The Michael Knowles Show


Ep. 1686 - Trump's Address To Congress EXPLAINED in 5 Minutes


Summary

Trump's State of the Union speech is the best in my lifetime, and probably the best by any president in history. Most people are happy about it, and Democrats in Congress have no idea how to react. The 2020 Democratic primary race is already kicking off, and we have our first potential candidate.


Transcript

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00:00:37.720 President Trump's speech to a joint session of Congress last night was the best from any president in my lifetime and probably the best ever.
00:00:46.360 I don't just say that because I like the guy.
00:00:48.780 I don't just say that because I'm a Republican.
00:00:51.340 It's not even just me saying that.
00:00:53.940 Even left-leaning CBS News found that 76% of viewers approved of President Trump's speech.
00:01:02.640 76%.
00:01:03.240 91% of viewers said that Trump spent time on issues they care about.
00:01:09.740 63% said that he spent a lot of time on issues that they care about.
00:01:14.460 We're talking about huge majorities of the country here.
00:01:17.080 68% said the speech made them feel hopeful.
00:01:20.080 54% felt proud.
00:01:23.220 Only 27% said it made them feel worse.
00:01:25.940 And only 16% said it made them angry.
00:01:29.380 74% of speech watchers called Trump presidential and entertaining.
00:01:36.020 71% called him inspiring.
00:01:38.580 62% found him unifying.
00:01:42.120 America is MAGA country.
00:01:45.180 Most people are happy about it.
00:01:49.220 And Democrats in Congress and beyond have no idea how to react.
00:01:54.980 I'm Michael Knowles.
00:01:55.700 This is the Michael Knowles Show.
00:01:56.540 The 2028 presidential race is already kicking off, if you can believe it.
00:02:19.960 And we have our first potential candidate, this one on the Democrat side.
00:02:25.380 And boy, oh boy, it's a doozy.
00:02:28.320 There's so much more to say first, though.
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00:03:42.300 Boy, oh boy, what a speech that was.
00:03:46.040 We went through it last night.
00:03:47.780 Many of you were watching during the live stream.
00:03:50.420 I was sitting with Drew and Jeremy, and Ben and Matt were actually in D.C. for the State of the Union.
00:03:57.340 So we were chatting all night.
00:03:58.960 I won't belabor the point too much.
00:04:00.740 But for those of you who just want some of the highlights, Trump woke up yesterday morning, and he chose violence.
00:04:10.440 That's the only way I can really describe it, how he walks in there.
00:04:14.260 Full of energy, very excited, and not willing to pull any punches on the Democrats.
00:04:20.720 The presidential election of November 5th was a mandate like has not been seen in many decades.
00:04:31.360 We won all seven swing states, giving us an electoral college victory of 312 votes.
00:04:38.740 We won the popular vote by big numbers and won counties in our country.
00:04:47.380 There you can hear the Democrats.
00:04:49.220 Boo!
00:04:50.340 We won all the counties, boo!
00:04:53.560 There we go.
00:04:54.640 Now you've got Al Green stands up as a Democrat congressman.
00:04:58.320 Then the Republicans boo him.
00:05:00.040 Then USA, USA.
00:05:00.940 In our country, 2,700 to 525, but a map that reads almost completely red for Republican.
00:05:16.000 So this speech, which is not technically a State of the Union, because Trump's been president for six weeks.
00:05:21.260 So he's not going to give the State of the Union address.
00:05:23.080 It's just a speech to the Joint Session of Congress.
00:05:25.580 But for all intents and purposes, it's Trump's first State of the Union.
00:05:28.360 He gets up there, and what's he going to update them on?
00:05:31.120 Well, the big thing that's happened so far is the election, where Trump won everything by a landslide
00:05:36.420 and won the popular vote as a Republican for the first time in 20 years.
00:05:40.000 So the Democrats are upset about this.
00:05:42.100 Al Green, who's tried to impeach Trump, I think, 150 times now.
00:05:45.960 He's already, this term, tried to impeach Trump.
00:05:48.600 Democrat congressman, a looney tune among looney tunes.
00:05:51.940 He gets up there, and Trump, he says, and look at all the counties we won.
00:05:57.080 We won the electoral college, we won the party, and we won all these counties and barely any counties.
00:06:01.900 Went for the Democrats.
00:06:03.500 The country voted Republican.
00:06:06.580 It was like a UFC fight.
00:06:08.640 So that sets the tone for the night.
00:06:12.520 Then Trump points out that the Democrats tried to, well, they tried, I guess, every Wile E. Coyote action
00:06:21.820 to get him off of the dais up there to prevent him from becoming president again.
00:06:26.840 And he has to rub it in their face to point out that he's back.
00:06:31.980 And we've ended weaponized government where, as an example, a sitting president
00:06:36.480 is allowed to viciously prosecute his political opponent like me.
00:06:42.680 How did that work out?
00:06:46.140 Not too good.
00:06:47.580 Not too good.
00:06:50.400 This was the greatest vindication of an American politician that we have ever seen.
00:06:55.920 It was better than Nixon.
00:06:57.020 Nixon had a big comeback.
00:06:58.440 It was better than Cleveland.
00:06:59.360 This is the greatest vindication ever because the Democrats tried to get Nixon
00:07:08.020 and they prevented him from becoming president in 1960.
00:07:13.180 Some people think the election was stolen.
00:07:14.560 But then he won election.
00:07:16.280 He won re-election.
00:07:17.140 But then they got him through a kind of deep state coup.
00:07:20.160 Grover Cleveland, he's the only other president in American history who won non-consecutive terms.
00:07:25.100 But they didn't try to prosecute Cleveland.
00:07:27.280 They didn't try to kick Cleveland off the ballot.
00:07:29.160 They didn't raid Cleveland's home.
00:07:31.060 With Trump, he went through this whole ordeal.
00:07:34.300 They did everything they possibly could.
00:07:36.040 They locked the country down.
00:07:37.760 They changed the election rules.
00:07:40.720 They tried to prosecute him four different times.
00:07:43.080 They raided his home at Mar-a-Lago.
00:07:45.300 And there he is standing up there.
00:07:46.880 He goes, how did that work out for you?
00:07:49.700 I'm more popular than ever.
00:07:52.640 I'm way more popular than I was last time.
00:07:55.300 And the Democrats, if they're being honest with themselves, can't even deny it.
00:08:00.560 But the real key to this speech, the real key to how it all played out, was when Trump set a trap for Democrats.
00:08:09.780 By telling them how they were going to behave for the rest of the night.
00:08:14.180 This is my fifth such speech to Congress.
00:08:18.700 And once again, I look at the Democrats in front of me and I realize there is absolutely nothing I can say to make them happy or to make them stand or smile or applaud.
00:08:30.640 Nothing I can do.
00:08:31.520 I could find a cure to the most devastating disease, a disease that would wipe out entire nations or announce the answers to the greatest economy in history or the stoppage of crime to the lowest levels ever recorded.
00:08:49.300 And these people sitting right here will not clap, will not stand and certainly will not cheer for these astronomical achievements.
00:08:59.180 Trump getting up there and saying that totally gutted all of the immature little tactics that the Democrats were planning to make noise, to hold up stupid signs.
00:09:09.880 It just made them look silly.
00:09:11.800 It made them look ridiculous.
00:09:14.220 Because traditionally in State of the Union addresses, the opposition party is not all that enthusiastic about what the president is saying.
00:09:21.020 But for certain things, they'll stand up.
00:09:24.040 We're going to, we want to help people.
00:09:27.620 Everyone stands up for that.
00:09:28.560 We love our country.
00:09:30.400 Everyone stands up for that.
00:09:31.280 But in this speech, truly, Trump could get up there and say, I've cured the greatest disease.
00:09:36.240 The Democrats would not applaud it.
00:09:37.920 Trump gets up there.
00:09:38.740 He says, we're going to make good on our promise not to tax tips.
00:09:43.500 Now, that was a Trump campaign promise that the Democrats stole, that Kamala Harris stole, that they campaigned on.
00:09:51.720 And this is at least one issue where the Democrats and Republicans throughout the campaign agreed.
00:09:58.760 Trump says, I'm going to make good on the campaign promise that we both made.
00:10:03.000 Democrats can't even stand for that.
00:10:05.760 Democrats can't stand up for Trump bringing an American citizen home who had been held prisoner in Russia.
00:10:14.800 Democrats can't stand up and applaud for the families of people who were killed, American citizens killed by illegal aliens.
00:10:22.480 Republicans, they can't stand up for a 13-year-old kid, who we'll get to in a second, who's been fighting brain cancer.
00:10:28.800 The Democrats couldn't stand up.
00:10:30.840 Many of them couldn't even clap for just about anything.
00:10:34.440 That was a trap that Trump laid.
00:10:36.400 He said, these people are going to look so ridiculous tonight.
00:10:39.360 Watch.
00:10:39.660 I could say anything, and they won't applaud.
00:10:42.380 And then they did it.
00:10:44.860 He memed that into reality.
00:10:48.040 Now, there was one defensive move that Trump made last night that a lot of people didn't pick up on.
00:10:52.940 Trump mentioned in his speech the price of eggs because Democrats are saying, well, when is the price of eggs going to go down?
00:11:01.520 Now, of course, Trump has been president for like five minutes.
00:11:03.940 He's accomplished a lot so far within his purview, what he actually can accomplish, that is enforcing border security.
00:11:11.540 Democrats told us a president couldn't do that without some new law.
00:11:14.760 Trump has shown you can do that within about five minutes.
00:11:17.800 He's deported people.
00:11:19.400 He has instituted tariffs.
00:11:22.220 These are all the sorts of things that Trump can do.
00:11:24.200 But you can't fundamentally reorder the economy.
00:11:27.260 You can't deal with four or five years of inflation overnight.
00:11:30.740 So Trump set the stage by pointing out the Democrats still own inflation.
00:11:38.320 As president, I'm fighting every day to reverse this damage and make America affordable again.
00:11:49.660 Joe Biden especially let the price of eggs get out of control.
00:11:55.200 The egg price is out of control.
00:11:58.600 And we're working hard to get it back down.
00:12:02.780 We're working hard with those egg prices.
00:12:04.860 Am I right, folks?
00:12:06.040 Am I right?
00:12:06.780 And it's a way to just establish in the minds of Americans who don't pay close attention to, you know, what sorts of political achievements can reasonably be, can reasonably occur within the first six weeks of a presidential administration.
00:12:22.160 He's saying, look, I can do immigration stuff, and I have.
00:12:26.660 I can do trade stuff, and I have.
00:12:29.040 But certain things that are going to lag by months, maybe even a year, things like getting inflation under control, things like getting our supply chains under control, those things are still Biden's fault.
00:12:39.580 But don't worry, even though I've only been president for five minutes, I am working on it.
00:12:43.160 But then, of the whole speech, and we'll leave it at this, we'll move on from Trump's greatest State of the Union, really the greatest State of the Union-like speech ever, certainly in my lifetime, certainly since Bill Clinton made them very long affairs.
00:12:56.420 There was one moment that stole the show.
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00:13:57.300 The moment that stole the show at the State of the Union, or sorry, it's the presidential address to the joint session of Congress,
00:14:05.480 the kind of quasi-State of the Union, was when President Trump shouted out a 13-year-old kid who's been fighting brain cancer for years.
00:14:15.860 He's had a real tough go of things, and he's always wanted to be a cop.
00:14:19.160 And Trump instructed the director of the Secret Service to make him an honorary Secret Service agent.
00:14:28.380 I don't care how tough you are.
00:14:30.740 I don't care how properly waspy you are where you repress your emotions.
00:14:35.140 I dare you not to get misty-eyed watching this exchange.
00:14:40.620 Joining us at the gallery tonight is a young man who truly loves our police.
00:14:46.080 His name is DJ Daniel.
00:14:47.960 He is 13 years old, and he has always dreamed of becoming a police officer.
00:14:52.800 But in 2018, DJ was diagnosed with brain cancer.
00:15:02.600 The doctors gave him five months at most to live.
00:15:06.960 That was more than six years ago.
00:15:09.180 And tonight, DJ, we're going to do you the biggest honor of them all.
00:15:21.740 I am asking our new Secret Service director, Sean Curran, to officially make you an agent of the United States Secret Service.
00:15:32.060 Thank you, DJ.
00:15:49.620 It was amazing.
00:15:50.460 Even in there, his dad picks him up at one point.
00:15:53.200 And when he's occurring to him what's just happened, the kid hugs the Secret Service director.
00:15:58.560 It's so sweet, especially if you're a father, you know this, especially if you're a father of boys as I am.
00:16:05.360 You just think, man, this is like the sweetest moment I have ever seen in politics.
00:16:12.680 And the Democrats couldn't be bothered to stand up for a kid who's been fighting brain cancer for seven years,
00:16:22.300 who gets this really nice honor.
00:16:24.480 It's just really beautiful.
00:16:25.760 Should be a unifying thing.
00:16:26.980 They can't be bothered to stand up.
00:16:28.940 I didn't see any Democrats standing up.
00:16:30.280 The only Democrat I saw standing up was Bobby Kennedy Jr., who's a Republican now.
00:16:34.240 Some of them, I saw Debbie Wasserman Schultz there, used to run the DNC.
00:16:37.520 She wouldn't even applaud for the kid.
00:16:40.660 These are sick people.
00:16:42.420 These are really sick people.
00:16:45.500 That's no partisan shot.
00:16:47.120 You know, I understand they're not going to stand up for everything.
00:16:49.480 They're not going to applaud for everything.
00:16:50.480 They're not.
00:16:51.460 How sick do you have to be?
00:16:52.760 You get some sweet little kid hugging the Secret Service director, this nice honor at the State of the Union.
00:16:59.880 Kid's not even old enough to vote, so you don't even have to worry that he voted for Trump.
00:17:03.080 And you can't be bothered to put your two little hands together to pay the kid an honor.
00:17:10.180 It was sick people.
00:17:10.920 But it got sicker from there, actually.
00:17:13.040 Because after the speech, an MSNBC, one of the worst people on MSNBC, decides to lobby this attack on this sweet moment.
00:17:26.380 I think this was a lesson in finding one thing that you let yourself feel.
00:17:33.480 And I let myself feel joy about DJ.
00:17:37.540 And I hope he's alive for another, you know, 95 years.
00:17:42.520 And I hope he lives the life he wants to live.
00:17:46.340 He wants to be a cop.
00:17:47.160 He knows what he wants to do.
00:17:48.160 And maybe when you have childhood cancer, that crystallizes for you.
00:17:51.920 And I hope he has a long life as a law enforcement officer.
00:17:55.500 But I hope he never has to defend the United States Capitol against Donald Trump supporters.
00:18:00.240 And if he does, I hope he isn't one of the six who loses his life to suicide.
00:18:04.780 And I hope he isn't one who has to testify against the people who carried out acts of seditious conspiracy
00:18:10.060 and then lived to see Donald Trump pardon those people.
00:18:15.240 What?
00:18:15.680 What?
00:18:15.740 You know, very little surprises me.
00:18:20.320 What's that woman's name?
00:18:21.200 Nicole Wallace.
00:18:22.040 Is that her name?
00:18:23.660 She's one of the real wackos, but she's one of the big stars of MSNBC.
00:18:27.820 And her reaction to this really sweet moment is she tries to put on a good face.
00:18:34.380 You know, it's like that meme she's got.
00:18:35.860 She's plastered on the smiling face.
00:18:37.680 Oh, that was nice.
00:18:38.760 I liked that.
00:18:39.740 Yeah, that was really nice.
00:18:41.300 But I hope he doesn't kill himself.
00:18:43.240 That little kid.
00:18:44.080 I hope that little 13 year old kid doesn't go kill himself after that.
00:18:48.500 What kind of a demented psycho do you have to be for that to be your reaction?
00:18:53.180 What kind of a demented psycho do you have to be to even think that?
00:18:57.420 To even think that, much less say that privately to someone, much less say that on national television.
00:19:06.280 It's MSNBC, so there are probably five people watching.
00:19:08.740 It's like making an utterance in your own living room.
00:19:11.240 But nevertheless, there are cameras and microphones in that studio.
00:19:15.200 This is how contorted with hatred these people have become.
00:19:22.920 This is how divorced from reality they have become because of their irrational contempt for the man that they consider to be the mango Mussolini.
00:19:33.080 That when Donald Trump, a very, very popular president, who gave an even more popular speech.
00:19:40.580 He's already very popular.
00:19:41.820 His speech was extraordinarily popular with three quarters of the country.
00:19:47.140 And he says, hey, let's just give a nice honor to a kid who's fought a really brave fight against brain cancer.
00:19:53.080 And this psycho's first reaction is, yeah, I hope he doesn't kill himself.
00:19:59.060 Sick stuff.
00:20:00.600 Sick stuff.
00:20:01.460 And the Democrats' performance in that room last night and the Democrats' performance on television after the speech, I don't think it won them over one single vote.
00:20:10.380 I think, if anything, it sent more votes to President Trump and the Republicans and the MAGA movement.
00:20:16.360 Because, as Trump said in the speech, he was leading the common sense revolution.
00:20:21.460 Common sense, that's a phrase I've been saying throughout the campaign.
00:20:23.980 That's what the election's about.
00:20:25.660 That's the meaning of this election.
00:20:27.520 Trump articulating that beautifully.
00:20:29.780 And I think anyone who watched the Democrats' display in the Capitol or on television has to think,
00:20:36.000 these people have a screw loose and I do not want them to have power.
00:20:39.960 Now, the Democrats did their best to pick the most normal person in their party to give the response to the State of the Union.
00:20:49.360 Even that, it wasn't great.
00:20:51.380 They selected a woman.
00:20:52.160 I didn't even recognize her at first.
00:20:53.520 I was watching her on the monitor last night.
00:20:54.980 I said, who is this?
00:20:55.720 I've never even seen this Democrat.
00:20:57.580 And it's Alyssa Slotkin, who's a new Democrat senator from Michigan.
00:21:01.060 Michigan, obviously, a very important swing state.
00:21:04.780 She is kind of new to the national spotlight.
00:21:08.100 It was a tough election.
00:21:09.260 We were hoping the Republican was going to eke it out in November.
00:21:12.360 So she makes her national debut and she tries to soften the edges of a Democrat party that increasingly embraces castrating little kids,
00:21:25.400 makes murdering babies their sacrament, advocates a totally open border, wants to abolish prisons,
00:21:31.440 really crazy stuff that doesn't resonate with Americans.
00:21:33.940 So they picked this woman to try to soften the edges.
00:21:36.540 I don't think she does a very persuasive job.
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00:22:54.640 Slotkin comes out for the Democrats, and she says, all right, we're not going to focus on trans.
00:22:58.300 We're not going to focus on mass migration.
00:23:00.140 We're not going to focus on the crazy stuff that people don't like.
00:23:03.520 We're going to focus on the middle class.
00:23:07.100 Most Americans share three core beliefs.
00:23:10.580 That the middle class is the engine of our country.
00:23:13.200 That strong national security protects us from harm.
00:23:16.560 And that our democracy, no matter how messy, is unparalleled and worth fighting for.
00:23:23.000 Let's start with the economy.
00:23:25.360 Michigan literally invented the middle class.
00:23:28.580 Hold on, wait.
00:23:30.140 So I was sort of, I was with you, not that the Democrats care about those core beliefs.
00:23:35.420 They don't.
00:23:35.840 The main thing the Democrats care about is slaughtering kids, castrating little kids, and importing illegal aliens with face tattoos into our country.
00:23:42.740 Those are the main, at least judging by their advocacy during the campaign.
00:23:46.320 But Alyssa Slotkin probably thinks Democrats should focus on all the other stuff.
00:23:50.140 But then she lost me at Michigan literally invented the middle class.
00:23:55.620 I'm pretty sure the middle class was literally invented in like late 14th century Italy.
00:24:03.140 I don't think, I think it was a development of the high middle ages and early modern era in continental Europe, not a development of Michigan, you know, in the 1950s or something.
00:24:19.440 So her history is already a little bit off.
00:24:22.060 I'm starting to question her judgment.
00:24:24.180 And then she makes a claim about illegal immigration because they can't help themselves because the Democrats just love mass migration because they think, all right, we can't convince actual Americans to vote for us.
00:24:33.340 So let's just bring in foreigners who statistically are at least more likely to vote for Democrats.
00:24:39.180 And then we'll give their kids birthright citizenship.
00:24:42.020 We'll try to give them amnesty and maybe we can just gain power politically by cheating.
00:24:47.340 Here's the claim she makes.
00:24:50.340 Securing the border without actually fixing our broken immigration system is dealing with the symptom and not the disease.
00:24:57.860 So that just isn't true.
00:25:00.100 Whatever you want to think about amnesty or immigration reform or even border security, just her logic doesn't make any sense.
00:25:09.900 She's saying that the open border in contravention of American federal law, the open border is a symptom of the disease of having lots of illegal aliens in the country that have not received amnesty and are living in quasi-legal circumstances.
00:25:30.100 But actually, the opposite is true.
00:25:32.800 The disease is that we have the open border.
00:25:35.320 That is to say, the root cause of the immigration debates in the country is the open border across which the illegal aliens came.
00:25:43.040 The symptom of that disease is that we have lots of millions, 11 to 16 million or maybe more people living in this country, many of whom are committing crimes.
00:25:54.140 People who are living in this country are statistically much more likely than the native population to be using welfare programs and to be draining our public resources that we don't know what to do with because they're living in the shadows and in quasi-legal circumstances.
00:26:06.400 It's not just that this woman is wrong about illegal immigration.
00:26:11.940 She doesn't understand basic logic.
00:26:14.920 Her fundamental reasoning is wrong.
00:26:18.040 She's confusing cause for effect, symptom for disease.
00:26:22.300 That's par for the course with a Democrat party that has increasingly failed to make persuasive arguments to the American people.
00:26:33.080 So, it's the toughest job in politics trying to give the opposition party response to the State of the Union.
00:26:40.340 Pretty much everyone fails at it.
00:26:42.380 I remember, was it 2012 or something?
00:26:45.660 Bobby Jindal gave it and everyone attacked him and said he did a bad job.
00:26:48.840 I remember Bobby Jindal, he was the governor of Louisiana, and then Marco Rubio, everyone made fun of him because he drank out of a water bottle during the response.
00:26:55.760 And it's just a bad job.
00:26:57.300 And she didn't do the worst job I've ever seen, but she, I think, ultimately failed to make her case.
00:27:04.180 And it's not even her fault.
00:27:05.300 She's a perfectly attractive Democrat politician relative to the rest of her party.
00:27:11.820 But her party is just so far gone, and she does have to defend things like mass migration, and she does have to defend things like LGBTQ ideology, which she alluded to last night that she tried to soft pedal it.
00:27:22.800 And she just has to defend things that most people rejected, most voters rejected in November.
00:27:28.660 So, looking ahead to potential presidential candidates, we have our first name that's really being floated for the 2028 race.
00:27:38.020 The next presidential cycle begins almost immediately after the last one ends.
00:27:43.920 And who is that candidate?
00:27:46.220 That would be Minnesota governor, former vice presidential candidate, Tim Wolfe.
00:27:54.040 Look, I never had an ambition to be president or vice president.
00:27:57.340 I was honored to be asked.
00:27:58.820 I told the vice president I would go wherever she asked me.
00:28:00.720 If she didn't pick me and she sent me to Omaha to win one electoral vote, that's what I would do.
00:28:04.980 I've always done this.
00:28:06.120 If I feel like I can serve, I will.
00:28:08.020 And if nationally that looks like, you know, maybe people are like, dude, we tried you, and look how that worked out.
00:28:13.560 I'm good with that.
00:28:14.580 If I think I could offer something, or if there's a piece there that would do it, I would certainly consider that.
00:28:22.580 Please.
00:28:23.580 You know, I don't even feel like I need to get on my knees and beg for this guy to be a presidential candidate or to be the presidential nominee in 2028.
00:28:30.080 Because the Democrats are already indicating that they have learned nothing from the election.
00:28:36.600 And they're going to keep putting their least attractive candidates into positions of power.
00:28:40.940 The clearest example would be electing David Hogg, one of the least likable Democrats, even among Democrats in the country.
00:28:49.140 The kid who he created a media career for himself by going on television after his school had a shooting.
00:28:55.180 And then he got into Harvard that way, even though academically it was a little suspect that he got in.
00:29:00.820 And he's just like really annoying, and he wants to take away people's guns.
00:29:03.820 And he doesn't seem to know very much about the Constitution and our legal tradition.
00:29:07.940 And they made that guy the vice chairman of the party.
00:29:11.280 So they're clearly, they are clearly specifically interested in elevating liberal white guys that most people don't like.
00:29:21.360 And so Tim Walsh fills that spot perfectly.
00:29:25.140 Went down in flames as one of the worst vice presidential candidates in modern memory.
00:29:30.420 And so if he's the nominee, please, thank you, please.
00:29:35.220 Christmas came early.
00:29:36.260 Christmas came four years early, I guess.
00:29:37.940 Now we're getting some breaking news, according to CNN, that the Supreme Court has rejected President Trump's request to keep billions of dollars in foreign aid frozen.
00:29:50.540 Foreign aid, remember, doesn't just mean, doesn't even primarily mean sending javelins to the Ukrainians.
00:29:56.700 Foreign aid doesn't just mean or even primarily mean helping with diseases in Africa.
00:30:01.360 Foreign aid means, to use one notable example, sending a lot of money to the wife of some British politician to go teach Afghan peasants about Marcel Duchamp and how urinals actually constitute really beautiful modern art.
00:30:20.320 Now, there's a lot of graft and weird stuff in the foreign aid promoting things like transgender ballet performances in Guatemala or Papua New Guinea or whatever.
00:30:31.300 Crazy stuff.
00:30:32.040 And so President Trump and Doge go in and they say, okay, we're going to freeze that.
00:30:36.020 We're not sending that money out.
00:30:38.960 Supreme Court now rejecting Trump's, reportedly, according to CNN, rejecting President Trump's plea to stop that.
00:30:46.260 But there's going to be a fight here, okay?
00:30:47.640 And it's actually part of our constitutional system that there is a fight between the executive branch and the judiciary and the legislature sometimes.
00:30:55.400 That's a feature, not a bug of our system.
00:30:58.600 What's weird about this kind of moment, though, is this is not a case of President Trump trying to exercise control over the legislature.
00:31:09.960 And the court coming in and saying, oh, actually, the executive has no right to exercise this kind of authority over the legislature, a co-equal branch of government.
00:31:19.320 This isn't an example of President Trump trying to exercise authority over the court.
00:31:24.740 And the court stepping in and saying, no, we're not going to do that.
00:31:26.900 But what's so weird about all of these executive agencies and all this money that is sent over to the executive branch to be sent overseas, really just to promote leftism abroad and at home, because some of that money gets funneled back into the United States.
00:31:43.860 To use just one example, USAID sends money to the Tides Center.
00:31:48.480 The Tides Center, a left-wing organization, gives money to BLM.
00:31:52.120 BLM burns down your city and pressures the corporations in your country and the politicians in your communities to give them even more power and give in to even more of their demands.
00:32:06.700 And then the cycle continues, rinse and repeat.
00:32:10.640 That's how this works.
00:32:11.580 And so what's so strange about this situation is President Trump, the leader of the executive branch, is being told he can't even control the executive branch.
00:32:22.120 This isn't one branch of government trying to take power from another.
00:32:25.880 It's the duly elected leader of a branch of government trying to control that branch of government.
00:32:31.920 And so that's what distinguishes this governmental fight.
00:32:37.600 And how Trump reacts to the court's decision remains to be seen because this news is just breaking right now.
00:32:43.820 In the meantime, though, you're going to hear a lot of talk about true conservative principles.
00:32:48.980 You can hear a lot of talk about, well, you know, President Trump, he's a threat to our order.
00:32:53.400 And we stand by our principles from a bunch of squishes who support Democrats.
00:32:56.520 Well, I've got, I have now the apotheosis of the so-called principled conservatives who won't support the Republican leader of the party who has been the leader of the party for the past, you know, three presidential cycles.
00:33:12.080 And who's won non-consecutive terms and who won the popular vote for a Republican the first time in 20 years.
00:33:17.660 Because it's so principled.
00:33:18.740 Well, that principled conservative is now embracing transgenderism.
00:33:27.020 We'll get to that in a moment.
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00:33:55.880 My favorite comment yesterday is from Ben BJU4558, who says, C.S. Lewis was walking with a friend when a beggar asked for money.
00:34:05.000 Lewis gave him the money, and his friend said, you know he's just going to go buy booze with that.
00:34:08.980 Lewis replied, well, that's what I was going to do with it.
00:34:10.980 That's right, I've never heard that story.
00:34:12.260 I don't know if that's a true story.
00:34:13.740 It might be one of those, you know, Abraham Lincoln said, and it might be an apocryphal attribution, but it might be real.
00:34:19.420 Because I've had similar thoughts sometimes.
00:34:21.800 You know, you walk around, a guy says, can I have some money?
00:34:25.240 I say, what do you want it for?
00:34:25.960 He goes, I want it for cigarettes.
00:34:27.260 I say, well, you can have a cigarette if you want.
00:34:29.680 I don't know.
00:34:30.040 That's not better than like black tar heroin or something.
00:34:32.400 But I remember one time, I was walking.
00:34:34.940 Actually, a friend of mine reminded me of this story just the other day.
00:34:37.240 I was walking, and some bum comes up to us on the street.
00:34:40.340 And I had just left a bar, actually.
00:34:42.300 I forget, it was in some city around the country.
00:34:44.360 And the bum said, hey, can I have some money?
00:34:46.800 I said, what do you want to do with the money?
00:34:48.740 And he says, I want to buy a beer.
00:34:50.460 Well, I thought, well, that's honest at least.
00:34:51.860 He's not, sometimes bums will lie and say they want food, but they don't really want food.
00:34:55.020 They want booze or drugs.
00:34:55.980 But my friend reminded me, I said to him, well, why do you want the beer?
00:35:02.360 He's like, well, I don't know, because I like beer.
00:35:06.720 You were in a bar.
00:35:07.700 I said, that's true.
00:35:08.420 I was in a bar.
00:35:09.840 I said, but is that beer going to help you?
00:35:12.300 If I give you the money, if I give you the five bucks for a beer, is that really going to help you?
00:35:17.980 Because I can go have a beer.
00:35:19.500 This is one of the cruel twists of addiction, I guess.
00:35:22.340 I can go have a beer and it's totally fine because I'm not addicted to beer.
00:35:26.920 I don't even like beer that much.
00:35:29.180 But that guy, who's clearly an addict, he likes beer so much that he can't ever have beer.
00:35:36.700 And this is a line Norm MacDonald, the great philosopher, late great philosopher Norm MacDonald made in his memoir based on a true story.
00:35:43.240 Said, you know, it's kind of crazy.
00:35:44.360 My friend Adam Egett, he's an alcoholic.
00:35:47.480 So that means he likes beer so much.
00:35:49.180 He likes alcohol so much he can never have any.
00:35:51.140 But me, I don't like alcohol that much and I can have as much as I want.
00:35:54.220 And yeah, that's how it works.
00:35:56.040 That's how it works in a fallen world.
00:35:57.780 Okay.
00:35:59.240 Speaking of a fallen world, this is a doozy.
00:36:04.080 The Democrats are attracting very few people to their party.
00:36:07.640 They've lost a lot of ground with Hispanic voters, black voters, with women.
00:36:12.560 74, 75% of people said they liked Trump's speech last night.
00:36:15.860 They thought it was good.
00:36:16.540 A lot of people, 91% said Trump was speaking about things that they care about.
00:36:21.880 You know, Trump won the popular vote, obviously.
00:36:24.500 But one guy, at least one guy, has gone from Republican to Democrat.
00:36:28.760 And that would be Bill Kristol.
00:36:32.120 Bill Kristol, former chief of staff for the Republican vice president, Dan Quayle.
00:36:36.640 Bill Kristol, the former head honcho over at the Weekly Standard, which was formerly, until it went out of business, it was a premier conservative publication.
00:36:46.460 He was on Fox News as the conservative talking head.
00:36:50.800 He had a real prominent position as a conservative thought leader.
00:36:56.920 And Bill Kristol tweeted this yesterday.
00:37:00.860 Stand with trans Americans.
00:37:04.260 You don't have to understand everything about the transgender experience to know that Trump's acts of humiliation and dehumanization are unjust and dangerous.
00:37:13.460 Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you your principled conservatives embracing transgenderism, an ideology that presents a false view of human nature that does not help anyone, that harms everyone that it touches, that tramples on the legitimate rights of women, that has led to rapes of women and girls in bathrooms, that has led to women's skulls being cracked in because of transgenderism in sports,
00:37:42.940 that has led to women losing their medals and scholarships because transgender identifying men compete against them and beat them.
00:37:53.180 Your principled conservatives are now embracing transgenderism.
00:37:56.880 This is proof positive of the accusation against some Republicans that Republicans are just liberals five to ten years too late.
00:38:06.220 They're conserving the liberalism of five years ago.
00:38:11.740 I don't even know if it's five.
00:38:12.900 It might be two years ago for this guy.
00:38:14.780 I remember I was in college.
00:38:16.760 Bill Kristol came up to speak.
00:38:19.080 And one of the conservative students in college, conservative, quote unquote, he was defending same-sex marriage.
00:38:25.980 Now, this was before the Obergefell decision.
00:38:29.380 This might have even been before.
00:38:30.820 It was right around the time that Obama switched his view.
00:38:33.500 But it was right around the time when Obama still defended marriage as it truly is and opposed so-called same-sex marriage.
00:38:40.560 And he said, I think we Republicans should embrace gay marriage.
00:38:44.140 You know, that'll be good for everyone.
00:38:45.900 And I remember Bill Kristol scoffing at that idea.
00:38:48.480 And I think he published at least one column about this.
00:38:51.140 He said, no, no, no, conservatives should not embrace same-sex marriage.
00:38:54.120 That's crazy.
00:38:55.080 That's absurd.
00:38:55.660 And now I'm waiting for Bill Kristol to paint his face in a rainbow.
00:39:00.340 We stand with the trans-Americans.
00:39:02.740 Trans kids' rights are human rights.
00:39:05.740 I don't know.
00:39:07.080 Is he going to wear a free Palestine keffiyeh next?
00:39:10.280 I don't know.
00:39:11.400 Who knows?
00:39:12.500 Who knows?
00:39:13.380 What do these principled conservatives conserve?
00:39:17.340 I've just noticed, having met a handful, having known even somewhat well, a handful of these malcontents over the years.
00:39:25.660 The hard-line never-Trumpers.
00:39:28.440 The never-Trumpers in 2025.
00:39:30.920 They all describe themselves as principled conservatives.
00:39:34.580 And they are the least principled people in politics that I have ever seen.
00:39:42.220 What principles do they hold?
00:39:44.580 The principles of petty personal grudges and milking a little bit of money out of new donors,
00:39:52.860 even those who oppose everything you've ever pretended to stand for in your whole life.
00:39:57.140 Crazy.
00:39:58.320 Crazy.
00:39:59.200 Meanwhile, the Democrats continue to make themselves look totally ridiculous.
00:40:06.820 Democrats in the California legislature are proposing a new bill after those devastating fires.
00:40:14.260 So, devastating fires occur, burn the city down.
00:40:17.600 There are lots of reasons those fires occurred.
00:40:19.920 Totally predictable Santa Ana winds that the political leaders refused to prepare for.
00:40:25.320 Because the California leaders in recent years didn't want a clear brush in their woody areas.
00:40:31.460 President Trump warned Governor Gavin Newsom about this in 2018.
00:40:34.080 Because the city emptied reservoirs before those predictable Santa Ana winds.
00:40:42.000 So, the Palisades Reservoir didn't have any water in it when the fires broke out.
00:40:45.580 Because the global warming obsessed Democrats decided to send 95% of rainwater into the Pacific Ocean.
00:40:53.580 Because they feared that if they collected the rainwater, like reasonable people, they might damage the Delta smelt.
00:40:59.460 Some tiny little, you know, sardine or something.
00:41:02.640 So, all of these political problems led to the fires.
00:41:05.980 Some people took actions to protect themselves against the fires.
00:41:10.120 Notably, Rick Caruso, who ran as a Republican for mayor of Los Angeles and lost to former communist, maybe current communist, Karen Bass.
00:41:18.380 But like literally, this woman associated with communists.
00:41:21.700 Terrible.
00:41:22.140 She wasn't even on the continent during the fires.
00:41:24.600 That's how neglectful she was of her duties.
00:41:26.760 So, Rick Caruso has a very popular property in the Palisades.
00:41:29.740 Beautiful little mall.
00:41:30.840 Lovely property.
00:41:32.500 And it didn't burn down.
00:41:34.540 Because Rick Caruso hired private firefighters in advance of the Santa Ana winds to protect his property.
00:41:41.440 So, the California Democrats, trying to make life better, ostensibly for the constituents, they propose a bill.
00:41:48.960 Does the bill say that they're going to clear the brush?
00:41:52.940 No.
00:41:54.540 Does the bill say that they're going to keep their reservoirs filled?
00:41:57.600 No.
00:41:59.260 Does the bill say that they are going to keep their rainwater so that they don't shove it all into the Pacific Ocean and they have water to fight the fires when they come?
00:42:10.060 No.
00:42:13.780 The bill that the California Democrats are proposing, AB 1075, bans private firefighters.
00:42:21.820 This is the perfect encapsulation of the Democrat Party.
00:42:25.700 this is Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut. They're not going to help anyone live a better
00:42:30.880 life. They're just going to prevent certain people from living a good life. They're not
00:42:36.280 going to elevate everyone. They're just going to handicap the people who are doing reasonable
00:42:41.340 things and flourishing. They're not helping. They're just being vindictive. The guy who ran
00:42:49.140 for mayor, who Angelino could have had for mayor, who prepared at least his own properties for the
00:42:54.360 fire as a private citizen. They're going to punish him. They're not even thinking, how could we have
00:43:00.940 saved all of these homes in this historic fire? They're just thinking, how could we have burned
00:43:04.840 Rick Caruso's property down? Okay. Well, next time we'll burn that down. That's perfect.
00:43:11.680 And this is not just the California Democrats. This is true of Democrats nationwide.
00:43:18.220 They do not even think about how to help people. They are purely thinking about how to punish
00:43:24.340 their opponents. Really, really weak stuff. Now, a big feature of the speech last night
00:43:33.100 that a lot of people aren't really talking about, but it was a huge proportion. Proportionally,
00:43:38.600 it was a huge part of the speech was when Trump was talking about tariffs and we're getting mixed
00:43:44.300 messages on tariffs. Are tariffs a negotiating tactic? Are tariffs just a sound economic policy
00:43:49.340 to raise revenue? Is Trump really going to levy 50% tariffs on Colombia, 25? Or is he going to take
00:43:55.240 them away the next day when Colombia acquiesces? Is he going to levy big tariffs on Canada and Mexico?
00:44:00.040 Is he going to keep the tariffs on China? What's the deal? So he says he's going to levy those tariffs
00:44:05.100 on China or on Canada and Mexico. And then he says there's nothing that they can do to stop the
00:44:13.080 tariffs. Then Howard Ludnick, his commerce secretary, comes out on television and says,
00:44:17.160 actually, maybe the tariffs will disappear tomorrow. Or at the very least, maybe he'll
00:44:20.560 walk them back tomorrow.
00:44:23.060 He's going to come out today angry that Americans are still being killed. Now, both the Mexicans and
00:44:29.260 the Canadians were on the phone with me all day today trying to show that they'll do better.
00:44:33.760 And the president's listening because, you know, he's very, very fair and very reasonable.
00:44:38.060 So I think he's going to work something out with them. It's not going to be a pause,
00:44:41.980 none of that pause stuff. But I think he's going to figure out,
00:44:45.100 you do more and I'll meet you in the middle some way. And we're going to probably be announcing
00:44:49.380 that tomorrow. So somewhere in the middle will likely be the outcome. The president moving with
00:44:54.620 the Canadians and Mexicans, but not all the way. So this is the big question. To me, the interesting
00:45:00.160 question, I was debating this a little bit last night with Ben on the backstage show. He has been
00:45:05.340 very opposed to tariffs in principle. Now, Ben and Jeremy was saying this too. They're open to
00:45:13.640 tariffs as a negotiating tool to get greater global trade, but they oppose tariffs as a matter of
00:45:19.680 economics. And I pointed out, I said, you know, there actually is a principled economic argument
00:45:25.360 for tariffs. I know these days, everyone who's taken a seventh grade economics course and has
00:45:29.880 watched like one Milton Friedman video thinks that they know everything about economics and there's
00:45:33.460 no case for tariffs. But there's actually a long tradition in this country and in the Republican
00:45:37.700 Party and just in global economics for tariffs. Abraham Lincoln famously said, give me a tariff,
00:45:43.820 I'll give you the greatest nation on earth. So the question that exists is, is Trump using the
00:45:51.080 tariffs to negotiate for better trade deals and open up global trade? Is it just, are the tariffs
00:45:58.880 just instrumental to him for greater free trade? Or does he really believe in tariffs? And does he
00:46:05.980 really want those tariffs, whether or not he gets concessions from the trade partners so that we
00:46:10.120 can reshore American manufacturing, so that we can rebuild America's industrial base, so that we can
00:46:16.960 reorder the economy of the United States to be more conducive to the kind of country that we had in the
00:46:23.260 middle of the 20th century when things seemed to be going pretty well, when all things considered
00:46:29.200 America was pretty great. And maybe we want to make it great again. Which is it? Are the tariffs just,
00:46:35.880 are they kind of a bluff? Or does he really believe in this? And I don't know the answer to that. I'm
00:46:40.100 not, I'm not a clairvoyant. I'm not reading Trump's mind. However, just want to point out for, for any who
00:46:45.900 doubt Trump's political skill, I can't believe anyone would doubt it now. Some people still say,
00:46:50.100 oh, he's a dummy. Oh, he doesn't know what he's doing. Oh, it's like, okay. All right. Hey,
00:46:54.940 you get elected president on your first real go at it, and then get elected to a non-consecutive
00:46:59.540 second term, and then be historically popular. And yeah, good luck, you know, and then bring
00:47:04.700 peace to the Middle East. And you know, yeah, good luck. You try it. I think he's pretty sophisticated.
00:47:09.540 But my point on Trump's political sophistication is, even I, I watch the guy pretty closely,
00:47:16.080 even I do not know if he's bluffing on the tariffs, or if he really believes in them. Because if he is
00:47:22.720 bluffing, he is acting exactly as the kind of person who really believes in them. Even down
00:47:27.600 to saying, we're going to have a new McKinley era, okay? Even down to, we are going to fund him,
00:47:33.140 we will get rid of the income tax, because we're going to make so much revenue on the tariffs.
00:47:37.320 And that is the defining feature of Trump's foreign policy. The man is totally unpredictable,
00:47:46.780 totally inscrutable. And if you are one of the people negotiating a trade deal right now with Trump,
00:47:50.520 you have to believe that there is at least a 15, 20% chance that he just is dead set on the tariffs,
00:48:01.540 and you got to do everything you can to head those off. It's like when Trump told Putin,
00:48:07.160 reportedly, that if he invaded Ukraine, he'd bomb Moscow. And Putin might be thinking that it's a
00:48:14.320 5% chance he means that. But are you willing to take the risk? That is a great political skill,
00:48:20.300 and he showed it, Trump showed it in spades last night. Today is Woke Wednesday. The rest of the
00:48:25.720 show continues now. You do not want to miss it. Become a member. Use code Knowles,
00:48:28.600 K-N-A-W-L-E-S at checkout for two months free on all annual plans.
00:48:31.340 Mm hmm.
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