Ep. 1666 - Trump Goes Nuclear On USAID
Summary
In the latest episode of The Michael Knowles Show, Michael explains why the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is in danger of being completely shut down, and why it might need some serious restructuring. Plus, a look at how the left is trying to delegitimize President Trump.
Transcript
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Over the past two weeks, President Trump has, among other actions,
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deported thousands of illegal aliens, started trade wars with four separate nations,
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and threatened to invade another nation. And the left whined about all of that.
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Then Trump announced that he would restructure a single federal agency that most people have
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never even heard of. And the left is now threatening to shut down the executive branch.
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Which sort of makes you wonder what the left was doing with that single federal agency,
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doesn't it? Kind of makes you think probably maybe it might need some restructuring.
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Let's take a look. I'm Michael Knowles. This is The Michael Knowles Show.
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Welcome back to the show. Anti-Trump deportation protests have shut down the one-on-one freeway
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in LA. A ton of people, looks like pretty much all of them waving Mexican flags. It's weird. I'm told
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these are patriotic, assimilated Americans who just dream to be here in America. But they're all
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waving a ton of Mexican flags, rather. Not a single American flag in sight. Anyway, I have one weird
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trick to shut down those protests. There's so much more to say first, though. Go to
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President Trump is threatening to totally shut down and is at the very least restructuring
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the U.S. Agency for International Development. Never heard of it. Many people probably have never
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heard of this agency in their life, USAID. Some people might have heard of it, but they don't
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know much about it. Well, staffers have been locked out. Yesterday, staffers showed up to USAID.
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There was yellow tape around the building. Do not cross. The reason I'm hedging here on whether
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it's being totally shut down or just restructured is Elon Musk has announced they're shutting it down.
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President Trump has not exactly announced that, but Elon Musk has said that Trump agrees with him
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that it needs to be shut down. From what we've seen so far, though, it might just be a massive
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restructuring that's moving the agency underneath the authority of the State Department. And whatever is
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happening to it, the left is furious. And I'm not talking about fringe, crazy, purple hair marching
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the streets kind of left. I'm talking about elite, at least formerly influential, serious, suit and tie,
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go to all the NGOs and the fancy lunches around Washington kind of liberal. I'm talking about
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the libs who, until very recently, have had a lot of power. Ben Rhodes, who was a speechwriter for
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Obama. He joined the national security team at the Obama White House. Big, big figure in the Obama
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administration. He tweeted out, what is happening to USAID will cost untold lives around the world,
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devastate America's standing and massively empower China and other countries. There's no excusing it.
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It's a shameful, stupid cell phone without excuse and a harbinger of even worse to come.
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We have a Democrat senator, senator from Hawaii, Brian Schatz, who is saying that he will stall
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all Trump nominees, all Trump nominees to the whole executive branch and I guess judicial nominees
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until USAID is back and functioning. Hold on, hold on, wait.
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This Democrat senator thought mass deportations, fine. Multiple trade wars, fine. Threatening to
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invade Panama, fine. Threatening, oh, I got, Trump threatening to invade Greenland. Sorry,
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he threatened to invade two different countries. Fine. All of these things, totally fine.
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But you close down one federal agency? No, that's it. We're going to throw a wrench into the whole
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system of government? Wait, what? What is going on at USAID? Well, a friend of ours down in Latin
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America, Nayib Bukele, the leader of El Salvador, thinks he has an answer. Amid all of this hubbub,
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he posted on X, most governments don't want USAID funds because they understand where much of that
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money ends up. He said specifically, at best, maybe 10% of the money reaches real projects
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that help people in need. There are such cases, but the rest is used to fuel dissent, finance protests,
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and undermine administrations that refuse to align with the globalist agenda. Cutting the so-called
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aid is not just beneficial for the United States, it's also a big win for the rest of the world.
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This is telling you what the USAID money is really about. Well, most of it is really about. It's not
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about primarily helping hungry people. It's not about just some pure act of charity. USAID, this agency
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that has been protected from democratic control and oversight from even really the actions of the
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elected executive branch for many, many years. USAID is used to promote the Libs agenda all around the
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world with your taxpayer dollars. That's what this is about. You can't help but notice that the worst
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people in mainstream American politics, the Ben Rhodeses and these Democrat senators, the absolute
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worst people in the mainstream of American politics, are all particularly outraged over the closing of
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this one single agency. Must mean that they're hovering over the target. Must mean that Trump and Elon and
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Doge and the new administration have identified a really important feature of the liberal regime.
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And they're probably right, certainly right to at least restructure it and maybe right to close it.
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What specifically does USAID fund? Here is White House Press Secretary Caroline Levitt just running
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down a brief list of projects. Through USAID over the past several years, these are some of the insane
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priorities that that organization has been spending money on. $1.5 million to advance DEI in Serbia's
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workplaces. $70,000 for a production of a DEI musical in Ireland. $47,000 for a transgender opera in
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Colombia. $32,000 for a transgender comic book in Peru. I don't know about you, but as an American
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taxpayer, I don't want my dollars going towards this crap. And I know the American people don't either.
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And that's exactly what Elon Musk has been tasked by President Trump to do, to get the fraud, waste and abuse
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out of our federal government. Thank you, Donald Trump.
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That's a brief list of examples. I love Snoop Dogg coming at the end there.
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Da-da-da-da-da-da. There is Mrs. Levitt just absolutely beating the press into submission.
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But the list could go on and on of the radical leftist programs that are being funded all around
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the world by USAID. The one program that people are really upset about being stalled right now
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is PEPFAR, the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. This plan began in 2003 under George W.
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Bush. I believe President Bush said it was the accomplishment of which he was most proud from
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his whole presidency. It saved lots of lives. It's given a lot of medical attention to people
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with AIDS in Africa. But there are downsides to it, too. There are downsides and costs to anything
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in life. Even as PEPFAR has saved a lot of people from AIDS and has given a lot of retroviral drugs,
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and that's all really good stuff, the programs have intended and unintended consequences. One of
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the unintended consequences is when you get a lot of U.S. taxpayer dollars to hire and pay top dollar
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to doctors in Africa, then all the medical resources are going to go toward fighting AIDS.
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But more people in lots of Africa, many parts of Africa, more people will die from diarrheal diseases
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than they will from AIDS. So why are we focusing on just one disease? Particularly a disease that is
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absent cases of rape and being born with it, passed through birth, is a lifestyle disease that raises all
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sorts of questions. Even with the great successes of PEPFAR, and I'm largely a big defender of PEPFAR,
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it's pretty impressive. Biden kind of screwed up PEPFAR because Biden tied PEPFAR to the promotion of
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abortion and radical LGBT ideology, just like he tied all USAID to the promotion of abortion and radical
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LGBT ideology. Do we want to promote that? I don't want to promote those things in America,
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much less around the world. What about the other programs? Well, just to give you an example,
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just one example of how USAID operates. USAID takes your money.
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The IRS takes your money and gives it to the government. It is the government. Now,
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you elect parts of the government, but you don't really elect certain agencies of the bureaucracy,
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including USAID. So you give your money to the IRS. The IRS is in principle controlled by people
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that you elect, ultimately at the top of the president. And then the money goes to USAID.
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Then that largely unaccountable bureaucracy sends your money to various organizations around the world.
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For instance, the Tide Center. The Tide Center is a left-wing institution that then takes the money
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that you gave the government, that the government gave to them, and gives that money to groups,
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such as Black Lives Matter. So then Black Lives Matter takes money from the Tide Center,
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which took money from the government, which took the money from you. And it spends that money
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murdering you, robbing your stores, setting your cities on fire, and shaking you down for more money.
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Do you see the moral hazards of this kind of closed loop? All sorts of problems with it.
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Now, there are going to be all sorts of large ideological calls looking at the abuses in USAID
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to end all foreign aid and see, this is why we never should spend anything on foreign aid.
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That is the wrong conclusion. I actually have a different view from most conservatives at the
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moment, it seems. There's so much more to say. First, though, right now, text Knowles,
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to 989898 today. The problem with USAID, the problem with foreign aid generally, is not that
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it spends money spreading American influence. The problem with USAID and American foreign aid
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generally, is that our liberal elites have been using our money to spread their toxic influence.
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The problem is not spending money to influence things. The problem is what specifically we're
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doing with the money. What specifically we're influencing. These specific substantive values that
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we're spreading around the world. That's the problem. The problem is not the procedural norm
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of foreign aid. The problem is the substantive good of promoting abortion and LGBT and upending
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good governments that we should be friends with around the world. That's the problem.
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Okay? I hear these arguments sometimes. We need to end foreign aid. Why are we spending money on
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anything around the world? Because we're the global superpower. What do you mean? What are we
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spending money? Because we're a very powerful country. We have interests around the world,
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and we want to secure our interests around the world. We want to promote our influence.
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And when we wield power, as a superpower does, as any nation does actually, to wield power costs money.
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So that's what it's about. If you think about foreign aid as a purely charitable act,
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then there's an argument for it, I think. But it's not going to be persuasive to a lot of Americans.
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But if you recognize that foreign aid is a tool of empire, it is a tool, really, even of just
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any nation state. It's a tool of influence and statecraft. Every nation does it in one way or
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another. We're always trying to influence geopolitics to be more conducive to our flourishing.
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It's been true of every little polis, every state, every major nation, and every empire in
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the whole history of the world. Then you say, okay, in principle, I'm all right with foreign aid.
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The question is, what are we influencing? How are we influencing people?
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So I recognize there are people who say, we just need to end all foreign aid. I'm not that guy.
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I don't think that's a strong view. And more importantly, for our discussion today,
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I don't think Trump is that guy either. I don't think Trump is a guy who says, I just,
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I don't want America to project any influence anywhere. I just want to keep to myself and be
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a yeoman farmer and pretend that we're living in Thomas Jefferson's fantasy land in 1789.
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That ain't Donald Trump. Donald Trump is a big guy. Donald Trump is not a put your head in the
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sand and keep to yourself and just don't bother anybody kind of. Donald Trump is a big guy who
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wants to project power, who's threatened to invade two countries in the last two weeks. Okay.
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I strongly suspect that President Trump shares my view here. And yet we can have a ton of common ground
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with the people who ideologically want to end foreign aid right now, because we recognize that
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this is a tool of, of the liberals. What we are seeing here is it's, it's one of the most
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interesting moments in politics in my entire life, because you're seeing an actual sea change.
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You're seeing an act, what seems to be an actual shift in power.
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So all of a sudden the libs who were so happy to, to be promoting using American power and influence
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all over the world, they're not the ones who have the reins anymore.
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Now we do. And so the question for us that I think is, is do we want to just shutter this and
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not project influence anywhere? I think that's the mistake conservatives made on the domestic front
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for many decades. We're not going to wield power. We're going to abandon the institutions.
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We're going to give up on the schools. We're going to give up on Hollywood. We're going to
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give up on, on corporate America. We're going to do our own thing. Forget about it. Left. You can
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have it. Oh, good. Yeah. Great. We gave the whole country to the left. Look how that works. We're
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going to give up on government. We don't like the government. Okay. Now the government's totally
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populated by libs. They're, they're wielding it against our interests. You might not care about
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politics, but politics cares about you. That's one option. Or you can say, oh, all right,
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we got the juice now. Oh, we got the power. All right. Let's wield it for our interests,
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for our political vision and for the common good. I think that's what Trump is doing,
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which is why I suspect it's not that USAID is going to completely disappear. I think it's the
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art of the deal or it, even if the agency disappears, there'll be some new version of it.
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The question now is what are we going to be promoting? If it ain't going to be abortion and
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LGBT LMNOP, what are we going to be promoting? You see, you're seeing the art of the deal working
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very well already. Remember things are happening so quickly. It's actually hard to keep track
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of hour by hour of, of, of the last thing we were talking about. I guess the last thing we were
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talking about on this show was that Trump was threatening massive tariffs on Mexico.
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if Mexico did not fix its border and all the usual suspects were saying, oh no, this is terrible.
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It's going to raise the price of avocados, which don't even taste like anything. And this is going
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to raise the cost of Modelo or whatever Corona. Okay. All right, whatever. It'll raise the cost of a
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perfectly mediocre beer. That's fine. Well, guess what? Mexico already caved. Mexico, Mexico's president
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tweets out. We had a good conversation with president Trump with great respect for our
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relationship and sovereignty. We reached a series of agreements. Mexico will immediately reinforce
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the Northern border with 10,000 members of the national guard to prevent drug tracking, trafficking
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from Mexico to the U S particularly fentanyl. The U S is committed to working to prevent trafficking
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of high powered weapons to Mexico, whatever, like that's a big problem. Our teams will begin working
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today on two fronts, security and trade. They're pausing tariffs for one month now. Okay. What about
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Canada? We were told we were seeing this all yesterday. Oh no, we're offending our allies.
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Oh no, this is going to lead to a trade war. This might lead to an all out war. Oh no, this is
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terrible. Well, what happens? Justin Trudeau sends out almost the same message. I just had a good call
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with president Trump. Oh yeah. You, you know, you guys are all speaking real politely about president
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Trump. Now I noticed you weren't all that polite about Trump six months ago, but now I had a good
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call with president Trump says the leader of Canada. Canada is implementing our $1.3 billion
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border plan, reinforcing the border with new choppers, technology and personnel, enhanced
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coordination with our American partners, increased resources to stop the flow of fentanyl. Nearly
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10,000 frontline personnel are and will be working on protecting the border. China, Canada is making
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new commitments to appoint a fentanyl czar. We will list cartels as terrorists, ensure 24 seven eyes on the
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border, launch a Canada U S joint strike force to combat organized crime and fentanyl and money
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laundering. This is good stuff. And we're backing it with 200 million bucks. Proposed tariffs will be
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paused for at least 30 days while we work together. What's this about? In part, it's about what it says
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it's about. In part, Trump has now gotten commitments from Mexico and China. I keep saying China. That's a
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Freudian slip when I'm talking about Justin Trudeau and America's evil top hat, Canada. He's gotten
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concessions for Mexico and Canada. We're going to, we're going to put more troops on the border.
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We're going to restructure the government a little bit so that we can really pay attention to this.
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We're going to designate the cartels as terrorist organizations. Going to make it easier to go after
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them. We're going to do this. We're going to do that. Okay. That's all good. It's a, it's in part
00:20:56.000
about that, but it's in part about showing that he can do this, right? Canada and Mexico's response to
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Trump was exactly the same as Columbia's response to Trump, but notice the escalation here.
00:21:09.480
Trump sends a couple of planes with criminal aliens down to Columbia. Columbia refuses the planes.
00:21:16.980
Trump says, I'm slapping you with a 25% tariff. I'm freezing your visas and your passports. I'm
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going to sanction your elites. I'm going to, all of a sudden, what? Immediately, Columbia sends the
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presidential plane up to America to get the criminal aliens. Oh, we're working with America. This is
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great. Okay. So he starts with Columbia, shows, why does he focus on Columbia? In part, it's what
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it was really about, the criminals, but in part, it's to show Mexico and Canada that he's serious.
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And he elevates it. He tries the same trick with Mexico and Canada. Why does he do it? In part,
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because of what it's about. In part, I think, to show the bigger players, China, Russia,
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other people around the world, that he's serious. He's going to throw his weight around. He's going
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to get what he wants. And so Mexico and Canada, when they concede, even if they're not conceding
00:22:12.320
all that much materially, they are conceding the principle that Trump is going to get what he wants.
00:22:18.020
He's going to bully people into the negotiating table, and then he's going to come to deals.
00:22:23.240
And that is a message. It is not primarily for Toronto or Montreal or Tijuana or Mexico City.
00:22:30.660
That is a message for Beijing and Moscow, for that matter. There's so much more to say. First,
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Michael and series over the past few days. A lot of internet chatter about it. So, I wanted to call
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your attention to the many other episodes that we have out there. A lot of big ones. Probably our most
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popular one is with Father Dan Rehill, the exorcist here in the Diocese of Nashville. And so many others
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that have really taken off. One that has taken off is my conversation with Pearl Davis on marriage
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and her view that men shouldn't get married and my view that men should get married. Do the risks
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guys' advice. And sometimes, you know, it ruins their life. What would men do if they begged you
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kind of are. Well, what percent of women do you think are marriageable? I think you're squirting the
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issue. People are not going to return to marriage until you make the institution more fair. Well, what
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they'll do is they'll return. It doesn't matter what you say. It doesn't matter what I say. You guys
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have been preaching marriage for a decade. And the rates of marriage have still been going down.
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Why? Because the cost is too high and the quality of women is too low. How do you fix it? Do you
00:25:03.160
want to get married? Watch the full episode. I guess a debate now on the Michael Knowles YouTube
00:25:15.700
channel. For the uncensored, ad-free version, subscribe. Watch exclusively on Daily Wire Plus.
00:25:24.460
Even Denmark. Okay, this is my last little button on President Trump and the art of the deal.
00:25:30.600
Colombia, caves. Canada, caves. Mexico, caves. Even Denmark, which controls Greenland.
00:25:37.220
The Danish prime minister, Meta Fredriksen, says, I totally agree with the Americans that the high
00:25:45.640
north, the Arctic region, is becoming more and more important when we're talking about defense
00:25:49.720
and security and deterrence. And it is possible to find a way to ensure stronger footprints in
00:25:56.380
Greenland. So if this is about securing our part of the world, we can find a way forward.
00:26:00.380
But Greenland is part of Denmark and is not for sale. Wow, man, what a shift. Trump says,
00:26:09.720
we want Greenland. He's been saying this for months. We want Greenland, we're going to take it.
00:26:15.700
Most people assume that Greenland was an independent nation. Most people don't even
00:26:19.260
realize that Greenland, this huge landmass right next to America, is actually owned by Denmark,
00:26:26.060
this tiny little country on the other side of the Atlantic. And then they discover, hold on,
00:26:30.680
Denmark owns Greenland. A lot of Greenlanders say they like America and they don't really care that
00:26:34.880
much about Denmark. And Denmark says, absolutely not. You're threatening us. France, speaking for the
00:26:42.440
EU, says, this is a threat against your ally in the European Union. How could you dare suggest this?
00:26:47.960
We are so offended by this. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Now, after Colombia caved and Mexico caved
00:26:56.020
and Canada caved and Trump's the president and he's doing what he wants. Now, all of a sudden,
00:27:01.340
we got a little change in tune, don't we? Oh, no, actually, you know, I totally agree with Mr. Trump.
00:27:07.660
Actually, maybe we should increase the American presence in Greenland. That's a good idea.
00:27:12.000
Please don't take my country. That ain't your country, first of all, Denmark.
00:27:16.580
Mark, Greenland's a different country. It's closer to us and we have more interest in it
00:27:21.740
and we're the global hegemon. And I didn't exactly like your attitude the first time we talked about
00:27:27.360
this. Not even the first time. We've been talking about acquiring Greenland since the middle of the
00:27:31.080
19th century. This has been a U.S. State Department initiative and priority for 150 years. After World
00:27:38.800
War II, President Truman made a big effort to get it too. But now, okay, good. I'm glad you're coming
00:27:45.180
to the negotiating table. And that's what this is, by the way. When the leader of Denmark,
00:27:51.900
rather, it's confusing. The Greenlanders really like America. The Danish, they're coming around
00:27:57.600
on America. But when the leader of Denmark, which owns Greenland, says, look, we'll give America a
00:28:03.480
lot, but it's not for sale. They are negotiating. And that's what this is. This is all a big
00:28:09.460
negotiation. And the libs who clutch their pearls when Trump says, we're taking the Panama Canal back.
00:28:14.980
When Trump says, we're going to acquire Greenland. When Trump says, we're going to smack huge tariffs
00:28:21.100
on Mexico and Canada if they don't start enforcing their border better. The libs remind me of,
00:28:26.800
and excuse my blunt language, ladies. You know, I love the ladies, but they remind me of women trying
00:28:34.960
to buy a car. You know, when women, I know it's a stereotype, but stereotypes are all true.
00:28:41.800
They don't pertain to all the individuals of a group, but they're broadly true. That's where they
00:28:45.080
come from. When women are buying a car, they get really nervous. They don't like negotiations.
00:28:52.580
They don't like the anxiety. This is why women in practice actually don't often make as much money
00:28:58.380
as men in corporate America. One of the reasons is they just hate negotiating and they hate asking
00:29:02.980
for raises and they hate really tough deal-making, okay? But I remember the last time I was buying a
00:29:10.580
car. I was sitting with sweet little Elisa, and we were going to buy the minivan. And it's actually
00:29:17.460
a pretty tight automobile market right now, so there's not really much room for negotiating anyway.
00:29:21.960
But you got to get something off, right? You got to get a little bit of money off.
00:29:24.960
And I'm sitting there, and we're going back and forth, and the dealership says, okay,
00:29:28.280
well, here's the price, and we'll come down here for you. We got to add all this fake stuff onto the
00:29:32.520
car, like some paint job or whatever, some ceiling wax and some stupid navigation system that no one
00:29:38.240
wants. And I said, well, you got to take that off and this and boom, boom, boom. And we're going
00:29:41.940
back and forth. It's taking an hour. But it's just the dance, you know? And oh, I got to talk to my
00:29:46.840
manager. All right, you go talk to your manager. He goes, pretends to talk to the manager. Oh, this and that.
00:29:50.420
And I'm sitting there. And Elisa, she's going, oh, she goes, I hate this. She looks at me.
00:29:57.600
But you love this. And I said, I do. I love this. And men do. Men love it. Going in asking for a raise,
00:30:05.760
it's fun, actually. It's a little nerve-wracking, but it's fun. You talk to a man, a man will say,
00:30:12.360
you know what? It's fun. I felt good in that negotiation. You talk to a woman, a lot of the
00:30:16.720
time. She'll say, I didn't like that. I felt uncomfortable. I don't want to do it. I'd rather
00:30:20.540
not get the raise. I'd rather not get the discount on the car. That's how I feel about the liberals
00:30:25.420
with these things. Oh, please don't upset Justin Trudeau in Canada. No, please don't threaten any
00:30:31.800
tariffs on him. He's going to be really angry with us. Are you kidding me? It's Justin Trudeau. Who cares?
00:30:38.320
And by the way, he won't even be angry because he gets it. He knows what's going on. He runs a country.
00:30:43.280
He knows how statecraft works. He's not good at it, but he understands a little bit how it works.
00:30:49.300
Oh, no, we can't possibly threaten Mexico, what with their less than $2 trillion economy.
00:30:56.100
No, no, we, the global hegemon with a $30 trillion economy, we can't possibly ask them politely to get
00:31:02.880
the face-tattooed Satan-worshipping gangsters off the border and to stop poisoning our kids.
00:31:08.420
We couldn't. We don't want to offend them. Let's just leave it be.
00:31:12.060
What if they raise the price of avocados? Good grief, you pansies. Are you kidding me?
00:31:19.240
Chuck Schumer, give me a break. Now, in the case of Chuck Schumer and the Democrats,
00:31:24.600
what they actually want is to just keep the border open and keep all of these gangsters
00:31:27.620
coming to the country because they think it'll help them politically. But the people who are
00:31:31.820
sincerely worried, oh, no, we're going to upset the status quo by negotiating. Good grief.
00:31:38.900
With these people at the helm of our government for 60 years, it's a wonder we still have a country.
00:31:45.080
This is good stuff, man. This is fun. This is going to be the difference. This is going to be,
00:31:50.060
which way, Western man? Are we going to go the way of people who hate negotiating for a car or
00:31:54.460
the people who like it? Not everyone is as resigned as Denmark, Mexico, and Canada to President Trump's
00:32:05.700
presidency. Anti-Trump deportation protests have shut down the 101 freeway in Los Angeles.
00:32:13.880
Take a look at some of these protests. If you're only listening right now, I'll explain it to you.
00:32:24.320
There are about a billion Mexican flags. Big signs that say stolen land. Stolen land? What does that
00:32:31.240
even mean? Stolen land. We conquered some of this land. We purchased a lot of this land. We're just
00:32:37.500
talking about stolen land. From whom? Who are these people? They say they're Americans. The liberals tell
00:32:46.100
us they're Americans. They're undocumented Americans. But I don't see any American flags.
00:32:51.900
You'd think if they were Americans, documented or undocumented, you'd think they were Americans
00:32:57.280
and they were waving a flag. The flag they'd be waving would be the American flag, but it's not.
00:33:02.100
It's the Mexican flag. So I guess they're Mexicans. They're shutting down American highways,
00:33:10.220
waving symbols of another country, trying to subvert our political system in favor of political
00:33:19.160
preferences of the aforementioned other country. In what sense are they Americans? They are not in any
00:33:28.200
sense Americans. Other than that they're a bit entitled and eccentric. I guess maybe that's the
00:33:35.260
most American feature about them. But otherwise, they haven't assimilated much. However, I have a
00:33:41.100
solution. Usually when people on the left shut down highways, which happens frequently, you know,
00:33:47.120
BLM and all that, when they do that, the environmentalists, the LGBT, LMNOP activists,
00:33:52.780
all the rest. Usually I say, hey, cops, get them off the freeway. Stop it. You know, this is really bad.
00:33:57.900
It's slowing down traffic. Imagine someone's got to get his kid to the hospital or something. Get them
00:34:01.140
out of there. In this case, though, I have a different solution. For this one particular instance,
00:34:07.680
I would just recommend to the marchers that they keep marching. You see, because it looks to me
00:34:14.040
like they are marching south on the 101 freeway. So if my LA geography doesn't escape me, if they just
00:34:26.800
keep marching south, eventually they're going to hit the five and then they're going to, they should
00:34:32.320
just keep, get on that one, keep marching south. Basically just keep marching south until you reach a
00:34:39.660
little town called Tijuana. And then once you get, keep going just a little bit further and maybe the cops
00:34:46.420
could give them a little push and then you go from a growing problem to problem solved. You know, folks,
00:34:53.840
it's February, which means the usual crowd is claiming we don't do anything for Black History Month. We
00:35:01.820
have, okay, it's totally ridiculous to even claim that this year. We have the number one documentary of
00:35:08.420
the decade covering race in America. It's called Am I Racist? This was the surprise box office hit of
00:35:15.580
the year. And well, it's not the narrative that the left wanted, of course, but it is available
00:35:20.940
exclusively on Daily Wire Plus. We are pulling back the curtain with the making of Am I Racist, where Matt
00:35:27.800
Walsh and director Justin Folk and the whole team come together and discuss the movie. Watch it right
00:35:33.880
now, dailywire.com. My favorite comment yesterday is from Dry Floater. Now, I didn't pick this comment.
00:35:41.000
I didn't pick a comment yet. So I deferred to the producers on picking this comment. Let's see how they
00:35:45.000
did. Comment. I just bought 5,000 pounds of avocados to prepare for the avocado polyp, avocado
00:35:54.980
palips. Well, I got bad news for you. Val, you better really like avocados because you are not
00:36:10.160
going to be able to resell those for a huge markup. You are going to have to eat them. And the problem
00:36:14.060
with avocados is you buy them and then the moment you look at them, they start to turn brown.
00:36:20.020
They don't. Once you slice them, the avocados stay green for about four nanoseconds and then
00:36:28.660
they turn brown and look gross. So you better eat fast. Now, speaking of Tijuana, I want to turn
00:36:40.540
some attention right now to the old Tijuana tarragon. You know what I'm talking about? I'm talking about
00:36:45.520
the old Peruvian parsley. You know what I, are you catching my drift? The old Haitian oregano.
00:36:52.140
You know what I mean? Talking about pot. Talking about marijuana, man, because there's a new report
00:36:59.160
out. Finds that memory problems from cannabis might last long after quitting. And this is according
00:37:11.360
to scientists. Research out of the University of Colorado School of Medicine. Researchers tracked
00:37:17.720
brain changes in a major study. We haven't seen a thousand person study like this. And the effects
00:37:25.720
were noticeable in especially the part of the brain that is responsible for working memory.
00:37:33.300
According to the study, impacts on memory function, other mental tasks like emotional processing,
00:37:38.100
language, and logical thinking were not significantly affected by heavy cannabis use. However, working
00:37:45.780
memory looks like it could be affected long afterwards. These findings are published in the
00:37:54.040
journal, the journal of the American Medical Association. Okay. I'm not even going to get into
00:38:00.760
all the highlights of the study. You can read it yourself or you can just read news reports about the
00:38:04.660
study. Duh. Like duh, of course. Yeah. I don't, you know, I'm not the biggest promoter of the old
00:38:13.480
devil's lettuce. Okay. I'm not, I'm not saying it's the single worst thing in the world. I do think that
00:38:18.720
it's worse than booze and I think it's worse than nicotine. And I think the reason, in brief, the reason
00:38:26.400
that it's worse than booze is you can, you can drink without getting drunk. In fact, that's how you're
00:38:34.440
supposed to drink. This is traditionally in our culture, certainly in Christianity, we recognize
00:38:40.360
that it's not evil to drink. It's not sinful to drink. I mean, our Lord's first miracle is to turn
00:38:44.960
water into wine at a wedding for people who've been drinking for a long time. But that it is a sin to get
00:38:49.520
drunk. Totally lose your, your wits and your, you know, divorce your will from your reason and all
00:38:58.280
the rest of it. But, you know, to drink, to be a little sociable or, you know, that's fine. Okay.
00:39:03.660
It's very difficult to just smoke pot without getting high. I guess unless you're Bill Clinton
00:39:10.480
and you don't inhale, it's hard to do that. So that's one reason why. It's also, Tucker made this
00:39:16.320
point very well. The left wants you to smoke a lot of pot so that you're fat, lazy, and stupid.
00:39:21.440
His words, not mine. Send him the hate mail, not me. Whereas the right tends to prefer nicotine,
00:39:26.320
in particular cigars for me. But a lot of right-wingers now love the Zin packets because
00:39:30.700
nicotine focuses you, focuses you. It makes you more alert, more focused. You can be more productive.
00:39:37.600
So that's, that's the difference between the left and the right in a nutshell. Okay. All sorts of
00:39:42.100
reasons why I don't think marijuana is identical to booze and nicotine and why I think that booze
00:39:46.720
and nicotine in moderation are superior to marijuana. But regardless, let's say you love
00:39:50.880
pot. A lot of people listen to the show. They love the old Zin spinach. Okay. That's fine. I'm not,
00:39:55.500
I'm not, I'm not making a big deal about it. My issue, my big issue is with the people who pretend
00:40:02.680
that marijuana is the one substance in the world that has no downsides whatsoever.
00:40:09.380
Cane sugar. Cane sugar has a lot of downsides to it. But no, no, no. Water. You can, you can drink
00:40:15.160
too much water. You can die drinking water. But no, no. The one substance in the whole world that
00:40:20.220
has no downsides, it's only upsides, it's this magical herb, is marijuana. And that's obviously
00:40:26.460
not true. It's a finite world. It's a fallen world. We have limits. This is, it's a drug.
00:40:33.280
Of course there are downsides to it. Duh. In this case, in the case of a study like this,
00:40:40.960
science and common sense match up. When, when I was told for years that marijuana has no downsides,
00:40:48.820
only upsides, not at all addictive, even though it obviously is, it's all just totally great. I
00:40:53.880
thought, well, huh, that's a, the language of science speaking, but that contradicts my common
00:41:00.040
sense. And generally science and common sense should go together. Much like generally reason
00:41:06.540
and faith, actually always reason and faith go together. They're not, they're not opposed. Okay.
00:41:12.340
They compliment each other. That's how it should be here too. And so you could zoom out even past
00:41:17.080
the jazz cigarettes. When scientists tell you things that are totally outlandish,
00:41:25.640
that contradict other things that you know to be true, you should be skeptical of, of that science.
00:41:33.720
This is true when Dr. Fauci is saying it. This is true when Al Gore is making movies about it,
00:41:38.280
about how the world's going to end in five minutes because the sun monster, this is true
00:41:41.260
generally because we like, we think of knowledge as all divided up and compartmentalized and segregated.
00:41:50.200
That's not how it works. There is just the truth. There is the truth and we're trying to know
00:41:55.880
something about it and you can learn something about it through science and you can learn something
00:42:01.540
about it through common sense and you can learn through, you know, the inherited wisdom of the
00:42:05.100
ages. You can learn something about it through reason. You can learn something about it through faith.
00:42:09.060
You can learn something about the truth through chemistry and biology and music and mathematics
00:42:15.380
and anthropology and philosophy and English literature.
00:42:21.840
You can learn some, but it's all talking about the same truth, okay?
00:42:29.460
Don't divorce your common sense for a supposedly higher sense.
00:42:33.020
Now, speaking of common sense, really, really good news
00:42:37.020
and a huge cultural shift going on in my state of Tennessee.
00:42:45.380
Covenant marriage, you're going to hear about it more and more.
00:42:52.200
that would establish covenant marriage into law.
00:42:59.300
It was introduced into the statehouse here, January 22nd.
00:43:04.120
It would establish covenant marriages in Tennessee
00:43:07.360
as being between, quote, one male and one female
00:43:11.520
who, quote, agree that marriage is a lifelong partnership.
00:43:16.420
The legislation would make it harder for couples who agree to enter into this kind of marriage
00:43:29.200
The representative, Gino Bulso, who proposed this bill,
00:43:34.880
and Chris Hurt, who originally proposed the bill before passing the sponsorship on,
00:43:40.920
Anything I can do to help them, I'm happy to do.
00:43:51.720
Covenant marriage is reality with a few extra steps.
00:43:54.200
Because what this really is, is just what everyone understood marriage to be
00:44:00.900
Until the Obergefell decision in, what was that, 2015,
00:44:07.300
everyone everywhere understood marriage to be the union of a man and a woman.
00:44:11.900
Not because we don't like fellas who have different views and desires.
00:44:17.940
Not because we don't like ladies who have different views and desires.
00:44:20.440
Not because we're phobic or hateful or anything.
00:44:25.340
If marriage is not that, there is no way to identify what distinguishes marriage
00:44:37.160
And then, this isn't just distinguishing covenant marriage from same-sex marriage or something.
00:44:44.560
His son does an error that began really 50, 60 years ago,
00:45:02.220
ordered toward the procreation and education of children,
00:45:06.640
ordered toward the mutual support of the spouses.
00:45:20.200
and also for the mutual support of the husband and wife.
00:45:32.840
it's that that is the only definition that marriage can have
00:45:55.960
It's the only thing that gives marriage a definition.
00:45:59.720
And there are all sorts of downstream effects of that,
00:46:08.740
not just to call attention to a law in Tennessee,