The Michael Knowles Show - December 18, 2025


Ep. 1878 - War In Venezuela？ Trump Addresses The Nation


Episode Stats


Length

54 minutes

Words per minute

177.44289

Word count

9,608

Sentence count

790

Harmful content

Misogyny

12

sentences flagged

Toxicity

6

sentences flagged

Hate speech

21

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Vivek Ramaswamy has an essay in the New York Times called What is an American? in which he weighs in on the right-wing civil war, all these questions about American identity. And he makes a lot of good points, but he leaves out some good points too.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
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00:00:27.400 American warships off the coast of Venezuela, blowing up Venezuelan drug boats, demands that dictator Nicolás Maduro leave the country.
00:00:39.680 And amid all the tensions, the threat of war with Venezuela, President Trump calls a White House address on all the networks in prime time.
00:00:52.520 We were all waiting for the declaration of war.
00:00:57.740 And President Trump, as always, subverted our expectations.
00:01:02.260 We'll get into exactly what he said.
00:01:04.940 I'm Michael Knowles.
00:01:05.680 This is The Michael Knowles Show.
00:01:06.600 Welcome back to the show.
00:01:27.380 Our pal Vivek Ramaswamy has an essay in the New York Times, we'll forgive him for the New York Times, called What is an American?
00:01:34.740 In which he weighs in on the right-wing civil war, all these questions about American identity.
00:01:40.260 And he makes a lot of good points, but he leaves out some good points, too.
00:01:43.720 We'll get into exactly his view, where it fits in with this brutal, bare-knuckle brawl on the right of what the future of America is.
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00:03:16.660 All the news networks, they all cover President Trump's major announcement.
00:03:22.840 It's all being reported in the liberal media amid tensions with Venezuela, a major announcement from the president.
00:03:28.380 And he walks up there and you know what he does?
00:03:30.180 He totally punks them.
00:03:35.000 There's no war.
00:03:35.900 Hey, spoiler alert.
00:03:36.780 Sorry, I should have maybe said this at the top.
00:03:38.520 We're not at war with Venezuela.
00:03:40.160 He goes in and he just talks about all of his biggest wins from the first year.
00:03:47.020 Everything on the economy, on migration, all the good stuff that's coming.
00:03:51.580 It was just a recap of all the great stuff that he did.
00:03:55.740 All from this cozy looking room in the White House with all the Christmas decorations up.
00:04:02.280 He ends it with Merry Christmas.
00:04:04.180 He pulled the old war with Venezuela fake out to make all of his enemies at the news networks cover all of his successes in prime time.
00:04:14.100 A lot of people still watch prime time TV, even though everything's online.
00:04:17.620 It makes all of the, even the digital media pay attention to him.
00:04:21.180 Even I usually, I catch up on the news later.
00:04:23.580 I'm usually not watching it in real time because I'm doing something else.
00:04:25.680 This, I stopped what I was doing.
00:04:28.400 I had to, I was going to, I was going to get my Christmas tree off my car and I stopped.
00:04:32.580 And eventually I just took the phone out with me as it's going.
00:04:35.000 I take the Christmas tree off my car.
00:04:36.400 It was a total punking.
00:04:37.900 Whether you love him, whether you hate him, it is beyond dispute at this point.
00:04:42.540 President Trump is the greatest media manipulator ever to hold that office.
00:04:48.740 So it was really good.
00:04:49.620 And it was important.
00:04:50.240 And it served really important political purposes because the Democrats right now have historically low approval ratings.
00:04:57.640 The Democrats are in a really, really bad spot.
00:04:59.680 They have no leading candidate for president for the first time in 25 years.
00:05:02.780 They're in a really bad spot.
00:05:03.920 But President Trump's approval ratings have lagged a little bit in certain areas, especially on the economy.
00:05:08.580 And this is frustrating for the White House because the White House has really good economic numbers this year.
00:05:14.800 The White House has outperformed on GDP, on jobs.
00:05:18.580 We were all told the tariffs were going to destroy the country.
00:05:20.920 They didn't.
00:05:21.540 The tariffs have worked.
00:05:23.040 The stock market hit record highs.
00:05:25.100 The economy has done very, very well under Trump.
00:05:27.900 Inflation has come way down.
00:05:29.280 And yet, real wage growth has gone up.
00:05:31.840 I mean, the numbers go on and on.
00:05:33.060 And yet, people still feel the pinch in this economy.
00:05:37.340 And they're right to do so.
00:05:39.200 But the point that Trump is making is they feel the pinch because eggs cost two bucks a carton five years ago.
00:05:46.720 Then Biden sped up inflation to over 9%.
00:05:49.440 And then eggs cost ten bucks a carton.
00:05:52.540 And now eggs might be down to six bucks a carton or something like that.
00:05:55.880 But everyone's remembering the halcyon days when they were two bucks a carton.
00:05:58.680 Never mind that Trump has reduced costs on a whole host of things.
00:06:02.720 Because don't forget, Biden oversaw this massive spike in inflation.
00:06:07.500 And he blamed it all on COVID.
00:06:08.720 But it wasn't just COVID.
00:06:10.160 It was also his massive spending.
00:06:12.340 It was also the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, which even Bernie Sanders admitted didn't reduce inflation.
00:06:17.140 It was also the big infrastructure bill that ballooned government spending.
00:06:20.660 It was also Biden destroying the energy sector and killing the Keystone Pipeline.
00:06:26.220 And energy, which causes inflation throughout the economy.
00:06:30.820 Biden really was responsible for a lot of the inflation.
00:06:33.460 And so Trump needed to take this opportunity to set the record straight to control the narrative.
00:06:38.980 He even rolled out new things.
00:06:40.400 Here's so fitting, given the setting, given the time, we're right before Christmas.
00:06:44.560 Here's a new little bonus that President Trump gets that he is offering to some of our most deserving citizens.
00:06:53.120 Because of tariffs, along with the just passed one big beautiful bill, tonight I am also proud to announce that more than 1,450,000, think of this,
00:07:05.960 1,450,000 military service members will receive a special we call Warrior Dividend before Christmas.
00:07:16.740 A Warrior Dividend.
00:07:18.440 In honor of our nation's founding in 1776, we are sending every soldier $1,776.
00:07:29.240 Think of that.
00:07:30.960 And the checks are already on the way.
00:07:33.600 Nobody understood that one until about 30 minutes ago.
00:07:38.520 We made a lot more money than anybody thought because of tariffs and the bill helped us along.
00:07:43.780 Nobody deserves it more than our military.
00:07:46.120 And I say congratulations to everybody.
00:07:48.580 And by the way, we now have record enlistment in our military.
00:07:52.380 And last year we had among the worst recruitment numbers in our military's history.
00:07:57.140 What a difference a year makes.
00:07:58.720 Bonuses for the vets in the amount of $1,776.
00:08:05.380 I dare a Democrat to oppose them.
00:08:08.400 Democrats never met federal spending they didn't love.
00:08:10.840 I dare the Democrats to oppose a bonus for the vets for $1,776.
00:08:18.740 The year our country was founded on the 250th anniversary of our country.
00:08:22.020 It was brilliant.
00:08:23.240 And it's not just pandering to a very sympathetic and very revered group of Americans.
00:08:30.720 Trump is also looking down the line at the Supreme Court, which potentially could overrule his tariffs.
00:08:36.560 Tariffs which are key to his economic agenda.
00:08:39.620 And so what does Trump do?
00:08:40.480 He comes out and he says the tariffs have worked.
00:08:42.760 They brought in a lot of money for this country.
00:08:44.540 And we're going to give some of that money out.
00:08:46.680 We're not just going to hoard it for ourselves.
00:08:47.920 We're not even going to use it just to pay down our debt.
00:08:50.420 We're going to give it to some of our most deserving Americans who are often overlooked.
00:08:56.140 Okay, Supreme Court, I dare you to get rid of my tariffs now.
00:09:00.000 You want to take money out of the hands of hardworking veterans who have sacrificed for this country?
00:09:04.320 Be my guest.
00:09:04.920 Trump then pointed out that not only are his jobs numbers good this year, they're actually much, much better.
00:09:13.280 Some would say almost infinitely better than Biden's job numbers.
00:09:16.880 Job numbers we've seen in recent years, really even recent decades, because the jobs under Trump have gone to actual Americans.
00:09:25.700 For the first time in 50 years, we are now seeing reverse migration as migrants go back home, leaving more housing and more jobs for Americans.
00:09:36.080 In the year before my election, all net creation of jobs was going to foreign migrants.
00:09:42.800 Since I took office, 100 percent of all net job creation has gone to American-born citizens, 100 percent.
00:09:54.000 In the end, government either serves the productive, patriotic, hardworking American citizen, or it serves those who break the laws, cheat the system, and seek power and profit at the expense of our nation.
00:10:09.360 There's a little-known fact that the job growth in recent years has largely been illusory, because those jobs are going to foreign-born workers.
00:10:19.340 So real Americans don't really benefit.
00:10:22.380 But this year, because of the Trump immigration policy, because he closed off the border, so he stopped another one to three million illegals from coming into the country,
00:10:30.140 because he formally deported over half a million of them, and because he caused at least 1.6 million, probably significantly more, to self-deport,
00:10:38.840 you see all the jobs going to actual Americans.
00:10:42.800 Big, big win.
00:10:43.860 How does he end it?
00:10:45.860 Merry Christmas.
00:10:46.700 When the world looks at us next year, let them see a nation that is loyal to its citizens, faithful to its workers, confident to its identity, certain to its destiny, and the envy of the entire globe.
00:11:02.060 We are respected again like we have never been respected before.
00:11:06.760 To each and every one of you, have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
00:11:12.140 God bless you all.
00:11:13.280 Beautiful.
00:11:14.440 Beautiful.
00:11:14.900 Couldn't have said it better myself.
00:11:16.200 Beautiful, beautiful stuff.
00:11:18.400 I loved, there was, one person responded when I tweeted out, I knew exactly what he was doing.
00:11:23.180 The minute he opened his mouth, I said, ah, that's what he did.
00:11:25.660 He tricked all the networks.
00:11:27.520 None of them want to give him good coverage.
00:11:28.880 He's going to give a year-end roundup right before Christmas.
00:11:31.300 Great optics, great numbers, sets the record straight.
00:11:35.420 And one person responded and said, I've been had.
00:11:38.600 So that's true.
00:11:39.320 We've all been had.
00:11:40.660 But we had fun.
00:11:41.300 And we're not going to war.
00:11:42.720 This is the other thing.
00:11:43.500 All these panic hands, you know, so we're going to war, we're going to war.
00:11:46.080 I don't know.
00:11:46.760 I don't freak out about Trump, especially when it comes to foreign policy.
00:11:50.560 And it's not just because I blindly follow a leader or something like that.
00:11:54.180 It's just based on reason, looking at precedent.
00:11:58.840 We now have 10 years of precedent with Trump.
00:12:00.920 The guy has been the best foreign policy president in my lifetime, probably including George H.W. Bush, who was good in his own right.
00:12:06.340 So he just has earned a little grace with me when it comes, especially to foreign policy.
00:12:13.300 Now, a major shakeup also was announced yesterday.
00:12:17.140 Another one that's been a media rumor for months now.
00:12:19.720 Dan Bongino, our pal Dan Bongino, is leaving the FBI.
00:12:23.900 Dan, you know, had a very, very successful podcast business, news aggregator business.
00:12:30.700 He's a great guy, Dan Bongino, and he's obviously a great broadcaster and a businessman.
00:12:36.940 Dan was doing very, very well.
00:12:39.000 I don't have the exact numbers of how much money he was bringing in through his business empire, his media empire.
00:12:43.920 He was doing very, very well, and he gave it all up to take the job as deputy FBI director to serve the country.
00:12:51.100 And I'm sure that's a very frustrating thing, especially when you're in the deputy position.
00:12:55.560 You're not even in the director position.
00:12:57.060 You're not the attorney general, for instance.
00:12:58.560 And so he did it.
00:13:00.220 He did it for a year.
00:13:00.880 He gave up a lot.
00:13:01.600 He sacrificed for his country.
00:13:03.220 He's done a great job.
00:13:04.980 President Trump has confirmed this rumor.
00:13:12.880 Oh, Dan did a great job.
00:13:15.200 I think he wants to go back to his show.
00:13:19.540 Yeah, I do.
00:13:21.540 I like the way Trump is leaving this, too.
00:13:23.800 You know, Trump and Dan have gotten along for a long time.
00:13:27.420 He says, yes, Dan did a great job.
00:13:29.540 He did it.
00:13:29.980 He put in his year, put in a solid year.
00:13:33.080 And some jobs in a presidential administration, that's a lifetime.
00:13:36.180 He says, now I think Dan probably wants to go back to his show, which I think will be great.
00:13:41.520 I think it's very honorable what he did.
00:13:46.100 He gave up a lot.
00:13:46.880 He actually did sacrifice for his country.
00:13:48.940 And now I'm excited that he's going to have a show again.
00:13:50.580 I assume he's going back to his show.
00:13:52.220 In any case, notice something.
00:13:54.100 This is the first quasi-major shakeup in the admin.
00:13:58.440 From the beginning, President Trump has had the media gunning for a lot of his top appointees,
00:14:05.500 especially Pete Hegseth.
00:14:06.500 Notice, the media have been trying to, not just the media, the Democrats, the activists,
00:14:10.600 have been trying to get rid of Hegseth since before he was confirmed.
00:14:13.200 They really tried to torpedo his confirmation.
00:14:15.340 They've been going after him ever since.
00:14:16.960 Every three days, it seems, there's some rumor.
00:14:18.840 Hegseth's getting pushed out of the Pentagon.
00:14:20.880 And yet it never happens.
00:14:23.320 Oh, there's a big rumor.
00:14:24.580 Kristi Noem is getting pushed out.
00:14:26.100 Kristi Noem.
00:14:27.000 Trump's, what are you talking about?
00:14:28.180 Kristi Noem's great.
00:14:30.480 Notice that Dan, deputy FBI director, is the first one to leave.
00:14:35.820 And he's leaving on good terms.
00:14:36.980 And he's leaving of his own accord.
00:14:39.960 Big, big difference between that and the first administration,
00:14:43.740 when the secretary of state finds out he's getting fired via tweet.
00:14:47.600 And there's a lot of turnover in the first admin.
00:14:49.420 And this, to me, is something that Trump didn't mention.
00:14:53.560 It wouldn't have been fitting for the speech.
00:14:54.660 But I think it's important to note, we were going around here at the Daily Wire the other day
00:14:58.540 to talk about what are the biggest wins and losses for Trump in the first year.
00:15:01.720 To me, really the biggest win was the personnel.
00:15:07.880 Trump, he was totally new to it in the first term.
00:15:12.240 That little interregnum period, I think, actually probably helped him focus a little bit,
00:15:16.040 figure out who the friends are, separate the wheat from the chaff.
00:15:18.180 The second term notice, there's basically no turnover.
00:15:24.020 Very, very good people in these positions, for the most part.
00:15:27.500 There are a couple of people who are not quite as good as the others.
00:15:30.200 But for the most part, very, very good people in these positions.
00:15:33.740 And they're lasting.
00:15:34.820 And they're surviving.
00:15:35.740 They're getting stuff done.
00:15:36.740 It was a very, very impressive year.
00:15:38.620 All right.
00:15:38.800 We have a lot more soaring political rhetoric to get to this time,
00:15:43.260 not from the President of the United States, but rather from Jasmine Crockett.
00:15:47.880 We'll get to that momentarily first, though.
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00:17:06.960 Jasmine Crockett, the gift that keeps on giving,
00:17:10.480 apparently trolled into running for Senate by the Republican Senate Committee,
00:17:15.020 inserted her name in a poll, now actually gets her to run, 1.00
00:17:19.380 the gamble being that it'll screw it up for Democrats in Texas.
00:17:23.960 Jasmine Crockett laying out her immigration plan,
00:17:27.620 the reason why the Democrats support mass migration and open border,
00:17:32.800 all these illegals pouring into the country.
00:17:35.000 Democrats for years have told us it's because of humanitarian reasons,
00:17:38.180 because we care so much about the oppressed people on the other side of the border,
00:17:42.440 the refugees.
00:17:43.740 Jasmine Crockett says, nah, that's BS.
00:17:46.000 We were lying the whole time.
00:17:47.520 The reason we need them is because I don't want to pick any more cotton. 1.00
00:17:50.140 So I had to go around the country and educate people about
00:17:54.360 what immigrants do for this country or the fact that we are a country of immigrants.
00:17:59.500 Right, right.
00:18:00.720 The fact is, ain't none of y'all trying to go and farm right now.
00:18:06.940 Okay, so I'm lying.
00:18:08.180 Raise your hand.
00:18:09.460 Raise your hand.
00:18:14.360 You're not.
00:18:16.040 You're not.
00:18:17.800 We done picking cotton.
00:18:20.140 We are.
00:18:22.380 You can't pay us enough to find a plantation. 1.00
00:18:26.060 We need to import third world peasants because we want a new slave class. 1.00
00:18:34.640 Why aren't y'all applauding?
00:18:37.520 So for years, I love her.
00:18:39.860 For years, the Republicans have pointed out the Democrats support mass migration from the third
00:18:46.440 world, especially illegal immigration, but even some legal immigration.
00:18:49.360 The whole reason that the Democrats wanted it is, one, to cynically give them a permanent
00:18:54.580 electoral majority by fundamentally changing the demographics of the country, and two, because
00:19:00.480 they're in cahoots with big business because they want cheap labor.
00:19:04.360 They want to commit one of the sins that cries out to heaven for vengeance, namely defrauding
00:19:13.340 the poor, oppressing the poor, the workers, giving them substandard wages.
00:19:18.340 And then Jasmine Crockett comes out and goes, you're totally right.
00:19:21.740 Dino might.
00:19:22.480 That was Jasmine Crockett putting on her 1970s jive voice. 1.00
00:19:27.360 Of course, she engages in interviews where she sounds like a perfectly normal person.
00:19:31.360 But I guess whichever group she was talking to there, she thought she had to dial it up,
00:19:35.500 dial up the blaxploitation talk. 0.73
00:19:37.140 You know, I said, listen here, man, we done picking that cotton. 0.89
00:19:39.860 So what does it mean?
00:19:40.900 What it means is we are bringing these people in to treat them like slaves.
00:19:44.980 So thank you, Jasmine.
00:19:47.920 You have totally admitted the Republicans were right the whole time.
00:19:52.520 That was the justification for it.
00:19:55.140 Amazing, too, that this clip is going viral right after you had this very sorry display
00:19:59.940 in the U.S. Capitol where even Republicans went along with it.
00:20:03.620 They tore down a statue of Robert E. Lee.
00:20:05.900 They said, Robert E. Lee, one of the greatest Americans ever to live.
00:20:09.720 A man who said he rejoiced at the end of slavery, even though he was the general defending his
00:20:14.720 homeland in the Civil War, he said he rejoiced that slavery would end.
00:20:19.200 He called slavery, quote, a moral and political evil in any country.
00:20:22.100 He was so happy that it was abolished.
00:20:24.100 They tear down the statue of Robert E. Lee.
00:20:26.320 They put up some lady no one's ever heard of.
00:20:28.440 They feel so good about themselves.
00:20:32.260 General Lee was a much, much better person, a much more moral person than any of the people
00:20:40.340 tearing his statue down.
00:20:41.460 General Lee was a much more moral person than Jasmine Crockett and had a much more moral
00:20:49.020 political vision.
00:20:50.680 General Lee, on the one hand, saying, look, I have to defend my home, my countrymen, my
00:20:57.060 community.
00:20:58.220 I have to defend them.
00:20:59.400 But I hate slavery.
00:21:01.040 Slavery is a moral evil, not only in America, anywhere.
00:21:04.100 I'm so happy slavery is abolished.
00:21:06.620 That's the guy they're tearing down and the one that the Democrats are going to run for
00:21:10.080 Senate in Texas saying, we need a new slave class.
00:21:13.260 Yeah, we abolished slavery.
00:21:14.580 That's good for me, I guess.
00:21:16.140 Now let's import a bunch of Guatemalans. 1.00
00:21:18.080 Have them pick the cotton for no money. 0.99
00:21:20.420 Am I right?
00:21:21.920 Am I?
00:21:22.580 Can I get an amen?
00:21:23.520 Men, you tear down the ancestors, the forebears, the people who built our country, the giants
00:21:31.540 on whose shoulders we stand and we think that we're flying.
00:21:34.000 You tear them down because of some moral failings that they had, real or imagined.
00:21:39.660 And who do we put in their place?
00:21:41.220 We put Jasmine Crockett in her place. 1.00
00:21:42.780 We put the modern Democrat Party and the squish collaborators in the Republican Party. 1.00
00:21:50.000 Much less moral, much less dignified people in every single way.
00:21:53.780 So what is American identity?
00:21:55.380 My friend Vivek Ramaswamy published a very thoughtful essay on this in the New York Times.
00:22:00.880 We can overlook that.
00:22:02.640 We can forgive him for publishing in the New York Times.
00:22:05.480 On what is an American.
00:22:06.780 I really encourage you to check out this essay because Vivek makes an important point,
00:22:12.160 but I think he misses an important point too.
00:22:14.860 He opens up, he says, there are two competing visions now emerging on the American right,
00:22:19.560 and they are incompatible.
00:22:21.360 One vision of American identity is based on lineage, blood and soil.
00:22:25.320 Inherited attributes matter most.
00:22:27.220 The purest form of an American is a so-called heritage American,
00:22:31.440 one whose ancestry traces back to the founding of the United States or earlier,
00:22:34.880 even earlier, I guess referring to the Mayflower, which is a great cigar brand.
00:22:39.780 It says, this view is now popularized by the Groyper right,
00:22:43.540 a rapidly ascendant online movement that argues for the creation of a white-centric identity.
00:22:48.880 This is a predictable response, one I anticipated in my book,
00:22:51.840 to anti-white discrimination over the last half decade.
00:22:54.400 It is no longer just a fringe viewpoint.
00:22:56.220 The alternative Vivek proposes, and in my view,
00:22:58.700 the correct vision of American identity, is based on ideals.
00:23:01.500 Americanness is not a scalar quality that varies based on your ancestry.
00:23:06.480 It's binary.
00:23:07.140 Either you're an American or you're not.
00:23:09.700 You are an American if you believe in the rule of law,
00:23:12.180 in freedom of conscience, in freedom of expression,
00:23:14.460 in colorblind meritocracy, in the U.S. Constitution, in the American dream,
00:23:18.200 and if you are a citizen who swears exclusive allegiance to our nation.
00:23:22.100 So, Vivek is saying that he fully endorses what is called the creedal view of America.
00:23:29.340 If you believe in the ideals of America, and if you check a box,
00:23:35.420 you become naturalized as a citizen, then you are an American.
00:23:39.480 It has nothing to do with heritage, the people you come from, your family's history here.
00:23:44.000 And look, there's obviously a creedal aspect to the country.
00:23:47.000 So, he's getting at something that is partially true.
00:23:49.540 But I think he's missing a point.
00:23:51.380 Here's the problem for Vivek's argument, is what about the guy who lives in West Virginia?
00:23:59.620 What about the guy who lives anywhere in the middle of America,
00:24:02.700 whose family's been here forever?
00:24:05.600 Maybe they were on the Mayflower.
00:24:06.820 Maybe they came around the Revolution.
00:24:08.200 Maybe they came in the Civil War.
00:24:09.140 Maybe they came 100 years ago.
00:24:10.100 But they've been Americans for many, many generations.
00:24:12.800 Guy loves his American flag.
00:24:15.080 He eats hot dogs on the 4th of July.
00:24:17.600 His kids are all American.
00:24:19.960 He loves his country.
00:24:22.520 But maybe he doesn't believe in absolute freedom of expression or something like that.
00:24:30.360 Which, as I argue in my book, Speechless, is not really part of the American free speech tradition.
00:24:36.000 Oh, thank you very much.
00:24:36.740 I actually forgot about my bell.
00:24:38.040 Yes.
00:24:38.740 That this belief in total freedom of expression,
00:24:41.080 that's not really the American free speech tradition.
00:24:43.980 We outlaw all sorts of speech.
00:24:46.400 Obviously, fraud, direct threats, obscenity.
00:24:51.420 Now we've weakened that over time.
00:24:53.320 There were blasphemy laws on the books for much of American history.
00:24:56.400 It still are on the books in some places.
00:24:59.360 What if he doesn't believe in that?
00:25:00.580 Does that mean that he's not an American?
00:25:02.220 The notion of colorblind meritocracy, even take the colorblind part out for a second.
00:25:05.780 Just focus on meritocracy.
00:25:07.520 The notion of meritocracy is, in its most extreme form,
00:25:11.420 is a very modern innovation in America.
00:25:14.980 If we believe in pure meritocracy, whatever that means,
00:25:18.640 does that mean that we have to oppose legacy admissions in universities?
00:25:22.620 Does this mean that people can't give some preference in hiring, say, in their family business?
00:25:27.660 They have a mom-and-pop family business that's been in the family for generations.
00:25:30.940 You can't pass that business along to your kids or your grandkids.
00:25:35.000 You can't favor hiring your grandkids over, I don't know,
00:25:37.760 some random person on the street who maybe scored higher on the SAT.
00:25:40.160 Take it to its fullest extreme, does that mean that we have to support totally free and open trade?
00:25:44.160 Where we're competing against not just our countrymen, but the whole rest of the world for spots in schools, for jobs, for, I don't know.
00:25:53.920 That's not really part of the American tradition.
00:25:55.780 And I think there are plenty of people in America who don't totally go along with those ideas.
00:26:01.740 Who are nonetheless, I think, still American.
00:26:05.320 There's someone from Tibet who comes over to America, let's say, last week.
00:26:10.380 And he gets naturalized as a citizen by hook or by crook.
00:26:14.340 He has no experience in America.
00:26:16.940 He doesn't have any of the learned traditions that come about, not just through a lifetime, but through the generations.
00:26:22.180 He doesn't really know about hot dogs on the 4th of July.
00:26:24.540 He doesn't really know about fireworks.
00:26:25.720 He's not, you know, he passed a civics test, but he doesn't, he's not really part of the community.
00:26:31.920 You're telling me that guy, because he has memorized some portion of the Declaration of Independence, that guy is American.
00:26:40.060 But the guy who, I don't know, maybe he hasn't memorized every line of the Federalist Papers.
00:26:45.380 Nevertheless, his family's been here for 300 years.
00:26:47.280 That guy's not an American. 0.96
00:26:48.200 I don't think that holds.
00:26:49.700 I don't think that really makes a lot of sense.
00:26:51.400 I see what Vivek is looking at, but I think it's a false dichotomy.
00:26:57.780 I don't think the only two choices are blood and soil nationalism, where heritage is all that matters, or this creedal conception, where belief in what is imagined to be the American idea, which in many ways was a construction of the 20th century, that that's all that's American.
00:27:13.600 I think there's something more to it.
00:27:14.980 I don't think that the view that, you know, having rootedness in America is purely the domain of some fringe or unseemly or bigoted online right wing.
00:27:24.700 I don't think that's true at all.
00:27:26.920 Vivek goes on.
00:27:27.900 He points out that anti-Semitic statements are now normalized online.
00:27:33.500 That's true.
00:27:34.160 Now, in fairness, all sorts of nasty, ugly things are normalized online.
00:27:37.760 That's kind of what the Internet's for. 0.85
00:27:38.860 The Internet's for porn and racism.
00:27:40.080 You know, we tried to, actually, we tried to circumscribe that in the 1990s with the Communications Decency Act and the Child Online Protection Act, and it passed with Republican and Democrat support.
00:27:50.080 And then, unfortunately, judges gutted it because judges had a very, very liberal view of the American free speech tradition that wasn't really historical.
00:27:57.340 But, yeah, look, it bothers me.
00:27:59.700 I don't like that.
00:28:00.280 I hate anti-Semitism. 0.99
00:28:01.260 I hate nasty, cruel racism and misogyny and all the rest of that. 0.99
00:28:05.160 But it's normalized online.
00:28:06.580 Online is not, you know, the Internet is not the same as real life.
00:28:09.520 There's overlap, but it's not the same thing.
00:28:12.720 He goes on.
00:28:13.920 He says, this pattern eerily mirrors the hesitance of prominent Democrats to criticize woke excesses in the run-up to 2024.
00:28:19.520 So, in other words, if the right does not excise the nasty fringes of its movement, it's going to end up in the same electoral quagmire that the Democrats ran into because they adopted all the pro-trans radical woke stuff that killed them in 2024.
00:28:35.980 Yeah, okay, that's fair.
00:28:36.900 Any political movement has to circumscribe itself, you know, just as a nation is known by its borders.
00:28:42.760 That's what distinguishes it from other nations. 0.94
00:28:44.300 So, too, with political movements, you got to invite as many people in as you can in a way that is just and successful while also keeping some people out.
00:28:52.760 Totally agree with that.
00:28:53.800 I totally agree with that.
00:28:56.540 However, I just think the premise is a little bit wrong.
00:28:58.880 No, I don't think that you need to ascribe perfectly to the present day's understanding of what America means as a creed.
00:29:09.520 I don't think America is just an idea.
00:29:11.800 I think it's a country.
00:29:12.760 I think it's a real country.
00:29:13.700 And countries are made up of people, made up of geography, made up of actions and traditions and sacrifices, and made up of creedal beliefs, of course.
00:29:26.500 So, it seems to me that there is a synthesis of some of these ideas.
00:29:30.440 I alluded to this the other day when I talked about the book of Ruth.
00:29:33.780 I think the book of Ruth is really instructive on what it means to be part of a political community.
00:29:39.280 I think, actually, it provides the type of what a political community is because Ruth is a Moabite, but she assimilates and joins into the Israelites. 0.69
00:29:48.520 And how does she do it? 0.97
00:29:50.060 She does it in three ways. 1.00
00:29:51.980 We'll get to what that is, and we'll get to really the heart of this question that we're going to be debating for a year.
00:29:55.680 What is an American?
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00:31:11.440 Yes, there's a creedal aspect to American identity, but there are two other aspects.
00:31:16.280 There's sacrifice.
00:31:18.360 There's contribution.
00:31:19.200 One way that people have been Americanized in the course of history is when they fight in wars.
00:31:23.760 Or when they contribute something really great.
00:31:25.900 You know, they're beneficent.
00:31:28.220 They contribute to our economy.
00:31:31.280 They contribute to our political community.
00:31:33.400 Elon Musk is a good example of this.
00:31:34.820 He's an immigrant, and he's generated a lot of prosperity for people.
00:31:37.480 He's sacrificed some of his private interests to help the good of the country,
00:31:40.120 even working in government.
00:31:41.540 That would be one way.
00:31:42.600 And then the third part is the people.
00:31:45.640 The people matter.
00:31:47.780 Just a simple thought experiment.
00:31:49.540 If you took all the people in America today, 330 some odd million people,
00:31:53.280 and you swapped them out, and you filled up the country with 330 million other people,
00:32:01.100 and they all had memorized the Declaration of Independence.
00:32:04.020 They all had memorized whatever the current conception of the American creed is.
00:32:08.980 Would you still have the same country?
00:32:11.640 Manifestly, you would not.
00:32:13.200 It would be a different kind of country.
00:32:16.200 In Ruth, Ruth says three things importantly.
00:32:20.940 She says, I'm going to leave the Moabites. 1.00
00:32:23.480 I'm going to become an Israelite.
00:32:25.140 Israel, which is the particular nation that is the type of all the nations,
00:32:28.700 says, your people will be my people.
00:32:30.820 I will marry in.
00:32:31.800 I will have children.
00:32:32.980 Children that go down into the line of David and into the lineage of Christ.
00:32:36.940 So assimilation is possible. 0.54
00:32:37.860 You've got to kind of marry in. 0.59
00:32:39.280 You've got to intermingle with these people.
00:32:41.640 Where you go, I will go. 1.00
00:32:42.640 Where you die, I will die. 1.00
00:32:43.580 You're giving something up. 1.00
00:32:45.360 I'm giving up the Moabites. 1.00
00:32:46.500 I'm giving up Tibet.
00:32:48.580 I'm giving up the third world. 1.00
00:32:49.840 I'm coming.
00:32:50.400 I'm part of this.
00:32:51.700 Your God will be my God.
00:32:53.080 It's a creedal aspect.
00:32:54.160 And when she marries her second husband, Boaz, after her first husband dies,
00:32:58.920 she says, why are you accepting me?
00:33:00.080 And he says, everything you've done for your mother-in-law,
00:33:02.740 everything you've done for us, for our tribe, for our nation,
00:33:05.980 that's been told to me, the sacrifice part.
00:33:10.000 That's what the three of them are.
00:33:11.800 And so there is a founding stock of America
00:33:13.540 that's been radically changed over the centuries.
00:33:17.120 We've had periods of no immigration.
00:33:18.260 We've had periods of a lot of immigration.
00:33:19.960 And then since 1967, we've had this mass influx of immigration and demographic change.
00:33:23.680 But there is a founding stock.
00:33:25.220 There really is.
00:33:25.900 There's a people.
00:33:27.120 And you can kind of marry into that.
00:33:28.420 I mean, for me, use the example of the Mayflower.
00:33:30.620 I'm only quarter English.
00:33:32.220 And even of the quarter English, the Knowleses got here in 1660,
00:33:35.360 and they married into the Mayflower line that got here in 1620.
00:33:38.120 So even of that, I'm pretty swarthy.
00:33:39.600 I'm pretty Sicilian.
00:33:41.240 But there was intermarriage.
00:33:42.880 There was a long period of assimilation over the generations.
00:33:47.840 You can't totally lose that.
00:33:49.280 That's the icky part.
00:33:50.080 That's the part that no one wants to talk about in our totally abstract modern life.
00:33:53.680 That tells us, modern liberalism, that tells us that America is not a real country.
00:33:56.720 It's not a real people.
00:33:57.300 It's just an idea.
00:33:59.060 No, there's a people component.
00:34:00.900 And there's a creed.
00:34:01.480 But what's the creed?
00:34:02.040 Is the creed 20th century liberalism?
00:34:03.940 21st century liberalism?
00:34:05.060 Or is the creed Christianity? 0.52
00:34:08.540 John Adams says that the principles of the Christian religion
00:34:13.160 are the general principles on which independence was won.
00:34:16.560 We're kind of a Christian country, aren't we?
00:34:18.260 John Jay writes about this in Federalist No. 2.
00:34:20.380 And there's an American conception of liberty.
00:34:22.380 And so there's a civic belief and there's a religious belief,
00:34:25.780 which is grounded in Christianity.
00:34:27.280 And there's contribution.
00:34:28.400 Right now in American identity, we have none of the three.
00:34:31.600 You don't have to be part of the people.
00:34:33.100 You don't have to assimilate.
00:34:33.900 You don't have to do anything.
00:34:35.120 You don't have to believe anything.
00:34:37.140 You can be a Muslim communist. 1.00
00:34:38.920 It's fine.
00:34:39.460 It has nothing, no bearing on it.
00:34:41.260 And you don't have to sacrifice.
00:34:42.560 You actually, you're going to commit welfare fraud.
00:34:44.000 You're going to take all the money from the taxpayers.
00:34:45.640 So we have this really big problem.
00:34:47.560 But going all the way back to classical political philosophy,
00:34:50.980 classical civilizations, ancient Rome,
00:34:53.020 which men have to think about three times a day,
00:34:55.400 all the way up to the present, you need all three.
00:34:58.700 And to divorce one or the other, say it's only creed,
00:35:01.580 or it's only stock, or even that it's only sacrifice,
00:35:05.020 I think misses the point.
00:35:06.060 So I think Vivek touches on a good point.
00:35:08.120 But it's not complete.
00:35:10.240 It's a partial truth.
00:35:11.240 And it will be insufficient to persuade Americans now
00:35:14.420 who are seeing the real results of demographic change,
00:35:18.200 massive demographic change, contrived demographic change
00:35:20.660 without any kind of assimilation.
00:35:22.160 That the partial truth will not persuade.
00:35:24.480 You need the whole truth.
00:35:27.100 Talking about the New York Times,
00:35:28.520 I'm quoting the Washington Post today.
00:35:30.260 Something's gone very, very wrong.
00:35:31.840 But the Washington Post has a very important report out.
00:35:34.180 The report is on Charlie Kirk's alleged killer.
00:35:38.700 You see this news, what Charlie Kirk's alleged killer
00:35:41.140 told friends after the attack.
00:35:44.400 This is Tyler Robinson.
00:35:46.140 A patchwork of social interactions
00:35:47.540 and a trail of online posts provide a view
00:35:49.300 into Tyler Robinson's life and his beliefs.
00:35:51.820 Really, really long piece, but important reporting.
00:35:56.100 It says, 55 minutes before he allegedly shot
00:35:57.980 and killed right-wing political activist Charlie Kirk,
00:36:00.040 Tyler Robinson was bragging about his success
00:36:02.360 playing the online puzzle game Wordle.
00:36:04.960 So he was bragging about committing the crime,
00:36:06.600 according to Wordle.
00:36:10.220 He's got all of these other exchanges
00:36:12.540 on different social media servers.
00:36:15.320 Some of his friends, people referring to family interactions.
00:36:20.720 His mother told police he'd become more, quote,
00:36:23.520 pro-gay and trans rights oriented,
00:36:27.020 had started dating a roommate
00:36:28.120 who was undergoing a gender transition.
00:36:30.720 Friends confirmed the pair's romantic involvement
00:36:32.680 says the roommate was distressed about anti-trans sentiment.
00:36:37.220 Robinson sent the roommate a confession,
00:36:39.940 said, I've had enough of his hatred.
00:36:41.680 Some hate can't be negotiated out.
00:36:43.740 He wrote that in a message reportedly hours after the killing.
00:36:47.600 The Post reached out to all of these other people,
00:36:50.060 and it's a very long article.
00:36:52.240 I encourage all of you to read it.
00:36:57.260 Maybe read it on a gift article.
00:36:59.020 Don't give the Washington Post too much money.
00:37:00.380 But it's important reporting,
00:37:02.100 and this is the kind of stuff that's all going to come out in the prosecution.
00:37:04.660 It's good to get a little bit of this now.
00:37:07.200 I mention all of it because
00:37:08.860 some people have asked
00:37:11.100 why I have not joined in
00:37:13.500 on the personal side of the right-wing civil war.
00:37:16.560 There's always a right-wing civil war,
00:37:17.660 but sometimes it gets hotter than at other points,
00:37:19.160 and now it's particularly hot.
00:37:22.320 I gave a speech on this at Belmont Abbey,
00:37:24.440 and I outlined some of my reasons
00:37:26.500 for not getting so involved there.
00:37:29.400 Beyond the virtue of loyalty,
00:37:31.700 beyond any personal affections
00:37:33.740 or personal hostilities
00:37:35.340 or anything in the mix,
00:37:37.620 there's a practical aspect as well.
00:37:41.320 As I've made perfectly clear
00:37:43.160 when speaking about the issue,
00:37:45.440 I have had no confusion whatsoever.
00:37:49.160 Since the moment that this guy
00:37:51.160 murdered Charlie, allegedly,
00:37:53.300 to the present,
00:37:54.800 that he did it.
00:37:57.240 I do wonder how many more of these friends
00:37:59.580 and trans furry boyfriends
00:38:01.360 and other people were involved,
00:38:02.640 had advanced knowledge,
00:38:03.600 were at least told after the fact.
00:38:05.120 But I've had no doubt that he did it.
00:38:07.780 And the reason for that is,
00:38:09.920 it's always the ones you most expect.
00:38:11.500 And the reason for that is that,
00:38:13.000 well, he's allegedly confessed to it,
00:38:15.060 and his fingerprints were on the rifle
00:38:16.320 and all the rest of it.
00:38:17.600 But also because this is the kind of guy
00:38:21.680 who does this kind of thing repeatedly.
00:38:23.500 We've seen this consistently for years.
00:38:26.260 And even in one case,
00:38:28.440 it was a speech that I was giving
00:38:29.400 at the University of Pittsburgh.
00:38:31.280 And so, given that this was all pretty clear,
00:38:35.100 and we're gonna get much, much more of this
00:38:36.820 in the prosecution and in the courts, I'm sure,
00:38:40.020 there's a practical aspect here,
00:38:41.540 which is that when things become really personal
00:38:44.620 and really gossipy
00:38:46.160 and really focused on reviling and detracting
00:38:49.380 and defamation in some cases,
00:38:53.180 but in detraction in other cases,
00:38:54.600 when it gets all really personal,
00:38:56.580 it distracts from the issue.
00:38:59.280 And some people love that.
00:39:00.180 A lot of people love that in politics and media.
00:39:02.460 I think that's very counterproductive.
00:39:04.880 And the chief lesson that I took from Charlie
00:39:07.520 in his public life,
00:39:08.300 not in our personal friendship,
00:39:09.180 but in his public life,
00:39:09.920 the chief lesson I took from him is
00:39:12.200 you've got to kind of tune out the noise
00:39:15.440 and you have to keep your eyes on the prize
00:39:17.400 and you have to focus on the issues
00:39:18.880 and you have to keep the team together
00:39:20.380 and you have to advance
00:39:21.400 and you have to move
00:39:22.300 and you have to win the elections
00:39:24.080 and you win the elections by forming coalitions
00:39:26.380 and you move on.
00:39:27.640 And in some cases,
00:39:28.840 you have to confront the noise head on.
00:39:30.180 In some cases,
00:39:30.920 the facts of the matter are so apparent
00:39:32.740 that they're going to come to light
00:39:34.600 over the course of weeks or months
00:39:36.540 or maybe a year,
00:39:37.140 but they're gonna come to light.
00:39:38.000 And you can't allow yourself to get distracted.
00:39:41.320 Now we're heading into AmericaFest,
00:39:43.220 which is the last event that Charlie gave us.
00:39:46.980 He planned this event.
00:39:48.160 He invited people to this event.
00:39:49.960 You can't get a hotel room in the city of Phoenix.
00:39:52.860 Everybody is showing up to this thing.
00:39:54.980 This is the group that he invited.
00:39:58.180 You know, this is the team
00:39:59.020 looking ahead at the midterms,
00:40:00.900 looking ahead at 2028.
00:40:02.220 Charlie was very, very practical.
00:40:04.960 And Charlie was a winner.
00:40:06.820 He was a winner.
00:40:07.640 He knew how to win.
00:40:08.680 A lot of people have opinions.
00:40:09.860 A lot of people like to blab.
00:40:11.220 Charlie liked to win.
00:40:12.940 And I think the truth is obviously
00:40:15.440 coming out very clearly.
00:40:16.920 Most people never really doubted it
00:40:18.540 in the first place.
00:40:19.640 But it's going to come out much more clearly.
00:40:21.760 The common enemy,
00:40:23.340 the radical left,
00:40:24.240 is once again going to be pronounced.
00:40:26.280 It's going to come out very, very clearly.
00:40:27.560 The stakes of losing
00:40:28.880 when you have an enemy
00:40:30.940 that not only is willing
00:40:33.700 to commit these kinds of crimes,
00:40:35.140 but justifies it,
00:40:36.440 excuses it, celebrates it.
00:40:37.940 The stakes of losing
00:40:38.980 and giving power back over to those people,
00:40:41.420 I think those are going to come into the fore.
00:40:43.360 And I hope that the legacy
00:40:45.240 of the last event that Charlie puts on,
00:40:47.300 albeit posthumously,
00:40:48.740 is a revitalization,
00:40:51.540 a putting away of personal animosities
00:40:53.780 and gossip and whatever,
00:40:55.100 and focusing,
00:40:56.560 keeping the eyes on the prize,
00:40:58.060 winning, moving together
00:40:59.280 with some unity,
00:41:01.540 with a clear vision,
00:41:03.420 with practical steps to move forward,
00:41:05.780 to win, to achieve results.
00:41:07.240 Because the winners go to Washington
00:41:08.380 and make laws
00:41:09.160 and the losers go home.
00:41:11.000 A very, very important lesson
00:41:13.040 and probably the only time in my life
00:41:15.000 that I will encourage people
00:41:15.860 to read the Washington Post.
00:41:17.440 In one week on Christmas Day,
00:41:18.580 episodes one and two
00:41:19.120 of the Pendragon Cycle,
00:41:19.960 Rise of the Merlin,
00:41:20.580 start streaming on Daily Wire Plus
00:41:21.960 for all Access members.
00:41:23.380 Here is the truth.
00:41:25.100 No one else was ever going to make this.
00:41:26.400 No one was going to bring this legend to life
00:41:27.880 at this scale
00:41:28.440 with the conviction it deserves.
00:41:30.280 Too big, too demanding, too risky.
00:41:31.760 We built a company that could do it.
00:41:33.460 So, on Christmas Day,
00:41:34.920 all Access members
00:41:35.580 are going to get episodes one and two
00:41:37.060 before anyone else.
00:41:37.980 January 22nd,
00:41:38.940 the seven-part epic launches
00:41:39.920 for all members.
00:41:41.160 The wait is almost over.
00:41:42.620 The moment Rise of the Merlin
00:41:43.780 hits your screen,
00:41:44.480 you will get exactly
00:41:45.560 why we went this big.
00:41:47.100 Become a Daily Wire Plus member
00:41:48.140 right now.
00:41:48.860 Get 40% off
00:41:50.000 new annual memberships.
00:41:51.060 Dailywire.com
00:41:51.560 slash subscribe.
00:41:52.400 Very important interview to get to.
00:41:55.220 Speaking of winning,
00:41:56.040 speaking of making policy,
00:41:57.120 I'm so honored
00:41:57.980 to have on the show
00:41:59.120 Admiral Brian Christine,
00:42:01.220 who is the
00:42:01.920 Assistant Secretary for Health
00:42:03.980 at the U.S. Department of Health
00:42:05.120 and Human Services.
00:42:06.020 Major announcement,
00:42:07.260 big press conference
00:42:07.960 coming out
00:42:08.560 of HHS
00:42:09.780 today.
00:42:10.760 Obviously,
00:42:10.980 we've covered a lot of the big changes
00:42:12.260 to the vaccine schedule,
00:42:13.740 to how public health
00:42:14.300 is treated
00:42:14.620 after the massive scandals
00:42:16.000 of public health
00:42:16.600 during the Biden administration.
00:42:18.280 one of the scandals
00:42:19.760 actually pertaining
00:42:20.800 to the very position
00:42:22.040 that Admiral Christine holds.
00:42:24.040 So, Admiral,
00:42:24.520 thank you so much
00:42:24.980 for coming on the show.
00:42:26.720 No, Michael,
00:42:27.500 thank you for having me
00:42:28.340 on the show.
00:42:29.200 I love what you do.
00:42:30.700 I love your online presence
00:42:31.960 and I'm really pleased
00:42:33.000 to be here today.
00:42:34.100 Well, thank you so much.
00:42:34.780 The pleasure is all mine.
00:42:35.480 I can't help but notice,
00:42:36.800 Admiral,
00:42:37.460 you are the
00:42:38.160 Assistant Secretary for Health
00:42:39.580 and you are wearing
00:42:41.680 a men's uniform
00:42:43.340 and I believe
00:42:45.080 your predecessor
00:42:45.760 in that very position
00:42:47.460 though a man
00:42:49.740 wore a woman's uniform. 0.99
00:42:52.560 That's exactly right.
00:42:53.860 No, my predecessor,
00:42:55.080 Admiral Levine,
00:42:56.320 wore a woman's uniform. 0.99
00:42:57.780 No, I'm a man
00:42:58.580 wearing a man's uniform.
00:43:00.420 That speaks to the truth
00:43:01.880 that boys are boys
00:43:03.380 and girls are girls
00:43:04.480 and you can't change that.
00:43:06.080 That alone, Admiral,
00:43:08.120 I think goes a long way
00:43:09.720 to restoring some faith
00:43:11.140 that our health department
00:43:13.160 has a sane conception
00:43:15.600 of what health even is.
00:43:18.540 There's been so much.
00:43:19.720 It's like a fire hose
00:43:20.640 of information
00:43:21.180 coming out of HHS.
00:43:22.160 Can you tell us
00:43:22.540 a little bit about
00:43:23.140 what the department
00:43:23.680 is announcing today?
00:43:25.720 Yes.
00:43:26.240 Well, so you know
00:43:27.540 that we have
00:43:28.640 an issue in this country,
00:43:30.800 the explosion
00:43:31.900 of children
00:43:33.680 who are being,
00:43:34.500 who have gender dysphoria,
00:43:35.920 who are being treated
00:43:36.780 with castrating chemicals
00:43:38.760 and surgeries
00:43:39.880 that really do not
00:43:41.480 address the problem.
00:43:42.780 And so we've seen
00:43:43.380 an explosion of this.
00:43:44.520 We certainly saw that
00:43:45.660 in the last administration
00:43:46.820 in my predecessor.
00:43:48.340 And I want to thank
00:43:48.980 President Trump
00:43:49.820 and Secretary Kennedy
00:43:51.000 for saying,
00:43:51.940 no, we are going to be led
00:43:53.360 by gold level science.
00:43:55.440 We're going to be led
00:43:56.120 by what's right.
00:43:56.880 We're going to be transparent.
00:43:57.800 And we're actually
00:43:58.620 going to speak to parents,
00:44:00.140 speak to these children
00:44:00.960 and give them
00:44:02.460 treatment that actually works.
00:44:04.200 And treatment
00:44:04.720 that actually works
00:44:05.760 is not chemicals,
00:44:08.140 puberty blockers
00:44:09.040 and surgeries,
00:44:09.880 but rather address this
00:44:11.280 as you would
00:44:11.800 any other mental health issue
00:44:14.180 and give them
00:44:14.840 compassionate,
00:44:15.840 supportive,
00:44:16.960 expert mental health counseling.
00:44:18.800 That's the way forward
00:44:19.640 with these kids,
00:44:20.540 not surgeries or chemicals.
00:44:22.280 The Biden HHS
00:44:23.640 was transgender.
00:44:25.260 The Trump HHS
00:44:26.440 is transparent.
00:44:27.860 I think that's
00:44:28.380 a big, big improvement.
00:44:31.040 This was an issue
00:44:32.300 that I think
00:44:32.880 scandalized a lot of voters.
00:44:34.180 I think it is
00:44:34.620 actually a big part
00:44:36.040 of the reason
00:44:36.600 why Republicans
00:44:37.660 and President Trump
00:44:38.440 won in 2024
00:44:39.300 is voters looked
00:44:40.440 at that issue
00:44:41.040 in particular.
00:44:41.540 They said,
00:44:41.980 this is such a travesty
00:44:43.340 that is being done,
00:44:44.020 especially to children.
00:44:45.420 It's scandalous.
00:44:46.920 It's destroying lives.
00:44:48.580 It's not helping
00:44:49.280 in any way.
00:44:49.860 It's really making
00:44:50.620 the problem worse.
00:44:51.900 It represents
00:44:52.740 such a total failure
00:44:53.780 of judgment
00:44:54.380 on the part
00:44:55.340 of the previous administration
00:44:56.600 and Democrats.
00:44:57.700 These guys,
00:44:58.540 they don't have the judgment
00:44:59.280 to be the dog catcher
00:45:01.760 in Palookaville,
00:45:02.380 much less run a country.
00:45:03.800 So can you just give us
00:45:04.960 a little bit of a sense
00:45:05.560 at the federal level
00:45:06.400 of what the Biden
00:45:08.320 trans kids policy
00:45:11.040 had been
00:45:11.700 and how today's actions
00:45:13.280 are changing that?
00:45:14.980 Right.
00:45:15.700 I think they were driven
00:45:16.860 more by a warped social
00:45:18.920 and political agenda.
00:45:20.620 Let's just say it
00:45:21.320 for what it is.
00:45:22.020 That was the driver
00:45:23.000 in the last administration.
00:45:24.620 The driver
00:45:25.100 in this administration
00:45:26.280 under President Trump
00:45:27.380 and Secretary Kennedy
00:45:28.780 and myself
00:45:29.360 is that we are going
00:45:30.380 to look at science.
00:45:31.600 We are going to let science
00:45:32.640 guide us
00:45:33.220 how we treat
00:45:34.500 these vulnerable children.
00:45:35.920 And understand,
00:45:37.100 gender dysphoria
00:45:37.840 is a real entity.
00:45:39.920 Gender dysphoria
00:45:40.540 does occur,
00:45:41.580 but you don't treat it
00:45:42.620 with chemicals and surgery.
00:45:43.880 You treat it
00:45:44.380 with counseling.
00:45:45.800 And so we looked at this.
00:45:47.600 We've looked at,
00:45:48.340 we brought together
00:45:48.980 the best scientists
00:45:50.060 to look and to make
00:45:51.140 recommendations.
00:45:51.900 We've looked at the science
00:45:52.860 and simply the science
00:45:54.100 does not support
00:45:55.100 the use of castrating chemicals
00:45:57.280 and mutilating surgeries
00:45:58.360 to treat these children.
00:45:59.780 What science does support
00:46:01.360 is, again,
00:46:02.800 compassionate care,
00:46:05.000 compassionate counseling.
00:46:07.400 If parents want to loop in
00:46:09.720 pastoral support,
00:46:10.980 I think that's entirely reasonable
00:46:12.280 and I think that's appropriate
00:46:13.320 as for any other disease process.
00:46:15.540 But the important thing is
00:46:16.780 is that surgeries and chemicals
00:46:18.300 are not the way forward.
00:46:19.320 That is what was being pushed
00:46:21.060 in the last administration.
00:46:22.980 And what we are saying is,
00:46:24.280 no, that's not correct.
00:46:25.980 Science doesn't support this.
00:46:27.800 What science does support
00:46:28.940 is handling these children
00:46:30.360 with care and with love
00:46:31.300 and with counseling.
00:46:32.300 I'm glad you mentioned, too,
00:46:33.700 not just the scientific experts,
00:46:35.380 but also the parents,
00:46:37.040 the pastors,
00:46:37.620 all these other social supports.
00:46:39.100 I was giving a speech
00:46:40.000 at some school
00:46:40.860 a couple years ago
00:46:42.040 and a young gal
00:46:43.320 walked up to the microphone
00:46:44.200 and said,
00:46:44.660 hey, Michael,
00:46:45.180 I just want to thank you
00:46:46.320 for speaking out
00:46:47.160 on the trans issue
00:46:48.220 because I suffered
00:46:49.260 from gender dysphoria
00:46:50.180 and I thought
00:46:50.960 I was the opposite sex
00:46:51.920 and I really wanted
00:46:52.540 to go through the procedures
00:46:53.500 and the hormones
00:46:54.200 and the surgeries.
00:46:55.620 And luckily,
00:46:56.420 I had good supportive parents
00:46:58.100 and I had a good doctor
00:46:59.640 who wasn't just guiding me
00:47:01.180 down that path,
00:47:02.220 a path that's very difficult
00:47:03.460 to come back from
00:47:04.120 if possible at all.
00:47:05.180 And I had a good priest
00:47:06.300 and I had all of this
00:47:07.620 social support
00:47:08.300 and what she said was
00:47:10.240 that she had undiagnosed autism.
00:47:12.640 She was on the autism spectrum
00:47:13.740 and when the scientists,
00:47:16.200 when the doctors
00:47:16.700 started treating that issue
00:47:19.000 and there were a whole host
00:47:20.260 of issues that can contribute
00:47:21.220 to the gender dysphoria,
00:47:22.480 she said,
00:47:22.980 my gender dysphoria
00:47:23.740 greatly abated.
00:47:25.060 I'm in a much better place now
00:47:26.280 and I'm just so thankful
00:47:27.380 that I wasn't misled
00:47:28.760 in the way that all of the experts
00:47:29.980 were telling us to.
00:47:30.880 So I think it's
00:47:31.960 a magnificent approach.
00:47:34.220 Nuts and bolts,
00:47:35.220 what can medical providers,
00:47:36.840 what can states,
00:47:38.160 what can parents
00:47:38.880 who maybe whose kids
00:47:39.660 are dealing with this,
00:47:40.320 what can they expect
00:47:40.980 from the policy change?
00:47:42.840 I think what they can expect
00:47:44.120 is that we are offering hope
00:47:46.320 in this administration
00:47:47.240 and this Department of Health
00:47:48.500 and Human Services.
00:47:49.720 We are offering hope
00:47:50.620 to these parents
00:47:51.320 and we're offering
00:47:52.080 the right treatment,
00:47:53.320 trying to guide them
00:47:54.080 toward the correct treatment
00:47:55.060 for their children.
00:47:56.140 One of the things
00:47:56.700 that you brought up
00:47:57.460 is other co-occurring issues
00:48:00.700 that can occur in these kids.
00:48:01.860 You mentioned the autism
00:48:02.660 with this one individual.
00:48:04.060 You have to treat
00:48:04.780 all of these things.
00:48:05.660 Again,
00:48:05.880 you just don't simply
00:48:06.680 don't jump to a knife
00:48:07.920 or to a syringe of chemicals
00:48:09.400 to treat these kids.
00:48:10.720 You treat the underlying issues,
00:48:12.460 the mental health issues.
00:48:13.740 You treat
00:48:14.180 what else might be going on,
00:48:15.880 whether it be autism
00:48:16.800 or something else.
00:48:17.800 We know
00:48:18.440 that these kids,
00:48:19.660 if you give them
00:48:20.260 this kind of support,
00:48:21.380 the vast,
00:48:22.380 vast,
00:48:23.260 vast majority
00:48:24.300 by the time
00:48:25.140 they get into
00:48:25.600 their middle
00:48:25.960 or late teens
00:48:26.640 will be very comfortable
00:48:27.540 in their skin.
00:48:28.680 So the wrong thing
00:48:29.700 is to go in
00:48:30.580 and jump in
00:48:31.400 with surgeries
00:48:32.340 that castrate,
00:48:33.560 make infertile,
00:48:34.280 or chemicals
00:48:34.720 that do the same thing,
00:48:36.220 that do irreversible,
00:48:38.760 irreparable,
00:48:39.620 and horrible harm
00:48:40.620 to these kids.
00:48:41.360 We're offering hope.
00:48:42.420 The most important thing
00:48:43.280 is, I think, Michael,
00:48:44.340 is that we're offering
00:48:45.400 this approach
00:48:46.260 backed by science.
00:48:48.120 We are being
00:48:48.540 very transparent about this.
00:48:50.180 We are united about this.
00:48:51.600 This is critically important
00:48:53.160 for President Trump
00:48:54.020 and Secretary Kennedy
00:48:55.000 to protect
00:48:55.880 these vulnerable children.
00:48:57.400 We don't look at them
00:48:58.560 as pawns
00:48:59.580 for some warped
00:49:00.680 social and political agenda.
00:49:02.620 We look at them
00:49:03.420 as our children,
00:49:04.860 as our patients,
00:49:05.760 as people who matter.
00:49:07.180 We want to do
00:49:07.660 the right thing,
00:49:08.400 and we believe,
00:49:09.420 and we know
00:49:10.000 because science backs us up,
00:49:11.760 the right thing
00:49:12.440 is to approach treatment
00:49:13.620 the way we suggest,
00:49:14.960 not operate on them,
00:49:16.180 not give them chemicals.
00:49:17.720 Of course.
00:49:18.280 If a kid comes 0.95
00:49:19.140 to a parent
00:49:19.680 or to a doctor
00:49:20.400 and says,
00:49:21.340 you know,
00:49:21.620 I think deep down
00:49:22.380 I'm really an F-150,
00:49:23.340 you wouldn't have
00:49:24.320 the doctor say,
00:49:25.020 okay,
00:49:25.320 well,
00:49:25.460 we're going to get you
00:49:25.980 into the operating room
00:49:26.780 and put a catalytic converter
00:49:27.880 in you.
00:49:28.360 That would be absurd.
00:49:29.900 And yet,
00:49:30.200 that's the exact kind
00:49:31.140 of treatment,
00:49:31.680 treatment so-called,
00:49:32.720 that the experts
00:49:34.060 under the Biden administration
00:49:35.220 were pursuing.
00:49:36.820 And as you point out,
00:49:37.980 it's still very ideologically
00:49:39.680 hot on the left.
00:49:41.520 Do you and does HHS
00:49:44.040 expect pushback
00:49:45.740 from the courts,
00:49:47.940 any other bureaucrats,
00:49:49.240 any of the usual suspects,
00:49:50.640 or is the administration
00:49:52.700 confident
00:49:53.460 that they won't have
00:49:55.480 many impediments
00:49:56.340 to restoring
00:49:57.400 some sanity
00:49:57.940 to health?
00:49:59.620 Well,
00:49:59.800 we are absolutely confident
00:50:00.860 that what we are saying
00:50:02.520 is right.
00:50:03.220 We are absolutely confident
00:50:04.500 that what we are suggesting
00:50:06.360 for the best treatment
00:50:07.240 for these kids
00:50:07.940 is the right treatment.
00:50:09.300 We have absolute confidence
00:50:10.360 in that.
00:50:10.740 Yes,
00:50:11.260 I'm sure there are going
00:50:11.900 to be detractors
00:50:12.920 from the left
00:50:14.060 or detractors
00:50:14.660 who have their own
00:50:15.300 social agenda.
00:50:16.920 We're not worried
00:50:17.500 about that.
00:50:18.060 What we're here to do
00:50:19.060 is to evangelize parents,
00:50:21.480 to tell them
00:50:22.280 that the best way
00:50:23.100 to treat their kids
00:50:24.080 is with this
00:50:24.800 compassionate care.
00:50:26.180 So we're going to march
00:50:26.860 forward and do that
00:50:27.760 because it's the right thing
00:50:28.760 for our kids.
00:50:29.520 It's the right thing
00:50:30.220 for our country.
00:50:31.220 It's the right thing
00:50:32.480 for President Trump
00:50:33.500 and Secretary Kennedy
00:50:34.560 and for the rest of us
00:50:35.500 at the Department of Health
00:50:36.400 and Human Services.
00:50:37.460 Admiral,
00:50:37.840 it's great.
00:50:38.740 And I think for a lot
00:50:39.620 of people,
00:50:40.080 they'll say,
00:50:40.860 my goodness,
00:50:41.560 this is how medicine
00:50:42.820 was practiced
00:50:43.440 for approximately
00:50:44.540 all of human history
00:50:46.120 until, I don't know,
00:50:47.120 2020 or something.
00:50:48.800 And so they say
00:50:50.220 it's just unbelievable
00:50:51.760 that we've gotten
00:50:52.340 to a place as a society
00:50:53.540 where this kind of thing
00:50:54.560 needs to be said and done.
00:50:55.700 It just shows you
00:50:56.180 how far we had degraded.
00:50:57.680 The course correction
00:50:58.240 is greatly welcomed.
00:51:00.160 I really appreciate
00:51:01.620 your efforts on this,
00:51:02.940 the efforts of the entire
00:51:04.160 Trump HHS.
00:51:05.920 And I'm sure a lot of people
00:51:06.780 are going to be tuning in
00:51:07.520 to that press conference
00:51:08.380 and hearing even more
00:51:10.900 details about it.
00:51:11.900 Admiral, thank you so much
00:51:12.520 for coming on the show.
00:51:14.260 Thank you, Michael.
00:51:15.120 Bless you.
00:51:15.980 And have a very blessed
00:51:17.100 Advent and Christmas.
00:51:18.380 Thank you.
00:51:18.860 You as well, sir.
00:51:19.760 And thank you to all of you.
00:51:20.920 Same message, actually,
00:51:21.600 to all of you.
00:51:22.040 I'm Michael Knowles.
00:51:22.780 This is The Michael Knowles Show.
00:51:24.140 I'll see you tomorrow.
00:51:25.500 All of this is an illusion.
00:51:41.500 An echo of a voice
00:51:42.520 that has died.
00:51:45.940 And soon that echo
00:51:46.900 will cease.
00:51:55.500 They say that Merlin is mad.
00:52:05.560 They say he was a king
00:52:07.220 in Dovid.
00:52:09.120 The son of a princess
00:52:10.440 of lost Atlantis.
00:52:12.520 They say the future
00:52:14.260 and the past
00:52:15.400 are known to him.
00:52:17.680 That the fire and the wind
00:52:19.020 tell him their secrets.
00:52:21.240 That the magic of the hillfolk
00:52:22.940 and druids
00:52:23.660 come forth
00:52:24.520 at his easy command.
00:52:27.600 They say
00:52:28.560 he slew hundreds.
00:52:31.160 Hundreds.
00:52:32.020 Do you hear?
00:52:32.980 That the world
00:52:33.660 burned
00:52:34.260 and trembled
00:52:35.080 at his wrath.
00:52:39.240 The Merlin died
00:52:41.100 long before
00:52:41.920 you and I
00:52:42.800 were born.
00:52:45.220 Merlin Emerus
00:52:46.260 has returned
00:52:47.780 to the land of the living.
00:52:50.980 Vortigin is gone.
00:52:52.940 Rome is gone.
00:52:54.520 The Saxon
00:52:55.480 is here.
00:52:57.600 Saxon Hengist 1.00
00:52:58.520 has assembled
00:52:59.020 the greatest war host
00:53:00.000 ever seen
00:53:00.600 in the Island of the Mighty.
00:53:02.120 And before the summer
00:53:02.840 is through
00:53:03.360 he means to take
00:53:04.600 the throne.
00:53:06.660 And he will have it.
00:53:08.160 If we are too busy
00:53:09.500 squabbling amongst ourselves
00:53:10.800 to take up arms
00:53:11.680 against him
00:53:12.340 here is your hope.
00:53:14.640 A king will arise
00:53:15.860 to hold all Britain 0.59
00:53:17.060 in his hand.
00:53:18.500 A high king
00:53:19.360 who would be
00:53:19.960 the wonder of the world
00:53:21.000 to a future
00:53:26.080 of peace.
00:53:29.340 There'll be no peace
00:53:30.560 in these lands
00:53:31.260 till we are all dust.
00:53:33.120 Men
00:53:33.440 of the Island of the Mighty
00:53:34.800 you stand together.
00:53:38.180 You stand
00:53:39.360 as Britons.
00:53:41.400 You stand as one.
00:53:42.220 Great darkness
00:53:46.420 is falling upon
00:53:47.240 this land.
00:53:49.460 These brothers
00:53:50.420 are our only hope
00:53:51.080 to stand against it.
00:53:53.820 Not our only hope.
00:53:56.720 Esay Merthen
00:53:57.540 slew 70 men
00:53:58.780 with his own hands.
00:54:00.900 At Gathay
00:54:01.440 he slew 500.
00:54:02.700 No man is capable
00:54:06.240 of such a thing.
00:54:08.040 The immortal man.