Verdict with Ted Cruz - Reflecting on Jimmy Carter's Passing, plus Washington Post Absurdly Tries to Re-Write History to Defend Biden

00:00:00.000 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:00:02.600 Guaranteed human.

00:00:05.280 Welcome.

00:00:05.960 It is Verdict with Senator Ted Cruz, Ben Ferguson with you.

00:00:09.060 And Senator, this is the last podcast we are going to do in 2024.

00:00:14.780 It has been a year that has been filled with insane stories, an unbelievable election.

00:00:20.820 And also today we found out about the passing of a former president of the United States

00:00:25.480 of America, Jimmy Carter.

00:00:26.980 Well, that's right.

00:00:27.920 And so we're going to reflect today on the passing of Jimmy Carter.

00:00:31.000 We're also going to talk about just an extraordinary article in the Washington Post that was an

00:00:36.140 attempt to whitewash all four years of Joe Biden's presidency.

00:00:41.120 It may be the single most dishonest journalistic piece I've seen and also the most screamingly

00:00:46.920 funny pretense at journalism I've seen in years.

00:00:51.720 We're going to talk about that in depth.

00:00:53.220 All that coming up.

00:00:54.260 Yeah, it truly is amazing to see what the media will cover now that there's no consequences

00:01:00.300 to doing the stories on Joe Biden the way they should have long before now.

00:01:05.820 But let's move back to what we mentioned a moment ago, and that is the life and legacy

00:01:10.740 of Jimmy Carter.

00:01:11.700 He was the 39th president of the United States of America.

00:01:15.340 He made it to the incredible age of 100.

00:01:18.660 That is how old he is the day he passed.

00:01:22.560 And I tell you, Jimmy Carter, it's an interesting legacy because he was one of the most unpopular

00:01:29.320 presidents when he left office, and certainly in modern political history.

00:01:33.800 But his legacy that he left behind is actually incredible.

00:01:38.140 It's extraordinary what he did after leaving the White House.

00:01:41.400 Well, James Earl Carter Jr. was born on October 1st, 1924.

00:01:46.740 He was born in Plains, Georgia, and he lived 100 years.

00:01:50.240 He died on December 29th, 2024.

00:01:52.840 He was age 100.

00:01:55.100 He was the oldest former president to have ever lived.

00:01:58.220 No president lived to 100 other than him.

00:02:01.340 And he also has an interesting statistic.

00:02:03.960 He and Rosalind Carter were the president and first lady who were married the longest.

00:02:10.340 They got married in the year 1946, and she died in 2023.

00:02:15.500 She died last year, so they were married 77 years.

00:02:18.580 That's the longest any president and first lady have ever been married.

00:02:21.900 And, you know, I got to say, in talking about Jimmy Carter, there's a lot that I certainly

00:02:29.720 want to honor.

00:02:30.320 I want to honor his military service.

00:02:32.080 He is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy.

00:02:36.540 He was in the Navy.

00:02:37.940 He was active duty from 1946 to 1953.

00:02:41.580 He was in the reserves from 1953 to 1961.

00:02:46.580 He was a submariner.

00:02:48.020 He was one of the very first submariners, and he had honorable service.

00:02:52.200 And then he returned to Georgia and became a peanut farmer, joined the family farm, and

00:02:58.720 ended up going into politics and running for state senate and running for,

00:03:02.080 for governor, and then running a scrappy grassroots campaign and really shocking the world as

00:03:08.840 an unknown southern governor, getting the Democrat nomination for president in 1976, and being

00:03:17.460 elected president.

00:03:18.280 And, you know, I will say, look, it is no secret that I have strong disagreements with Jimmy Carter's policy decisions.

00:03:27.180 And so, and I've detailed those at length before.

00:03:31.200 I'm not going to choose the moment of his passing to go into that.

00:03:35.340 I'm simply going to honor his life.

00:03:36.800 He had honorable service defending our nation.

00:03:40.960 He had honorable service in public office.

00:03:44.800 And, you know, I will say, look, I never met Jimmy Carter.

00:03:47.560 I did not know him personally.

00:03:49.700 But he always struck me as an honest, honorable man.

00:03:55.180 He was very open about his faith.

00:03:58.180 He was a Southern Baptist.

00:03:59.620 He, in 1976, it was a bit of a shocking thing nationally that he described himself as a born-again Christian.

00:04:07.340 And that was a new thing in politics.

00:04:11.880 And he was, he taught Sunday school right up almost to the moment of his death until his health finally prevented him from doing so.

00:04:19.100 You're right that his legacy after the White House was remarkable.

00:04:25.920 And he did a lot of things, I think, most notably with Habitat for Humanity.

00:04:29.800 He put enormous for decades.

00:04:31.860 He was very focused on building homes for those in need.

00:04:35.540 And I will say he also did not, as a former president, he didn't go out and seek the limelight excessively.

00:04:42.520 He wasn't a vocal critic of his successors.

00:04:46.580 And I think all of that is to be commended, even if the policy decisions he made are different than those you and I might have chosen to make.

00:04:59.100 I'll tell you two interesting things.

00:05:02.420 Number one, do you know who else was born on the very same day Jimmy Carter was born on October 1st, 1924?

00:05:11.120 Who?

00:05:11.560 I have no idea.

00:05:13.100 Well, we've talked about this before.

00:05:14.700 I, you know, I give friends grief sometimes.

00:05:16.520 I'm like, don't you bother to listen to the podcast?

00:05:18.420 And I'm going to ask you, Ben, don't you bother to listen to our podcast?

00:05:21.400 We've talked about that.

00:05:25.040 On the very same day.

00:05:26.700 I know when I'm getting set up.

00:05:27.220 And this is the moment.

00:05:28.200 If anyone's listening right now, if you want to know what a setup from Senator Cruz sounds like, I get to experience this more than almost anyone else in the world.

00:05:36.920 This is a setup.

00:05:38.260 And this is how it always plays out.

00:05:40.920 So you've all been warned.

00:05:42.180 This is that moment.

00:05:43.200 If you're at dinner with him, you know it's coming.

00:05:45.460 So go ahead.

00:05:46.060 I cannot wait to hear this answer.

00:05:47.640 So Jimmy Carter was born on the very same day that William Hubbs Rehnquist, the 16th Chief Justice of the United States, was born.

00:05:57.800 And as you know, Chief Justice Rehnquist was my former boss, and I knew him well.

00:06:01.700 And he passed a long time ago.

00:06:03.140 So, I mean, he did not live to 100.

00:06:04.620 And I wrote a couple of different obituaries for Chief Justice Rehnquist when he passed and noted in one of the obituaries that I wrote that he and Jimmy Carter were born on the exact same day.

00:06:18.400 And so that gives a sense of the length of time and service that Jimmy Carter served.

00:06:24.220 But I'll tell you, secondly, so Jimmy Carter, interestingly, is intimately connected to my very first political memory in life.

00:06:34.740 Really?

00:06:36.040 Yeah.

00:06:36.540 How so?

00:06:37.720 So my first political memory in 1976 is my mother voted for Jimmy Carter. 1.00

00:06:45.500 And my mother was a Republican, but she just thought Gerald Ford was an idiot. 0.98

00:06:50.740 She did not like Ford. 1.00

00:06:52.280 She just thought he was not all that bright.

00:06:55.140 And she thought Carter seemed like a very nice man.

00:06:57.520 And so she voted for Carter.

00:06:59.620 And what I remember, so at the time, my dad, who, you know, as you know, was from Cuba, he was a Canadian citizen at the time.

00:07:05.880 They'd moved to Canada and started a business in Canada.

00:07:08.820 And so he was not a U.S. citizen at the time.

00:07:11.160 And I remember my dad and my mom having an argument in the living room because my father was horrified that she had voted for Jimmy Carter.

00:07:20.580 And because she was an American citizen and he was not at the time, he is now, but he wasn't then, he felt like she had the family vote.

00:07:30.340 And so he was really I just remember them fighting back and forth.

00:07:33.080 My mother came to regret that particular vote.

00:07:35.080 But my first awareness that politics existed was was wondering why my father was so upset that that that that my mother had voted for Jimmy Carter.

00:07:45.200 That's really interesting.

00:07:46.640 My first interaction with Jimmy Carter was actually, of all things, you laugh because if you if you've ever met my sister, she's not exactly a most political person.

00:07:56.560 She's an inner city school teacher and she kind of laughs at how different our lives are.

00:08:02.240 But she met a president of the United States of America before I ever did.

00:08:06.240 And it was Jimmy Carter at the Memphis College of Art, where I think one of his his children or grandchildren was at school.

00:08:15.060 He had come down for an event.

00:08:16.680 She happened to be there and got his autograph when she was like, I think, seven or eight years old.

00:08:21.120 And so for.

00:08:21.640 And I assume you think he was a nice man.

00:08:24.260 Oh, said he was so nice.

00:08:25.600 He talked to her for a minute and chatted and they talked about Memphis and asked what she was studying and was she doing art.

00:08:33.420 And so to this day, she's always like, you know, you may have met a lot of political people, but I just want to remind you, I met a president long before you ever did, which is true because I didn't meet a president for another, I don't know, 15 years.

00:08:45.740 Well, and look, that that's consistent with it, with everything I've ever heard.

00:08:49.060 I've never heard of him being unpleasant to anyone.

00:08:52.800 You know, one of the things I saw on Twitter today was videos of him coming on to a commercial flight on Delta and just stopping and shaking hands with everyone in the seats going through, which which seems very consistent with everything about his character that I knew about.

00:09:10.740 You know, Donald Trump sent out a tweet that I thought was was was very well done.

00:09:18.000 Here's what Trump wrote, quote, I just heard of the news about the passing of President Jimmy Carter.

00:09:22.880 Those of us who have been fortunate to have served as president understand that this is a very exclusive club and only we can relate to the enormous responsibility of leading the greatest nation in history.

00:09:34.160 The challenges Jimmy faced as president came at a pivotal time for our country, and he did everything in his power to improve the lives of all Americans.

00:09:43.660 For that, we all owe him a debt of gratitude.

00:09:47.220 Melania and I are thinking warmly of the Carter family and their loved ones during this difficult time.

00:09:51.540 We urge everyone to keep them in their hearts and prayers.

00:09:54.420 And I got to say what I like about that statement in particular is is this the second paragraph, the challenges Jimmy faced as president came at a pivotal time for our country, unquestionably true.

00:10:08.180 And he did everything in his power to improve the lives of all Americans.

00:10:12.540 And I think that's a very nice way to compliment him because I think he did believe he was improving the lives of all Americans.

00:10:19.420 Now, Trump did not say his policy succeeded in that, but but he was earnest in his in his desire and effort.

00:10:27.240 And I thought that was a nice way for for Trump to compliment it.

00:10:30.700 Yeah, it really is.

00:10:31.420 And I will say, as divided as politics has been, it is cool to see a former president put politics aside in many ways later in his career and his legacy and work with building homes and bringing people together in that way.

00:10:46.620 I know several people that had the opportunity to help build a home with him, Habitat for Humanity, many different places around the country.

00:10:53.780 And it really is cool to see that legacy.

00:10:55.860 So our thoughts and our prayers are with the family, obviously, of Jimmy Carter.

00:11:01.240 And any time you have a president of the United States of America pass away, it's always important.

00:11:06.020 I think we just take a moment, pause and say job well done.

00:11:09.680 I mean, to live 100 years is incredible to be a president of the United States of America, the 39th president, incredible.

00:11:16.520 And to do what he did after he left the White House, really remaking, I think, how people would remember him because they don't really remember the political stuff in the 70s and what brought us Ronald Reagan.

00:11:27.620 They remember, I think, that he built a lot of houses.

00:11:30.320 To be clear, Skippy, you weren't alive then.

00:11:32.120 So you definitely don't remember it.

00:11:34.360 81.

00:11:35.000 I'm an 81.

00:11:35.580 But my oh my, did I hear the stories.

00:11:37.820 I heard the stories.

00:11:39.080 All right, let's get into this.

00:11:41.580 Well, the Reagan revolution doesn't doesn't make sense without the Carter predicate.

00:11:46.080 But but that's that's another story for another day.

00:11:48.780 So let's move to the Washington Post.

00:11:51.800 And I'm going to do something unusual on this podcast.

00:11:53.900 So I read this article and my head exploded and I texted you and said, this is the most absurd, self-satirizing article I've ever seen.

00:12:06.080 So I just want to go through it literally line by line.

00:12:08.600 This is a major story in The Washington Post banner headline on on drudge.

00:12:15.200 And and it is entitled.

00:12:16.500 We're just going to go through sentence by sentence.

00:12:18.700 It's entitled How Biden Leads Joe Biden's Lonely Battle to Sell His Vision of American Democracy.

00:12:25.600 In his presidency's final chapter, Biden has mused about whether he should have handled some decisions differently.

00:12:32.160 And the guy who wrote this is a guy named Tyler Pager.

00:12:35.600 We're going to come back to him later.

00:12:37.400 So let's start.

00:12:39.140 Earlier this year, Representative James E.

00:12:41.060 Clyburn met President Joe Biden at the White House to deliver a stern message.

00:12:45.060 Biden had to find a way to revitalize his flagging campaign.

00:12:48.920 Clyburn, who had been pivotal to Biden's 2020 victory, also made a confession about his own longstanding belief that substance is more important than style and politics.

00:12:57.080 Quote, I've come to the conclusion in recent days that I'm wrong about that.

00:13:00.940 The South Carolina Democrat 84 remembers telling Biden the new environment that we currently live in.

00:13:06.860 Style seems to carry the day more than substance.

00:13:10.120 Your style, he told the president, does not lend itself well to the environment we're currently in.

00:13:15.380 Clyburn's conclusion, which was shared by anxious Democrats in the months before the president ended his re-election bid, undermined Biden's theory of presidential leadership.

00:13:25.880 After Donald Trump's assent, Biden believed that he just needed to show Americans that traditional democracy still worked.

00:13:34.680 By listening to experts, working with Republicans, passing popular policies, and voters would rally around him.

00:13:42.400 All right, let's stop there.

00:13:43.180 Okay, so, so far, every word of this article, if this was written by the Biden press office, it would not be any different.

00:13:52.320 And this entire article is hagiography.

00:13:55.020 This entire article is not journalism.

00:13:57.560 It is not only trying to praise breathlessly, as we're going to go through, Joe Biden and cast him as a mighty titan.

00:14:07.180 But it is profoundly dishonest.

00:14:09.980 So, it starts with the frame that Biden's great success is on substance, not style.

00:14:16.280 And the obvious implication, of which we're going to get more, is that all Trump has is style.

00:14:20.840 There's no substance.

00:14:21.700 That's the obvious implication.

00:14:23.300 Let's take this last sentence.

00:14:25.460 After Donald Trump's assent, Biden believed he just needed to show Americans that traditional democracy still worked.

00:14:32.420 We're going to get more into democracy in a second.

00:14:35.020 By listening to experts, working with Republicans, and passing popular policies.

00:14:40.820 All right.

00:14:41.860 What experts did he listen to?

00:14:43.180 He did not work with Republicans. 0.99

00:14:44.580 Every damn thing he passed, he rammed through on a vicious party line vote. 0.99

00:14:49.200 He used budget reconciliation over and over again with no Republicans and passing popular policies. 0.99

00:14:55.120 Nobody helped Donald Trump get elected more than Joseph Robinette Biden Jr.

00:15:01.140 Because his policies were so incredibly unpopular.

00:15:04.720 All right.

00:15:05.300 Let's keep going.

00:15:07.340 Back to the article.

00:15:08.600 Quote, he succeeded in phase one of his plan.

00:15:12.180 Did he now?

00:15:12.640 Enacting legislation, much of it bipartisan, to reshape the nation's infrastructure, revive the semiconductor industry, and fight climate change.

00:15:22.720 Let's be clear.

00:15:23.420 The climate change, the Inflation Reduction Act, was a straight party line vote, rammed through on reconciliation.

00:15:29.120 But phase two never happened.

00:15:31.540 The truth of Biden's presidency is that he has failed in what, by his own count, his most important mission.

00:15:39.720 Making Trump's presidency seem like an aberration. 0.92

00:15:43.600 Quote, he governed through traditional processes and institutions, said Julian E. Zelizer, a moron presidential historian at Princeton University. 0.98

00:15:52.700 It doesn't say moron, but you're going to see that everything this guy says, and I know he's sadly a professor at my alma mater. 1.00

00:15:59.180 He's a complete moron. 1.00

00:16:00.240 Let's start with the traditional processes and institutions. 1.00

00:16:05.220 There's nothing traditional about weaponizing the federal government to go after your opponents.

00:16:10.600 There's nothing traditional about prosecuting and indicting the former president over and over and over again.

00:16:16.400 There's nothing traditional in using the institutions about opening the border and having an invasion of our country.

00:16:24.400 But here, the good Princeton professor, quote, it didn't change the picture where he started.

00:16:29.940 This anger in the electorate towards the institution, this support for a pretty radical conservative vision that Trump embodied.

00:16:37.920 It didn't do anything to end the very intense polarization that exists in this country.

00:16:43.640 Now, the idea that Trump is a radical conservative is a bizarre idea.

00:16:48.720 Trump ran on securing the border, bringing down inflation, standing with our friends and defeating our enemies.

00:16:53.920 That is very hard to characterize as a, quote, radical conservative vision.

00:16:59.220 But, hey, the Princeton professor says it, and the Washington Post breathlessly reports it.

00:17:05.440 We're going to go on, but give me your thoughts so far, and then we'll go back to the article.

00:17:09.620 I'm not surprised that this is how they want to just rewrite history, part of this, and just be so delusional.

00:17:17.180 I am a little bit.

00:17:18.420 It gets worse.

00:17:20.380 I'm a little bit shocked, though.

00:17:22.740 If they, like, you know how you're supposed to, like, proofread before you print?

00:17:27.480 If you're reading what you just wrote that you just read, I would think there would be a moment where you might be like,

00:17:34.500 yeah, I don't know if this needs to see the light of day.

00:17:36.660 Yeah, here it is.

00:17:37.720 They put it out there.

00:17:39.480 All right, let's keep going, because it gets much, much worse.

00:17:42.820 Previous articles in this series examined the pillars.

00:17:45.900 Oh, they're so strong, the pillars.

00:17:48.120 The pillars of Biden's leadership, how he absorbs information, how he makes decisions, how he communicates with Americans.

00:17:55.720 They showed that Biden, even at the peak of his glorious, magnificent power, doesn't say glorious, magnificent, but it's just implied,

00:18:02.720 struggled mightily to communicate his decisions and vision.

00:18:06.000 This article, based on interviews with more than two dozen people close to Biden,

00:18:10.120 reveals the ways in which his theory of how to succeed in an era of American politics dominated by Trump

00:18:15.560 fell apart in the final phase of his presidency and how he's been publicly and privately rethinking

00:18:21.420 whether he should have handled some decisions differently.

00:18:24.600 Even some of his closest advisors, without faulting Biden,

00:18:28.060 conceded recently that his style of governing did not always mesh with today's politics.

00:18:33.560 Quote,

00:18:33.880 The president has been operating on a time horizon measured in decades,

00:18:39.580 while the political cycle is measured in four years.

00:18:43.920 Jake Sullivan, Biden's national security advisor, said,

00:18:47.400 with his lips planted firmly on Biden's rear end.

00:18:50.760 That last piece was my comment.

00:18:53.100 Like, I want you to go back and listen to that sentence again.

00:18:55.760 The president has been operating on a time horizon measured in decades,

00:19:01.860 while the political cycle is measured in four years.

00:19:06.200 Now, look, kudos to the Biden White House for just having the chutzpah to say,

00:19:12.700 oh, Biden's presidency would be hysteric.

00:19:15.620 And, you know, you really have to measure decades.

00:19:17.240 12 million people invading this country. 0.94

00:19:19.260 Four years is too short to measure it.

00:19:21.060 We're going to screw up this country for decades.

00:19:23.400 You know, undermining our allies, causing two wars,

00:19:28.640 a war in Ukraine and a war in Gaza.

00:19:30.660 Like, you're right.

00:19:31.600 The harm from Biden will last decades.

00:19:36.400 But that's their entire spin.

00:19:38.480 Well, yes, everything Biden did was profoundly unpopular

00:19:42.560 because all of his policies failed.

00:19:44.440 But he's really playing the long game. 1.00

00:19:48.400 You foolish people don't understand. 1.00

00:19:50.520 And this this this misery is good for you. 1.00

00:19:54.280 All right.

00:19:54.480 Let's let's keep going.

00:19:55.840 Sullivan added that Biden's accomplishments by their nature

00:19:59.780 will take a long time to bear fruit.

00:20:03.180 Quote, how to govern at this moment to set the U.S. up for long term success

00:20:07.720 has one answer and how to deal with midterm and presidential elections

00:20:11.380 in the very short term might have a different answer.

00:20:13.720 He said the president went with doing things that really put America in a strong position.

00:20:20.900 Ben, what the hell have they done to put America in a strong position in every part of the world?

00:20:27.740 America is weaker today than when Joe Biden entered the White House.

00:20:31.340 Like this is absurd.

00:20:33.960 And I got to say the absurd thing. 0.71

00:20:36.540 We're going to go back to this in a minute is the Washington Post just publishes this drivel like it's news.

00:20:43.820 There's not a moment of reflection.

00:20:46.980 There's not a moment of facts.

00:20:50.580 There's not a moment of reality.

00:20:52.700 And it's I mean, how do you react to that?

00:20:58.680 Oh, he's playing the long game.

00:21:03.100 Yeah, I think there's two things here.

00:21:05.660 One, there's a part of me that's like, I can't believe it.

00:21:09.040 And then there's another part of me.

00:21:10.100 It's like, good, because if you don't learn from your losses,

00:21:13.680 then you're going to repeat the same mistakes that you just made.

00:21:17.540 And I think the Democratic Party learned nothing from November,

00:21:20.540 nothing from losing the popular vote,

00:21:22.920 nothing from the resurrection of Donald Trump from from 2000 to 2024,

00:21:27.640 nothing from weaponizing the government,

00:21:30.320 nothing from overspending and no accountability.

00:21:32.820 And honestly, nothing.

00:21:33.760 They've learned nothing from having a president that clearly was incapacitated.

00:21:37.400 So part of me is like, good.

00:21:39.140 Keep writing these types of articles because it's going to help conservatives

00:21:43.240 like you and I be able to be way more successful

00:21:46.740 and getting this country back on track.

00:21:48.980 Well, Ben, the Post just reported that he absorbed information like,

00:21:54.060 you know, some some sort of Nobel, you know, scientist like like just.

00:21:58.760 All right, let's let's go back.

00:22:00.760 As his presidency and his 50 year political career wind down far faster than he wanted,

00:22:06.720 Biden is taken to acknowledging some strategic mistakes, both big and small.

00:22:10.620 Many of those missteps resulted from his determination to restore the age old rules

00:22:14.980 of the American presidency after Trump's term,

00:22:18.640 a determination that many of his supporters in retrospect consider a politically fatal error.

00:22:24.840 All right.

00:22:25.200 So what are the age old rules of the American presidency that he returned to?

00:22:29.480 Earlier this month in a speech on his economic legacy, 0.96

00:22:33.700 Biden admitted he was stupid for not putting his own name on the pandemic relief checks 0.97

00:22:38.260 his administration sent out in 2021. 0.99

00:22:40.080 Yeah, that really was the problem.

00:22:42.620 He just didn't sign the checks.

00:22:44.420 Clearly, Kamala would have won if Biden had just signed those checks. 0.91

00:22:48.000 That that that was the pivotal issue. 0.99

00:22:50.540 Damn it. 0.99

00:22:51.500 I didn't see Joe Biden's name on those checks. 1.00

00:22:53.640 So forget it.

00:22:55.280 But hey, Trump, by contrast, made a point of signing his own relief checks in 2020.

00:22:59.560 And Biden suggested that Trump got more credit for the economic recovery because of it.

00:23:04.160 Balderdash.

00:23:04.600 Biden acknowledged that he had, quote, screwed up.

00:23:08.400 It is June 27th debate against Trump.

00:23:10.480 You think as he struggled to put together sentences and defend his policies as his rivals 1.00

00:23:15.560 held forth with a series of falsehoods, evil liar who I hate named Donald Trump. 1.00

00:23:20.980 That is not there. 1.00

00:23:22.460 It's just implied and called him a criminal.

00:23:24.740 He does not regret participating in the debate.

00:23:27.020 Just his performance that night.

00:23:28.960 Now, at this point, there's a breakout quote.

00:23:32.840 And you know what the breakout quote is?

00:23:35.060 It's Jake Sullivan saying the president is operating on a time horizon measured in decades,

00:23:39.140 while the political cycle is measured in four years.

00:23:41.540 So if you missed the central political spin from the White House, then, well, that's your problem.

00:23:47.980 Let's let's keep going.

00:23:49.780 He is also amused on changes in the media, arguing that he did not get enough credit for

00:23:54.400 his accomplishments, especially on the economy.

00:23:56.660 But in citing examples like Richard M.

00:23:58.760 Nixon's 1960 debate against John F.

00:24:00.760 Kennedy, Biden has suggested that, like Nixon, he has struggled to adjust.

00:24:04.600 We pick what news we want to hear.

00:24:08.040 It's a totally different deal, Biden said in a podcast interview this month.

00:24:11.460 We've got to figure out how we deal with this significant technological change.

00:24:15.500 If Nixon was more accustomed to television, he wouldn't have perspired so much.

00:24:19.320 And he would be president when he beat Kennedy.

00:24:21.820 I know that sounds silly, but think of the changes taking place.

00:24:24.880 Where do you go?

00:24:25.540 What is true?

00:24:26.160 We have no evidence anymore.

00:24:27.280 I'm not sure how that gets resolved.

00:24:29.240 The president and his aides have acknowledged that they struggled to communicate.

00:24:33.360 See, that's the whole problem.

00:24:34.580 The record was phenomenal.

00:24:35.740 They just failed to communicate it.

00:24:37.740 Struggled to communicate about the administration's efforts to lift the country out of the pandemic.

00:24:43.020 Frustrated that even as the United States fared better than other countries, Americans did 0.62

00:24:47.440 not feel the impact psychologically. 1.00

00:24:49.480 You idiots, you're doing great. 1.00

00:24:50.880 Why are you so dumb that you don't realize it? 1.00

00:24:54.300 And now here's, all right. 1.00

00:24:56.280 Now remember, so, so far there's two main themes that the Post has laid out.

00:25:01.400 Number one, genius Biden is playing for the history books for the decades rather than the

00:25:06.940 short-term political cycles.

00:25:08.640 So don't blame him for the disasters of his policies.

00:25:12.420 But number two, that he wanted to restore the norms of the presidency and the norms of democracy.

00:25:18.360 So this next paragraph is going to blow your mind.

00:25:24.300 In private, Biden has also said he should have picked someone other than Merrick Garland as

00:25:30.840 attorney general.

00:25:32.640 Well, no kidding.

00:25:33.660 He was the most partisan and political attorney general in history and a disgrace to the

00:25:37.020 Department of Justice.

00:25:38.040 But no, no, no, no, no, no.

00:25:39.460 That's not Biden's complaint.

00:25:41.860 Biden, quote, complaining about the Justice Department's slowness under

00:25:48.200 Garland in prosecuting Trump and its aggressiveness in prosecuting Biden's son, Hunter, according

00:25:56.300 to people familiar with his comments.

00:25:57.960 So understand this great titan restoring the norms of the White House.

00:26:04.360 His DOJ is the first Department of Justice to indict and prosecute a former president and

00:26:10.460 a leading candidate for president who later got elected president in the history of our

00:26:14.940 country.

00:26:15.180 It's never been done.

00:26:16.460 Under Biden, they did it twice.

00:26:18.480 They absolutely weaponized the DOJ to go after his opponents over and over and over

00:26:23.780 again.

00:26:24.060 They weaponized the FBI. 0.99

00:26:25.460 And his complaint is, damn it, they didn't do enough. 0.98

00:26:28.520 They should have been more vigorous. 0.98

00:26:29.960 They should have indicted him more.

00:26:31.440 They should have indicted him faster.

00:26:33.240 We should have.

00:26:34.120 We should have attacked him from day one.

00:26:36.440 And by the way, everything I'm saying, there's not a word of that in this article, that they

00:26:43.560 don't acknowledge no other DOJ has indicted a president.

00:26:47.820 They just report like a blinking, doe-eyed four-year-old.

00:26:54.580 Well, his complaint was Biden didn't move fast enough.

00:26:57.660 And the other thing, he was too aggressive in prosecuting Biden's son.

00:27:02.380 Now, mind you, the Biden DOJ went to a court and tried to enter a sweetheart deal that Biden

00:27:09.640 got a slap on the wrist and no jail time.

00:27:11.980 And it was so egregious that the judge threw it out only after public scrutiny, including

00:27:17.420 this podcast, which shined a great deal of light on it.

00:27:20.620 But he still says that's too much to hold Hunter accountable.

00:27:24.260 And by the way, the DOJ also bent over backwards to protect Joe Biden.

00:27:31.480 That paragraph may be the most astonishing paragraph of this entire article.

00:27:37.280 Canadian women are looking for more. 1.00

00:27:39.440 More out of themselves, their businesses, their elected leaders, and the world around them.

00:27:43.620 And that's why we're thrilled to introduce the Honest Talk podcast.

00:27:47.280 I'm Jennifer Stewart.

00:27:48.280 And I'm Catherine Clark.

00:27:49.520 And in this podcast, we interview Canada's most inspiring women, entrepreneurs, artists,

00:27:54.880 athletes, politicians, and newsmakers, all at different stages of their journey.

00:27:59.280 So if you're looking to connect, then we hope you'll join us.

00:28:02.520 Listen to the Honest Talk podcast on iHeartRadio or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

00:28:08.340 You look at this article, and I think there's three different points that I want to dive into

00:28:13.620 with you.

00:28:14.080 One, what was the real purpose of writing it?

00:28:18.040 I mean, I get the whole rewriting of history, but it's so extreme that I don't even think

00:28:24.380 many on the left could take this seriously, or am I wrong?

00:28:27.020 So let's start with that.

00:28:29.240 Well, I think they have the audacity to believe that they can, that they are, that the newspaper,

00:28:37.480 the Washington Post, is the first draft of history.

00:28:40.700 And as I said, this is not journalism.

00:28:44.320 This is hagiography.

00:28:46.400 The article continues.

00:28:47.700 We've only done about the first third of it.

00:28:49.320 I'm not going to continue reading the rest of it.

00:28:51.600 It goes on to say how Biden modeled himself after FDR.

00:28:55.360 And I am just going to skip to the end, because the end is every bit as absurd as the earlier

00:29:00.840 parts we read.

00:29:01.920 So here's the end of the article.

00:29:04.060 To show that he respects the peaceful transfer of power, Biden is welcoming Trump, who openly

00:29:11.140 challenged that transition.

00:29:13.700 Biden has repeatedly directed his aides to do all they can to help Trump assume the presidency

00:29:19.020 after years of calling Trump unfit for high office.

00:29:23.340 Now, mind you, every day in the White House, Biden is doing everything he can to frustrate

00:29:29.620 Trump coming in.

00:29:30.420 So what is he doing?

00:29:31.840 Number one, he pardoned Hunter Biden, which we predicted on this podcast, because he does

00:29:36.260 not want any accountability for the rampant lawlessness of his son and the corruption of

00:29:41.780 selling access to himself, Joe Biden.

00:29:44.440 Number two, he pardoned every single federal death row inmate, except for the three most

00:29:52.980 notorious.

00:29:53.720 So of the 40, he pardoned 37 of them.

00:29:55.800 Again, we predicted that.

00:29:57.520 It was absolutely brazen.

00:29:59.840 Why?

00:30:00.200 Because he knew Trump was going to actually carry out the law.

00:30:02.960 And so he's trying to frustrate that.

00:30:04.260 Number three, he's selling off the border wall for $5 a parcel because he doesn't want Trump

00:30:10.580 to build the wall.

00:30:11.340 Number four, he's granting, considering granting wholesale pardons.

00:30:16.640 He is actively trying to do, by the way, number five, Trump has said he wants federal workers

00:30:21.320 to go back to work.

00:30:22.780 So Biden is signing contracts, collective bargaining contracts to make sure that federal workers

00:30:29.020 can stay home because he wants to tie up the next administration on litigation.

00:30:33.500 So, but here, here's what the Post said.

00:30:36.300 Biden has repeatedly directed his aides to do all they can to help Trump assume the presidency. 1.00

00:30:43.560 Like what utter and complete garbage. 0.99

00:30:45.920 And let me, let me say something. 0.99

00:30:47.000 Jeff Bezos owns the Washington Post. 1.00

00:30:49.700 Jeff Bezos should be ashamed of this garbage. 0.99

00:30:53.100 If Jeff Bezos cared at all about the integrity of the Washington Post, this guy, Tyler Pager, 0.99

00:31:00.680 and I have no idea who this numbskull is, he should be fired. 0.98

00:31:04.220 He is not a journalist. 0.99

00:31:05.220 Anyone who writes this garbage that contains no facts, it contains no, no counterbalancing, 0.99

00:31:13.680 countervailing side. 0.99

00:31:14.720 It is simply, if Madison Avenue were hired to come in and let's rewrite the Biden presidency

00:31:23.640 to be exactly what we wanted it. 0.98

00:31:25.840 They couldn't write it more ridiculous than this. 0.96

00:31:28.480 And by the way, the editor who signed off on this should be fired as well. 0.94

00:31:32.700 This is, you want to know why nobody trusts the media? 0.92

00:31:36.060 It's because they publish garbage like this without even a tiny nod to facts or the simple reality 0.91

00:31:49.580 that we just saw a overwhelming election where Trump won the popular vote of the seven battleground states. 0.99

00:31:57.040 He won all seven.

00:31:58.640 Like someone at the Post should say, gosh, maybe these incredibly popular policies that were so good for America,

00:32:06.940 maybe people really didn't like it.

00:32:09.640 Maybe waging a war on oil and gas and driving up energy prices was a really bad idea and hurt a lot of Americans.

00:32:16.240 Maybe undermining our allies, maybe giving Vladimir Putin a gift of waiving sanctions on Nord Stream 2

00:32:24.560 and causing the biggest war in Europe since World War II, maybe that wasn't a great idea.

00:32:28.000 Maybe sending $100 billion to Iran who sends it to Hamas and Hezbollah, 0.95

00:32:32.780 who uses it to fund a war on Israel, the worst war in the Middle East in 50 years,

00:32:36.680 maybe that wasn't a good idea.

00:32:38.420 Maybe turning a blind eye and refusing to prosecute anti-Semitic terrorists all across,

00:32:43.700 or they're protesters, terrorists is too strong, but anti-Semitic protesters who threaten violence,

00:32:48.900 maybe that is a profoundly bad idea.

00:32:51.440 Maybe watching the integrity, half of America believes the FBI and the Department of Justice

00:32:57.880 are completely unprincipled because, well, they've been completely unprincipled.

00:33:03.300 None of that.

00:33:05.200 There isn't even the tiniest acknowledgement of facts.

00:33:10.360 This is the Washington Post behaving in a way that I think everyone connected with this article

00:33:16.620 ought to be thoroughly, thoroughly embarrassed.

00:33:19.700 When your principal points are, we're aiming for 50 years, not four,

00:33:25.360 so as bad as our policies are in 50 years, we'll claim they were great.

00:33:30.940 And Merrick Garland's problem was he wasn't political enough,

00:33:35.260 and he should have indicted Trump even more,

00:33:37.640 and he should have covered up Biden's wrongdoings even more, 0.99

00:33:42.300 and you don't acknowledge any, like, this is a load of crap? 0.98

00:33:47.300 That ain't journalism. 0.96

00:33:50.600 Final question on this, because there's two articles now in about an eight-day span.

00:33:57.300 One of them was an article that was written a couple days ago encouraging Congress to stop Donald Trump,

00:34:03.720 and we mentioned on this show, from becoming president.

00:34:08.260 And then now you have this one.

00:34:10.540 Is there a chance that the media has just gotten so radical and is so far gone now

00:34:17.640 that they're actually just going to lose their influence over the American people

00:34:21.740 because this is no longer even looking like journalism,

00:34:25.680 and this is just two examples of just how insanely biased they are?

00:34:30.580 Is that the blessing in disguise here?

00:34:32.620 Yeah, I think there's no doubt that the reputation of journalism has gone down incredibly.

00:34:38.780 You know, you see these corporate journalists screaming about, you know,

00:34:43.940 the American people are not journalists now.

00:34:46.340 The fact Twitter, or X, has completely transformed it,

00:34:49.760 where when they lie, the facts come out immediately, 0.97

00:34:52.720 and it drives these liars crazy. 0.78

00:34:56.900 Look, we've talked before about how Trump broke the media. 0.94

00:34:59.960 This is an incredible example.

00:35:03.820 And by the way, look, today, in most corporate media outlets,

00:35:09.340 there's going to be some hagiography of Jimmy Carter.

00:35:12.700 You know what?

00:35:13.660 I'm okay with that.

00:35:15.240 He lived till 100.

00:35:16.380 It's the time of his passing.

00:35:18.200 I think you can be respectful to people when they pass.

00:35:21.760 Now, mind you, the media never is to Republicans, but set that aside.

00:35:24.800 Um, it's one thing to do it when someone passes away.

00:35:31.860 It's another thing to do it when you're just ignoring reality that the American people

00:35:40.480 rejected the obvious and incredible failures of the Biden policies.

00:35:45.840 And it's not even that they don't include it.

00:35:48.880 Much of what they say in the article is exactly the opposite of reality.

00:35:53.940 So when you hold Joe Biden up as a paragon of returning to norms,

00:35:59.280 look, look, on our open borders,

00:36:02.260 no president in the history of this nation,

00:36:06.160 none, has had a lawless policy of simply defying federal immigration law

00:36:11.840 and releasing the people they apprehend.

00:36:14.900 That was a massive issue in this election.

00:36:17.940 They don't acknowledge it at all.

00:36:19.480 Instead, they say he's a champion for democracy.

00:36:22.360 This is at the same time.

00:36:23.840 They're arguing to hell with democracy, block Trump from becoming president.

00:36:29.020 They went to court repeatedly.

00:36:30.360 They tried to throw him in jail.

00:36:32.460 They, you know, we saw multiple Democrat officials across the country try to throw Trump off the ballot.

00:36:38.880 Thankfully, the Supreme Court unanimously reversed that because, you know, 0.99

00:36:42.500 nothing says defending democracy like trying to stop damn pesky voters voting for your opponent. 0.98

00:36:47.840 Yeah, it really, you're right. 0.99

00:36:49.740 It's incredible.

00:36:50.820 And I do think, Trump, as you said, breaking the media is going to have an incredible impact on future elections,

00:36:58.520 not having to basically go up against a machine that has been as effective as the media has been.

00:37:04.560 They have been basically being able to give billions of dollars in in-kind donations to Democratic candidates,

00:37:08.860 and they seem to be losing that influence.

00:37:10.960 Let's hope it keeps going that way.

00:37:12.380 Don't forget, we do this show Monday, Wednesday, and Fridays.

00:37:15.260 Hit that subscribe or auto-download button, and make sure you write us a five-star review, if you would,

00:37:21.240 wherever you listen to this podcast.

00:37:22.880 On those in-between days, grab my podcast, the Ben Ferguson Podcast.

00:37:26.200 I'll keep you updated on the latest breaking news as well.

00:37:30.020 And the Senate and I will see you in 2025.

00:37:34.180 Be safe out there on New Year's Eve, and we'll see you then.

00:37:36.420 This is an iHeart Podcast.

00:37:39.920 Guaranteed Human.

Verdict with Ted Cruz - December 30, 2024

Reflecting on Jimmy Carter's Passing, plus Washington Post Absurdly Tries to Re-Write History to Defend Biden

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