or John McCain or more standard Republicans.

00:27:20.300 There are many, especially in the GOP consulting class, beltway class, who still don't like Trump.

00:27:28.040 But there are going to be some people who are a little more disappointed, who were hoping that Trump, having brought such fresh air into the GOP,

00:27:34.420 Trump having won such a massive election with unified government, that he would get a little bit more of what he wants.

00:27:40.460 This to me, and maybe I'm just reading too deeply into it, but any sign I see of Trump not being able to do what he wants to do.

00:27:47.820 In this case, look, I don't even know if President Trump wanted his daughter-in-law to be a U.S. senator.

00:27:51.440 But if he did, the fact that she withdrew like this, I don't know, makes me think he really doesn't dominate the political class.

00:28:03.340 Even as he is this American original who has an overwhelming amount of support from the American people.

00:28:11.480 There seems to be a disconnect there.

00:28:13.680 Now, who runs the GOP?

00:28:15.580 According to Hillary Clinton, the GOP is taking orders from Elon Musk.

00:28:20.460 Here is what my cousin-in-law, Hillary Clinton, had to say.

00:28:23.740 If you're just catching up, the Republican Party taking orders from the world's richest man is on course to shut down the government over the holidays.

00:28:30.220 She can't say what holiday it is.

00:28:31.860 It's Christmas, Hillary.

00:28:34.220 I guess she didn't get the memo from the New York Times about how they are supposed to have religion again.

00:28:38.820 Stopping paychecks for our troops and nutrition benefits for low-income families just in time for Christmas.

00:28:43.440 Yeah, that's what the GOP is doing.

00:28:45.400 Give me a break.

00:28:46.980 This line of attack, you're going to see this ramp up.

00:28:51.000 You're going to see more and more people saying, Elon Musk really controls the GOP.

00:28:56.540 Elon Musk, he's pulling the puppet strings of Donald Trump.

00:29:00.780 You're going to expect to hear a lot more of this. 0.63

00:29:02.540 And it's total nonsense.

00:29:07.140 The immediate purpose of it is to create a divide between Trump and Elon because their partnership has been extremely powerful for both of those men and for our country and for the Republican Party.

00:29:18.900 So here she's trying to draw a little wedge. 1.00

00:29:23.420 Hey, Trump, you're taking your orders from Elon, aren't you?

00:29:25.600 Ha ha, you're not really in control. 1.00

00:29:27.460 It's totally ridiculous.

00:29:28.420 For goodness sakes, one of the first things Trump announced when he became president or when he was elected president was that he was going to end the electric vehicle tax credit.

00:29:37.020 Immediately after Elon spends all this money, all this time on the campaign trail to help Trump, Trump comes out.

00:29:41.420 He goes, yeah, well, that's really nice.

00:29:42.560 Thank you, Elon.

00:29:43.200 But I'm going to take away your biggest government subsidy for your electric cars.

00:29:46.520 And what does Elon say?

00:29:47.960 Out of principle, he says he supports that policy because he thinks it's unnecessary for his car company to succeed.

00:29:55.780 He's probably right.

00:29:56.300 Anyway, they're still going to keep up this line.

00:29:59.420 It's the same line they used about Rush Limbaugh in 2009. 0.93

00:30:03.220 It was totally ridiculous with Rush. 0.74

00:30:05.700 Love Rush Limbaugh. 0.97

00:30:06.960 Rush was the man.

00:30:08.060 Very cool.

00:30:08.480 I hosted his radio show.

00:30:09.780 I have the mug that they gave me when I hosted Rush's show over there on my wall.

00:30:14.320 I really love the guy.

00:30:15.140 But he was not the de facto leader of the GOP as Democrat operatives tried to pretend for a few weeks in 2009.

00:30:22.200 Just as Elon Musk is not the de facto leader of the Republican Party.

00:30:26.380 Trump is the leader of the party.

00:30:28.620 And even still, Trump has more control over the GOP probably than any figure since Reagan.

00:30:36.200 And even still, there are people who don't want to put his agenda into action.

00:30:39.920 Now, moving to the cultural front, James Gunn, the man behind Superman, has just come out.

00:30:47.640 And I reviewed the Superman trailer pretty much live on the show last time.

00:30:54.180 And I said, oh, this actually looks pretty good.

00:30:57.520 Superman looks like Superman.

00:30:58.920 He kisses a pretty girl. 0.99

00:31:00.760 There are no Lebanese lesbian pygmies. 1.00

00:31:05.340 He's, it's, look, wow, it looks normal. 0.97

00:31:07.840 It looks good.

00:31:08.780 But he came out, and he said it's a political piece.

00:31:13.420 And so now all the headlines, James Gunn, he's going to make a woke Superman.

00:31:17.840 And I thought, I said, look, he could.

00:31:19.240 I don't know, I've only seen a 60-second trailer.

00:31:21.280 But I thought it didn't look like that to me.

00:31:23.980 What does James Gunn actually say about the movie?

00:31:26.700 He says, we do have a battered Superman in the beginning.

00:31:29.540 That is our country.

00:31:31.840 Battered.

00:31:32.040 I believe in the goodness of human beings.

00:31:35.420 And I believe that most people in this country, despite their ideological beliefs, their politics,

00:31:39.200 are doing their best to get by and be good people, despite what it may seem like to the other side.

00:31:45.000 This movie is about that.

00:31:46.140 It's about the basic kindness of human beings.

00:31:48.740 And that it can be seen as uncool and under siege by some of the darker voices or some of the louder voices.

00:31:54.680 It's about basic kindness on human beings.

00:31:56.500 It's a noble premise and one that seems designed to appeal across the political spectrum.

00:31:59.900 It's a moral call to embrace decency and optimism.

00:32:02.340 Hold on.

00:32:02.820 That actually sounds pretty good.

00:32:04.440 Because even, you think about the beginning.

00:32:07.080 This battered, bloody Superman at the beginning.

00:32:10.660 That's our country.

00:32:13.540 How is that a woke point?

00:32:15.360 How is that a leftist point?

00:32:17.820 Biden's the president.

00:32:19.820 Biden's the president when the trailer comes out.

00:32:21.580 If the country is battered and broken, Democrats have been governing for four years.

00:32:27.500 And government, leftists have dominated the culture for 60 years.

00:32:30.960 So I don't view that as a woke or leftist point.

00:32:34.780 I view that as either a non-partisan point or if it's partisan, it's anti-democrat.

00:32:40.900 And this whole thing, he says, I believe in the goodness of human beings.

00:32:44.240 That most people are doing their best.

00:32:46.440 They're trying to help.

00:32:49.020 That's a good point too.

00:32:50.020 Man is corrupted, but we are made in the image of God.

00:32:53.300 Remember that point I said at the beginning that is really important?

00:32:55.420 It's a basic conservative tenet.

00:33:00.040 We're fallen through original sin, but we do retain something of the image of God.

00:33:06.880 Okay, we do retain some ability to have intellect and to have will.

00:33:12.380 We can't save ourselves.

00:33:14.460 We're not going to get to heaven without God's grace.

00:33:17.100 But we can cooperate with God's grace.

00:33:20.600 We can cultivate habits of virtue.

00:33:22.620 We can do something.

00:33:23.840 Even when I think about the other side of the political aisle, most of the time, well, really all of the time, I guess, in principle, when people are doing really bad things, they're trying to do good things.

00:33:35.320 Because desire is aimed at some good.

00:33:39.440 When we, this is also why I hammer it on the show all the time, that freedom is not the ability to do whatever we wish, but the right to do what we ought.

00:33:48.820 That's the classical definition of freedom, not the liberal definition.

00:33:51.660 Well, what that comes from is an observation that willing, like willing to do something, comes from a conception of the good.

00:34:04.760 We don't will things that we don't, in some way, think are good.

00:34:08.800 Now, people can be mistaken all the time.

00:34:10.440 Like when the left murders babies.

00:34:13.160 They are aiming at a good.

00:34:14.900 They're aiming at the good of women's liberation and independence and the dismantling of the patriarchy or whatever they would say.

00:34:20.640 But they are aiming at some good.

00:34:22.820 Most of the time, they deny that they're killing a baby in the process.

00:34:25.420 They use all sorts of euphemisms.

00:34:26.600 They say it's not a baby.

00:34:27.380 It's a clump of cells or whatever.

00:34:28.420 They're doing that because they're aiming at some good.

00:34:30.120 They're just wrong.

00:34:31.420 So the point that James Gunn is making here, you know, there are people, they're doing their best.

00:34:35.320 There's a kind of basic goodness, but they screw it up sometimes.

00:34:39.140 That's why our country's battered.

00:34:40.440 That's like classic conservative stuff.

00:34:44.040 It's about the kindness of human beings, not the darker voices that are louder.

00:34:48.720 What are the loudest voices in the country?

00:34:50.140 The loudest dark voices in the country are the libs. 1.00

00:34:52.700 They're the ones always shrieking.

00:34:53.780 Conservatives don't shriek that much. 1.00

00:34:55.680 Go to any political rally.

00:34:56.920 We're actually pretty demure.

00:34:58.520 We're pretty quiet.

00:34:59.480 It's the libs are always screaming.

00:35:00.820 Remember the first time Trump got elected?

00:35:02.380 No!

00:35:03.020 And they're all shrieking. 0.99

00:35:04.180 They have the women's march with the crazy hats that are based on genitalia. 1.00

00:35:08.220 The libs who are loud and screech and scream and they burn down the city for BLM. 0.99

00:35:13.640 And they throw bombs at my, you know, explosives at the wall when I go on stage in Pittsburgh.

00:35:18.700 They're the loud ones.

00:35:20.140 Sounds like he's talking about them.

00:35:23.020 To embrace decency and optimism.

00:35:24.920 I would prefer to say hope.

00:35:26.540 That's all conservative stuff. 0.95

00:35:28.840 So you're saying, Michael, are you putting lipstick on a pig here?

00:35:31.420 Michael, are you wish casting?

00:35:33.500 Are you trying too hard here?

00:35:34.920 James Gunn's a huge lib.

00:35:36.740 Maybe he is a huge lib.

00:35:37.580 I don't know.

00:35:37.880 I don't know anything about James Gunn.

00:35:39.440 And I don't watch these movies.

00:35:41.020 But maybe I'll have to watch this one.

00:35:43.020 Because it is entirely possible that James Gunn is a huge lib and that he will make a good movie.

00:35:51.000 That is possible.

00:35:52.140 It is entirely possible that James Gunn will think he's making a movie about how bad Trump is and how good the libs are and how we need transgender bathrooms all over the place.

00:36:04.140 But if he is a good filmmaker, he could still accidentally make the conservative movie.

00:36:09.560 I wonder this about Greta Gerwig.

00:36:11.580 I think Greta Gerwig is a phenomenal filmmaker.

00:36:13.660 I think she's excellent.

00:36:14.960 I think Lady Bird is one of the best movies of the last couple decades.

00:36:17.320 I think Barbie was superb.

00:36:18.540 I know it's a somewhat controversial opinion.

00:36:21.100 Though superb, deeply conservative, deeply religious, very reactionary almost. 0.99

00:36:26.740 The movie begins with Barbie and feminism coming on the scene and leading girls to kill their babies. 1.00

00:36:31.860 And it ends with a woman saying, forget about my career. 0.99

00:36:34.840 She's speaking to God and she says, the thing I want to do is have a child.

00:36:38.240 And it ends at the gynecologist's office, not at the job interview. 0.77

00:36:41.180 Deeply, deeply conservative movie.

00:36:44.240 So I don't know.

00:36:44.900 And maybe Greta Gerwig is a secret right winger. 1.00

00:36:47.060 I don't know.

00:36:47.460 But I also think Greta Gerwig might think of herself as kind of a liberal, but she's just a really good filmmaker. 0.93

00:36:52.580 And so when she's telling a story truthfully, because it connects to reality, she tells a conservative story.

00:36:59.820 That's my point at the beginning.

00:37:01.060 When I say the non-negotiables that we have to work with, they're just about accepting basic aspects of reality.

00:37:08.160 Including the foundation of reality, which is that God exists.

00:37:11.300 And if you deny that, you're just going to get really confused really quickly.

00:37:15.080 Now, speaking of religion, speaking of culture, really, really terrible story coming out of Germany. 0.94

00:37:26.320 A major attack on a Christmas market.

00:37:28.860 Many people injured.

00:37:30.280 A number of people dead.

00:37:31.460 Right before Christmas.

00:37:32.560 We will get to that story in a moment.

00:37:33.620 First, I'll tell you my favorite comment on Friday.

00:37:37.440 It's from the Trad Dad Show.

00:37:39.700 It says, Elon will make history as the first African-American Speaker of the House.

00:37:43.120 That's possible, I guess.

00:37:44.260 He could be the Speaker of the House.

00:37:45.500 I don't.

00:37:45.980 Can you be the Speaker of the House if you're simultaneously running six or seven companies?

00:37:49.480 I don't know.

00:37:51.820 Maybe.

00:37:52.780 You don't need to be a member of Congress.

00:37:54.200 Maybe he could.

00:37:54.640 But back to a really, really devastating story that broke over the weekend.

00:38:00.560 CNN reported it this way.

00:38:03.920 A driver who ran the car into a crowded Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg,

00:38:08.100 killing at least five people and injuring more than 200, has been identified.

00:38:12.960 He's a 50-year-old Saudi Arabian citizen who's lived in Germany for more than a decade and worked as a doctor.

00:38:19.160 So really awful.

00:38:20.000 We should pray for the people who died and for the families and the people who are injured still.

00:38:23.980 Awful.

00:38:24.420 Christmas market attack right before Christmas.

00:38:26.400 We've heard this story before.

00:38:28.400 Then you find out he's a Saudi. 0.91

00:38:30.680 He's got an Arab name.

00:38:33.200 Oh, here we go.

00:38:34.200 This is, you know, this is the consequences of the Islamization of Europe. 1.00

00:38:37.840 Here's where the story gets weird.

00:38:39.140 This guy, the suspect, is not Muslim.

00:38:44.400 He's an atheist.

00:38:45.480 In fact, he claimed asylum or was seeking asylum in Germany.

00:38:48.560 Because he's an atheist.

00:38:50.480 In fact, this guy invaded against the Islamization of Europe. 1.00

00:38:56.020 He was attacking Germany in part because he hates that Germany is allowing in so many Muslims like he could have been. 0.99

00:39:04.260 And that's leading to the Islamization of Europe. 0.99

00:39:06.220 He's saying, I fled Saudi Arabia.

00:39:07.240 I come to Germany.

00:39:07.920 And Germany is turning into Saudi Arabia. 0.76

00:39:09.980 So this is all according to reports that he's not a Muslim.

00:39:12.740 He's an atheist.

00:39:13.380 And I think that buttresses the point I was making earlier, though coincidentally, I suppose.

00:39:23.500 Atheism is a big threat.

00:39:27.040 Because other groups, you know, people who engage in heresies or Islam or whatever, you know, that can be a threat to your polity, too.

00:39:35.320 But atheism is a fundamental threat. 0.68

00:39:36.900 Because if you accept atheism, nothing makes sense.

00:39:39.480 And you end up in the world of Karl Marx or Friedrich Nietzsche.

00:39:42.360 And neither of those worlds looks good.

00:39:45.880 But right now, what is the state of Germany?

00:39:48.040 Right now, 18% or more of the German population has immigrated since 1950.

00:39:55.280 One in five Germans, almost, is not German.

00:39:57.840 Not ethnically German. 0.85

00:40:00.820 Usually from Islamic countries.

00:40:04.800 And you think, okay, well, we'll just have to take a hard line on Islam. 0.98

00:40:07.740 No.

00:40:08.420 No, in this case, the problem is the guy wasn't Muslim.

00:40:11.040 It's worse.

00:40:12.240 The guy was an atheist.

00:40:13.520 The turning away from God, the collapse of faith in the West, is the most likely thing to kill the West.

00:40:25.040 And it could kill the West a lot faster than people think.

00:40:28.280 Now, speaking of populations mixing, The Guardian has a story out.

00:40:33.020 The story of an uncontacted tribe in the Brazilian rainforest.

00:40:39.300 Headline, photographs reveal first glimpse of uncontacted Amazon community.

00:40:42.800 The exclusive automatic cameras in the Brazilian rainforest show images of the Masako people who are flourishing despite environmental threats.

00:40:50.020 These are pictures, cameras that were just set up so the group remains uncontacted, truly, by the white man or any kind of civilized man.

00:40:58.280 The pictures of a group of men offer the outside world its first glimpse of the community and give further evidence the population is growing.

00:41:05.940 Well, that's good.

00:41:06.420 This uncontacted tribe surviving on roaches and dirt is able to have kids and grow its population.

00:41:12.900 America, the richest people in the history of the world, can't do that.

00:41:15.760 We haven't had above replacement birth rates since 1971.

00:41:19.920 Maybe we should go move to the jungle and eat bugs.

00:41:22.640 Then maybe we could have a flourishing country.

00:41:24.420 I'm not in any way being ironic.

00:41:26.020 That's crazy.

00:41:28.520 That's not even the point I wanted to make, but that is such a shocking fact of this article.

00:41:32.740 These people who are naked running through the jungle who probably think these cameras are, you know, alien deities who have shown up.

00:41:45.360 These people have a more ordered and serious society than America in the year of our Lord 2024.

00:41:51.760 That's really bad.

00:41:52.300 Now, the article goes on.

00:41:55.020 The group is known as the Masako after the river that runs through their lands, but no one knows what they call themselves.

00:41:59.260 No one's talked to these people, so they don't know.

00:42:00.600 We just call them Masako.

00:42:02.780 While their language, social fabric, and beliefs remain a mystery.

00:42:05.200 So there's this big question that comes up, which is, they're uncontacted.

00:42:08.880 Should we contact them?

00:42:11.020 On the one hand, they're naked and, you know, they're likely having their grandmothers eaten by jaguars and things, leopards.

00:42:17.940 And they, you know, they don't have running water.

00:42:22.440 Well, they have rivers.

00:42:24.060 They probably don't have very stable sources of food.

00:42:27.540 They probably don't have a particularly robust system of law and order.

00:42:30.460 They don't have iPhones.

00:42:31.620 They don't have dentistry.

00:42:33.100 So should we contact them?

00:42:36.300 On the one hand, you say, yes, we certainly should.

00:42:38.020 On the other hand, you say, no, these people, they're so preserved.

00:42:41.660 Wow.

00:42:42.320 It's like an amber.

00:42:43.080 It's like a zoo.

00:42:44.160 If we keep the cameras there, we can see what it was like.

00:42:46.700 Primitive man or even the real hippie-dippie types will say, no, they're living the really perfect way.

00:42:52.660 And look, there's something to recommend their lifestyle.

00:42:55.220 They're growing and we're not.

00:42:57.120 So they're doing something right.

00:42:58.400 But still, I bet there's a lot of problems with this tribe running around naked in the jungle. 1.00

00:43:03.580 So some people say, no, no, we've got to preserve them.

00:43:05.780 We shouldn't contact them.

00:43:06.840 Now, others would say, that's cruel not to contact them.

00:43:08.820 You have so much you could give them.

00:43:10.100 You could offer them.

00:43:10.680 You could give them, you know, potato chips and iPhones or something.

00:43:15.080 But the other people say, no, no, no, but you might infect them with the diseases and the pathologies of the West.

00:43:19.460 And that's a fair point, too.

00:43:20.620 Both sides actually make fair points.

00:43:23.620 Because the question is not, should we contact them or should we not contact them?

00:43:28.400 The question is, what would we be bringing them?

00:43:32.880 What would we contact them for?

00:43:34.960 If you told me, we're going to contact them to teach them about atheism and doom scrolling and porn and fentanyl, we're going to teach them all those great wonders of life in the 21st century.

00:43:52.140 I would say, you know what, leave them alone, okay?

00:43:55.100 They seem to be actually doing fine on their own.

00:43:57.380 If, on the other hand, you say, we're going to contact them to make disciples of all nations and teach them about the love of God, the love of Christ, who is incarnate, and we're about to celebrate the incarnation, who died to redeem mankind and fulfills the old law and promises everlasting life.

00:44:18.060 And we're going to do, actually, what the first explorers to the Americas did.

00:44:21.620 Men like Christopher Columbus, Hernan Cortes, the conquistadors, these great brave men who brought civilization to the Americas, helped to give us our country.

00:44:33.300 I would say, go full steam ahead.

00:44:35.440 That's a charitable thing to do.

00:44:36.680 That's very good for the uncontacted tribe.

00:44:40.560 That's what the West used to do when we called our civilization Christendom and we had a good, thriving civilization.

00:44:45.920 Now we have a dying civilization that is being invaded by people who have other religions or, worse yet, they don't bring their religion here. 1.00

00:44:54.600 Worse yet, they adopt our lack of religion and drive cars into Christmas markets. 0.62

00:45:00.520 Yeah, well, we don't want to spread that.

00:45:03.160 You're right.

00:45:03.580 I'm anti-contacting to spread the sicknesses that have infected modernity, liberal modernity.

00:45:10.600 But if we're going to go back to the old school, yeah.

00:45:13.920 Bring them the truth.

00:45:14.700 I want to bring them the truth.

00:45:16.760 So much of modernity is based on falsehood.

00:45:18.900 What are we going to do?

00:45:19.480 We're going to bring them transgenderism? 1.00

00:45:20.820 That's false.

00:45:21.440 We would be confusing them.

00:45:23.660 We would be leading them further from the truth if we did that.

00:45:26.020 Or we can bring them the love of God.

00:45:29.740 Bringing them closer to the truth.

00:45:31.680 God who is the truth.

00:45:32.680 Christ who is the truth.

00:45:34.680 Yeah, good.

00:45:35.260 Let's do that.

00:45:35.940 That's a good idea.

00:45:39.000 There's an amazing story that's just come out.

00:45:42.240 Also, Wall Street Journal.

00:45:43.160 It's about surprising psychosis treatments.

00:45:49.220 I only have one minute left.

00:45:50.600 And I hate to leave you before Christmas on psychosis treatments.

00:45:54.140 But this is an amazing story.

00:45:55.540 Surprising psychosis treatment that works.

00:45:57.280 Learning to live with the voices.

00:45:59.400 It's a journal article.

00:46:00.240 It talks about this guy, Noah, whose family spent $150,000 on his psych care.

00:46:06.000 And it didn't really work.

00:46:07.000 And he was hearing voices.

00:46:08.060 And he was, you know, he's like really upset and really crazy.

00:46:10.180 Thought that he knocked down the Twin Towers and that he caused COVID.

00:46:13.880 And he was schizophrenic and all these problems.

00:46:16.840 So no treatment worked.

00:46:19.080 He tried this new treatment that's now gaining some steam.

00:46:22.580 Which is teaching people with psychosis to live with the imagined voices.

00:46:27.580 To work with it.

00:46:28.700 To understand them as false.

00:46:30.300 Not to take a bunch of drugs that are going to screw up their whole heads and maybe lead them to suicide.

00:46:34.420 But just to learn to live with this problem.

00:46:39.320 If it cannot be cured in some helpful way.

00:46:43.200 And that is helpful.

00:46:45.000 I guess this is kind of the through line of the whole show.

00:46:48.500 It's teaching people to understand the limitations that they cannot break through.

00:46:53.740 Liberal modernity says we've got to break every limitation.

00:46:56.200 We've got to break the limitations of biology.

00:46:57.720 We've got to break everything.

00:46:59.580 We've got to make ourselves gods.

00:47:01.340 But this says, understand there are limitations.

00:47:04.040 And have a healthy resignation.

00:47:06.480 And try to live with them.

00:47:07.640 And that is going to be more likely to make you flourish.

00:47:12.320 Flourishing comes from learning to live within limits.

00:47:15.080 Rather than constantly trying to deny or obliterate them.

00:47:18.340 That's only going to make you crazier.

00:47:19.900 That's only going to make you. 0.97

00:47:21.280 That's going to drive you truly mad.

00:47:24.980 We're about to learn.

00:47:26.120 I mean for goodness sake.

00:47:27.260 God himself takes on certain limitations in Christmas.

00:47:30.320 In the nativity.

00:47:32.020 He's so unintimidated by the evils of the world.

00:47:34.600 He enters into the world as a baby.

00:47:36.780 As the most vulnerable being he possibly can.

00:47:39.640 And conquers death.

00:47:41.180 You can do that.

00:47:42.080 You can do that.

00:47:42.700 Even in your human nature.

00:47:44.540 In cooperation with God.

00:47:45.540 You're not going to do it otherwise.

00:47:46.940 That's our show.

00:47:48.300 Merry Christmas.

00:47:50.040 Almost.

00:47:50.780 I broke my advent rule.

00:47:52.880 I say no Merry Christmas until Christmas Day.

00:47:57.640 Happy Monday.

00:47:58.780 I'm Michael Knowles.

00:47:59.380 This is The Michael Knowles Show.

00:48:00.880 See you later.

00:48:01.380 The Michael Knowles Show.

The Michael Knowles Show - December 23, 2024

Ep. 1642 - Superman Is Political, Says Director James Gunn

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