Latest / The Hugh Hewitt Show: Highly Concentrated / The Filibuster, Trump's Trip to China, and The Rise of Antisemitism

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The Filibuster, Trump's Trip to China, and The Rise of Antisemitism · The Hugh Hewitt Show: Highly Concentrated

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to today's podcast sponsored by Hillsdale College, All Things
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Hillsdale at Hillsdale dot ed or. I encourage you to
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: take advantage of the many free online courses there, and
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: of course I'll listen to the Hillsdale dialogues, all of
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: them at Hugh for Hillsdale dot com or just Google,
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Apple iTunes and Hillsdale Reading in Grace America. I'm Hugh Hewittt.
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  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Wednesday editions that you do at show.
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  Speaker 1: There's a lot to cover today, but I'm very, very
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  Speaker 1: grateful that a majority leader of the United States Senate
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  Speaker 1: John Thune has joined me this morning. Senator, welcome back.
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  Speaker 1: Good to have you. I believe it is the case
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  Speaker 1: that when you sign up to be majority leader, there's
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  Speaker 1: a clause in your contract that says you're obliged to
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  Speaker 1: defend the filibuster even when people who want you to
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  Speaker 1: defend the filibuster deny so on camera. Isn't that not
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  Speaker 1: in the small print?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: I think you are correct there, Hugh. This is a
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  Speaker 3: This is a conversation, as you.
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  Speaker 2: Know, has gone on for many years, many decades, and
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  Speaker 2: through multiple administrations and congresses, and it's just a me again.
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  Speaker 2: The founders when they designed the country, one of the
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  Speaker 2: ways they divided power was they took the Article one
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  Speaker 2: branch to the government and made it a bi cameral
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  Speaker 2: process in which one of the institutions, the United States Senate,
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  Speaker 2: was non majoritarian. They wanted a counter majoritarian institution. The
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  Speaker 2: Senate represents that.
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  Speaker 3: It's hard sometimes.
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  Speaker 2: I know people, it's hard to explain and not something
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  Speaker 2: that we all learn in physics growing up. But there's
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  Speaker 2: a reason why the Senate is the way that it is.
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  Speaker 2: It's designed to slow things down and make it more
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  Speaker 2: deliberative and to give the minority in the country of
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  Speaker 2: waste in our government.
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  Speaker 1: Now later soon last week ten days you have President
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  Speaker 1: Trump was my guest, and normally I just asked the
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  Speaker 1: President questions and he's the best interview in America. No
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  Speaker 1: offense leader, but yeah, he just is. But in the
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  Speaker 1: middle of that, he turned around and said, well, you
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  Speaker 1: don't support the filibuster, do you? Yeah, yes, I do.
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  Speaker 1: I much President. He did not ask me to explain
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  Speaker 1: that I think it's the first line of defense to
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  Speaker 1: the Supreme Court being attacked and that it's therefore important
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  Speaker 1: to keep it where it is. How do you defend.
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  Speaker 1: And by the way, my listeners hate the filibuster and
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  Speaker 1: they get on me whenever I defend. How do you
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  Speaker 1: tell people, how do you explain it to them?
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  Speaker 2: Well, I mean, I think historically, and you know this
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  Speaker 2: better than anybody that you know, if you look at
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  Speaker 2: if you're a conservative and you want to protect a
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  Speaker 2: conservative policies, priorities, principles, you know, the Democrats have been
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  Speaker 2: the majority in the Senate more years than not, and
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  Speaker 2: their agenda is a aggressive, expansive agenda because they're all
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  Speaker 2: about growing government, and Conservatives through the years have been
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  Speaker 2: able to use the filibuster to protect against a lot
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  Speaker 2: of crazy ideas that Democrats have, like expanding the Supreme
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  Speaker 2: Court and you know, adding DC and in Puerto Rico
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  Speaker 2: with states, and federalizing our elections, and abortion on demand,
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  Speaker 2: and you know, redistribution of wealth in the kind of
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  Speaker 2: I mean, there's a whole bunch of just you know,
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  Speaker 2: sort of crazy left ideas is that they would they
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  Speaker 2: would turn to were it not for the fact that
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  Speaker 2: Republicans were able to because of the legislative filibuster, prevent
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  Speaker 2: that from happening. So it's something that's protected conservatives a
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  Speaker 2: lot more than it has liberals, that's for sure.
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  Speaker 1: And it protects the Court, and I think it's probably
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  Speaker 1: unconstitutional to expand the court anyway. But for another day,
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  Speaker 1: I want to move on to the second argument that
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  Speaker 1: the President makes often, though he didn't make it to me,
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  Speaker 1: the Senate isn't getting enough done. In fact, you cleared
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  Speaker 1: the nominations backlog, did you not?
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, we did.
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  Speaker 2: In fact, we're way ahead of where we were where
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  Speaker 2: he was in his first term because of the changes
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  Speaker 2: we made. And that's an executive calendar issue and again
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  Speaker 2: something that not constitutionally the Senate is responsible for, and
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  Speaker 2: another reason why you want to have a majority of
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  Speaker 2: the Senate, especially in Trump's the last two years of
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  Speaker 2: his term, because we still are going to have judges
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  Speaker 2: coming through, We're still going to have executive branch nominees
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  Speaker 2: coming through, and the Senate is the place where those
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  Speaker 2: get confirmed. And so it's going to be really key
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  Speaker 2: and critical that we that we keep the majority. And
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  Speaker 2: I think that you know, you talk about issues like
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  Speaker 2: the court.
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  Speaker 3: You or gun rights or any of those things.
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  Speaker 2: Historically you know somebody has suggested and the President does too.
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  Speaker 2: He probably did to you when you talk to him about, well,
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  Speaker 2: the Dems are.
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  Speaker 3: Going to do it anyway.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, And the truth of the matter is it's hypothetical,
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  Speaker 2: and maybe they do, maybe they don't. But if somebody
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  Speaker 2: has once described that the Dems at some point may
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  Speaker 2: try and steal the car, but we're not going to
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  Speaker 2: hand them the keys and all that stuff I mentioned
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  Speaker 2: that they would do if filibuster was gone, or things
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  Speaker 2: that we would then own, and and I just I
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  Speaker 2: don't think that's where Republicans this country want to end up,
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  Speaker 2: or want us to end up. But it's very hard
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  Speaker 2: to explain that to your point to an audience that
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  Speaker 2: really doesn't care about that. They just want to get
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  Speaker 2: results and they want to get him pasted.
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  Speaker 1: Well, that leads me to my next question. I get
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  Speaker 1: that argument that hadn't done anything. The Working Family's Tax
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  Speaker 1: Cut continues to roll out and its benefits, especially saying
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  Speaker 1: in the area of school choice. I mean, school choice
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  Speaker 1: is revolution. I believe Senat A. Cruz put that into
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  Speaker 1: the one big beautiful bill aka the Working Family Tax Cut.
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  Speaker 1: But do you think the country is quite aware yet
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  Speaker 1: how big a bite of legislation that was.
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  Speaker 2: It's the most consequential thing I've done in my time
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  Speaker 2: in public life, and if I don't do anything else,
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  Speaker 2: we got the first entitlement reform we've gotten in my
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  Speaker 2: in my entire time in office. The Medicaid getting rid
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  Speaker 2: of the waste, fraud, abuse and the Medicaid program SNAP
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  Speaker 2: program were historic in terms of their accomplishments. But to Europe,
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  Speaker 2: to the broader point, yeah, I included one hundred pieces
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  Speaker 2: of legislation school choice, you know, ban on federal funding
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  Speaker 2: for plant parenthood, which will expire. That was a one
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  Speaker 2: year deal. That's all we could get past. The parliamentarian
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  Speaker 2: newborn accounts for kids, childcare tax credit, something the Democrats
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  Speaker 2: talk about but have never done anything about. And this president,
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  Speaker 2: President Trump, working as a Republican Congress, achieved that.
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  Speaker 3: So and you know, there was so many things in there.
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  Speaker 3: It's it's hard. And I think that's one of the.
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  Speaker 2: Reasons the challenges we've had, you is it. You know,
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  Speaker 2: getting out there, it becomes there are so many things
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  Speaker 2: you can shoot at. And I think, you know, as
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  Speaker 2: we talk about this out on the campaign trail, we've
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  Speaker 2: got a home in on the things that are impacting
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  Speaker 2: people's daily lives and remind them about some of the
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  Speaker 2: things that we've accomplished.
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  Speaker 1: Well, one of the things that is underway now is
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  Speaker 1: another reconciliation process, and I hope that there is defense
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  Speaker 1: mending in there, but at least there's got to be
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  Speaker 1: a Department of Homeland Security and where does that stand
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  Speaker 1: right now?
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  Speaker 3: Later to well right now?
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  Speaker 2: Of course, the reconciliation two point zer one is the
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  Speaker 2: first one we did last year, which did literally a
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  Speaker 2: decade of legislating in one bill.
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  Speaker 3: Now we're going to have to fund is you know.
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  Speaker 2: The DHS, both ICE and CBP through a reconciliation bill.
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  Speaker 2: But there is a talk now because we have a
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  Speaker 2: third bullet available to us, a third legislative vehicle of
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  Speaker 2: what a reconciliation three.
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  Speaker 3: Point zero might look like. And you know, the.
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  Speaker 2: House is going through that process. We are too having
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  Speaker 2: conversations about timing and what it might include, etc. But
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  Speaker 2: we are looking for good ideas, ways to eliminate waste,
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  Speaker 2: fraud and abuse, and government reform entitlement programs, make them
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  Speaker 2: run more efficiently, and obviously look for tax policies that
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  Speaker 2: will allow the American people to keep more money in
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  Speaker 2: their pocket and quit sending so much to Washington.
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  Speaker 3: The one thing.
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  Speaker 2: That's clear you all the time I've been here, and
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  Speaker 2: that is that when Democrats are in power, they grow
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  Speaker 2: government and it's very.
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  Speaker 3: Very hard to unwind that.
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  Speaker 2: But even when they had unified control of the government
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  Speaker 2: during the Biden administration, they did two big reconciliation bills
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  Speaker 2: which dramatically expanded the size of government, spent four trillion
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  Speaker 2: dollars and it wasn't paid for, and created all kinds
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  Speaker 2: of crazy policies and green new deal policies that we're
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  Speaker 2: now paying a price for.
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  Speaker 3: And trying to go back and unwind.
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  Speaker 2: And that's why it's really important that we keep majorities
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  Speaker 2: here in the Congress. Right now, with a Republican president,
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  Speaker 2: it's a historic time. So if there's another reconciliation bill
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  Speaker 2: that we think works and that we can get through
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  Speaker 2: both the House and Senate where the margins are very narrow,
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  Speaker 2: well you know, we'll take a hard.
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  Speaker 1: Look at it. Can we hone in from em and
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  Speaker 1: on Chairwoman Collins, Senator Collins from Maine. I spent a
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  Speaker 1: lot of time in Maine. She's belived she's like Saint
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  Speaker 1: Susan up there. She is Chair of Appropriations, and she's
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  Speaker 1: a little bit skeptical of the train and a half
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  Speaker 1: dollars defense budget, and I'll find a chance to talk
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  Speaker 1: to her about it. But what are what do you
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  Speaker 1: understand her concerns to be about that?
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  Speaker 2: I think part of it is and I've sat down
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  Speaker 2: with her infectious yesterday to talk about appropriations. And obviously
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  Speaker 2: what has traditionally happened to you around here is that
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  Speaker 2: every dollar you increase you get in defense budget. Democrat's
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  Speaker 2: demanded an increase in non defense spending, so they get,
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  Speaker 2: you know, more of their social spending in exchange for
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  Speaker 2: our national skurity spending. And so she's trying to figure
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  Speaker 2: out how what's the you know, the number we can
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  Speaker 2: achieve do the most we can. She's a big defense hawk,
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  Speaker 2: as our most senate Republicans, and particularly now when we
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  Speaker 2: live in in a very dangerous world and a very
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  Speaker 2: you know, I would say, challenging threat environment. We need
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  Speaker 2: to make sure that we're paying attention to national security.
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  Speaker 3: We've always sat in this office.
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  Speaker 2: If you don't get national security right, the rest is conversation.
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  Speaker 2: You've got to be able to defend the country, and
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  Speaker 2: right now that needs to be priority number one. So
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  Speaker 2: she's working through how can she optimize what we can
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  Speaker 2: do on defense to take care of the country's national
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  Speaker 2: security needs and still fund the other agencies of government,
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  Speaker 2: but not in a way that you know explodes costs.
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  Speaker 2: And I think that's the challenge, is the appropriate the
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  Speaker 2: chairman of the Corporations Committee, you face.
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  Speaker 3: Here in the Senate.
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  Speaker 2: You've got Democrats who have very different priorities than the
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  Speaker 2: Republicans do, and you have to figure out how to
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  Speaker 2: strike that balance.
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  Speaker 1: We got forty five seconds center. I think Center call
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  Speaker 1: hold on to a sat against Graham Plattner because he's
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  Speaker 1: a nut. But what about the rest of them? Map,
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  Speaker 1: how do you feel about that? They'll still spend one
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  Speaker 1: hundred million dollars against her? Are we going to get
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  Speaker 1: out spent? Are we going to hold on to the Senate?
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  Speaker 2: Well, we're doing really well on the Senate leadership funding,
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  Speaker 2: funds fundraising, NRC is doing really well. RNC is doing well.
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  Speaker 2: The Democrat candidates because of ac Blue, raise a lot
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  Speaker 2: of money. But Maine is a good case in point
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  Speaker 2: Susan Collins will have what she needs and she's running
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  Speaker 2: against a flat out crazy guy who Democrats never would have.
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  Speaker 3: Used to wanted to defend. But this year, for some
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  Speaker 3: reason he's.
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  Speaker 2: Become their darling. So I think we're going to be fine,
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  Speaker 2: but we've got our work cut out for us.
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  Speaker 1: Senator then always got to talk to you, Leader, keep
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  Speaker 1: turning back. I appreciate the time. Majority Leader, John Soon,
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  Speaker 1: I'll be right back in America, stays Welcome back in America.
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  Speaker 1: I'm here here. I joined now by Noah Rothman. Noe
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  Speaker 1: is the senior political writer at Nashville Vie, a regular
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: guest on the program Noah. Our friend Matt Continetti was
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: on yesterday after the Nick Christoff column, the Despicable column
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  Speaker 1: came out, and I asked him if we aren't living
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: in an age not so different from the Dreyfus affair
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: in France in the late eighteen nineties and early nineteen hundreds,
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: where all of France became infected with anti semitism overnight.
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  Speaker 1: And Matt pointed out that actually was a preview of
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  Speaker 1: coming attractions in Europe, and I suggested anti intellectualism. He
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  Speaker 1: has other ideas. What is going on?
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  Speaker 4: It's profoundly dispiriting and really troubling. And I share Matt's
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  Speaker 4: assessment on your show that a lot of these accusations
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  Speaker 4: are actually confessions on the part of those who issue them,
• 11:50
  Speaker 4: especially in light of the report conducted by an independent
• 11:54
  Speaker 4: Israeli women's rights and goo which outlined in graphic and
• 11:58
  Speaker 4: gratuitous detail the degree of sexual depravity and inhumane violations
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  Speaker 4: that were committed on the course over the course of
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  Speaker 4: October seventh. And since that atrocity, we have seen a
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  Speaker 4: mania erupt across the Western world. My colleague, former colleague,
• 12:14
  Speaker 4: Abe Greenwald attributes anti Semitism to a sense of helplessness,
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  Speaker 4: which also manifests in hostility to the outward world. It's
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  Speaker 4: an ideology for losers, and it explains their loserdom in
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  Speaker 4: a way that absolves them of responsibility for or any
• 12:32
  Speaker 4: agency over their lives.
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  Speaker 5: And you can see the attractiveness to it.
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  Speaker 4: But I also I delve into a lot of this
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  Speaker 4: in my book, my forthcoming book, Blood and Progress, a
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  Speaker 4: Century of left Wing Violence in America. And it's hard
• 12:45
  Speaker 4: to promote a book that you're actually kind of disappointed
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  Speaker 4: with because I'm very disappointed with the subject matter.
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  Speaker 5: It's really dispiriting.
• 12:52
  Speaker 4: And one of the things that I go through in
• 12:53
  Speaker 4: that book is the degree to which anti Semitism, anti
• 12:56
  Speaker 4: Zionism is a Soviet project, and a lot of thoseatives
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  Speaker 4: are still with us. Drawing on the scholarship of Isabella Tabarovsky,
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  Speaker 4: Paul Holland or Paul Berman, etc. The degree to which
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  Speaker 4: the Soviets, after the nineteen sixty seven and nineteen seventy
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  Speaker 4: three Wars, in which its investments in Arab military has
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  Speaker 4: showed to have no return on that investment. Demonizing the
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  Speaker 4: Zionist project became a Soviet geopolitical imperative, and they invented
• 13:21
  Speaker 4: narratives around the idea that Israel was a white colonialist
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  Speaker 4: outpost in the Middle East, that it was chauvinists, that
• 13:28
  Speaker 4: it was racist, that it was militant, that it engaged
• 13:31
  Speaker 4: in starvation campaigns, that it was a genocidal power, that
• 13:35
  Speaker 4: it was slaughtering Palestinians and mass that it was using
• 13:38
  Speaker 4: rape systematically as a weapon of war. You hear all
• 13:40
  Speaker 4: this today. These Soviet narratives are still with us. The
• 13:44
  Speaker 4: militancy that they inspired is still with us, and indeed
• 13:47
  Speaker 4: it's getting worse.
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  Speaker 5: So now you see Jews.
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  Speaker 4: Who happened to be lawyers who happen to be Jews
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  Speaker 4: getting thrown off cases because they can't be expected to
• 13:54
  Speaker 4: be impartial when the issue is judaism. You see story
• 13:59
  Speaker 4: on student cam is getting thrown out.
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  Speaker 5: I'm sorry if you continued.
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  Speaker 1: I haven't seen that story yet about the lawyers. That's
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: a disbarment offense. If you actually throw a lawyer.
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  Speaker 4: Goes on and on and on, it goes on and
• 14:12
  Speaker 4: on and on, and it's pure sectarian religious hatred. And
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  Speaker 4: it is becoming something so powerful that even the New
• 14:19
  Speaker 4: York Times suspends it's rigorous fact checking operation. I've been
• 14:23
  Speaker 4: through it, but they just didn't put it aside because
• 14:27
  Speaker 4: the accusation was too titillating. It was satisfying too many
• 14:32
  Speaker 4: demands from the audience. It was giving them license to
• 14:36
  Speaker 4: be losers, and that's what they want.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: And it was a subset of a larger problem. And
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: I want to put I put it to that yesterday.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: I put it to you. Idiocracy was a funny movie.
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: It's now a reality in which we're living people like
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: AOC Javier Bicera his interview yesterday. Did you see any
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: of that, Noah.
• 14:56
  Speaker 5: I saw the clip, the extremely embarrassing clip.
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  Speaker 1: I didn't see the whole interview, okay, And he's the
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: best they got. So we're talking of all of California.
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: The best they got is Jai aerbishah, who's a zero
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: when it comes in a life. So is the problem
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: that stupid people have taken over democratic politics.
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  Speaker 4: Stupid people have taken over politics period. I'm sorry to
• 15:19
  Speaker 4: be so crass about it. But for the most part,
• 15:22
  Speaker 4: anybody who would subject themselves to this torture, to subject
• 15:25
  Speaker 4: their families to this torture, to have the reputation smeared
• 15:29
  Speaker 4: on the basis of factually deficient allegations, which is just
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  Speaker 4: part and parcel of the game. Now, nobody would want
• 15:35
  Speaker 4: to go through that. Nobody with merit would want to
• 15:37
  Speaker 4: go through that. And the people who I really admired
• 15:40
  Speaker 4: in politics are all on their way out the door.
• 15:42
  Speaker 4: They're going to go make money in the private sector
• 15:44
  Speaker 4: and contribute meaningfully to the sum of human knowledge and
• 15:50
  Speaker 4: human flourishing, perhaps more so than they would in the
• 15:52
  Speaker 4: public sector. But the people who are attracted to politics
• 15:55
  Speaker 4: now are, if not narcissists, which some of them are, are.
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  Speaker 1: Masochists I'm talking about I'm not, We're talking about different cuture.
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  Speaker 1: Some of the people I just had on Leader though
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  Speaker 1: very bright man, great man, a character. Tom Cotton, one
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: of the good ones. Yeah, Tom Cotton, very bright man,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: man of great character. I can run down a long
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: list of very smart people who are in politics. But
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: I despair of the next generation because you really have
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: to check your brain at the door to put up
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: with this stuff now, and to go to work in
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: journalism when you're going to be surrounded by whoever is
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: running the New York Times, Who in their right mind
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: would do that?
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  Speaker 5: Yeah, I just don't know. I mean, and it's everywhere
• 16:41
  Speaker 5: where you when you start looking for it.
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: It's a piece I haven't written yet. I'll probably write
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: it today. But there was totally unrelated. I was just
• 16:48
  Speaker 4: scrolling through Axios and there was this piece on how
• 16:51
  Speaker 4: Americans are no longer interacting with their neighbors. It was
• 16:53
  Speaker 4: citing an American Enterprise American AI and AI study, and
• 17:00
  Speaker 4: the lines in that study was without casual conversations with
• 17:02
  Speaker 4: neighbors who are often from other races or have different
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: religions or political ideologies, people risk becoming more isolated. So
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: I want to click through to that study to see
• 17:10
  Speaker 4: if AEI had identified the degree to which Americans were
• 17:13
  Speaker 4: just too ethnically or racially hostile to engage with their neighbors.
• 17:17
  Speaker 5: And that's just not there. It's not there. The allegation
• 17:20
  Speaker 5: was not even made.
• 17:21
  Speaker 4: Indeed, it said that people who are religiously affiliated are
• 17:24
  Speaker 4: more likely to engage in their neighbors. No denomination there
• 17:27
  Speaker 4: associated with it. She just made it up. But she
• 17:30
  Speaker 4: made it up because she knew it would sell. The
• 17:32
  Speaker 4: audience wants to hear it, the editors want to hear it.
• 17:35
  Speaker 5: It's too good to check.
• 17:36
  Speaker 4: So this fact gets loungered into the conversation and it's
• 17:39
  Speaker 4: just out there.
• 17:40
  Speaker 5: It's live.
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: It's never going to be retreating, taken back, and you
• 17:43
  Speaker 4: can say.
• 17:44
  Speaker 1: The reality together. I don't know if their church goer.
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: The reality is the only thing that encourage me is
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: me on a weekly basis is when I go to
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: my own church, my mass, huge crowds, very diverse, young, old,
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: all different races. I went to my daughter's church this weekend,
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: full to the rim with brim, with lots of kids
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: and lots of parents and lots of different people. I
• 18:04
  Speaker 1: think religious America is just fine, doesn't matter the denomination.
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: You can be Hasstic Jew, or you could be a
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: trad rad Catholic or anything in between. Everything is just fine.
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: I just think we're less religious as a whole, and
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: the legacy media you.
• 18:22
  Speaker 5: Are a religious we are.
• 18:25
  Speaker 4: And I am not in a church. I was not
• 18:27
  Speaker 4: raised in a church. I do not take my children
• 18:29
  Speaker 4: to a church. But I have really robust relationships with
• 18:32
  Speaker 4: my neighbors, and I'm not hostile to the practice of religion. Indeed,
• 18:35
  Speaker 4: I'm pretty friendly towards it because I see it as
• 18:37
  Speaker 4: the societal glue. It's extremely valuable, and I'm very optimistic
• 18:42
  Speaker 4: about the future of this country. And I love the
• 18:43
  Speaker 4: American people, and I think they'll muddle through this and
• 18:45
  Speaker 4: we'll get to the other side of it better for it.
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: But I have no.
• 18:48
  Speaker 4: Hope in the institutionalists who run our major organizations, major
• 18:53
  Speaker 4: to governmental institutions, major societal institutions, not at the ground.
• 18:57
  Speaker 5: Level, not at the municipal level.
• 18:59
  Speaker 4: In the broader sense, those who have a national platform
• 19:02
  Speaker 4: increasingly seem inclined to sacrifice national comedy and their institution's
• 19:07
  Speaker 4: good standing just to maintain the good graces of an
• 19:11
  Speaker 4: unrepresentative activist class that is busily taking his sledgehammer to
• 19:15
  Speaker 4: the foundations of this country. And that does make me really,
• 19:18
  Speaker 4: really nervous. Should make you nervous too.
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: Then Noah, if you have time to chick around, I'm
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: going to raise the question of whether or not New
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: York Times v. Sullivan's standard ought to be relaxed and
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: changed in the next segment, And if you want to
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: participate in that, please stick around. Don't know if he can,
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: don't ask you about it before him. And if he can,
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: please do. I'll be right back America. We're putting libel
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: and slander on the table because maybe it's time to
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: change that. I'll be write back, fark and back America.
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: I persuaded Noah c. Rothman to stick with me. Blood
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: and Progress comes out soon. I'll do a very long
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: interview with Noah about Blood and Progress when it drops.
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: When does Blood and Progress drop?
• 19:59
  Speaker 5: Noah, next Tuesday.
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: Really, you've got it's upon us. You got to send
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: me a copy up north so that I can get
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: ready for a longer interview on Wednesday or Thursday. Everyone
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: out there pre order so that we can get Noah
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: on the New York Times list. They're going to probably
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: try and erect a sleuthgate to keep your order sheets
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: from showing up on the New York Times bestseller list.
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: Don't you think.
• 20:25
  Speaker 5: I have no idea.
• 20:26
  Speaker 4: I want this to be a cultural crusade against the
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: New York Times, though I appreciate that stick it to
• 20:30
  Speaker 4: the New York Times, buy a copy of my book
• 20:31
  Speaker 4: that is, That's brilliant, that's it, and.
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: Put them on the list. So, Noah, this is It's
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: not a legal question. It's a cultural question. The culture
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: of the United States, as embodied in our legal president
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: New York Times v. Sullivan and others, is for robust
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: free speech, even when it hurts people's feelings, even when
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: it's live. You have to really go out of your
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: way to lible and slander a public figure. And I've
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: been the beneficiary of that. I haven't had to worry
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: about speech on the radio or on the television for
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: thirty five years. I've been doing this. But with people
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: like Nick Kristoff not being checked by anyone at the
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: New York Times, is it about time to re examine
• 21:09
  Speaker 1: all of the legal structure that allows anyone to say
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: anything about anything at any time, no matter how much
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: it harms or distorge the truth.
• 21:18
  Speaker 5: Well, I'm not a lawyer.
• 21:19
  Speaker 4: I didn't go to law school, and I can't tell
• 21:22
  Speaker 4: you the contours of the and the precedents that went
• 21:25
  Speaker 4: into Sullivan b New York Times. I am skeptical of
• 21:29
  Speaker 4: the premise. I understand the impulse to want to impose
• 21:33
  Speaker 4: consequences on reckless institutions like the New York Times that
• 21:36
  Speaker 4: would violate its own standards in order to propagate blood
• 21:39
  Speaker 4: libel narratives like that. And maybe you can, but then
• 21:43
  Speaker 4: you're going to confront the problem that I think we're
• 21:46
  Speaker 4: dealing with, which is not a supply side problem, it's
• 21:48
  Speaker 4: a demand side problem. And so yeah, maybe you imposed
• 21:51
  Speaker 4: some caution on the New York Times of the Washington Post,
• 21:54
  Speaker 4: but then it's live on social media, So then you
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: revise Section two thirty in order to go after social
• 21:59
  Speaker 4: media companies make and publishers make them liable for what
• 22:01
  Speaker 4: people say on their sites, and then that conversation goes
• 22:04
  Speaker 4: underground where it can no longer be policed, where it
• 22:06
  Speaker 4: just festers and metastasizes outside the view of prospectable, polite society.
• 22:11
  Speaker 4: So I don't think going after it and driving it
• 22:13
  Speaker 4: underground the answer, because the problem is that people want
• 22:18
  Speaker 4: to hear this sort of thing, and what people want
• 22:20
  Speaker 4: in this country they tend to get. But we have
• 22:22
  Speaker 4: to go after as a demand, not the suppliers.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: Now your old colleague and my frequent guest, and you
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: still appear on the commentary podcast John Podhornz has made
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: the very trudge observation that the Internet has allowed people
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: who ought never to have met to come together frequently.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: Is there anything we can stop or do about that
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: short of minority report sort of stuff.
• 22:45
  Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly, short of a bridging America's fundamental civil rights.
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: Maybe it's a failure of imagination on my part. I'm
• 22:52
  Speaker 4: open to that. I'm willing to be convinced, but I
• 22:54
  Speaker 4: do think that any effort to police thought and speech
• 22:58
  Speaker 4: like that runs up against the First Amendment and its freedoms,
• 23:00
  Speaker 4: and the First Amendment has to win in that contest.
• 23:03
  Speaker 4: It protects you and me as much as it does vilelibelous,
• 23:06
  Speaker 4: anti Semitic slanderers. And I mean, I'm discomfeted by the
• 23:12
  Speaker 4: tension there, but I don't understand.
• 23:13
  Speaker 5: I don't see a way to mitigate that.
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: That is a tension that we've had in this country
• 23:18
  Speaker 4: since the dawn of it, and we've worked through it.
• 23:21
  Speaker 5: We do manage to get to the other.
• 23:22
  Speaker 4: Side of these crises that involve really powerful but dangerous
• 23:26
  Speaker 4: ideas coming to the foe and catching heat.
• 23:30
  Speaker 5: This is yet another one of those.
• 23:32
  Speaker 4: Periods of tension in American public life, and I don't
• 23:34
  Speaker 4: know what to do about it. I don't think there's
• 23:36
  Speaker 4: a silver bullet, which is part of the reason why
• 23:37
  Speaker 4: I'm in such a downbeat mood today.
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: All right, so let me add one more difficult question.
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: I do not mean to add to the many burdens
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: of David French and Brett Stevens and any other non
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: left wing nut who works the New York Times at
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: day to quid when their platform begins to pedal anti Semitism.
• 23:58
  Speaker 4: If I were them, I would be first working behind
• 24:02
  Speaker 4: the scenes pretty furiously to ensure either're a correction or
• 24:06
  Speaker 4: retraction of that piece. And if that was not forthcoming,
• 24:09
  Speaker 4: then I would review my options. But my first choice
• 24:12
  Speaker 4: would not be to go public and go nuclear on
• 24:15
  Speaker 4: the first, you know, the first encounter here.
• 24:17
  Speaker 5: With my bosses.
• 24:18
  Speaker 4: I would try to work this out amicably behind the
• 24:20
  Speaker 4: scenes first. But if it cannot be, and if the
• 24:23
  Speaker 4: institution wants to stand by this, and they do seem to,
• 24:26
  Speaker 4: I mean, they ran an expose today that the Israel
• 24:28
  Speaker 4: is ruining the euro might euro Song Contest competition, because
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: it's angling behind the scenes for its people, as though
• 24:37
  Speaker 4: this is a vast conspiracy that no other country.
• 24:39
  Speaker 5: On Earth would engage in.
• 24:40
  Speaker 4: It's the definition of double standards, and the definition of
• 24:42
  Speaker 4: double standards when it's applied to Israel is anti Semitism,
• 24:45
  Speaker 4: according to the International Holocaust Museum's Working Definition of anti Semitism.
• 24:49
  Speaker 4: But it's running really deep in the institution. I would
• 24:52
  Speaker 4: try to save it before I went to war.
• 24:53
  Speaker 1: With it, you see, I think. But the Barry White standard,
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: which is easy for me to say since I'm older
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: and I've made my bones, but the very White standard
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: is a standard that ought to weigh heavily on everyone
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: who works there because she just quit and she has
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: prospered for her principal position, and it's something I think
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: many people ought to take courage from. No, I'm looking
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: forward to Blood and Progress. I'm going to text you
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: where to send it to because we got to have
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: a long conversation about the final edition. I read it
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: in proof, but I don't know what you changed and added.
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: Go get Blood and Progress right now at Amazon, Barnes
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: and Noble. Actually, just go to Amazon. I think that
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: counts in the New York Times list Blood and Progress
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: by nor C rothmans Hewitt Sarah Bedford as a senior
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: writer editor at the Washington Examiner, where I have a
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: column today urging the President to be more repetitive in
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: telling people why Iron can't have nukes because they're lunatics. Sarah,
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: I know you've had to cover Congress for a lot
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: of years. Did you have to watch the Rand Paul
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: hearings today? I did.
• 25:59
  Speaker 6: I caught, you know, some clips here and there, but no,
• 26:01
  Speaker 6: I didn't watch the whole thing. But it's remarkable that
• 26:03
  Speaker 6: it's even happening in the first place.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: Right, Well, it was a really boring two hours because
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: there was one sentence of revelation, which is a CIA
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: changed the report in twenty twenty one. It said it
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: was the wuhan lablak to saying we can't say precisely
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: what it is. That's the whole hearing. Does that happen
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: often where senators over sell a hearing and then nothing happens.
• 26:28
  Speaker 6: Sometimes I actually think it's so you can make an
• 26:30
  Speaker 6: argument that a lot of the so called blockbuster hearings
• 26:33
  Speaker 6: often end up being an over cell. And I guess
• 26:36
  Speaker 6: when I say it's remarkable that it's happening. It's like,
• 26:39
  Speaker 6: if you think back to a few years ago, the
• 26:42
  Speaker 6: fact that you have a CIA whistleblower, the fact that
• 26:45
  Speaker 6: it's now just so openly acknowledged that there was sort
• 26:48
  Speaker 6: of a cover up of the fact that there was
• 26:50
  Speaker 6: a lablique and that the administration knew that.
• 26:54
  Speaker 7: That still strikes me today even as remarkable.
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I just I think senators are bad at this.
• 27:02
  Speaker 1: Bernie Marino is not a lawyer. Johnny Ernst is not
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: a lawyer. Ran Paul is not a lawyer. Ron Johnson
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: is not a lawyer. Josh Hally is a very good lawyer,
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: but he was so mad he didn't ask any questions.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: Ashley Moody is a very good lawyer, and she was
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: so proud of Florida. I'm talking about the free state
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: of Florida that she didn't like. Who changed the report?
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: I mean, he said the report was changed over five
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: days from saying it was a kuon lablik that we
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: can't precisely say. But then no one asked him who changed?
• 27:29
  Speaker 1: Isn't that the obvious question? Who did? Yeah?
• 27:34
  Speaker 6: And I mean there's been many years and millions of
• 27:37
  Speaker 6: dollars of resources trying to answer some of those basic questions.
• 27:40
  Speaker 6: But it is sometimes frustrated to see, especially when Republican
• 27:44
  Speaker 6: members when they go into these hearings that they've piped up,
• 27:46
  Speaker 6: haven't coordinated, their questions, haven't settled on like a unifying
• 27:50
  Speaker 6: list of things they'd like to find out from the witness.
• 27:52
  Speaker 6: That does end up showing often no matter what this
• 27:55
  Speaker 6: topic of the hearing is on, if that level of
• 27:57
  Speaker 6: preparation wasn't.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: There, so no Democrats showed up, not one. Now, COVID
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: matters to a lot of Americans. We're still mad at
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: not the fact that we didn't prevent millions of death
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: that was unpreventable. In large part, we got the vaccine
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: out as as possible. It worked largely well, but the
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: restrictions were ridiculous. It did not harm children in school,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: should not have been closed, and we know that now.
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: But how long are we going to talk about COVID.
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: It is a long time ago and we know that
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: the government screwed it up. How long do you think
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: it's going to go on for.
• 28:30
  Speaker 6: I'm actually surprised how quickly it did kind of fade
• 28:33
  Speaker 6: from politics. You don't hear it on the campaign trail
• 28:35
  Speaker 6: that often. It's not a live political issue the way
• 28:37
  Speaker 6: it was even just a couple of years ago, even
• 28:40
  Speaker 6: though lots of us are still dealing with the fallout
• 28:43
  Speaker 6: from decisions that Democrats made, Like my son was out
• 28:46
  Speaker 6: of school for two years because of the closures here
• 28:49
  Speaker 6: in DC. We're still dealing with the effects of that
• 28:51
  Speaker 6: learning loss. A lot of families are dealing with that.
• 28:53
  Speaker 6: So I'm actually surprised you don't hear it more often
• 28:55
  Speaker 6: on the campaign trail because it was such a profound
• 28:59
  Speaker 6: betrayal for a lot of people by institutions they trusted.
• 29:03
  Speaker 6: But it's not really a live political issue anymore now.
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: Instead of the Wuhan lab, I would focus on that, Sarah,
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: I would hold hearings on what happened to the children
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: of America because you shuttered the schools, Democrats, because the Teachers'
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: union shuttered the school Are you mad at your school
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: district or your school still? Because I sure would be.
• 29:25
  Speaker 7: Yeah.
• 29:25
  Speaker 6: We left DC and moved to Virginia almost one hundred
• 29:29
  Speaker 6: percent because we couldn't continue in the DC public school
• 29:31
  Speaker 6: system after all of that betrayal and a vaccine mandate
• 29:35
  Speaker 6: for children on top of all of that when we
• 29:37
  Speaker 6: did return. And I know that I'm not alone in
• 29:39
  Speaker 6: that there are millions of families across the country that
• 29:41
  Speaker 6: are still feeling angry and betrayed by institutions that your
• 29:44
  Speaker 6: tax dollars fund and that when you really needed them,
• 29:48
  Speaker 6: sort of showed themselves to be partisan Organs.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there is a sleeping giant out there. It is
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: the school closure and the learning loss. And I hope
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: Republicans talk about it on the campaign trail, which brings
• 29:58
  Speaker 1: me to topic two, redistricting wars. How do you score the
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: redistricting wars? We're at maximum partisanship. Virginia's jam down failed,
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: California jam down work, Texas jam down work, Florida's jam
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: down work, Louisiana got ordered by the court to change it.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: I think Alabama's going to get for a Republican seat.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: Who's up and who's down. At the end of the.
• 30:21
  Speaker 6: Day, Republicans are absolutely up at this point. If you
• 30:26
  Speaker 6: ask a speaker Mike Johnson, he would say that Republicans
• 30:29
  Speaker 6: have netted as many as potentially ten seats or preserved
• 30:33
  Speaker 6: them in this redistricting fight.
• 30:35
  Speaker 7: It's pretty clear.
• 30:36
  Speaker 6: That the Democrats made a massive tactical error with the
• 30:39
  Speaker 6: Virginia referendum, not just because they didn't follow their own
• 30:42
  Speaker 6: states constitution and getting that referendum before voters, but also
• 30:46
  Speaker 6: because you had some Republican states that were reluctant to redistricts,
• 30:50
  Speaker 6: because Texas and California had sort of battled things to
• 30:53
  Speaker 6: a draw, and maybe they could have just left it there.
• 30:56
  Speaker 6: But after the Virginia Supreme Court and all of that,
• 31:00
  Speaker 6: you saw Florida move ahead, even before you had the
• 31:03
  Speaker 6: Voting Rights Act ruling get handed down by the Supreme Court.
• 31:07
  Speaker 6: So I do think that was just sort of a
• 31:09
  Speaker 6: massive strategic error for Democrats simply because they have fewer
• 31:13
  Speaker 6: states to jerrymander at this point, and if they are
• 31:15
  Speaker 6: going to inspire Republicans into an all out warfare, Republicans
• 31:19
  Speaker 6: just have more arrows to fire when it comes to redistricting.
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: By twenty thirty two, they're only going to be red
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: districts and red states, and blue districts and blue states.
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: It's going to get down to that. Let me ask you,
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: Sarah about that. I had Leader thun On to begin
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: the show. Transcript, by the way, if anyone wants to
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: read what he had to say about the filibuster is
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: soon to be posted at quewitt dot com. Leader Thune
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: was walking through the budget. Apparently there are going to
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: be two reconciliations, one for DHS and another one for
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: other things. How do you write the prospects for both
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: of those?
• 31:52
  Speaker 6: I think it's a near lock for the first reconciliation bill, right,
• 31:55
  Speaker 6: the one with the immigration enforcement funding. The only sort
• 31:59
  Speaker 6: of asterisk so that is that the Secret Service funding,
• 32:02
  Speaker 6: some of which would be used for security upgrades to
• 32:04
  Speaker 6: the ballroom, is proving to be a little bit controversial
• 32:07
  Speaker 6: even with moderate Republicans in the House. The other piece
• 32:10
  Speaker 6: of reconciliation legislation you have, you know, Fune is optimistic,
• 32:13
  Speaker 6: Johnson's optimistic, The White House is optimistic. But it could
• 32:18
  Speaker 6: be really difficult for Republicans to decide what goes in
• 32:22
  Speaker 6: that piece of legislation. If it becomes what would be
• 32:25
  Speaker 6: the last train leaving the station before the midterms, that
• 32:27
  Speaker 6: could turn into a real fight over just how big
• 32:31
  Speaker 6: Republicans try.
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: To make that. Sarah see Bedford always good to check
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: in with you. Follow Sarah on x at Sarah C.
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: Bedford up. Someone's listening, Sarah, and they decide to do
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: a commission or a special select committee on school closures
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: and their lasting ill effects on kids. That's the live
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: political issue. Hey, America, I want to remind everyone we
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: are raising our annual fundraising campaign for kids to go
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: to camp. Kids whose mom and or dad are in
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: prison or behind bars in jail somewhere, they go to
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: the Angel Tree camps. They're all across the country. They're
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: as full as they can be. It cost two hundred
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: dollars to send a kidney camp. That's the food, that's
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: the counselor, that's the insurance, that the doctor on site,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: that's keeping the cabin clean, that's having sunburned, medication and
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: mosquitoes prey ready. It's lifeguards at the lake. It's a
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: wonderful thing. All you have to do is help us
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: make the mark. Do that well, give a listen to
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: one of the campers.
• 33:30
  Speaker 8: We wake up, we have breakfasts, and then we usually
• 33:33
  Speaker 8: play some games, and then if you're older, we might
• 33:35
  Speaker 8: have like a Bible study before worship. We worship till lunch,
• 33:38
  Speaker 8: and it's the blast. You know, everybody's jumping. We're seeing it.
• 33:41
  Speaker 8: After lunch. We didn't have like free time we do crafts,
• 33:45
  Speaker 8: go swimming and do all that stuff, all that fun stuff.
• 33:47
  Speaker 8: I mean, I love Kio. That's how I Once you
• 33:50
  Speaker 8: coming back.
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: I want to keep coming back. That's what they always say.
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: They always want to come back, age out eventually, but
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: then some of them become counselors. If you're moved by that,
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: want to contribute, whether it's twenty dollars one tenth of
• 34:03
  Speaker 1: one scholarship or two hundred or four hundred and six
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: hundred eight hut whatever you can do, call Triple eight
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: two O six twenty seven sixty four, or call Angel Tree,
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: or go to the Angel Tree banner at the top
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: of Hugh hewitt dot com. Secure safe quick, make your
• 34:20
  Speaker 1: contribution there and come right back to the UTU Its
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: by former United States Senator Jim Towan, Senior Fellow at
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: the Reagan Institute Center for Peace through Strength, Senator Talent.
• 34:30
  Speaker 1: Before I get to missiles in Iran, I got to
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: tell you your friend John Thune started the program with
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: me today, and I asked him if it was in
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: the contract when you became a leader of your conference
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: to agree that you would say nothing when the people
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: who want you to defend the philibuster criticize you for
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: defending the filibuster, and he said it was in fact
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: in the small print. What number of Senators do you
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: think really hate the honest to goodness want the philiboupster gone.
• 35:01
  Speaker 9: On the Republican side, I would guess a pretty solid
• 35:05
  Speaker 9: majority now, and I think it's probably growing. The problem is,
• 35:10
  Speaker 9: of course, you that you have to get the fifty
• 35:12
  Speaker 9: votes in order to eliminate it, and until Thune can
• 35:15
  Speaker 9: get there, he's not going to actively argue in favor
• 35:19
  Speaker 9: of it, because that just makes the whole conference look ineffectual.
• 35:24
  Speaker 9: So I think when we get those votes, if we
• 35:28
  Speaker 9: get those votes, we'll see it, and the first crack
• 35:30
  Speaker 9: will probably be on something like reopening the government, because
• 35:35
  Speaker 9: you could, you could do a fairly minor tweak to
• 35:39
  Speaker 9: open the door, and it's it's the strongest. It's a
• 35:42
  Speaker 9: situation where it's most needed and where you're most likely
• 35:46
  Speaker 9: to get the votes. But until then, you're not going
• 35:48
  Speaker 9: to see Thune expand on that because it's counterproductive. I mean,
• 35:52
  Speaker 9: all it would do is cause people to dig in
• 35:55
  Speaker 9: their heels the most and make him look ineffectual, and
• 35:58
  Speaker 9: he's not going to do it.
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: Oh, well, we will regret that. We will regret that.
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: It's like Harry Reid figure, we will regret it. Okay,
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: New York Times today, big story. The United States didn't
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: destroy and Israel did not destroy nearly as many of
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: Iran's missiles as we think we did. Maybe seventy percent
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: of them are buried underground. But conceivably they could be
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: gotten to and conceivably they could repair their launchers, and
• 36:23
  Speaker 1: conceivably they might have seven out of ten left.
• 36:26
  Speaker 9: Your response, Yeah, and conceivably if we left them alone
• 36:32
  Speaker 9: they managed to hang on in power. They have eight
• 36:34
  Speaker 9: or ten years to try and rebuild, to figure out
• 36:38
  Speaker 9: new ways of getting money illicitly, to maybe engage more
• 36:42
  Speaker 9: with the narco terrorists, and figure out new ways to
• 36:46
  Speaker 9: launder the money, because that's pretty much gone now. Yeah,
• 36:48
  Speaker 9: maybe in eight or ten years. Effectively, you they have
• 36:52
  Speaker 9: been destroyed as an effective and organized aggressive power in
• 36:57
  Speaker 9: the Middle East. I mean, that's how I.
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: Put it to people.
• 36:59
  Speaker 9: We can between us and the Israelis upwards a twenty
• 37:03
  Speaker 9: thousand sorties precision strike with Israeli intelligence and our intelligence.
• 37:09
  Speaker 9: It's just not possible that they that they could have
• 37:12
  Speaker 9: survived as a major survived that as a major military power.
• 37:16
  Speaker 9: Now it's easier to see with things like the Navy,
• 37:19
  Speaker 9: we shunt the entire navy. I mean they still have
• 37:22
  Speaker 9: the fast boats for the IRG. When we clear the strait,
• 37:25
  Speaker 9: which will probably happen eventually, they won't have those anymore either.
• 37:30
  Speaker 9: I mean you I said, I think when this whole
• 37:33
  Speaker 9: thing was developing, I think I said on the show
• 37:36
  Speaker 9: that if you were an autocratic dictator of a country
• 37:39
  Speaker 9: with the long coastline along international waters, don't give the
• 37:44
  Speaker 9: United States two or three months to build up its
• 37:47
  Speaker 9: strategic precision strike capabilities unless you have air defenses that
• 37:52
  Speaker 9: you really trust, and they didn't, because if you do that,
• 37:57
  Speaker 9: you're going to end up very substantially truan. And I
• 38:01
  Speaker 9: am very kind. I bet good American money. Without having
• 38:04
  Speaker 9: been in on any of the I'm not read into
• 38:07
  Speaker 9: any of the intel the way Tom Cotton is. That's
• 38:10
  Speaker 9: my working assumption.
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: Now, center of talent. I am of the opinion that
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: we should believe the New York Times, and we should
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: use that article as a reason to go back and
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: womp them again and again and again, and by prediction.
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: That's my want, that's my desire. That's the wish that
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: gives I hope form to the thought. I want the
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: President to restart kinetic operations when he comes back from China,
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: do you yes?
• 38:41
  Speaker 9: And I said last night on the show, I think
• 38:43
  Speaker 9: the rhythm or logic of this process suggests that it's
• 38:47
  Speaker 9: time to do that now. I don't, and I think
• 38:50
  Speaker 9: the President will unless he gets a deal or they're
• 38:54
  Speaker 9: broken before then. I think he probably will. I doubt
• 38:58
  Speaker 9: it's going to be something devas because I think he
• 39:01
  Speaker 9: has moved this conflict, if you will, into the economic domain,
• 39:06
  Speaker 9: because I think he believes, and I think he's right
• 39:08
  Speaker 9: in this respect, that he is really hurting and throttling
• 39:12
  Speaker 9: them with that. And then it also has other benefits
• 39:15
  Speaker 9: for us, specifically with regard to the Chinese where he
• 39:19
  Speaker 9: is right now, because it is showing them how vulnerable
• 39:22
  Speaker 9: their energy supply chains are. So but I think the
• 39:26
  Speaker 9: logic of it almost requires it, and particularly since they're
• 39:30
  Speaker 9: continuing with these lunatic pronouncements that it's time for us
• 39:34
  Speaker 9: to surrender and pay them reparations and the rest of it.
• 39:37
  Speaker 9: I think he almost has to send a message to them,
• 39:40
  Speaker 9: and I would guess that he will when the Chinese
• 39:43
  Speaker 9: meetings are over all right.
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: Last question, Jim Tarrant, a Meet Sagaal frequent cast on
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: the program Scoop today. I believe it was a meet
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: who scooped. During the last two months, Prime Minister Nttanya
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: who secretly flew to the United Arab Emirates met with
• 39:59
  Speaker 1: their ruler MBG. The conference or the Emirates and May
• 40:04
  Speaker 1: agreed on the Iron Dome deployment to the UAE. They
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: have an effective alliance. Now, it's extraordinary. Yes, the Iranians
• 40:11
  Speaker 1: really shot themselves in the foot.
• 40:14
  Speaker 9: Yeah, it's further evidence that the Arab states in the
• 40:18
  Speaker 9: region have reconciled themselves fully to the fact that Israel
• 40:23
  Speaker 9: is there, Israel is going to continue, and are really
• 40:26
  Speaker 9: cottoning up to the idea that, you know, maybe if
• 40:28
  Speaker 9: we actually have peaceful relations with Israel, some of that
• 40:34
  Speaker 9: will be formal, some of them will recognize Israel, some won't.
• 40:38
  Speaker 9: But if we actually have peaceful relations with Israel, we
• 40:41
  Speaker 9: can accomplish what we really want, which is to stabilize
• 40:45
  Speaker 9: their governments in advance the economies of their people. And
• 40:48
  Speaker 9: now the other thing that's significant about this, it's pretty
• 40:51
  Speaker 9: clear that the UAE has decided it wants to go
• 40:54
  Speaker 9: out front. It wants to be a champion of that
• 40:58
  Speaker 9: Middle Eastern future, which is a very very important accretion
• 41:02
  Speaker 9: to our partnerships in the region. So I mean they're
• 41:05
  Speaker 9: going out in a limb. You It shows where everybody
• 41:09
  Speaker 9: in the region sees it going. They see who the
• 41:12
  Speaker 9: strong men are, who the leaders are, and they understand
• 41:16
  Speaker 9: a partnership like this, policed by Israeli military power and
• 41:21
  Speaker 9: led by the economic and diplomatic power of the United
• 41:24
  Speaker 9: States is the future of the region.
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: I think you're right, and I believe that MBG is
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: a uniquely qualified leader in that region to work with that.
• 41:33
  Speaker 1: And Yahoo. I hope the Conference of Saudi Arabia is
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: not far behind, because NBS is younger, and someone's got
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: to pick up the baton from NBZ and carry it
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: forward to help with the NBS. Jim Tallent always a
• 41:46
  Speaker 1: pleasure at fom on X At Jim Talent, I'll be
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: right back to America stake Laura and even grace America.
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: Hugh at back Brower three coming up. Jimmy Lai's son,
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: Sebastian Lai joins me. Eleanna Johnson later in the but
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: I begin with our friend Mary Katherine Ham. She is
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: the host of the Getting Hammered podcast, Fox News contributor
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: as well. Mary Catherine, I've got to thank you for
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: this morning's Getting Hammered episode. It made me laugh because
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: if you lean close to your camera, you'll see that
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: I don't have a shiner like your three year old,
• 42:18
  Speaker 1: but I got a bloody eye because my four year
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: old grandson put his thumb into it when I was
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: reading him a bedtime story on Saturday night. These toddlers
• 42:28
  Speaker 1: are dangerous. They're just dangerous.
• 42:32
  Speaker 7: They're brutal.
• 42:33
  Speaker 10: There's a bump on one side of my nose that
• 42:35
  Speaker 10: is from a nose, a slight nose break that my
• 42:37
  Speaker 10: second child gave me at eighteen months old.
• 42:40
  Speaker 7: Just slammed that head right into my nose.
• 42:43
  Speaker 1: That's the problem with toddlers. They're not aware of the
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: damage they can do. The t Rex Teddy, he's a
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: six year old and a three year and a half
• 42:51
  Speaker 1: year old's body, and he's built like Dick Buckis and
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: he just runs right into you. But that thumb in
• 42:56
  Speaker 1: the eye, that's never happened to me before. I had
• 42:59
  Speaker 1: to tell the makeup the Fox last night. It's not
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: pink eye. It's just a thumb in me. They believe me.
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: Theired about Teddy before, so Mary.
• 43:06
  Speaker 7: Kathy classes he's way ahead of the game.
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, tell people about your three year old and the
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: it's like a Nancy Drew mystery. The story, the missing
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: black Eye narrative.
• 43:20
  Speaker 7: It was put down for a nap on Mother's Day.
• 43:23
  Speaker 10: And when I used the term nap very loosely. We
• 43:26
  Speaker 10: locked them in their room.
• 43:27
  Speaker 7: We don't lock them in. Actually we closed them in.
• 43:29
  Speaker 10: Their room, and then many things break loops in there.
• 43:34
  Speaker 7: I don't know.
• 43:34
  Speaker 10: I stay out of it once time I'm off duty.
• 43:36
  Speaker 10: Once that door is closed, and you know, if there's
• 43:38
  Speaker 10: real problems, I'll go in there.
• 43:39
  Speaker 7: But we didn't hear any ruckus. We didn't hear any crying.
• 43:42
  Speaker 10: And then when he woke up from nap, eventually they
• 43:44
  Speaker 10: fell asleep. When he woke up from that nap and
• 43:47
  Speaker 10: I let him out of the room, I walk into
• 43:48
  Speaker 10: the house and I see just like this giant, swollen
• 43:52
  Speaker 10: black guy and we couldn't get a straight story out
• 43:54
  Speaker 10: of either of the young kids, like hey that my
• 43:57
  Speaker 10: daughter was a little quiet about it, which frankly still
• 43:59
  Speaker 10: has suspicious And he got in.
• 44:03
  Speaker 7: A tangle with the bedrails.
• 44:04
  Speaker 10: Is as much as I can tell. And was it
• 44:07
  Speaker 10: self inflicted or did she help?
• 44:10
  Speaker 7: That's the question.
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: What I thought of when I heard you telling this
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: story is in a Christmas story of the Music with Ralphie,
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: when he shoots his eye out, the cover up begins immediately.
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: So if your daughter hurt your son. There was a
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: lot of briefing going on in whispered tones. It was
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: sort of like the CIA talking to the whistleblower about
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: what he can and cannot say to the Rand Paul Committee.
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: All right, let's move on to serious stuff. I liked
• 44:36
  Speaker 1: your redistricting breakdown. I loved it, in fact, and I
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: do like the reality check that goes with We're in
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: an era of maximum partisanship. It's not going to end
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: while I'm working. It's probably not going to end when
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: you're working. But we're in the middle of a great
• 44:53
  Speaker 1: sort and it'll be fine. We'll have blue states and
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: red states, and I'll have all blue and red congress people.
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: I'm okay with that.
• 44:59
  Speaker 10: Well, and they'll have blue and red results accordingly, right, Like,
• 45:03
  Speaker 10: that's one of the things that is turning more states more.
• 45:07
  Speaker 7: Red is that people are leaving the.
• 45:09
  Speaker 10: Blue states because of the policies, right, so you will
• 45:12
  Speaker 10: actually have like an interesting contest between these two philosophies. Look,
• 45:17
  Speaker 10: I think it's nice to limit the partisan jerymanding where
• 45:21
  Speaker 10: you can. But the problem is the places we've attempted
• 45:23
  Speaker 10: to do that, California and Virginia Democrats are like, yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 45:27
  Speaker 10: we definitely want to limit the partisan jerrymandering, and then
• 45:29
  Speaker 10: as soon as they get a chance, they're like, now,
• 45:31
  Speaker 10: we didn't mean that, here's what we're going to do.
• 45:34
  Speaker 10: So I just accept that partisan jerymandering is a part
• 45:37
  Speaker 10: of life in a fallen world.
• 45:38
  Speaker 7: I understand that people are going to do it.
• 45:40
  Speaker 10: Racil jerymanding, however, is not allowed, and that's the thing
• 45:44
  Speaker 10: they're having a meltdown over.
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: Now. I have two quibbles with the American media. One
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: is jerrymandering is routinely mispronounced. It's gary mandering, but I'm
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: a scold when I bring that up. And the other
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: is the word decimate, which means too. From the Roman
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: Legion era, you would kill one soldier in ten when
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: the legion misbehaved. Do you have anything like that that
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: triggers you when someone eater says, mispronounces a word routinely Jerrymander,
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: Gary Mander, or uses a word wrongly, like decimate, which
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: is the Beltwayh's favorite word, decimate. It doesn't and it's
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: always wrong. They don't use it the right way. Now.
• 46:22
  Speaker 10: I'm like this about many things off the top of
• 46:24
  Speaker 10: my head, though, and especially in an age of reality TV,
• 46:27
  Speaker 10: it's very painful.
• 46:28
  Speaker 7: I am a stickler about.
• 46:30
  Speaker 10: She and I did something or ending with me, like
• 46:33
  Speaker 10: getting the form correct and the order correct. And I
• 46:37
  Speaker 10: make my children do it every single time. And in
• 46:39
  Speaker 10: reality TV they are the worst at this. It's like
• 46:44
  Speaker 10: him and I's house that we live in, Like that's
• 46:47
  Speaker 10: not how it works.
• 46:48
  Speaker 7: Don't do right, Catherine.
• 46:51
  Speaker 1: I'm a failed parent. I'm a failed parent because my
• 46:54
  Speaker 1: boys say me and Rob are going to go to
• 46:58
  Speaker 1: the play golf. Now I do too, but it doesn't matter.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: Somehow it gets hardwired in. All right, let's get to
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: the very serious step. Okay, Nick christoff the raping dog story,
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: and I'll leave it at that. I talked about it.
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: As Scott Jennings said yesterday, he felt stupid reading. He
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: felt like the intelligence was draining from his body when
• 47:23
  Speaker 1: he read that story. What do you make of that?
• 47:27
  Speaker 10: Well, the first thing I thought was like, this is
• 47:29
  Speaker 10: an IQ test, Like the dog thing is like, are
• 47:30
  Speaker 10: we kidding?
• 47:31
  Speaker 7: You have to be motivated to believe this in order
• 47:34
  Speaker 7: to believe it.
• 47:35
  Speaker 10: The other thought I had is I've written for mainstream
• 47:38
  Speaker 10: esteemed outlets before as a center right reasonable person, and
• 47:43
  Speaker 10: my every thought is fact checked within an inch of
• 47:47
  Speaker 10: its life, including just opinion sentences.
• 47:50
  Speaker 7: When I am published somewhere.
• 47:52
  Speaker 10: Like the New York Times, and the idea that this
• 47:54
  Speaker 10: gets into print on the I believe they ran it
• 47:57
  Speaker 10: on the front page.
• 47:57
  Speaker 7: Did they not?
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: Don't know for sure.
• 48:01
  Speaker 10: There was one screenshot where it looked like it's very
• 48:03
  Speaker 10: prominently placed. And this is just crazy. It's just a
• 48:07
  Speaker 10: dereliction of duty. It is obviously irresponsible, the lie of
• 48:12
  Speaker 10: courses around the world before the truth gets his pants on, right,
• 48:15
  Speaker 10: you can't. You can't fact check it after the case,
• 48:18
  Speaker 10: although we will. But I just think it's transparently wrong
• 48:23
  Speaker 10: and partly meant to derail and distract from the real news,
• 48:29
  Speaker 10: which is the detailed accounts of what happened on October set.
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: Now, there are three options to The New York Times
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: in Nicola and By the way, Nick has been on
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: this show dozens of times. I thought, until yesterday he
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: was a good guy. He's written some books like A
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: Path of Pears. He reports on poverty. He takes kids
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: in turns on trips to Africa to teach them how
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: to write about human suffering. So I was genuinely surprised
• 48:52
  Speaker 1: and shocked that he ran with this. He could retract it,
• 48:56
  Speaker 1: he could try and rehabilitate himself by giving equal coverage
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: the story. You just reference the real rapes, the real brutality.
• 49:04
  Speaker 1: Or they could be recklessly indifference to the blowback. What
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: do you think is going to happen?
• 49:09
  Speaker 10: I think they're going to go with reckless indifference because
• 49:12
  Speaker 10: the people they pay a price with are not the
• 49:14
  Speaker 10: people that folks in the New York Times bubble generally
• 49:19
  Speaker 10: care about their opinion.
• 49:20
  Speaker 7: That would I think they're going to let it fly
• 49:22
  Speaker 7: on by. I would hope not.
• 49:24
  Speaker 10: But there's been plenty of times in New York Times
• 49:26
  Speaker 10: history where they have ignored things they shouldn't have ignored
• 49:28
  Speaker 10: instead of correcting. And it's not to say that there's
• 49:30
  Speaker 10: not issues in prisons everywhere, right, but like, do the
• 49:36
  Speaker 10: work report the thing, don't take fourteen people, most of
• 49:39
  Speaker 10: whom are Hamas operatives, and regurgitate whatever they tell you.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: They don't slander dogs. I mean, he slandered every Jew
• 49:47
  Speaker 1: in the world, every Israeli in the world, but he
• 49:48
  Speaker 1: also suggested that dogs would do that, and I don't
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: believe it. I want to get to Avi Arbisserah. He
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: is a dummy. And I've known that because I used
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: to interview him back in the LA days when I'm
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: doing the nightly news in LA and he was a
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: state assemblyman from the area. Then he became a congressman,
• 50:05
  Speaker 1: then he got appointed attorney general, and he ended up
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: at HHS secretary. He's a zero part of the machine,
• 50:12
  Speaker 1: but a complete zero. He was interviewed last night by
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: KTLA channel I believe five. Here's my favorite part of that,
• 50:19
  Speaker 1: Mary Catherine cut number one.
• 50:22
  Speaker 5: By the way, this is a profile piece. This is
• 50:24
  Speaker 5: not a gotcha piece.
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 50:26
  Speaker 5: Well, look, I think we're these questions are fair. It's
• 50:28
  Speaker 5: in order to learn.
• 50:29
  Speaker 10: About you as a candidate.
• 50:31
  Speaker 5: So why it's about the profile.
• 50:32
  Speaker 11: I don't know how you defined profile, but I'd like
• 50:34
  Speaker 11: to begin the interview.
• 50:35
  Speaker 12: Your way I described profile is you talk about all
• 50:38
  Speaker 12: the things that I've done things I want to do
• 50:40
  Speaker 12: and along with some tough questions, but not only tough questions.
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: All right, Mary Catherin, I'm gonna let you react before
• 50:47
  Speaker 1: I ask you specifics.
• 50:49
  Speaker 7: Yeah, this is democrat privilege, is what this is.
• 50:52
  Speaker 10: He thinks he can tell her what to ask him
• 50:55
  Speaker 10: because he's a Democrat. She's supposed to be friendly to him.
• 50:57
  Speaker 10: We're supposed to work together. You're not supposed to ask
• 51:00
  Speaker 10: me tough stuff. And by the way, when you tell
• 51:02
  Speaker 10: a reporter this, whether they like you or not, they're
• 51:04
  Speaker 10: going to be more likely to ask you tough stuff
• 51:06
  Speaker 10: because you've just tried to dictate to them. This is
• 51:08
  Speaker 10: similar to the thing that made Katie Porter explode on
• 51:11
  Speaker 10: that local reporter. They're not getting much pushback at all,
• 51:15
  Speaker 10: but they can't stand up to anything because they never.
• 51:18
  Speaker 7: Get tough questions.
• 51:19
  Speaker 10: And thank you to these ladies for asking them just
• 51:22
  Speaker 10: She hadn't even started asking questions here, but like the
• 51:25
  Speaker 10: mere suggestion that she would was enough to throw him
• 51:28
  Speaker 10: off this much.
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: Now, isn't it normal that if you want to do
• 51:33
  Speaker 1: something like that, you'll say, can we go off the record? Right?
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: That's what you would say, can we go off the
• 51:38
  Speaker 1: record for a moment, or your comms team will have
• 51:41
  Speaker 1: called beforehand to say, hey, we don't really want to
• 51:44
  Speaker 1: do it grilling. I'm winning the primary, so can we
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: just establish it. This is just stupid. That's what I
• 51:50
  Speaker 1: walk away from. He's just not very smart.
• 51:54
  Speaker 7: Oh this is yeah.
• 51:55
  Speaker 10: You would have a conversation beforehand about what's the scope
• 51:57
  Speaker 10: of this interview. We want to be comfortable with it whatever,
• 52:00
  Speaker 10: but doing it on camera as both he and Katie
• 52:03
  Speaker 10: Porter have done. By these two people here who have
• 52:05
  Speaker 10: made the same mistake and are none too smart and
• 52:07
  Speaker 10: dealing with it because you don't have to have the
• 52:10
  Speaker 10: perfect answer, just have an answer and don't be a jerk.
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: Well he failed. He failed both of those conditions. He
• 52:17
  Speaker 1: didn't have an answer and he was a jerk. And boy,
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: if you can watch the tape on the Salem Nuke Channel,
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: I'll play it again. I've been playing all day. His
• 52:25
  Speaker 1: eye roll is insinuation. It's just bad. Mary Katherine Ann
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: follow her on exit Mkamer listened to getting hammered, especially
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: today's edition. I'll be right back in America. It was
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: Sebastian Live, Stay Chimp, Welcome back in America. President Trump
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: is still in his hotel in the People's Republic of
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: China after a big welcoming ceremony. He told me last
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: week that one of the things he would be bringing
• 52:53
  Speaker 1: up with the General Secretary of Jujuen Ping of the
• 52:56
  Speaker 1: People's Republic of China is the plight of him dissident
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: Jimmy Lai. I'm joined now by Jimmy l Son Sebastian. Sebastian,
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: welcome back. I don't know what to expect out of
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: I do believe that President Trump will bring up your
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: father to Yeshijhen paying. I don't know what to expect.
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: Have you heard anything that gives you encouragement?
• 53:21
  Speaker 12: Thank you so much for having me back, Sir, I
• 53:27
  Speaker 12: I can only pray. You know, my father's health is
• 53:29
  Speaker 12: getting worse and west by the day. He's not getting
• 53:31
  Speaker 12: any younger. You know, we've been so grateful that the
• 53:34
  Speaker 12: President has been so supportive and then and you know,
• 53:37
  Speaker 12: every time that you've asked him a question by my father,
• 53:39
  Speaker 12: he's answered so so passionately. We are at point now
• 53:47
  Speaker 12: where if my father's not really soon, I fear the worst.
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: Well I do too, and that's why I think a
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: lot of people are running, why are people pressing so hard,
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: including reporters in the Oval office that had the president
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: after I had him on the radio and the television.
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: They were pressing him in the Oval and he went
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: on a long explanation. He said, it's a tough lift
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: for Jijenping because your father caused so much trouble for him,
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: not illegal trouble. He was acting within the rights of
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: the free people of Hong Kong, and Jijin Ping it's
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: crushed them. Have you gotten any indication from your lawyers
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: on the ground people in Hong Kong that maybe GCI
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: some upside and letting your father go, like maybe getting
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: rid of the ruthless reputation he's earned.
• 54:33
  Speaker 12: I think you're exactly right. There's only upside and letting
• 54:35
  Speaker 12: my father go. You know, when you refer to the
• 54:40
  Speaker 12: you know, the protest. My father was always for peaceful
• 54:43
  Speaker 12: protest every occasion, very publicly and privately, he advocated for
• 54:48
  Speaker 12: peaceful protests. This isn't something that This isn't a person
• 54:52
  Speaker 12: that the Chinese or the Hong Kong regime wants to
• 54:55
  Speaker 12: see die in jail. He's a man who many people
• 54:59
  Speaker 12: around the world's he as a hero, a man who
• 55:01
  Speaker 12: has given everything that he has to stand up for
• 55:03
  Speaker 12: these basic liberties.
• 55:05
  Speaker 5: Basic liberty is.
• 55:05
  Speaker 12: That many people in the world feel that this is
• 55:08
  Speaker 12: something that every single person is entitled to and entited
• 55:12
  Speaker 12: entitled to demand. So having a man like this in
• 55:16
  Speaker 12: prison is a reminder of what China and Hong Kong
• 55:20
  Speaker 12: views these liberties that we all hold around the world.
• 55:24
  Speaker 12: It's a reminder of Hong Kong's broken legal system and
• 55:27
  Speaker 12: the vindictinness of the Hong Kong government who have destroyed
• 55:29
  Speaker 12: that legal system in order to imprison my father.
• 55:32
  Speaker 5: Because, as you said.
• 55:33
  Speaker 12: Running a newspaper until a nine two thousand and twenty,
• 55:38
  Speaker 12: until the part of the National Security Law was completely legal,
• 55:41
  Speaker 12: campaigning for democracy is completely illegal.
• 55:45
  Speaker 1: So Sebastian Lai I went back for Colin for Fox
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: News through famous distendents like your father, like souls Needs
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: and and Sharansky and other people like that. Dictator eventually
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: let people go if they're not crazy. Hitler had bon
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: Hofford killed, and Hitler was a lunatic fanatic who's gone
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: down in history of side. When dictators let people go,
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: they get a gloss on their reputation. Do you think
• 56:14
  Speaker 1: that appeals to jijiin thing at all.
• 56:18
  Speaker 12: I think this message that China is trying to portray
• 56:22
  Speaker 12: to the rest of the world that they are this
• 56:25
  Speaker 12: a stable partner, that you know the words that they use. Well,
• 56:30
  Speaker 12: if not even willing to put a ninety what a
• 56:33
  Speaker 12: seventy eight year old man who's in very very bad
• 56:36
  Speaker 12: health on a plane and send him away, if not
• 56:38
  Speaker 12: even willing to show something as as humane as this
• 56:42
  Speaker 12: and as rational as this in a case where many people,
• 56:45
  Speaker 12: including the President of the United States, has asked for
• 56:48
  Speaker 12: and said that it would be a meaningful gesture, Well,
• 56:52
  Speaker 12: then it tells you all you need to know about both.
• 56:55
  Speaker 5: China and Hong Kong.
• 56:55
  Speaker 12: And I don't think it's necessarily It's definitely not beneficial
• 57:00
  Speaker 12: to them. Is not beneficial to them in the short term,
• 57:03
  Speaker 12: it's definitely not beneficial to them in the long term.
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: Now, the President took with him a dozen of the
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: United States mostly high profile and important business executives. There
• 57:14
  Speaker 1: is no better time to let your father out than
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: when those people are in China. If China wants those
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: people to have their companies come and do business in
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: China again, A lot of people are backed off after
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: the Hong Kong crackdown after the threats to Taiwan. Is
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: that message getting I mean, really, if you want China
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: to reopen the business, you've got to let Jimmy Laie go.
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: Otherwise people are gonna be afraid to go there.
• 57:40
  Speaker 12: I completely agree with you in going off to my father.
• 57:44
  Speaker 12: China has essentially destroyed sorry, Hong Kong has essentially destroyed
• 57:48
  Speaker 12: its legal system. Hong Kong is a financial center, the
• 57:50
  Speaker 12: only unique selling point of the place, and I love it.
• 57:53
  Speaker 12: I'm from there. But it is a strong legal system
• 57:57
  Speaker 12: and this inherent trust that business people have with Hong
• 58:01
  Speaker 12: Kong as a financial censor. If you're going to break
• 58:04
  Speaker 12: the laws vindictively whenever you feel like it, well it's
• 58:08
  Speaker 12: no wonder that so many people are, as you said,
• 58:10
  Speaker 12: moving away.
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 58:11
  Speaker 12: Releasing my father isn't going to go back to pre
• 58:14
  Speaker 12: national scrazy law. But it's one big step in the
• 58:17
  Speaker 12: right direction. I think people will see it that way.
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: It would also be seen I can't tell you how
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: many people I've advised not to go to China that
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: they could end up in advised they could end up
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: in jail, they could end up with extra security attached
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: to them. Their phone's compliments. I've done it again and
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: again and again and again, and I'm not alone. And
• 58:39
  Speaker 1: one of the reasons is if the government is as
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: indifferent to your father as it's proved to be over
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: the last few years, why should anyone Trump Do you
• 58:49
  Speaker 1: give the same advice to people or are you just
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: trying to stay focused on your dad?
• 58:55
  Speaker 12: I stay focused on my dad, but you know, part
• 58:58
  Speaker 12: of that focus is highlighting the justice that's happened to him.
• 59:01
  Speaker 12: And and thank you for sending this message across you,
• 59:05
  Speaker 12: because it's true.
• 59:06
  Speaker 5: Look, everybody sees.
• 59:07
  Speaker 12: What's happening to my father and to so many other
• 59:09
  Speaker 12: people in Hong Kong who have been jailed for belief
• 59:12
  Speaker 12: that you know, I would say ninety nine percent of
• 59:16
  Speaker 12: Americans hold, and in fact, many people in America had
• 59:20
  Speaker 12: to sacrifice for Americans hold these beliefs. So if you
• 59:25
  Speaker 12: hold these beliefs, which again you're entitled to in this country,
• 59:28
  Speaker 12: and you and you and you say them in Hong
• 59:31
  Speaker 12: Kong or then you could very well end up in
• 59:34
  Speaker 12: prison like my father. And I think that's what's so
• 59:37
  Speaker 12: gregious about what's happening to him. It's not just the cruelty,
• 59:40
  Speaker 12: it's also the the The values that my father has
• 59:44
  Speaker 12: fought for are.
• 59:45
  Speaker 5: Not controversial values.
• 59:47
  Speaker 12: By any means in any country. It's value of the
• 59:50
  Speaker 12: free press, of freedom of democracy, and for that he's
• 59:55
  Speaker 12: being tortured.
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: Sebastian, I have two final questions for you. First, where
• 1:00:00
  Speaker 1: do people stay abreast of what's going on with your
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: father's case? What's the best website?
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 12: So we have support Jimmy Laie dot com. We also
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 12: have a page on x and that's the best way
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 12: to follow along the story.
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: Right, support Jimmy Lye. Last thing, your father was a
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: devout Catholic. He's a man of great faith, as is
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: your entire family. Has the Vatican been working quietly? I
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: don't expect them to be loud, But if they've been
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: working quietly to secure your father's release.
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 3: I.
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 12: Would not be able to say unfortunately, I don't. I
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 12: if they are, then I really do hope they are,
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 12: But I don't know if they are. As you said,
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 12: in my father's faith is what keeps him so strong
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 12: despite this incredibly harsh horteal.
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the last time I talked to you, he had
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: been denied the sacraments. Has been been allowed to sacraments again.
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 12: Since then, yes, because many people have caused couples saying
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 12: that this is completely ridiculous, that prisoner is a war
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 12: get second and so what reason is it that this
• 1:01:11
  Speaker 12: man in the maximum strategy prison is not allowed to
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 12: very basic human rights.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 1: And maybe that is a good sign. We will continue
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: to pray for his quick release and repatriations to your
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: family and in Great Britain. Thank you, Sebastian Laie. Our
• 1:01:26
  Speaker 1: prayers go with your stays in America. Thank you for
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: listening to highly concentrated Hugh. And don't forget one of
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: our great sponsors is Consumer Sailor one eight hundred forty
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  Speaker 1: free when you use my name, Hugh Welcome back to America.
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: Eleana Johnson is the editor in chief of the Washington Freebeacon.
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: Follow on exit Eleana Y. Johnson read the Freebeacon at
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: Freebeacon dot com. Eleona, I listened to the commentary podcast
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: today and I thought it was fabulous And I want
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: to go in reverse order. Can you update our listener
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: because we're on in Kentucky. We're on in Thomas Massey's district,
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 1: and I'm hoping he gets b next week. And you
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 1: broke the story today about his latest flame out. He's
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: a really bad egg. Tell people about it.
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 11: Oh sure, I wish I could take credit for breaking it.
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 11: But this was actually a video that appeared on X yesterday.
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 11: His former girlfriend sat down with an attorney in Kentucky
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 11: and talked about a relationship she began with Massey just
• 1:03:29
  Speaker 11: about two months after his wife of thirty years died.
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 11: He had her move to Washington, DC and got her
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 11: helped get her a job with Representative Victorious Sparts. When
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 11: that relationship fell apart, she was dismissed from Sparts's office
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 11: and filed a complaint. Massey offered her five thousand dollars
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 11: to dismiss that complaint, but she has produced the documents
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 11: both showing her that Massey offered her this hush money
• 1:03:56
  Speaker 11: and a non disclosure agreement, and that the House of
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 11: Representations offered her sixty thousand dollars and that so excuse me,
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 11: that will contain the non disclosure agreement. And she said
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 11: she's coming forward because of course, Hugh, you and your
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 11: listeners will remember that it was Thomas Massey, the Kentucky
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 11: representative along with Democrat Roe Conna who led the charge
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 11: for transparency in the Epstein files. And this woman, Cynthia West,
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 11: who's a school board candidate in Florida, says she thought
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 11: it was hypocritical, that he's calling for transparency and everybody
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 11: else's personal lives and in their emails, and that he
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 11: was not transparent. You know, she wanted to bring some
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 11: transparency to his life.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: He's such a creep on all the issues. I am
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 1: not surprised it took him two months to grieve his
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: late wife, took up with another woman, moved her to Washington.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: I don't know how he convinced Congressoman's Sparks, who was
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: a freshman or a sophomore at the time, to take
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: her onto her staff, or why he asked do we
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: know if he had her fired? Do we know?
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 11: We don't know. Sparts's office gave us a statement yesterday
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 11: when we began asking about this, that she was on
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 11: a ninety day probationary, that she was in a ninety
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 11: day probationary role and was let go after lack of
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 11: performance and that's the reason. And because she was let go,
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 11: she claims it was retaliatory, and she filed a complaint
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 11: with the House. The House in turn offered her this
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 11: sixty thousand dollars settlement, and Massey himself offered her five
• 1:05:32
  Speaker 11: thousand dollars to stop. You know, litigating with the House,
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 11: and Keith it greasy.
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: He's such a greasy character. Who's money again? You knew
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 1: is the opponent's name.
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 11: Sure, he's facing a primary challenge from a former Navy seal.
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 11: The primary takes place this Tuesday by the name of
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 11: Ed Gollrain, who has been endorsed by President Trump. President
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 11: Trump is imploring people not to vote for Massie, and
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 11: he says, you know, he refers to Massie as Rand
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 11: Paul Junior and says the two of them are always
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 11: the no votes in the Congress. Rand Paul of Kentucky
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 11: in the Senate and his mini me, Thomas Massey in
• 1:06:14
  Speaker 11: the House.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and Mini Me is generous. Since you brought up
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 1: Ran Paul, let's merge that with the intelligence community. He
• 1:06:23
  Speaker 1: gave a speech today or he held a hearing today,
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: and he promised an open bar and he brought flavored water.
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: He told us we were going to get a whistleblower
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: from the CIA that was going to reveal all about
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 1: the Wuhan LABLK. I watched two hours of my life
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 1: and I'll never get back. A lot of Senators are
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: mad about COVID, and justifiably so. But this witness did
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 1: not deliver anything except a CIA report in twenty twenty
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: one was changed in five days, and we don't know
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 1: who changed it or why that said it was the
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: Wuhan lab, and doesn't everyone know it's the Wuhan lablik eleana,
• 1:06:57
  Speaker 1: don't we all agree?
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 11: Well, there were some of us who were listening to
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 11: Senator Tom Cotton, I believe, in March or April of
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 11: twenty twenty, who said it was a lab and said
• 1:07:09
  Speaker 11: it's too convenient that there's a lab stone's throw from
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 11: where this wet market, you know, was, and from where
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 11: the outbreak of this virus was. And he was decried
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 11: as a conspiracy theorist in virtually every mainstream media outlet.
• 1:07:26
  Speaker 11: But we believed him, thought what he was saying was credible,
• 1:07:29
  Speaker 11: and of course most of the intelligence community and the
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 11: health health community, the public health intelligence yet came around
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 11: to that years later, after willfully misleading the public. I
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 11: have to say I did not see that hearing, so
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 11: I unfortunately can't comment on it.
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: Oh you're so lucky, But apparently I didn't make anything.
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: I mean, I thought Ashley Moody was good and Josh
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: Holly was good. Ron Johnson's perpetually mad at everyone over COVID.
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 1: So is Ron Paul, It's Anthony Faucher. If nothing new
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: we know all that that two hours I'll never get back.
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 1: Let's close with the IC because I thought your conversation
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: with John Vouderhortz, A Greenwald, Seth Mendel was very good.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: The IC is, I don't know what their game plan is.
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: What this leak today that all the missiles aren't destroyed,
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 1: but we don't know how many work, and we don't
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 1: know where they are, except we do know where they are.
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: What are they trying to get out of that? Do
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: you think, because John's right, it's a targeting plan.
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 11: Well, you, I know you're referring to the New York
• 1:08:32
  Speaker 11: Times story that says Iran retains, you know, seventy percent
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 11: of its weaponry, it remains very lethal. I have to
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 11: say I found the story quite confusing. But the broader
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 11: point is that it's clear the intelligence community is leaking
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 11: to mainstream media outlets to try to communicate to people
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 11: that this war has not set back Iran virtually at all.
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 11: And our point on the podcast today was that a
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 11: the intelligence community is often wrong, and that was context
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 11: that was missing from the story. You know, these are
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 11: the same people who told us that Hunter Biden's laptop
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 11: was Russian disinformation, that Saddam Hussein had nuclear weapons. That
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 11: they're often in error, and I think that's important context.
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 11: And b these are human beings with political views and
• 1:09:18
  Speaker 11: political actors. President Trump has had a lot of tension
• 1:09:22
  Speaker 11: with them, and it's clear the leaks are being given
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 11: to the mainstream media. Also not fond of mister Trump
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 11: to try to stymy the war effort here. I think
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 11: it's pretty clear what the motivation is, whether the leaks
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 11: are accurate or not. You know, it's hard to know.
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: Thirty seconds, Eleiano, when the President gets back from China, China,
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: I want the bombing to resume. I don't want us
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 1: to go wobbly. Do you think it will.
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 5: Well, I sure hope so, Hugh.
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 11: And one of the things I hope he focuses on
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 11: on his talks with the Chinese is to push them
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 11: to stop talking out of both sides of their mouth.
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 11: Tell the Americans that they will lean on the Chinese
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 11: to reopen the Strait of hor moves and on the
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 11: other side of their mouth they say things that they
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 11: indicate to the Iranians and to the rest of the
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 11: world that Iran has some kind of rights in the Strait,
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 11: though they don't clarify what those rights are. President Trump
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 11: should push them to take a side, and it should
• 1:10:20
  Speaker 11: be the American side. They cannot talk out of both
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 11: sides of their mouth, but the way they happened and
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 11: maintain his ambiguity.
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: Eleana Y Johnson from The Free Beacon follow on exit
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 1: eleano Y Johnson, thank you STACUN American