The Michael Knowles Show

00:00:00.000 Democrats' hopes were dashed as former counsel Robert Mueller disintegrated in real time on Capitol Hill today.

00:00:07.960 We will examine what he said and, more importantly, what he didn't say.

00:00:11.840 Then, Gallup finds that Americans care about one issue above all the others as we head into 2020.

00:00:17.200 We'll analyze what it means for President Trump and for the Democrats running against him.

00:00:20.900 Finally, Colorado State University publishes an Orwellian inclusive language guide

00:00:27.000 that reveals the truth about why the left loves political correctness.

00:00:30.860 All that and more. I'm Michael Knowles, and this is The Michael Knowles Show.

00:00:40.540 First of all, let's get one thing absolutely clear.

00:00:43.840 Nobody cares about Robert Mueller. Nobody cares about the Mueller investigation.

00:00:47.540 Nobody cares about the Russian collusion conspiracy. Nobody cares about any of that.

00:00:52.560 Okay, everyone has moved on other than people on Twitter and partisan Democrats

00:00:57.940 who were upset that they weren't able to impeach the president,

00:01:00.740 who were upset that the president wasn't a traitor who was working on behalf of Russia.

00:01:04.680 That doesn't matter.

00:01:06.280 What does matter, however, is what Robert Mueller's testimony today means for 2020.

00:01:12.720 The investigation itself is old news. We've done it. It was old news before it even began.

00:01:17.440 But the testimony today actually does matter. And the main takeaway is

00:01:21.820 this was an absolutely devastating day for Democrats.

00:01:26.960 Now, I couldn't have predicted that. I figured. I figured what was going to happen is

00:01:31.600 Mueller releases his report. It exonerates Trump on colluding with Russia.

00:01:36.080 It refuses to exonerate Trump on obstruction of justice.

00:01:39.660 So the DOJ finally had to come to that conclusion and say Trump didn't obstruct justice.

00:01:44.200 They weren't going to go after him. Then Mueller has his press conference.

00:01:48.420 He writes his angry letter. So the Democrats at this point think Mueller's got some more fire left

00:01:53.000 in him. Maybe we can bring him out and fill in all the gaps that we weren't able to get out of

00:01:57.960 the Mueller report. So I would have expected there would be something, anything for the Democrats

00:02:02.660 to grab here. What happened surprised a lot of people today, which was that the guy just

00:02:08.480 completely collapsed. He just fell apart. OK, there were there were two moments that the

00:02:14.140 Democrats got today that they're going to be playing over and over again on the left wing

00:02:17.780 cable news channels. They're excited for exactly two moments. The first one is when Bob Mueller says

00:02:23.660 that you can indict a former president report did not conclude that he did not commit obstruction

00:02:31.340 of justice. Is that correct? That is correct. And what about total exoneration? Did you actually

00:02:37.880 totally exonerate the president? No. Now, in fact, your reports expressly states that it does not

00:02:44.280 exonerate the president. It does. OK, that that was actually the second moment. But the first moment

00:02:50.720 is they say that you can indict a former president. That's what Bob Mueller admits. Can you you can't go

00:02:56.660 after the president while he's in office, but you can't go but you can go after the president

00:03:01.260 after he's out of office? This is not a comment on Trump. This is a comment on the office of the

00:03:09.360 president, period. This is simply a procedural answer, a legal reality. Now, OK, that's fine. If

00:03:16.420 Democrats wanted to hear that, I guess it sort of sounds like Mueller can go after Trump or they're

00:03:21.940 going to go after Trump once he leaves office. The only other thing that Democrats got was when

00:03:27.740 Mueller said he didn't exonerate President Trump on obstruction, which we already knew. So this was

00:03:32.820 the highlight for Democrats testimony today. President Trump walks away from this episode

00:03:37.080 the victor. And here's why. Not even because certainly not nothing that President Trump did,

00:03:44.320 but because Bob Mueller looked weak and confused. The high point is Mueller says,

00:03:50.800 I didn't exonerate him entirely. OK, you got that. We already knew that from the report.

00:03:56.700 But already from the Mueller report, President Trump comes out looking pretty good. Mueller didn't

00:04:01.100 totally exonerate him on obstruction, which was bad for Trump, but it did exonerate him on collusion,

00:04:05.900 which is the actual crime in question. So pretty good. Today made President Trump's victory cleaner

00:04:12.180 because what it did, far from giving more fodder for partisan Democrats, it actually cast doubt on the

00:04:19.660 Russia investigation itself on the whole thing and frankly, on Mueller's role in the whole thing.

00:04:25.720 The biggest loser today probably was Bob Mueller because the Democrats had pinned all of their hopes

00:04:31.900 on Mueller. And and therefore, when he fell, the Democrats got hurt to a lesser degree. Democrats were

00:04:37.960 the big losers from today. Mueller wouldn't even grant Democrats their main talking point from their own

00:04:44.360 report. So Democrat Representative Hakeem Jeffries leapt in there to say that there is clear evidence

00:04:50.360 that Donald Trump obstructed justice. After Mueller said, I didn't totally exonerate him,

00:04:55.300 he comes in, he says, that's right. He obstructed justice. Mueller actually shut him down.

00:04:59.200 The investigation found substantial evidence that when the president ordered Don McGahn to fire the

00:05:04.680 special counsel and then lie about it, Donald Trump, one, committed an obstructive act,

00:05:10.060 two, connected to an official proceeding, three, did so with corrupt intent. Those are the elements

00:05:18.500 of obstruction of justice. This is the United States of America. No one is above the law. No one.

00:05:27.700 The president must be held accountable one way or the other.

00:05:31.740 Let me let me just say, if I might, I don't subscribe necessarily to your

00:05:36.740 the way you analyze that. I'm not saying it's out of the ballpark, but I'm not supportive of that

00:05:42.260 analytical charge. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for saying that what I said is complete BS.

00:05:48.040 So it all went downhill from there for the Russia conspiracy theorists. The Republicans jump in.

00:05:55.200 Republican Representative John Ratcliffe asked Bob Mueller about this issue of exonerating

00:06:01.660 or not exonerating. And he pointed out that Mueller's language in this report is bizarre.

00:06:07.840 It's bizarre to say, I couldn't totally perfectly conclude that he didn't commit a crime, so I don't

00:06:13.460 exonerate him. And what Representative Ratcliffe asked is, is there any other case that he can recall

00:06:19.080 of the DOJ choosing not to exonerate because innocence was not conclusively determined?

00:06:26.660 The example other than Donald Trump or the Justice Department determined that an

00:06:30.600 investigated person was not exonerated because their innocence was not conclusively determined?

00:06:36.240 I cannot, but this is a unique situation. Okay, well, you can't. Time is short. I've got five

00:06:41.160 minutes. Let's just leave it at you can't find it because I'll tell you why. It doesn't exist.

00:06:46.060 Of course not. Of course it doesn't exist. Now, this is all just the setup because only now do things

00:06:52.620 start to get really weird. And it raises big questions about Bob Mueller himself. We'll get to that in a

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00:08:33.240 lender. So you've got Mueller saying, I didn't totally exonerate Trump, but I'm not saying that

00:08:39.820 he's guilty of committing obstruction. He's guilty of this crime. Then things start to get weird.

00:08:47.280 So Mueller just starts stonewalling. And this is particularly with regard to the infamous

00:08:53.980 Steele dossier. That Steele dossier, you'll remember, was the report that was uncorroborated,

00:09:00.920 never proven, totally bogus, in many cases, report that this ex-intelligence guy, Christopher

00:09:07.060 Steele, made, almost certainly with Russian intelligence services. And he made it for Fusion

00:09:11.820 GPS, which is an opposition research firm that did work for Clinton and the Democrats.

00:09:16.600 This is central to the whole Russia conspiracy hoax and Mueller stonewalls on it. Here is

00:09:25.380 Representative Steve Chabot asking Mueller about Fusion and about Christopher Steele.

00:09:31.240 When discussing the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting, you referenced, quote,

00:09:37.400 the firm that produced the Steele reporting, unquote. The name of that firm was Fusion GPS. Is that

00:09:44.500 correct? And you're on page 103? 103, that's correct. Volume 2.

00:09:51.720 When you talk about the firm that produced the Steele reporting, the name of the firm that produced

00:09:58.780 that was Fusion GPS. Is that correct? I'm not familiar with that.

00:10:04.820 Well, let me just help you. It was. It's not a trick question. It was Fusion GPS. Now,

00:10:12.240 Fusion GPS produced the opposition research document widely known as the Steele dossier.

00:10:18.960 And the owner of Fusion GPA was someone named Glenn Simpson. Are you familiar with that?

00:10:24.880 Outside of your purview? That's the whole investigation. The Steele dossier on which

00:10:34.640 the entire thing is predicated is outside of your purview? The Steele dossier is the beginning of

00:10:42.640 the Russia conspiracy. The Steele dossier was the predicate for the spying that took place,

00:10:48.360 the spying on members of the Trump campaign that started this whole three-year ordeal. And

00:10:54.300 Mueller seems like he doesn't know. He seems like he's ignorant of it. I mean, you have that line

00:10:58.900 from the congressman. He says, okay, and this was put together by Fusion GPS. Is that right?

00:11:05.160 And Mueller looks bewildered, dazed, and confused. He says, well, I don't, I'm not totally. And the

00:11:11.600 congressman has to lean in and say, it's not a trick question. It is Fusion GPS. It's in your own

00:11:16.780 report. Mueller seems totally ignorant of it. So then they go further. They start asking Mueller

00:11:21.720 not just about Fusion GPS, which is the firm that put it together, but Christopher Steele himself,

00:11:26.940 the ex-British intelligence analyst who put together the entire report. Mueller doesn't

00:11:32.920 seem to know very much about Christopher Steele either. Can you state with confidence that the

00:11:37.360 Steele dossier was not part of Russia's disinformation campaign? No, as I said in my opening

00:11:44.200 statement, that part of the building of the case predated me by at least 10 months. Yeah, I mean,

00:11:54.220 Paul Manafort's alleged crimes regarding tax evasion predated you. You had no problem charging

00:11:59.140 them. And matter of fact, this Steele dossier predated the attorney general, and he didn't have

00:12:04.340 any problem answering the question. When Senator Cornyn asked the attorney general the exact question

00:12:08.700 I asked you, director, the attorney general said, and I'm quoting, no, I can't state that with

00:12:13.620 confidence. And that's one of the areas I'm reviewing. I'm concerned about it, and I don't

00:12:18.420 think it's entirely speculative. Steele? Steele who? Christopher, I don't, uh, no, that name doesn't

00:12:25.780 ring any bell, does it? This was a great question from Republican Congressman Matt Gaetz. Unfortunately,

00:12:31.500 Gaetz went on a little bit too long in his question. He should have just gone in there and gotten the

00:12:35.320 clean hit. Because here's what he said. He said, let's talk about Christopher Steele.

00:12:40.140 Mueller says, well, that predates my experience in the investigation, so I can't talk about it.

00:12:45.040 And Gaetz has that great follow-up. He says, well, Manafort's tax problems predate your entrance

00:12:49.740 into the investigation. You're willing to talk about that. Why is it you're willing to talk about

00:12:54.460 things that make Trump look bad, but you're not willing to talk about things that make Democrats look

00:12:58.860 bad and maybe make Trump look pretty good? Why? It's pretty selective about what you're willing to talk

00:13:04.920 about and what you're not willing to talk about. It was a good hit. I don't mean to knock Congressman

00:13:09.460 Gaetz too much, but it should have been a cleaner hit. He should have ended it right there and let

00:13:13.220 Mueller stammer, which is what he did for much of the rest of the hearing. The fact remains, either way,

00:13:19.760 Mueller totally punted on Steele. This is pretty weird behavior. Two central figures and organizations

00:13:28.600 in this Russia investigation. Fusion GPS put the dossier together, took the Clintons' money,

00:13:34.680 took the Democrats' money, and Christopher Steele, the guy who actually wrote the thing.

00:13:41.320 That research that they put together launches the spying, launches the investigation.

00:13:48.140 And Bob Mueller, the head investigator, the special counsel, doesn't seem to know anything about

00:13:54.160 either of them. Not even that he's unwilling to talk about it. That he doesn't seem to,

00:13:58.680 oh, oh, Steele who? Fusion GPS who? Yeah, I never heard of her. This is difficult to believe. It raises

00:14:05.360 the question, is Mueller playing dumb? Or does Mueller actually not know what's going on in his

00:14:13.080 own investigation? How much does Bob Mueller know about his own investigation? I guess it could be either.

00:14:18.960 He could be playing dumb because he doesn't want to put himself at risk of committing perjury. Or he

00:14:25.080 doesn't want to make himself look too nakedly political. Or because when you play dumb, it

00:14:29.740 generally works to your advantage in politics. Bill Clinton has bragged about this. George Bush has

00:14:35.420 bragged about this. Playing a little below your mark is very helpful. But I don't know. Maybe he's not

00:14:41.700 playing dumb. Maybe he actually doesn't really know about these things. If that is the case, even if I'm

00:14:46.700 willing to believe that, this raises a more troubling question. If Bob Mueller doesn't know what's going

00:14:51.820 on in his investigation, who does? Because this has been the argument the whole time, is that this

00:14:58.520 investigation is extremely partisan. It's being staffed by never-Trumpers who hate the president's guts, who

00:15:04.240 have been caught in leaked text messages saying that they want to undermine the 2016 election and prevent

00:15:09.700 the people from electing Donald Trump. And all these guys have been caught as part of the Mueller

00:15:14.080 investigation. And the response the whole time was, okay, sure, there are a couple bad apples,

00:15:19.200 but Bob Mueller is a man beyond reproach. He's a former Marine. He's an FBI director under Republicans.

00:15:26.760 You couldn't possibly impugn his motives or his reputation or his competence.

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00:15:44.200 who does? Peter Strzok, Andy McCabe, Lisa Page? Who knows about it? Who was actually running it?

00:15:50.760 Who actually wrote this thing, if not Mueller? Or is Mueller playing dumb? Don't think this is some

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00:18:00.880 So is Bob Mueller playing dumb or does Bob Mueller really have no idea what's going on in his

00:18:05.500 investigation? If it's the latter, then who ran the thing? Who wrote the thing? Who is behind this

00:18:11.240 witch hunt? Don't accuse me of having some partisan attack here that I'm carrying water for

00:18:18.340 Republicans or something. People from both sides of the aisle were absolutely flummoxed by this

00:18:23.940 performance today. Mike Cernovich, you know, the right-wing independent journalist, he suggested

00:18:29.380 that the hearing be adjourned because it constituted elder abuse against Bob Mueller looking a little

00:18:36.560 long in the tooth. On the other side of the aisle, David Axelrod, the chief strategist for Barack Obama,

00:18:41.600 he tweeted out simply, quote, this is very, very painful. He even tweeted out later,

00:18:48.080 he said, you know, this is a very delicate subject, but when Mueller testified before Congress six

00:18:53.400 years ago, he was a lot sharper than he is today. At one point, I kid you not, at one point,

00:18:59.200 Mueller couldn't remember which president appointed him U.S. attorney in Boston.

00:19:03.960 Director Mueller, I'm disappointed that some have questioned your motives throughout this process,

00:19:09.280 and I want to take a moment to remind the American people of who you are and your exemplary

00:19:15.120 service to our country. You are a Marine. You served in Vietnam and earned a bronze star and a

00:19:21.720 purple heart, correct? Correct. Which president appointed you to become the United States attorney

00:19:27.340 for Massachusetts? Which senator? Which president? Oh, which president?

00:19:34.700 I think that was President Bush. According to my notes, it was President Ronald Reagan had the

00:19:40.380 honor to do so. Under whose administration? My mistake.

00:19:44.660 Oh, man, this is genuinely, you pity the guy. I mean, he evokes a lot of sympathy here. Even from the

00:19:51.100 beginning, the question was, which president appointed you U.S. attorney? And he said, which

00:19:56.340 senator? Senators don't appoint you U.S. attorney. Presidents do that. No, which president? He goes,

00:20:02.340 I don't know, Bush? No, Reagan. Like, it's not a trick question. The same thing with Fusion GPS.

00:20:07.520 This isn't a trick question. We're just establishing your credibility. That was a friendly question from a

00:20:12.200 Democrat. Really bizarre. Look, he might be senile. He might have been off his meds or something.

00:20:19.080 Or he might be playing dumb. Either way, the most revealing part of this testimony is that he punted

00:20:27.680 on one question. So you saw a buildup. He punts on Christopher Steele. He punts on Fusion GPS.

00:20:36.120 Oh, I don't know. Little, what do I know? But then he's asked a very pointed question on how the

00:20:42.360 investigation got started. And people aren't really covering this, but this is the key to the testimony.

00:20:46.960 And it's a little bit complicated, so bear with me. Bob Mueller is asked why Joseph Mifsud,

00:20:53.840 who lied to the FBI, was not charged with a crime. If that name Joseph Mifsud sounds familiar,

00:21:00.520 he matters because he's this Maltese academic. He's a professor. He's in London. He's in Paris.

00:21:06.600 He's in Malta. He's in Rome. And he's clearly got ties to intelligence agencies. Some people say he's

00:21:13.240 tied to Russian intelligence. Some people say he's tied to Western intelligence. Maybe he's tied to

00:21:17.720 both. And he is the academic who told the Trump staffer, George Papadopoulos, that the Russians had

00:21:24.900 dirt on Clinton. So this whole episode, the whole question of whether this Russia investigation was

00:21:30.220 a setup from the very beginning, comes down to this guy, Joseph Mifsud. How did George Papadopoulos,

00:21:37.340 the Trump staffer, come to find out that, or hear rather, whether it's true or not, how did he come

00:21:43.800 to hear that the Russians had dirt on Hillary Clinton? And then how did he come to pass that

00:21:49.360 information along, which was the trigger that started the investigation, which allowed the

00:21:52.840 Obama administration to spy on the Trump campaign? How did that happen? Joseph Mifsud is at the center

00:21:59.120 of this. And Mueller refuses to answer. The FBI interviewed Joseph Mifsud on February 10th, 2017.

00:22:08.420 In that interview, Mr. Mifsud lied. You point this out on page 193, volume one, Mifsud denied.

00:22:15.140 Mifsud also falsely stated. In addition, Mifsud omitted. Three times he lied to the FBI,

00:22:21.440 yet you didn't charge him with the crime. Excuse me. I'm sorry. Did you say 193?

00:22:26.400 Volume one, 193. He lied three times. You pointed out in the report. Why didn't you charge him with

00:22:31.500 the crime? I can't get into internal deliberations with regard to who would or would not be charged.

00:22:38.520 A lot of other people for making a false statement. Let's remember this.

00:22:41.680 That's right. He charged a lot of other people for making false statements. But you see,

00:22:46.220 Mueller just keeps going back to this. I can't talk about internal deliberations.

00:22:49.400 I can't talk about why I charged somebody, but I didn't charge any other people.

00:22:53.100 Well, it's a little weird, Mr. Mueller, because on the one hand, you're charging Mike Flynn for lying.

00:23:01.100 You're charging Papadopoulos. You're charging all of these guys associated with Trump for,

00:23:07.300 in some cases, very minor lies. But then this guy, this academic, Joseph Mifsud,

00:23:13.940 who lies on three occasions to the FBI, he doesn't get charged with a crime. Why not?

00:23:19.420 The obvious implication is that he has worked with Western intelligence. The obvious implication

00:23:25.320 is that he's got a longstanding relationship with the FBI and the intelligence community.

00:23:30.180 And the question that is being raised is, what was Mifsud's role in talking to Papadopoulos?

00:23:39.840 Did Joseph Mifsud, this cosmopolitan academic who just floats, flits around all over the world,

00:23:46.040 just happen to bump into George Papadopoulos, just happen to say that the Russians had dirt on Hillary

00:23:52.800 Clinton, which just happened to prompt the events that led to the spying on the Trump campaign? Was

00:23:58.420 that just an accident? Or was there some collusion, not between Trump and the Russians,

00:24:05.320 but between the Obama administration and guys like Joseph Mifsud? That's the question. And that's a key

00:24:12.360 question that has not been answered. The FBI, did the FBI use Mifsud to prod Papadopoulos,

00:24:20.740 who was working on the Trump campaign? That's a crucial question. And Jim Jordan, thankfully,

00:24:24.960 does not let up. So he sets up this whole scene. Then he asks the question, point blank,

00:24:31.380 what is the relationship between the intelligence community and Professor Mifsud?

00:24:34.980 You point this out on page one of the report. July 31st, 2016, they opened the investigation

00:24:41.840 based on that piece of information. Diplomat tells Papadopoulos, Russians have dirt, excuse me,

00:24:48.220 Papadopoulos tells a diplomat, Russians have dirt on Clinton. Diplomat tells the FBI.

00:24:53.720 What I'm wondering is, who told Papadopoulos? How'd he find out?

00:24:58.860 I can't get into the evidentiary filing. Yes, you can, because you wrote about it. You gave us

00:25:02.900 the answer. Page 192 of the report, you tell us who told him. Joseph Mifsud. Joseph Mifsud's the

00:25:11.020 guy who told Papadopoulos, the mysterious professor who lives in Rome and London, works and teaches in

00:25:16.800 two different universities. This is the guy who told Papadopoulos. He's the guy who starts it all.

00:25:22.360 And when the FBI interviews him, he lies three times. And yet you don't charge him with a crime.

00:25:29.540 You charge Rick Gates for false statements. You charge Paul Manafort for false statements.

00:25:33.340 You charge Michael Cohen with false statements. You charge Michael Flynn, a three-star general,

00:25:37.820 with false statements. But the guy who puts the country through this whole saga,

00:25:43.120 starts it all for three years we've lived this now. He lies. And you guys don't charge him.

00:25:49.620 And I'm curious as to why.

00:25:50.860 Absolutely stellar performance from Jim Jordan here. And he nails him. Just look at Mueller's

00:25:57.620 reaction when he says, I want to get down to Mifsud. I want to know who told Papadopoulos

00:26:05.620 on the Trump campaign that the Russians had dirt on Hillary. And you see, Mueller won't let him get

00:26:10.380 the words out of his mouth. Mueller jumps in. I can't talk about that. This is nothing that I can

00:26:14.300 talk about. And Jordan's got him right where he wants him because he says, of course you can talk

00:26:18.400 about that. You already did. It's in your report. Or is it your report? It's in the Mueller report.

00:26:26.960 I don't know who wrote it. Clearly you don't have much of a recollection of it. But you already

00:26:30.960 admitted that it was Mifsud who told him. Again, raises the question, does Mueller know about his

00:26:36.080 own report? Is he playing dumb? He clearly looks uncomfortable here. He clearly looks nervous. He's

00:26:41.020 jumping and saying, we can't talk about how this whole thing started. The one common thread through all

00:26:44.900 this testimony is this guy will not talk about how this investigation got started. I wonder why

00:26:51.840 then Jim Jordan goes in for the kill. We'll get to that in a second. We'll also get to the number one

00:26:58.920 issue for Americans as we look down to 2020, according to Gallup polling and the Orwellian

00:27:03.980 inclusive language guide from Colorado State University. But first, I've got to say goodbye

00:27:10.320 to Facebook and YouTube. And I've got to tell you guys, today, 7 p.m. Eastern, 4 p.m. Pacific,

00:27:16.660 our latest episode of the conversation will be featuring the great Supreme Lord of the multiverse,

00:27:23.880 Andrew Klavan. He will be answering your questions live, so make them good. As always,

00:27:28.800 the episode is free to watch on YouTube and Facebook. Only subscribers can ask the questions.

00:27:34.080 Subscribe today at The Daily Wire. Get your questions answered by Drew Klavan at 7 p.m. Eastern,

00:27:38.840 4 p.m. Pacific, and join the conversation. I also have to give a little plug to our buddy Bill

00:27:44.760 Whittle's podcast. Bill Whittle, you know him. You've seen him before. He has an incredible podcast

00:27:51.540 out on the Apollo 11 mission, the moon landing. The other day, I put out a video talking to people

00:27:57.940 about all the various theories of how we didn't actually go to the moon. Between 6 and 20 percent

00:28:02.300 of Americans don't think we ever went to the moon because there's a lot of misinformation

00:28:06.180 floating out there. Check out this podcast. It is informative, it is historical, but it's also

00:28:11.160 incredibly inspiring because this month marks the 50th anniversary since we first put a man on the

00:28:16.860 moon. This new podcast by Esoteric Radio Theater is called Apollo 11, What We Saw. It shot immediately

00:28:23.060 to number three on iTunes, Apple podcasts. It stayed there in the top 10 for a week, and it's getting

00:28:29.120 great reviews. Almost 1 million people have listened to the podcast or watched it on YouTube. It's really

00:28:34.240 just excellent. Don't tell Bill that I was so kind about it, but it is really, really good.

00:28:39.520 And Bill is, he's an author, he's a pilot, he's a space enthusiast. He takes you on the journey of

00:28:45.060 what it took to get to the moon, what happened when we got there, and how we almost didn't get

00:28:48.380 there at all. All four episodes are available right now, so you can binge it. Head over to Apple

00:28:53.220 Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts. Subscribe today to Apollo 11, What We Saw. While you're

00:28:58.240 there, please make sure that you subscribe to our show, The Michael Knowles Show. It really helps us out

00:29:02.880 when you subscribe, so please do that. Then you'll never miss even one syllable, one pearl of wisdom.

00:29:08.220 You can watch all of that. You can also watch the podcast episodes of Apollo 11 all over YouTube

00:29:14.740 at the Esoteric Radio Theater YouTube channel. Head over there right now. Head over to dailywire.com.

00:29:19.620 We'll be right back with a lot more.

00:29:21.020 So Jordan totally demolishes Mueller. He asks him the question. Mueller jumps. He doesn't want

00:29:39.580 to answer the question. He says he can't talk about it. Jordan says, of course you can talk

00:29:42.860 about it. You wrote it in the report that you apparently didn't even read. Then Jordan goes

00:29:47.800 in for the kill. Here he is. When the FBI interviewed him in February, FBI interviews

00:29:52.720 him in February, when the special counsel's office interviewed Mifsud, did he lie to you?

00:29:57.980 Can't get into that. Did you interview Mifsud? Can't get into that. Is Mifsud Western intelligence

00:30:02.880 or Russian intelligence? Can't get into that. A lot of things you can't get into. What's interesting,

00:30:07.960 you can charge 13 Russians. No one's ever heard of. No one's ever seen. No one's ever going to hear

00:30:13.360 of him. No one's ever going to see him. You can charge them. You can charge all kinds of people

00:30:17.320 who are around the president with false statements. But the guy who launches every, the guy who puts

00:30:23.380 this whole story in motion, you can't charge him. I think that's amazing. I'm not certain I agree

00:30:31.280 with your characterizations. Well, I'm reading from your report. Ouch. That's pretty bad. I'm not sure

00:30:37.480 I agree with your characterizations. They're not my characterizations, Mr. Mueller. They're yours.

00:30:42.820 I'm reading from your report. This is brutal for the Democrats on Capitol Hill who brought

00:30:48.540 Mueller up to testify. It shows us something that I had suspected, but I wouldn't have put money on,

00:30:56.040 which is that the Democrats' best shot here was to just run on the Mueller report and keep Mueller

00:31:02.060 himself quiet. Just take the report. You can spin the report however you want and just keep Mueller

00:31:08.080 quiet. But the Democrats couldn't do that because they were disappointed with the report because it

00:31:12.760 more or less exonerated the president. You know, a little bit on the edges or obstruction or some

00:31:17.060 tweety scent. So they could have used that. They could have taken those little bits and tried to say

00:31:22.720 that Trump was guilty of all these things. Instead, they wanted more. They thought that they would get

00:31:27.300 more by having Mueller testify. And there were more unanswered questions than answers in the report.

00:31:33.100 Namely, how did the investigation start? That question reflects very poorly on Democrats.

00:31:41.260 And it undermines whatever political win Democrats had with the report. I mean, they did have a little

00:31:48.140 bit of a win. Trump did get dinged in this report. He was not fully exonerated by Bob Mueller on

00:31:54.620 obstruction. They could have had it, but they got greedy. Now, with this testimony, it really is

00:32:01.060 making the whole Russia report and the whole investigation seem illegitimate. The only hope

00:32:06.220 for Democrats in all of this is that no one cares about Mueller or Russia or collusion or any of it.

00:32:10.400 They've all moved on. The bad news for Democrats right now is, one, they've lost even a minor talking

00:32:18.740 point. But two, Gallup polling shows that more people than ever are concerned about illegal

00:32:25.260 immigration, which is a terrible issue for them and a great issue for Republicans and President Trump.

00:32:31.360 Gallup polling shows more Americans than ever, ever before, are concerned about illegal immigration,

00:32:36.900 and it's the top issue in the country. 27% of Americans identify immigration as the most

00:32:42.200 important U.S. problem. This surpasses the previous high of 23% in June. To put that in perspective,

00:32:49.820 because it seems like kind of a low number, you think the top issue would have 75% or 80%. No,

00:32:54.940 people are very fragmented about what issues they care about. Very few issues since 2001,

00:33:00.760 since they really started this polling, have ever eclipsed 27%. So this is a top issue even historically.

00:33:08.420 Now, immigration is the biggest concern. The next biggest problem is government slash leadership.

00:33:15.140 And this isn't just, it's a problem for Trump, but it's not only a problem for Trump.

00:33:18.640 This has been the case since the second Obama term as well. So you got 27% immigration, 23%

00:33:26.160 government leadership. The next highest issues are racism, race relations at 7%, and healthcare at 7%.

00:33:34.240 So way, way below a quarter or a third what the number one and number two issues are.

00:33:40.900 Now, this is a double-edged sword for Trump. This actually isn't just all good news for Trump,

00:33:44.800 because the good news is he owns the illegal immigration issue, and this will help him

00:33:49.220 because he owns it. Except he hasn't built the wall. Fox News confirmed that CBP report the other day.

00:33:56.720 Customs and Border Protection came out and said, President Trump has not built one mile

00:34:00.760 of new border wall since he was elected president. And you heard some people pushing back,

00:34:07.040 the people who will just defend the president regardless of what's actually happening. They

00:34:11.200 were pushing back and saying, no, there is wall. There's new wall. Fox News confirmed the report.

00:34:15.260 So unless they have information, unless someone has information that I don't, right now it looks

00:34:19.380 like he hasn't built any new border wall. Look, I get that it's hard. I get it's hard from an

00:34:26.040 environmental perspective. It's hard from a zoning perspective. Obviously, it's hard from a bureaucratic

00:34:29.940 and a Democrat obstruction perspective. But if he hasn't built the wall,

00:34:35.380 he doesn't look great on that issue. It's also bad for President Trump because he's the incumbent,

00:34:41.220 which now makes him the object of everybody's ire, if you believe that the second biggest issue,

00:34:46.080 according to Americans, is government and leadership. So there is a simple fix for this.

00:34:50.920 It'll help him on the top biggest issue. And it'll help him on the second biggest issue.

00:34:57.140 Build the wall. Easy. Or if you can't build the wall because it's too hard,

00:35:02.860 at least propose a plan to get the wall built, a clear plan, so that we don't need to just keep

00:35:08.280 believing promises. Or if you can't do that, because I understand, very difficult to do that.

00:35:14.820 Short of that, start deporting criminal aliens. Like, start really deporting them. We were told

00:35:21.760 last week that the U.S. would be deporting millions of criminal aliens. Remember that? On Sunday,

00:35:26.880 there were all these protests all over the country. No, don't do it. There was a terrorist attack at an

00:35:30.840 ice facility. And do you know how many people we arrested? 18. Not 18 million, not 18,000. 18 people.

00:35:42.580 There were orders of magnitude more protesters protesting the alleged mass arrests and deportation

00:35:50.760 than there were people who actually got arrested to be deported.

00:35:56.180 Even, forget President, let's say he can't build the wall. Let's say he can't get a plan to build

00:36:00.260 the wall. Even deporting lots and lots of criminal aliens publicly would help him on the subject of

00:36:07.500 illegal immigration and on the subject of government and leadership. It would show leadership.

00:36:10.940 It would show progress on the top issue. President Trump had really good instincts in 2016 to focus

00:36:17.780 on immigration. It wasn't just him. A few other people got this. Actually, Daily Wire God King,

00:36:23.120 Jeremy Boring, and our senior producer, Jonathan Hay, he understood, both of them understood,

00:36:29.380 that immigration was going to be the big issue. Back in 2014, they made a movie, a movie called The Arroyo,

00:36:34.080 all about illegal immigration. Because they saw coming down the pike, this was going to be a big

00:36:38.680 problem. President Trump saw that in 2015 when he came down that elevator at Trump Tower. He made that,

00:36:45.560 in many ways, the defining issue of his campaign. Good moves. Smart. Ever since then, the issue has

00:36:52.940 moved even more in Trump's favor. Great. All the better. But you've got to show some leadership on it.

00:36:59.880 Also, I mean, time's running out, by the way. What is it already? We're already in the end of July

00:37:05.740 2019. Presidential campaigns move fast. So there needs to be action on that if President Trump is

00:37:12.240 going to capitalize on this new Gallup polling. Also important to remember, though, that people

00:37:17.460 don't only care about political issues. They might not even primarily care about political issues.

00:37:21.760 They also care about cultural issues. When I ask people why they voted for President Trump,

00:37:26.300 some of them will say, immigration, I want to get rid of illegals. I want to border control.

00:37:31.400 Some of them will say, the economy, I want jobs. The Obama economy was awful.

00:37:36.080 Many more people will say it wasn't that, that it was because they want to smash political correctness.

00:37:43.140 That they feel that political correctness is oppressive, it's damaging them, and they're done with it.

00:37:47.980 And we are now seeing political correctness to the extreme out of Colorado State University.

00:37:53.900 This story was reported last October, and now there's a final version of it coming out now.

00:38:00.600 Colorado State University has published something called an Inclusive Language Guide.

00:38:07.680 How Orwellian is that? It was from the Inclusive Language Committee or something. It's hosted on the

00:38:14.280 Women and Gender Collaborative website. I know you've got that in your bookmark, so make sure to go check

00:38:21.320 it out. I read through this guide. I counted 131 words that you're not allowed to say. In the original

00:38:30.460 draft of this, two of the words were American and America. This is at a public state-funded American

00:38:39.200 University. They said America is offensive, and American is offensive. If they find it so offensive,

00:38:48.260 maybe they shouldn't take any taxpayer funding from America. Maybe they shouldn't take government

00:38:52.780 subsidized and guaranteed loans from America. No, they're not willing to do that. Now, fortunately,

00:38:59.240 there was such a backlash to that in October, they took that out of the final version. But there are a

00:39:02.960 lot of other crazy things in this guide. I mean, obviously, we don't have time for 131. But here's an

00:39:07.260 example. Listen to just this logic. They say the word colored to refer to black people is offensive. Fair

00:39:15.040 enough. Yeah, people haven't used that word in a while. They say colored is a highly offensive racial

00:39:19.560 slur that was often used during segregation to separate people of color. Wait, what? Colored is bad.

00:39:30.280 Color is good. And if you use anything else, it's bad, I think. That doesn't make a whole lot of sense,

00:39:35.760 does it? But it's just a euphemism cycle. You had colored. That was the term that everyone was supposed

00:39:42.800 to use. Then that fell out of favor, and it became black. Then it became African American. Then it

00:39:47.080 went back to black again. Now it's people of color, which is exactly the same as saying colored people,

00:39:51.760 except if you say colored people, you're a racial bigot. And if you say people of color,

00:39:55.800 you're super woke for now. Obviously, it's going to change. Another phrase that you're not allowed

00:39:59.720 to say is hip hip hooray. This is true. They said because hip hip hooray developed from the German

00:40:07.520 hep hep, which they write was a harmless, adorable call shepherds would use when herding their sheep.

00:40:14.480 Okay. Seems like there's no problem, right? No, but they go on. But during the Holocaust,

00:40:19.080 German citizens started using it as a rallying cry when they would hunt down Jewish citizens

00:40:24.160 living in the ghettos. So if you use the phrase hip hip hooray, hip hip hooray, if you use that,

00:40:30.400 you are a Nazi, according to Colorado State University. They say you're not allowed to use the expression

00:40:34.920 a long time no see because that's offensive to Native Americans. How? I have no idea. They say

00:40:40.520 that you're not allowed to say no can do. Hey, Michael, can you help me out? No can do. That

00:40:44.800 apparently is offensive to Chinese people. Again, why? Couldn't possibly tell you. What's wilder though

00:40:50.400 than all of this, what you can say, what you can't say, the innocuous expressions that now I guess are

00:40:57.420 are evil and bigoted. What's more interesting than that is how woke expressions fall out of fashion

00:41:06.080 and are quickly deemed hateful. One example of this is they say you're no longer allowed to say

00:41:12.340 homosexual. I thought homosexual was the totally clinical PC term. No, they say you're not allowed

00:41:20.480 to say homosexual, but you can say, and what you should say, is a gay, okay, lesbian, okay, bisexual,

00:41:27.440 all right, pansexual, whatever, or queer. Do you remember like five minutes ago when we were told that

00:41:38.740 queer is the new n-word, that queer is a horrible racial slur, which is why that little twit, Carlos

00:41:46.300 Mazza, that little bigoted leftist at vox.com tried to get Steven Crowder and a lot of other

00:41:52.100 conservatives kicked off of YouTube? Do you remember that? Queer, because queer is the n-word. I went on

00:41:58.640 a television show and when they used the word queer, when it was used in a video, they bleeped it out

00:42:03.780 because we were now told queer is the new n-word, except then we're told from Colorado State, actually

00:42:09.600 queer is the right word and homosexual is the wrong word. So if Crowder had said homosexual in his podcast

00:42:15.140 or on his show, they'd go after him for that. And then if he says queer, they're going to go after

00:42:19.800 him for that. And you're damned if you do, and you're damned if you don't. And what it shows,

00:42:23.700 what all of this shows, these language guides are not about helping an aggrieved class, obviously not.

00:42:30.460 We were talking about this yesterday on the show. The left moves past their aggrieved classes and

00:42:36.220 ditches them as soon as it becomes politically useful. They used to prattle on about women's rights

00:42:40.680 and feminism. Now they ditch all those women for the transgender so-called community. Now they make,

00:42:47.240 now they force women out of business if they won't wax the genitals of grown men wearing a dress.

00:42:51.700 Now they won't let girls win high school scholarships to college because they force them to compete

00:42:56.760 against men in women's sports. So that's over. They always ditch those groups. It's also not about

00:43:01.400 civility. It's not about making a nicer community. The left is as vindictive and scolding as any when it

00:43:09.000 comes to these words. It's not about charity or civility. It's not even about the particular

00:43:13.980 words because the words change all the time. What it's about is shutting you up. What it's about is

00:43:20.440 forcing you to check in with the committee, check in with your overlords at Colorado State or Twitter

00:43:25.640 or YouTube or wherever before you say anything. Because it's not about the words, it's about the

00:43:32.040 opinions that you're expressing. This was all summed up in Alice in Wonderland. Excuse me,

00:43:37.420 Alice in Wonderland has this scene in it where Alice is talking to Humpty Dumpty.

00:43:42.380 And Humpty Dumpty says to Alice, when I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean,

00:43:48.420 neither more nor less. And Alice says, the question is whether you can make words mean so many different

00:43:55.040 things. And Humpty Dumpty knows better. He says, the question is, which is to be master? That is all.

00:44:03.080 We've talked about it before. And you see it again, clear as day out of Colorado State. The left would

00:44:10.200 master our culture by constantly changing and perverting the meaning of words. And the way that

00:44:16.580 conservatives can master the culture is by using words correctly, using words to mean what they mean.

00:44:23.260 When the left can't change the meaning of words, they totally obfuscate. I don't know. I couldn't

00:44:31.560 say. What does it mean? How do we know? You saw Bob Mueller doing it all day today.

00:44:38.260 We need to insist on using precise language. We need to insist on asking precise questions.

00:44:44.820 In the vague haziness of innuendo and emotion and smears and slander, the left will win.

00:44:54.800 But in the precision of language, in the precision of questions, in the precision of what is the truth,

00:45:00.580 that's conservatives' path forward. In the short run, when we insist on that, it hurts us. We might

00:45:05.840 get expelled from Colorado State. We might have milkshakes thrown at us on the street. We might get

00:45:11.440 squirted by weird super soakers in Missouri and ruin my nice suit. But in the long run,

00:45:16.320 that is the way that we will win. All right, that's our show. I had a great time today speaking

00:45:19.740 to TPUSA here in Washington, D.C. I'm going to be doing a number of other media appearances,

00:45:24.800 so you can check them out while I'm here in D.C. And then I'll be speaking for the Young

00:45:28.480 America's Foundation next week for their conference. And then I'll finally be back in La La Land.

00:45:34.660 In the meantime, get your mailbag questions in for tomorrow. I'm Michael Knowles. This is

00:45:38.300 The Michael Knowles Show. I'll see you then.

00:45:41.440 The Michael Knowles Show is produced by Rebecca Dobkiewicz and directed by Mike Joyner.

00:45:49.700 Executive producer, Jeremy Boring. Senior producer, Jonathan Hay. Our supervising producer

00:45:54.660 is Mathis Glover. And our technical producer is Austin Stevens. Edited by Danny D'Amico. Audio

00:46:00.060 is mixed by Dylan Case. Hair and makeup is by Jesua Olvera. And our production assistant is Nick Sheehan.

00:46:05.980 The Michael Knowles Show is a Daily Wire production. Copyright Daily Wire 2019.

00:46:09.900 Hey, guys. Over on The Matt Wall Show today, as we all suffer through another Robert Mueller news

00:46:14.900 cycle, I'd like to turn our attention back to the story of Erica Thomas. She claimed to remember

00:46:20.520 that she was verbally assaulted by a racist white man at the grocery store. Well, the police report

00:46:24.440 is out and it's not good for her. And I think when a race hoax is exposed, we should talk about it

00:46:31.000 rather than just move on as the media wants us to do. Also, we're going to talk about an actress who

00:46:36.680 came out as pansexual, even though the term pansexual has no meaning. And also, Forever 21

00:46:42.960 unintentionally came up with the most hilarious marketing gimmick of all time.

00:46:48.080 And we'll talk about that also over on The Matt Wall Show.

Ep. 387 - Mueller Collapses On Capitol Hill

Summary

Transcript