Western Standard - The Trump Nightmare： What's Next for the Democrats？

00:00:00.000 Good evening, Western Standard viewers. I am Nigel Hannaford. We all remember where we were

00:00:24.320 on what we were doing when we heard that Donald Trump had been shot. Luckily, he survived,

00:00:31.040 but many questions remain.

00:00:33.280 He was doing his job. I wouldn't even be doing this at some beautiful place.

00:00:38.480 Look, they're all pointed. Yeah, someone's on top of the roof. Look, here he is right there.

00:00:47.440 Right there. See him? He's laying down. See him? Yeah, he's laying down.

00:00:54.320 Are you fighting like hell to get a senator? What's happening?

00:00:57.760 And to make sure we take back the white man, because if we do, we're going to make America

00:01:02.080 better than ever before. We're going to make it. Yeah, look, there he is.

00:01:05.200 And it's not easy, because we have millions and millions of people in our country that shouldn't

00:01:10.240 be here. Dangerous people, criminals. We have criminals. He's on the roof. We have people

00:01:18.320 that should not be here. Right here, right on the roof.

00:01:20.560 It's much tougher than it is. It happened to be. He went right on the roof like that.

00:01:26.160 Probably 20 million people. And you know, that's a little bit older than Chuck.

00:01:31.440 That's not much a couple of months old, and if you've got one of the decisions, you can say

00:01:35.840 that you won't have to happen.

00:01:36.560 We've got breaking news. We've got breaking news. We've got breaking news coming in.

00:02:04.480 Shots fired. Seems to be shots fired. It's a truck rally.

00:02:15.920 Shots are still continuing to be fired.

00:02:19.200 He's giving a thumbs up, everybody. He's giving a thumbs up.

00:02:22.960 Speaking of breaking news.

00:02:40.560 Breaking news right now. This is Vanessa Broussard.

00:02:43.360 According to you live from Butler, Pennsylvania, we hear shots fired at the rally not 10 to 15 minutes

00:02:49.840 after President Trump arrived. He hit the ground. Unheard of yet if he has been hit by gunfire.

00:02:58.160 With me tonight is Western Standard publisher Derek Fildebrandt.

00:03:03.440 Derek, where were you when you heard the news?

00:03:06.240 I was sitting on my back porch, uh, sipping cheap tequila. But, uh, yeah, I, I, and I got the Western Standard

00:03:13.920 newsflash actually come across, uh, my phone. So I knew someone was at least working on the weekend.

00:03:18.400 Yeah, some, some of us were actually three of us and four of us were. So anyway, great. Look, Derek, uh, you've just

00:03:25.840 written a column and you have titled it dark questions arising. I think there are a tremendous number of questions,

00:03:33.760 actually, that, that come out of this, this incident. Take, for example,

00:03:41.920 is this failed assassination attempt a guarantee of success in November? Like if I were in the

00:03:48.480 Democratic Party trying to figure out how we play this one, I think I would just go home. Uh, not only

00:03:55.280 we'd love to think this is a lone wolf, but did somebody leave the door open for this kid?

00:03:59.920 Uh, that leads us into the whole matter of what happened that day and how could a security breach

00:04:07.920 of this magnitude take place when you have some of the world's most professional protection people

00:04:15.280 in the business surrounding the president? You say what? So I, I guess on the grand,

00:04:22.240 on a thousand foot level, was this just a lone wolf? Um, was this a epic and monumental, uh, breakdown and

00:04:34.400 basic secret service protocols? Um, was, you know, was it, uh, to put on the tinfoil hat, was this a plan, uh, involving the secret service?

00:04:47.200 Or, uh, uh, maybe in between those two, uh, those two theories?

00:04:52.720 Was this allowed to happen? Did he act on his own more or less? But the secret service

00:04:59.280 just kind of turned a blind eye for a bit. And that's what I get into in the column is, is, is going

00:05:04.720 through the evidence that we've got, you know, I, I've tried, uh, from the biggest, the minute we started the, the

00:05:11.280 Western standard, I had a general policy. If I don't want to talk about Trump, I don't want to talk about

00:05:15.440 American politics. Let Americans, we can, Canadians can read that stuff there. Uh, ever since the US

00:05:21.200 presidential debate, I've been kind of glued to this though. And I, and I've broken all my rules.

00:05:24.880 I'm, I'm now, I'm now neck deep in the muck of this stuff. Um, but you know, I'm, I'm pretty resisted

00:05:32.160 to conspiracy theories. I, I, it, it's water off my back, but very quickly we started getting a lot of

00:05:40.000 real serious evidence coming out of this. I mean, you've got roughly 20,000 people at this rally,

00:05:46.080 every single one of them as an amateur video recorder in their pocket. So there's never been

00:05:52.320 an assassination attempt or a successful or not like this. There's so much around and, uh, you know, and

00:05:59.680 maybe we want to kind of go through some of the major pieces of evidence that we have before us.

00:06:03.760 Well, I think we do. I will say that right at the start that I come at this in a slightly different

00:06:08.560 way than you do, because generally speaking, I take the view that just because it's a theory,

00:06:13.280 it doesn't mean there isn't a conspiracy. Uh, just about everything that happens starts with a couple

00:06:18.160 of people getting together and say, you know, we ought to do something. And then here you are,

00:06:21.760 you have a conspiracy. But in this particular case, I am persuaded personally, on the basis of what we

00:06:28.880 know now, as opposed to what we may find out in a couple of weeks, that this is just one error on

00:06:35.680 top of another error on top of another error until you get some something where tragedy was very

00:06:43.520 narrowly averted and good luck kicked in. But you are making the argument, I think, that there are some

00:06:50.640 serious questions to be asked. So let's, let's start looking at them. First of all, the perimeter.

00:06:56.640 Who secures a perimeter? So from, from what I understand, and I admit, I'm somewhat of a

00:07:03.520 call a prison study on the secret service. First, was this a hard shot? No. So for those who don't

00:07:11.040 know guns, what was this like? So the sniper crooks was on a roof, a perfect sniper nest. He can get in the

00:07:22.000 prone position. So, you know, anyone who's ever made a long distance shot. Most hunters aren't able

00:07:28.160 to get in the prone position, lay down flat. That is the best way to fire a rifle at any kind of distance.

00:07:35.120 Most assassins don't have the ability to do that, because they're, they're operating in a more,

00:07:41.600 they're not on a nice, relatively flat rooftop. This guy had a nice flat rooftop. And he is only 120 to 150

00:07:48.720 meters away. Now, I've dropped white tails at twice that distance while they're running.

00:07:56.560 Now, I admit, I'm, the last time I made that shot, I was pretty proud of it. That's a difficult shot.

00:08:01.920 But you know what? I wasn't, I wasn't in training for a presidential assassination. I was just looking

00:08:06.800 for dinner. And Trump was a stationary target. And he's a bigger guy. He should be. The guy was not

00:08:14.800 far. This was a easy shot. Now, that is to me, the, the best evidence out of the bit of evidence

00:08:22.240 that we have right now, that this guy was not necessarily put up to the task by someone high

00:08:27.840 up the food chain. Are we watching the X-Files right now? So you know, the smoking man or something.

00:08:32.320 The best evidence that he's not put up to this is that he's such a terrible shot.

00:08:38.160 On the other side, though, hunters will know the phenomenon of buck fever. When you,

00:08:43.440 especially the first time you get, you know, a big target in your crosshairs, your hands get shaky,

00:08:50.480 your steady is more on aim, adrenaline is pumping through you. And I would imagine if that applies

00:08:55.520 to a buck, it sure as hell applies to a former president and the leading candidate for president of

00:09:01.040 the United States. So it's possible Crooks wasn't the utterly terrible shot that we're all kind of

00:09:07.440 chuckling at him for being. It's possible he was a reasonable shot, but the adrenaline overcame him.

00:09:12.400 But this was not a difficult shot to make. And what about his decision to go for the head rather

00:09:16.960 than the chest? I mean, obviously, a head shot will do it if you make it. But the better shot is normally 0.98

00:09:23.760 the heart. It's a much bigger target. You know, with the head, it might hit the skull in a way that

00:09:32.160 actually kind of, you know, might not go through, might kind of deflect. But if you go for the heart,

00:09:37.280 even if you miss the heart, you've got two lungs to hit. It's, you know, I'm not a forensic expert.

00:09:43.360 I'm not a, I'm not American sniper. But I've shot enough whitetails to know where where you shoot at

00:09:49.040 and know enough that, you know, the head is not generally the best place to aim. You want to aim

00:09:54.000 for the upper cavity right at the heart. But this was the perfect sniper nest where a guy could lay

00:10:00.640 prone to get the perfect shot. He could sit, he was able to place his rifle on the top, on the

00:10:08.080 pinnacle of the roof. So you now have a natural resting spot for the rifle. You're in a comfortable

00:10:12.720 prone position where you're not breathing heavy. And it's only 120 to 150 meters away.

00:10:19.360 How it would not occur to them to secure that rooftop

00:10:26.880 defies all logic. I mean, I am obviously not qualified to lead, you know, a presidential

00:10:34.960 candidate secret service team. But I feel like I would have known that if they're like, Derek,

00:10:39.360 you're you're headed to secret service for the day. I'd be like, well, obviously,

00:10:42.880 we're getting these rooftops and easy shooting distance of the candidate. So one of the

00:10:48.240 one of the allegations that is doing the rounds on the television shows is that the secret service

00:10:55.040 does not actually have the legion of people that we assume that it does. And that because of that,

00:11:01.360 they rely heavily upon local police forces when they travel. Now, I can't believe that even local

00:11:11.200 police forces wouldn't have thought of that, wouldn't have said, well, we need to secure the AGR building.

00:11:17.760 So that does open up the possibility that they forgot for good reason.

00:11:25.280 I don't think so. I've been reading the same stuff on you. I mean, all of a sudden, the whole world,

00:11:32.560 we're all prison studies on secret service protocols. But, you know, the actual secret

00:11:37.600 service agents are mostly in extremely close proximity to the president or the presidential

00:11:42.720 candidate. Those are the guys you see, you know, jump on and do the human shield.

00:11:46.320 Um, but the whole, the whole operation is still organized and overseen by the secret service,

00:11:53.280 and they'll utilize state and local, uh, uh, police officials. And it would be the secret

00:12:00.320 service's job in advance of the event to go around and say, okay, these are the clear spots we need to

00:12:05.920 identify. Here's our perimeter. Uh, I saw a map of the perimeter, and it's a nice,

00:12:11.840 clean circle. And it's got a little Pac-Man mouth. And that Pac-Man mouth is the rooftop that

00:12:20.960 someone made a clear decision not to secure. So the local police, they would be in charge of

00:12:27.280 actually securing the outer perimeter that, you know, that's the secret service. We use the local

00:12:30.640 police for the outer perimeter. But, uh, it's the secret service's job to determine what is the outer

00:12:36.240 perimeter and what are the hotspots that they need to secure. And any bonehead would be a 0.96

00:12:41.760 look at that and say, obviously that 120, 150 meters from the podium where Trump stands with 0.98

00:12:48.240 a clear line of sight needs to be secured. It, there's just no way. Anybody who is wanting to

00:12:53.920 build a conspiracy is going to look at that Pac-Man mouth and ask the question that you're drawing

00:12:58.560 attention to. Why? Um, certainly in, um, in Canadian politics, these kinds of events are scoped out,

00:13:06.880 uh, weeks in advance by the advanced team. I can't believe that that wouldn't be the same

00:13:12.720 in the, in the United States, especially with, uh, when we're dealing with the secret service.

00:13:17.680 So that's, that's, that's a question that, um, smarter people than us are going to have to resolve.

00:13:23.200 But the other one that, uh, everybody is pointing at is people on the ground saw the man on the roof

00:13:31.920 with a gun. We played that tape here in the office this morning and timed it. There was two minutes

00:13:41.360 from when people first started, when they started recording, they must have seen it even before they

00:13:46.080 start recording, but when they started recording, there's a man on the roof. Yeah. Two minutes later,

00:13:51.280 shots ring out. In that time, we understand that the man was approached by a local police officer.

00:13:58.160 This man is getting, this, this police officer is getting a lot of criticism for backing away when

00:14:03.760 the rifle was turned in his direction, but I'm holding judgment on that until we know what the

00:14:10.000 standard operating procedures are. He may have been following the protocol that had been established

00:14:15.760 by his own police force, because I'm sure he didn't just back away and, and say nothing. So

00:14:21.440 can you imagine why it took 120 seconds from the first time somebody said there's a man on the roof

00:14:31.680 with a gun to when the event happened? Because as soon as the shots rang out, that's when the counter

00:14:40.480 snipers nailed this, this sniper. Well, not quite. He managed to get at least five shots off, maybe more.

00:14:47.200 Um, but yeah, like, so two minutes from the time, at least someone starts recording. So obviously

00:14:52.000 someone saw it, looks at it and goes, oh my God. And then they start recording. So two minutes from

00:14:58.000 the time they hit the record button from what we've seen, and we've seen quite a few of them,

00:15:01.760 and you can hear them yelling at police officers, yelling, uh, one guy says he was waving at the

00:15:07.120 secret service. And he's, at least he says that they could see him and they looked over and they saw

00:15:13.280 the assassin on the roof with a rifle. Uh, some people saw just the man on the roof. Some people's

00:15:17.760 videos showed him up there with a rifle crawling up the roof to, uh, to the spot where he could take

00:15:23.520 a spot for the pinnacle of the roof. Um, I, I can only imagine, but there was also, uh, the overwatch

00:15:32.320 anti-sniper unit. Uh, now that's unclear if that guy was secret service or, or, uh, local, uh, local kind of

00:15:39.280 SWAT, but, um, the overwatch would normally be secret service, I would imagine. These are top-end

00:15:44.640 snipers. And you can see him in the video, uh, quite a few videos of the overwatch sniper, uh,

00:15:52.560 tracking something. Now we can't say for certain he was tracking the sniper, but you can see that

00:15:58.400 he's tracking some, something, and then you hear shots fire, and then he fires. But quite a few

00:16:05.200 shots managed to get out before he dropped them. And I don't know what the, uh, field manual for the

00:16:11.200 secret service says, but I imagine when you've got a highly, highly controversial candidate on stage,

00:16:18.800 and you know people want to kill him, and you see a man on a roof 120 to 150 meters away from him,

00:16:25.360 with a rifle, you drop him. Now I guess the question would be, did he radio in for permission?

00:16:32.000 But if so, what was the answer? Uh, did someone withhold, uh, permission to open fire with the

00:16:38.400 rules of engagement? Uh, but it's, it's another one of those things, is that incompetence or being

00:16:44.800 allowed to happen? I, we're gonna, we're working towards that. I don't know, but there's just so many

00:16:52.400 monumental failures here, that it's difficult for me to believe this is all incompetency,

00:16:58.720 because the secret service has a reputation for several things, and incompetency is not one.

00:17:05.040 Well, you know, I, I, I am going to stay with the incompetency argument, and one of the reasons is that

00:17:12.080 when you get to do something like this too many times, you don't actually become

00:17:16.960 better at it, you become sloppier. And what this looks like to me is people who were so accustomed to,

00:17:28.160 you know, the, the advance was done, they, the, uh, the perimeter was drawn, for a reason that may

00:17:35.360 turn out to be, uh, the end of somebody's career, the decision was made not to include that building,

00:17:41.600 but at the time it seemed like a good idea, it'll be fine, we've got it covered from over here, you

00:17:49.280 know? You might, you might well be right. You know? I hope so. That's, that's, that's the best case

00:17:52.880 scenario, is that someone was grossly incompetent. And then you, then you add in the fact that the

00:17:57.920 secret service is understaffed, apparently. We, we obviously don't know that, but this is the reporting

00:18:04.480 that's going out. And, uh, to me, the clincher is that this young man clearly was no Lee Harvey

00:18:11.120 Oswald. And, uh, if you had been party to something like this, and I'm not suggesting that

00:18:18.640 this goes back to the White House or even into a senior, uh, uh, uh, functionary within the

00:18:25.040 Democratic Party. I think it's highly unlikely. Yes, highly unlikely. But if there was a plot,

00:18:30.640 that's not that 20 year old guy, borrowing his father's gun is not the guy that you're going to

00:18:38.160 pick. No, not if you actually mean this to work. Now the other, the other theory, I don't subscribe

00:18:45.120 to this for one minute. I'm going to bet that you don't either, but oh yes, well, it was all set up

00:18:49.840 to make Trump look good. Just wing him. I don't think so. No, I mean like the, first of all, you'd

00:18:56.320 then have to have one of the greatest snipers in the world, uh, to graze a guy, I mean grazing 0.98

00:19:03.680 to intentionally graze someone, bloody them, but not kill them on their head. 0.97

00:19:07.840 That would be an incredibly difficult shot. That would be a much more difficult shot than actually 0.99

00:19:13.200 shooting him in the head or shooting him in the chest cavity. Uh, that one, I mean, we're 0.99

00:19:18.800 going to get to the politics in a bit. I'm sure. Uh, obvious it's, it's, this is a political,

00:19:24.480 uh, triumph for Trump, the way, the way he handled himself and everything coming through. He's

00:19:30.560 obviously gaining politically from this, but, uh, yeah, no, I, I don't see any way, uh,

00:19:39.360 the chances, you know, off another inch, Trump would be dead. The only reason I bring it up there

00:19:44.000 is that people are seriously saying that. And I, I, I find that people on both sides are always

00:19:49.840 going to immediately start to draw conspiracy theories out of this. I'm, I am. It's crazy

00:19:56.400 talk. I don't put my tinfoil hat on often. I've just seen, I've seen enough evidence that shows in

00:20:00.640 the best case scenario, best, best case scenario, most charitable I can be is as gross incompetence.

00:20:07.600 But I, I don't think it's outside the serious realm of possibility that at least some elements of

00:20:13.840 the secret service, we're just, um, taking a coffee break off the game. Yeah. Yep. No,

00:20:22.320 something, something, obviously the fact that it happens means that something went wrong.

00:20:27.040 As I say, my case is that it's, uh, it's, uh, escalating incompetence at several levels, but

00:20:31.920 also remember there hasn't been a shot fired successfully or not at a U S president or major,

00:20:38.320 uh, party candidate in the United States since 1981, uh, against Ronald Reagan, uh,

00:20:44.880 well, skillies, well, sorry, against the U S president or presidential candidate from a major

00:20:50.160 party. Uh, there, there's been other assassinations, but, uh, you know, other, you know, congressional

00:20:55.440 leaders aren't afforded the same level of hyper security as presidents and presidential candidates.

00:21:00.400 Probably shouldn't really joke about this, but when president Biden says there has no place in

00:21:04.400 American politics for this kind of thing, he forgets Abraham Lincoln, William McKinley,

00:21:10.240 assassinating presidents is an unfortunately very American, uh, uh, very American tradition. Uh,

00:21:15.760 unfortunately, and they always assassinate the wrong ones. Now then, uh, the, um, let's talk about that.

00:21:22.640 Can Trump possibly lose in November? Yes. How? Someone could succeed in assassinating him. All right.

00:21:29.520 That's not losing in November. That's just losing period. Well, it means he doesn't win in November.

00:21:33.680 This is a huge, let's be honest. This is a huge political victory for him to have survived an

00:21:39.680 assassination attempt day before, two days before the big Republican national convention where he

00:21:46.560 rolls out his vice president candidate. Public sympathy is with him. Whatever you think of the

00:21:55.200 man, he performed heroically in the moment. He did not cower. He did not let them bundle him up.

00:22:03.920 He's supposed to let them do that. There is a protocol and that was another breakdown of

00:22:09.360 protocol just for a little side, but he, he wanted to stop to raise his fist and say fight, fight, fight

00:22:15.360 and good for him. But the secret service, they don't, once shots are fired, they're not taking orders from

00:22:21.120 the candidate. They get him out. Like they, they shield them and then they get them out. They're not

00:22:26.400 supposed to stop for that. I think that's a tribute to the force of personality that's at work here,

00:22:30.480 which of course, uh, was very evident is not president. But it put him at even greater danger.

00:22:37.200 Uh, the secret service allowed. Look, if there was one sniper, there could be two,

00:22:40.480 there could be four. So that's why they do it that way. But he somehow overpowered them and got the

00:22:45.600 fist up there. Yeah. Produced the iconic image that you speak of in your article. And, uh, now he goes into

00:22:52.240 the, uh, into the, uh, into the, into the convention. And this is a man who has been subjected to the

00:23:00.320 grossest calumnies in terms of the Russian hoax, the, the, the stripper things, the, the, the, the,

00:23:08.800 the, the lawfare that has been exercised and invented, an invented charge, which nobody could really

00:23:16.880 defy him. But he said, if he sounds guilty, then find him guilty. All of this stuff has happened to

00:23:22.640 him and he has not quit. He is not, he has not backed down. Then he gets attacked and survives.

00:23:31.840 I say that this man has got the white house in his pocket for a second time.

00:23:36.000 I mean, if you're asking me to put my money down, I'm putting it hard on red right now.

00:23:41.360 Uh, I mean, he could go wrong. He was already headed there. Um, he, he was doing well before

00:23:47.840 the presidential debate, first presidential debate. Uh, and then I'll, you know, we remember

00:23:52.160 Biden coming out with his pants around his ankles, practically, uh, just the greatest meltdown

00:23:57.920 we've ever seen in a debate in any country. Uh, so I think he was already a pretty good bet to get

00:24:03.760 there. Uh, he's got to be damn near unstoppable now, but I mean, the Democrats could still change

00:24:11.440 their candidate and maybe that candidate gets a great honeymoon period and catches fire. Uh, 0.56

00:24:17.680 you know, there's a lot of Americans who probably feel about Trump the way I do, which is,

00:24:23.680 I like the way he owns the libs. I like the way he, you know, takes on the establishment,

00:24:30.080 but you know, he seems overly narcissistic. He, uh, doesn't seem very presidential,

00:24:37.200 seems often petty, don't just have problems with his personality. Um, and they would vote for a

00:24:44.000 moderate Democrat, um, who would just kind of steer the ship for four years. Don't do anything crazy.

00:24:51.760 I think there's a lot of Americans who, who, who feel that way. I've not been as a biggest fan ever

00:24:56.720 since he said John McCain was, you know, coward for getting shot down. I had a hard time forgiving

00:25:00.880 him for that. But after this, the way he comported himself there, it's hard not to be romantic about

00:25:08.800 it. Uh, I mean, this stuff was straight out of Hollywood. I mean, if this was in an actual movie,

00:25:14.320 you'd say it was cheesy. It was over the top. It's unbelievable. It was unbelievable. You'd say

00:25:18.960 the secret service wouldn't allow him to do that. But, uh, he, I cannot imagine him losing now, but

00:25:26.080 of course, anything, it's still a long way to election day. That's November. We're talking

00:25:30.080 like we're four months out. The Democrats could conceivably pick a candidate.

00:25:34.880 That was going to be my last question to you is if you were asked to advise the Democratic Party,

00:25:41.520 what else have they got other than that Donald Trump is unsuitable for office?

00:25:47.040 Well, they can't really say that anymore. And they can't say that anymore. So what have they got?

00:25:51.360 Not much. Uh, they, they won't go after them on policies because policy wise is more aligned with

00:25:56.080 the American mainstream. Most Americans don't believe they should just be opening the border,

00:25:59.760 letting 10 million illegals pour over, then, uh, eventually start voting, uh, drawing on the welfare

00:26:05.760 and healthcare systems. Uh, I mean, they've got some policy advantages, but if they make this

00:26:12.240 into a policy fight, uh, they're gonna, they're gonna lose. The one thing they had was that Donald

00:26:17.120 Trump, you know, after January six stuff, he's a threat to the constitutional order. He's a threat

00:26:21.520 to democracy. The problem is that rhetoric, even if true, it, uh, especially if it was true would

00:26:29.600 legitimate someone taking violent action to save the Republic, to save the constitution, to save democracy.

00:26:34.560 But that's obviously hyperheated rhetoric. And the Democrats can't really say that anymore without

00:26:41.600 being accused of continuing to heat things up and fuel another assassination attempt. So they,

00:26:46.560 no pun intended, but they just lost their Trump card that I don't think they have anything to play.

00:26:51.200 Have you been saving that all this time? I've been saving it for years, Nigel.

00:26:56.000 They've lost their Trump card. How true. Look, the, uh, the Democrats are in huge trouble. There's no

00:27:02.240 question about that, but they deserve to be. And to the point about, uh, you know, President Biden

00:27:07.600 comes out and says all the right things about turning down the rhetoric and so on. And Trump has had

00:27:15.200 some better speeches aimed at the Democrats, but they have used some language, which in the hands of

00:27:22.160 a 20 year old misguided youth living in a rural backwater in Pennsylvania could well turn his head

00:27:29.200 and probably similar to youths elsewhere, but you know, you don't talk about putting a bullseye on

00:27:33.840 somebody. Well, I don't know. The Republicans need to be careful with, with that. Um, how far, I mean,

00:27:39.920 to an extent they can say the Democrats have used overheated language that is,

00:27:44.320 you know, gonna radicalize some people. They can say that to an extent, but I don't think at this

00:27:49.520 point in the absence of any evidence that they can, uh, place responsibility for the assassination

00:27:55.520 on the Democrats, the person who's responsible is the person who pulled the trigger. Possibly, you know,

00:28:01.360 as we were saying, uh, some people in the secret service and the intelligence apparatus, possibly,

00:28:08.720 we don't know, but possibly, but I mean, it could just as easily happen the other way.

00:28:14.800 You know, Republicans use strong language against the Democrats and, uh, you know,

00:28:19.360 a crazed Republican somewhere picks up a gun and shoots a Democrat. That also does not make the

00:28:24.000 Republicans responsible for it. It does mean though, that both sides need to be at least aware of how

00:28:30.480 far they're pushing their rhetoric, but a lot of Democrats genuinely believe Trump. They're not

00:28:36.320 just, you know, politicians say a lot of things for votes and to take down their opponents. Uh,

00:28:42.240 uh, but a lot of Democrats legitimately think Trump is, you know, the next Hitler and has to be stopped.

00:28:47.440 And if, and if you genuinely believe someone's the next Hitler, you got to call it out. And if someone

00:28:51.680 gets crazy and picks up a gun over it, it's LV. Hmm, gotta be careful. You're right in the

00:28:59.040 Western standard. Look, on the subject of, uh, Donald Trump, we're almost out of time, but I just want to

00:29:04.960 make this, uh, observation and get your comment on it. You've had experience with hospitals recently.

00:29:14.640 When you, if you were going in for a serious medical procedure where your life was actually

00:29:21.120 in the balance and dependent entirely upon the accuracy with which the surgeon's knife was deployed,

00:29:28.160 I would not myself care much about the personality, if at all, of the surgeon. He could be a beast of a

00:29:38.720 man or woman, but as long as he is known for complete professionalism and accuracy and has a high

00:29:47.360 survival rate, he's the guy I want. And it's the same with, with aviation. Every, every time we fly,

00:29:55.440 we assume that the pilot is going to get us where we're going to go. And he can be a jerk, 1.00

00:30:01.280 but if he is a safe pilot, that's the pilot you want to fly with rather than the, you know, 1.00

00:30:07.840 somebody who might be awfully good on the mic. So I see Trump and, and I, and I see leaders generally

00:30:16.000 as needing to be very, very good. And if they have personality characteristics that don't really bear on

00:30:24.000 the job that we don't like, well, let's look past that. Is he going to deliver the goods for the

00:30:30.000 people? How say you?

00:30:31.280 I'm not sure it's equivalent if we're talking a doctor, a firefighter,

00:30:37.040 things like that, because the personality bears relatively little weight in the job. Leadership,

00:30:43.360 personality, there's a lot. Everyone's had a bad boss. Most people have had a good boss

00:30:49.760 and everyone's had somewhere in between and personality is, is a big part of that. You know,

00:30:55.760 there's been days where I come in with a bad attitude. I storm through here and I'm grumbling

00:31:00.240 around. I'm just, and I'm in a bad mood and well, that rubs off on the team. So no, I actually,

00:31:05.200 it doesn't me ignore you. If I'm in a bad mood, I normally just do lock myself up in the office. But,

00:31:10.720 but even that is a, it reflects on leadership. No, I think personality character traits. I think these

00:31:18.000 things do matter in leadership, but you know, um, Donald Rensfeld, uh, said, uh, you know,

00:31:25.120 I think it was 2003. We're going to Iraq. You don't go to army with the army. You don't go to

00:31:30.160 war with the army. You want, you go to warm or with the army you have. And the same thing is with

00:31:34.320 elections. You don't, uh, once the primaries are over, you don't get to pick the candidates

00:31:40.320 anymore. You get to pick out of the men. You don't get to decide what's on the menu. You get to pick

00:31:45.280 what's on the menu, uh, once it's selected. So, you know, based on what's there,

00:31:50.320 uh, you know, it's going to be value propositions. I think more than anything,

00:31:54.560 people in America vote tribally increasingly in Canada and across the world, we're voting tribally.

00:31:59.760 Uh, you know, we're not voting, uh, based on religion and ethnicity anymore. We're voting on

00:32:04.320 political tribes. And Donald Trump is a very effective leader of, of, of his tribe.

00:32:09.920 And after the attempt on his life this weekend, I think there's a lot of people on the fence who,

00:32:17.200 who saw the way he dealt with it. It was, it's not just a sympathy that someone tried to kill him.

00:32:22.640 And, you know, maybe could say all those crazy Democrats. It's not just that it's the way he 0.98

00:32:27.680 comported himself, uh, little grace under fire. And, and that can't be faked because there's a lot

00:32:33.840 about Donald Trump. You can say, well, is this an act? Is this fake? Is this just because you know,

00:32:37.680 he's a, he's a showman. Showmanship is a big part of him. You can't fake that. That was genuine and,

00:32:43.600 and the whole world saw it. And some people who particularly needed to see it are our enemies.

00:32:51.600 That is, uh, perhaps all the, all the recommendation we need, but it's not our vote.

00:32:56.400 Derek, it's been great to have you on the show. My pleasure. And, uh, we'll do it again another day.

00:33:01.520 For the Western Standard, I'm Nigel Hanford.

00:33:15.440 my first member member for the debates was shown.

00:33:18.300 How dare you turn to know?

00:33:19.360 .

00:33:21.360 .

00:33:21.720 After I stopped working on their conversation, I said something good.

00:33:26.480 .

00:33:27.600 .

00:33:29.440 What about them?

00:33:29.760 .

00:33:32.420 .

00:33:33.440 You

00:33:35.440 .

00:33:38.320 .

00:33:38.520 Like chat.

00:33:40.520 .

00:33:41.520 .

00:33:42.520 .

00:33:42.600 .

00:33:43.520 .

00:33:43.560 .

00:33:44.140 .

00:33:44.520 Oh,

Western Standard - July 16, 2024

The Trump Nightmare： What's Next for the Democrats？

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