Latest / The Orange Report with Kira Davis / Ep.35 The California Vibe Shift with Steve Hilton
Transcript
- speaker-1: Well, hello everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Orange Report with Kira Davis. All the news and views you can use from around California, Orange County and America, because California news is America news right now. And you may recognize my special guest today. It is a candidate for California governor, Steve Hilton. Steve, welcome to my show. speaker-0: Right, Keira, so beautiful to be with you. Thank you so much. speaker-1: I love it when you come on my show. My career started really on your show or a portion of it, my Fox news portion started on your show. And it's been an incredible journey since then. Steve, just want, I know I've told you this before. I've told this story in public before, but I wanted to tell you that your show is where I first met Charlie. That's where I first became friends with Charlie. We were not friends at first. We were a little we always had a little bit of tension just because we disagreed on some stuff on the same side of the fence Yeah, but it's it I feel that it's ⁓ I don't know. It's very special to me that it was your show I met Charlie on and then before his death Charlie endorsed you and that's how I knew that I was making the right choice ⁓ So, I don't know. I'll always have that little special connect speaker-0: Thank you. appreciate that. I do feel very strong. I don't go on about it the whole time. know, after he was killed, obviously, it's just awful. know, I remember I both, I sort of felt it was the right thing to do, but then I actually said it to the team. I said, I'm sorry, this is just how I feel. And basically from the moment it happened until the memorial service, pretty much all I talked about was Charlie. And I just felt that that was really important to do. ⁓ and actually that's what people wanted to hear. mean, we had a lot of events planned and things that I obviously didn't want to counsel. We're traveling the state. had lots of these things. And actually that's all really, all I did was talk about Charlie and I don't since then, I don't want to go on about it, but, ⁓ he's just such an inspiration in so many ways. It's impossible to even list them. But one thing that actually I still say, ⁓ not at every event, but it's really true is when I hit that point about hope for us in California and people saying, well, how can a Republican win? You're never winning California. So Democrat, blah, blah, blah. You hear it all the time. said that and I know the way I was put it is as a new American citizen. First of all, that strikes me as a very un-American attitude. ⁓ that's really difficult. So you're not going to do it. It's ridiculous. It's like the opposite of the American spirit. But then very particularly Charlie actually. And I always put it like this. Imagine if he'd have listened when people said, What are you wasting your time for going to college campuses? Young people are so left, you'll never get anywhere. What are you doing? speaker-1: I hate to say I was one of those people, Steve. speaker-0: ⁓ really? That's amazing. then, so I remember him because when he, when I decided, when I finally decided to run, I've been thinking about it for a while. I no, I'm really going to do this. He was one of the first people I spoke to about it. And he said in his classic way, not just sort of pat me on the head and say, good job, know, good luck. He said, right, let's make a plan. Come and see. So we spent a whole day together in Phoenix kind of planning, talking about, you know, including specific things like. How are we going to use, you know, get out the vote and he's chased the vote thing he built and what? Anyway, during that time, I remember him telling me his first ever campus visit. He said it was, I think it was Illinois where he was living at the time. And he said, I spent four hours and I had two people come up to me and I was there for four hours, two people. And look what he built from that. You know, so I always say, that's true. You know, like, you never know, you got to go for it. And if you can see something there, as he could, then you've got to go for it. speaker-1: Yeah, absolutely. Well, I'll tell you what I, I kind of thought that in the beginning, what is Charlie doing? Like the college campuses are lost. Go focus on getting out the vote. Like whatever. I didn't have the vision that he had, but I'll tell you what Steve, I had the opportunity just a few short months before his death to attend one of his campus events. Totally a fluke. ⁓ my daughter and I were visiting a college and he was there. I went to him and it really changed my perspective. of on everything and how curious people were, the kids were, you know? ⁓ And they were hungry for that. And just shifting gears a little bit, because this isn't the Charlie Kirk Memorial show, although we do miss him and I just wanted to acknowledge that. ⁓ one of the things that I was so impressed with Steve was how engaged the student body was, even the people who were a little bit salty. And I know there are a lot of people who tell you, Steve, what are you doing? And I've stood there while people are saying this to you. What are you doing running as a Republican in a state like California? It's really a lost cause. Every time I make a comment about this campaign, there's a million comments under it. Well, it doesn't matter anyway. A Republican's never going to win. Why, what gives you the nerve is what I'm saying to run for California. speaker-0: So there's a, I can give you some, look, we have friends and we know it's, this is not the normal kind of formal interview where I could, and I could easily go through the kind of points that I would make that there's a majority for change in California. If you look at the polling, fifth, the proportion saying the state's on the wrong track is in the last governor's race, was mid to high forties. Now it's mid to high fifties. So that's a majority for change. Um, that there are more Republicans that people think that actually, if you look at the number of votes that the president Trump got in California in 2024, if every single one of those people votes for me this year in November, then I'll win. You can go through all those kinds of practical things, but actually it's deeper than that. and I have two things that I'm in my response to you. The way you set that up is number one, I, I'm, this is a hopeless thing to say, but I just kind of. I feel it and I feel it in this way that I just, I can't quite see how it happens, but I can't see it not happening. How could they, how can you possibly have another four years of this? It just doesn't make sense. Right. And so I, I, I know, I know this sounds crazy, but I've always believed that the primary is harder. than the general because it's so messed up with this top two thing and you never know what's going on and just weird. ⁓ But once it's a clear straight choice for change or more of the same, honestly what I feel is like, it's more like how can a Democrat win? That's truly what I think. How on earth can a Democrat candidate for governor win? ⁓ That's one thing I feel. And then the second way I put it, which is more an observation. It's not a hard and fast rule, but it is an observation based on being in and around politics for nearly 40 years now. ⁓ I've been, you know, most of my career has been in business, but I've been involved in politics and government, both in the UK here as a commentator, actually in many other countries as well. There's something I've noticed, which is often, not always, but more often than not, elections give the right result. the kind of the kind of deeply in a deep sense, the right result. Yeah, you know what? It was time for change. You know what? That wasn't the most that was. It feels like that the people came to the right conclusion. That's what I mostly think about elections when you look back on them. And I think it's just so obvious that the that this is a sort of dying, failing, corrupt regime. They've got no new ideas. They got nothing to say. It's a total failure. Like really is a total failure on every single front. Nothing's going well. They can't point to a single success. All they've got to say is Trump, Trump, MAGA MAGA. And so, I don't know, I just feel there's a logic to elections. And the logic this time is that these Democrats are going to be kicked out. speaker-1: I think what you're describing is the vibe. This is something that I said in 2024. was like, you know what? American vibe has changed. And I, I, I just feel like this is the golden ticket in the golden age. I don't know. I feel like you, is it hopeful or is it the vibe? We, it's just not the time for America to be losing in California really is. Yeah, the beating heart part of the beating heart of America This is why I really want people from across the country to take this election seriously I think a lot of people are watching this for many reasons but as we say maybe you can speak to this steve As we always say as california goes so goes the rest of the nation We usually mean that in a bad way, but it could be something really great if yeah We're able to shift the vibe here this election speaker-0: I agree. I agree. I really feel strongly about that. you know, it may well be the case, probably will be the case because, you know, you got to start from, ⁓ you know, where you are. But let's just play it forward a couple of weeks and let's say all goes well and I'm in the general election and there's one other Democrat, let's say it's Javier Becerra. I can absolutely imagine, you know, the first poll that's done when it's like just fresh from the primary and no one's really heard the arguments particularly. And it's like, I don't know, the usual, right? 60-40, 60-230. I can imagine that. And at that point, you're going to get all of those people saying, see, I told you, can't wait. You know, I get it. But that's, it's not going to stay that way. And I know what I want to say and how I want to say it and how I want to campaign. ⁓ and I'm excited about that. And I'm very confident by the time we get to November, it'll be a different story. I really am, even though it may seem, ⁓ hopeless at the beginning. speaker-1: Well, I think a great example to speak to what you just said, Steve, is what Spencer Pratt is doing in LA, right? What a great sort of illustration of that, where this guy just kind of sort of comes out of nowhere, but he's catching the vibe and the people are hearing what he's saying. And you know what? My husband asked me the other day, he said, what party is Spencer Pratt registered for? You know, like that's, that's what's going on here. People. aren't really going for this left, right, Republican, Democrat, you know, there's some obviously the true believers are always going to be there. But really what's happening is we're sort of all suffering in the same boat here and people just want change. think Spencer's a great example of that. speaker-0: And it's, look, it's a different race. It's a nonpartisan race for mayor, the party label doesn't appear next to your name. That's not the case with governor. And so they're different races in many ways, but there's such a lot of similarity. mean, we're both outsiders. We've never run for office before. ⁓ We're just, you know, there's a sort of rage against the machine. It's particularly strong in LA, of course, because of what happened with the fires. And actually, not just the fires, but the accumulated insanity. There's a sort of level that it's reached with the filth and the squalor and the homelessness and the streetlights going out and just the copper being stolen and nothing works. it's just, nothing's getting better. It's all getting worse. And that it's a particularly strong LA thing, but I really agree with you that. And actually the other thing I'd note is that it's a different structure in terms of the race because what you've got in LA is basically it's like a general election already because it's really just Spencer. I know there are other candidates, but I mean that niche woman is obviously just imploded. She's ridiculous. So, so it really is Spencer taking on the machine, Spencer. That's already what it is. ⁓ and so it's like a general election. And so that gives it that gladiatorial kind of clarity that we don't have in the governor's race. still all this kind of you know, what's the math and who's in the top two and is so and so going to drop out and this and that, you know, it's like, it's not as clear. And I think that once we get into the general election, it will be easier to just to get that kind of vibe shift going. speaker-1: Let me ask you about your Republican opponent ⁓ who, mean, everybody who reads me and tunes into me knows that I've been saying all along, I don't think this guy can win. And I've been asking him to ⁓ drop out. One of the reasons I've been asking him, Steve, is that I think the math is not there for a top two Republican finish. And the latest polls have him. way down at the bottom. And my sources tell me it's lower and I have good sources. ⁓ But there, so it seems mathematically impossible for him to leapfrog one, two, three, possibly four people in two weeks to get to that top. But there are a lot of people who feel like, no, we have to do this. If we don't have two Republicans in the top, there's no way that we're going to win a general. I find it frustrating as the The leading candidate here, Steve, and a Republican up against only one other Republican. How do you feel about that? speaker-0: Well, I think that the two Republicans in the top two scenario, which really was based on the polling going back, you know, really from the, I don't know, like second half of last year, actually, from kind of, I don't know, I don't remember exactly, but at least October onwards through the new year. And it was pretty stable. And it was me and Chad Bianco in the top two. Sometimes he would be ahead. Sometimes I would be ahead. It'd be pretty close, you know, within two or three points usually. Um, well, as we moved into the new year. something shifted. think it was actually the first TV debate, if I'm honest. Everyone forgets, because there was that first one and then the really long gap when we've had a bunch of them back to back. But that very first one, which I think was the end of January or early February, I think shifted things. Remember, Chad didn't participate in that debate. And then we saw a shift and a gap opening up between us. And that gap just got bigger and bigger. you've had the president's endorsement and so on. so the top two scenario, just from a practical point of view, went away basically since January. It hasn't been two Republicans in the top two in the polling. But actually there's a deeper level on which to think about this, which is who believes that the Democrat machine would have just let that happen? I mean, you look at the way they're talking, Newsom with his break glass and whatever, they've got unlimited money. They've got unlimited. They've got the unions. were there's no way. I mean, I said this back in the end of a lot when people would raise this scenario. I look, I don't know how it's going to happen. I don't know exactly what the moves are going to be. But the idea that the Democrats are just going to stand back after running this state and this corrupt machine for all these years is just going to hand it over to Republicans. It's ridiculous, particularly Gavin Newsom. who's running for president. That's the only thing he cares about. The idea that he would just stand back and allow a rep, mean, what a, that's why he's talking about this break glass thing because Newsom's running for president in the event of a top two Republicans. That means he's guaranteed that the launch of his presidential campaign in 2027 coincides with him losing California, the crown jewel. It's just unthinkable for him personally, nevermind. the machine generally. they would have found a way, they would have, you know, whatever manipulation they wanted to do, just as they did with the Steve Garg, this is what they do. And so they, it was never realistic, never realistic. Anyway, we are where we are. And there's, it's obvious that Chad can't make it into the top two. He's way too far behind. And so the only question is really not, we going to have a Republican top two, are we going to have a Democrat top two? That's the actual risk we face. At the moment, most of the polls and the polling average, just to be on Real Clear Politics, basically has me and Becerra very closely at the top. And then a gap to Tom Steyer and Chad below that. But there was that one Emerson poll last week, which was very scary. It had Becerra slightly ahead, me and then Steyer basically tied. all around whatever it was 17, 18, 19 percent, a three-way tie. And in that situation, I mean, do you want to take a risk? That means if we have a Democrat top two, the Republican Party will be completely demoralized. There will be no enthusiasm, no energy. We'll lose all of the assembly and Senate races we're trying to target for the state legislature. Forget about all the congressional seats that are on a knife edge. that really will matter for holding the house or not. Voter ID could be at risk. So it's incredibly important that we get a Republican in the top two just to lead, whatever you think of me, honestly. And it's not about that anymore. It's not about personal feelings or even policies or the time for that is over. Who do you think will do a better job? Who do you align with? Who do you connect with? That's over. It's two weeks. speaker-1: You just want speaker-0: But until it's done. And right now is just about the math. It's just about the reality, which is we could have two Democrats in the top two unless we unite behind the leading Republican. ⁓ you know, I don't want to rub anyone's nose in it, but it's just a fact. I'm the leading Republican, leading in the polls, leading by far on fundraising, endorsed by the leader of the party. It's just, it's unarguable. speaker-1: Well, the argument I hear people say is, well, Chad won the majority of delegates at the California GOP convention, so you should be the one, speaker-0: That's ridiculous. That's a ridiculous idea. That's like 800 people. And that's a sort of totally corrupt machine thing. mean, by the way, how did that happen? But it was the legislators in the assembly and the Senate who stitched it up. It's a totally corrupt process. We know that. They go around this sort of haggling and stealing proxy votes, all this stuff. speaker-1: We have a big proxy vote problem in the CAJC. speaker-0: Yeah. And so that was all the insiders in Sacramento who all endorsed Chad. They all endorsed Chad, apart from a few like Carl DeMa, like the fighter David Tangipa. Most of the ⁓ legislators in Sacramento endorsed Chad years ago before I was even running. And so I guess they feel they have to sort of go with that. And so they stitched it up. We know that. So that doesn't mean anything. That's just the corrupt. It's our, you know, the corrupt Sacramento swamp. That doesn't reflect anything. speaker-1: Yeah, I agree. I, I think it's a silly thing. Again, 800 people compared to all these people, but, I, I do want to do before I lose you, I do want to do some rapid fire questions. just want to ask you some, some, um, things that people think about when they're thinking about this race. So, uh, first of all, how do you get to $3 gas? That seems. Kind of crazy for one man to say I can get to Sacramento and get you $3 gas speaker-0: And before the Iran war, there were 40 states in America with gas at $3 or below. Most of them don't have oil reserves. So it's not some outlandish thing. was the norm in the rest of the country without the kind of crazy climate policies that we've got here in California. if you look at the components of why gas is higher, you've got the gas tax, that's about 61 cents. Newson's just put it up to 63. But the bulk of that too, basically it's $2 higher here than anywhere else. So it's true. I can't affect what's going on with the world oil price and Iran and any of that. So that I can't deal with. That's an extra since I made the three dollar pledge. But to get from where we were, which is five dollars before the war to three is is is ⁓ things like the gas tax. then there's a policy paper on my website. It's these regulatory things, the regulations on the refineries that make it more expensive. Things like the low carbon fuel standard, which is a detailed regulatory thing that's completely unnecessary, that that's about 40 cents or 44, something like that. You've got this tax, which is basically called cap and invest used to be cap and trade. It's basically a tax on oil producers and consumers. you can break it down that way. I speak to it. But the number one thing is actually opening up our own production so that we're not having to ship oil halfway around the world. We're now importing nearly 80 % of what we use and we can turn that around. We never Look, the highest we've ever been in terms of domestic proportion of what we make is about 65%. And then we've and then then we imported about 20 % from Alaska and then the rest from other countries. Now it's 80 % imported and Alaska has actually got lower. So look, there's a whole set of reforms. You can read it on my website, stevehiltonforgovernor.com. speaker-1: Great. ⁓ okay. I would like $3 gas release as close as we can get to it. ⁓ it's getting rough out there. ⁓ my adult children are coming to me for gas money. So I need, yeah, I need it lower. ⁓ okay. Let's talk about title nine, girl sports this past week, a young man, AB Hernandez. stole in my estimation, three titles from teenage girls in the CIF ⁓ track and field, one of the CIF track and field competitions. AB is just one of several transgender identifying boys who have been taking titles up and down the state. But this one was particularly egregious to my mind. Like even one of the, you know, the triple jump, I think he won that by three feet. Like he beat. The second place girl by three feet and the consolation they gave to the girls was to give The first place a top two finish so a B and then whatever girl finished next she got it seems like a tacit admission But it also seems ⁓ Just really cruel and ugly. you know, I don't have any good feelings about this What was your perspective as someone who's running for governor and what would you do about this if you were governor? speaker-0: It's really outrageous. I mean, I don't need to repeat why it is and you've you've laid it out very well and not just now, but over the years. So I just want to show you something. So I don't know you can see my wristband. It's probably a little hard to see. It's a pink one. Sometimes people say, why are you wearing these ridiculous wristbands? Well, that's one is it says save girls sports. Okay. Save girls sports. And it was given to me about this time last year when the actually I'm in Fresno today was we're speaking and the last year's track and field was in Clovis. I am and Same story, same athlete. And I went there and I to lay out my position and Sophia, Laura, she's a campaigner against all this. Right. So she gave me, gave me this wristband. I put it on that day, say save girls sports. And I said, I'm going to keep wearing it until I do save girls sports. And here's the plan that I laid out that day. And I had a lot of conversation running up to it with legal advisors to make sure I was saying something that I could deliver. So the The origin of this madness in California is actually a legislation that was passed in 2013. It's actually 13 years ago now. AB 1266. It's the law in California. And so you got to take that seriously. The governor can initiate a process to overturn laws that violate the state constitution. There's been a lot of laws like that passed recently, but you haven't had a governor that cares. Well, on this one, there are two specific grounds that we think we can overturn this law. One is safety in schools, I think that's article 28 or something of the constitution, and the other is section 31, which is gender discrimination. This obviously discriminates against girls. So we think we've got grounds to overturn this law. And in the meantime, as Michael Gates, my running mate for attorney general, has pointed out, you can also suspend the law as governor while that's going on. So we've got a very serious plan to stop this insanity. speaker-1: I'd love to hear that. And then the other question I think a lot of Californians have is on crime. you know, we have, we voted for Prop 36, but it's just sort of been underfunded, defunded. It's not really working. And I'm talking to a lot of people out here and all of this is spreading out. You know, Steve, I don't know if, I don't even know if you know this about me or if you've heard this over the years, but my husband and I moved here to California from the inner city. We lived across the street from our local gang leader and that's where my husband grew up and that's where we started to raise our family. But when we got into, when we pushed ourselves into the middle class, we moved out here to California for more opportunity for our children and a safer place to raise them. So no, I really don't particularly appreciate now crime starting to push in on the edges. I don't care what anybody says about, you're uppity now, Kira, you're middle-class. Yes, I am. Yes, I am uppity. I pay, I worked hard and I paid a lot of money to get my kids out of the place where they have to wade through needles and human feces to go to school. I don't want to see that creeping into my nice, lovely suburb. I'm here for a reason and it's starting to invade everywhere and not that, ⁓ it's okay if it's in the inner city and it shouldn't be. I'm not saying that. What I'm saying is that. It's everybody that's affected. There are no safe places to go now. So speak to me about your position on the crime epidemic. speaker-0: So there's a couple of things. mean, again, strongly agree with everything you said. So what am going to do about it? There's two things. Prop 36 exactly to say Newsom opposed it. Most of the Democrats opposed it and it was passed. It shows how out of touch though is passed by nearly 70 % of the voters in California. So that means Democrats as well. And yet they opposed it. so, and because they're so pathetic, they won't admit they were wrong. And that's why they're not funding it. Basically, there's two, this is oversimplifying, there are two components to Prop 36. One was making ⁓ higher sentencing, tougher sentencing powers available to prosecutors and judges. And the other part was providing treatment for crime that's related to street homelessness and street drug use and whatever. A lot of the crime is driven by that in terms of people stealing and robbing in order to get money for drugs or whatever. So you've got to get that under control. That's the part they're not funding. so it's, and then now the governor sets the budget. That's the first, that's the main policy making vehicle in California is the governor's budget. And you not only write the budget, the first version of it, and you send it to the legislation in January, then it gets a process of negotiation. comes back in May. We just had the May revise as it's called. Then you have to sign it off by mid-June. The governor also has So I will be making sure it's funded in my first budget. That's like a very practical thing that I can do. But then even if they take it out, because whatever insane ideological reasons, you've got a line item veto as the governor. can go through in detail and change, know, and okay, const people will say if they've got a two thirds majority, they can overturn the governor's veto. That's true, including a line item veto in the budget. But there hasn't been a veto override. by the legislature since the 1980s. They don't like doing it because it puts them on the spot because then they have to defend their position and the governor has a much bigger platform. So I'm confident that we can get that through. But the second big part of it is actually is not directly related to Prop 36. A very important part of the story, which is one of the main drivers of the insanity that we see in California is the prison closure program, which started under Jerry Brown, was accelerated under Gavin Newsom, got five prisons. major state prisons closing, they've halved the number pretty much of the tens of thousands of dangerous violent criminals who've been released from state prison, either directly into the community or transferred to county jails, which were not designed for those kinds of prisoners. There's no county jails are not there for, they don't have the capacity to do any kind of rehabilitation or anything. And so you've got county jails that are now overrun with prisoners that they're not designed for that cascades through the system. because local prosecutors and judges, the whole system knows that the county jails are bursting at the seams. So then there's no custodial sentence at the local level for crimes that would have got you as short amount of time in county jail. Doesn't happen. And so everything is undermined. The law enforcement now say, I hear it all the time. What's the point? Because I hear this phrase all the time. It's basically catch and release. That phrase that we used to hear about at the border, that's what's happening in California. You catch someone, whatever. book them, take them in, they're straight out the door because everyone knows there's nothing, nothing's going to happen. That undermines law enforcement. They think, should we bother? Nothing's going to happen. That undermines public confidence. They see that that's the case. So then people don't even bother reporting crime because they know that nothing's going to happen. The whole thing is rotten. so actually reversing the prison closure program, increasing prison capacity is a really, which the governor controls. That's a big part of the story, which I'll do. speaker-1: That's huge. Yeah. I love what you just said. The whole thing is rotten. I think that just sort of describes the machine of California right now. talked to Herb Morgan a couple of weeks ago. He's running for state controller on the golden ticket, of course. And he said, you know, I hate to say this, but like right now the machine is just one big giant money laundering machine. it's what it's just rotted from the inside out. And that's why we've got it. We have to start with the head. and do what we can. Steve, I gotta say this. I have to say this since I'm a huge advocate for your campaign. One of the things I find extremely attractive about your campaign is that you cannot run for president. So we're not gonna lose a governor in the last two years to some ghost presidential campaign like we are now. So I mean, you're a proud immigrant ⁓ and I have walked through you. I've known you all through that. through that process and it's been amazing to watch you become an American citizen and you've only become more and more hardcore American over the years as I've known you. So yeah, you're not running for president, right? That's not a thing that can happen. speaker-0: 100%. I'm all in for America, but especially for California. It's joy and an honor to do this. I'm thrilled at the reaction, but now we've got to go win it. Vote, vote, vote. If you haven't voted yet, you've got to vote. Remember, the only vote that will deliver change is a vote for me. speaker-1: Absolutely. One quick question before I let you go, Steve. Is there a book, do you have, can you think of a book, could be a magazine article, long form, that you've read in your life that really changed you or changed the way that you thought about an issue or your own life? Could be personal, could be professional. speaker-0: Little bit. mean, the one that comes to mind is a book written long time ago, 1940s, called The Road to Serfdom by Hayek. It's a very, very, it's quite dense. quite, it's not a kind of, you know, it's, but it's, it's not long. ⁓ and it's, and Hayek is an incredibly important figure, Austrian philosopher, economist, and the road to serfdom. And it's brilliant because Basically what it critiques is written towards the end of the Second World War and he was in London actually at the time and he wrote this book arguing that the mobilization of the government that was done in order to win the war, nationalizing all the factories so they could make weapons, all that kind of stuff. The sort of big government, the state dominating everything for the war effort. If people weren't careful, that would, if that was carried over into civilian time, you know, peacetime, what you'd end up with is a massive state control that would always end in disaster. And as you said, and that's the road to serfdom. You end up as slaves because the government just controls you. And it was the first real critique of government bureaucratic centralization, which is really the core of what I want to dismantle hearing california always have been completely and the argument he makes is very very profound because he says that central planning cannot possibly deliver a better result than the decisions of individual people because however good the information you just never gonna be able to get it right it's such a kind of brilliant argument against what we what we see happening and it's over the years has happened with with this sort of arrogance of government that we can make better decisions and so on And so I really, it's a beautiful book. ⁓ but there's a personal aspect to it as well. Sorry, I've got to go, but, ⁓ now I'm on this track and I'm going to tell you the story, which is that, ⁓ my wife's grandfather. ⁓ so my wife was British. She's an American now like me and my sons, but, ⁓ she was born in the UK. parents were British. Her grandfather was a fighter pilot in world war two and he saw his brother shot down. in front of him. Literally his plane went down in flames right in front of him. It was called the Battle of Britain. They were fighting the Germans, the Nazis. he then had this, he was a business guy, whatever. And he got back to England and then in after the second world war, famously the British kicked out Winston Churchill and elected a labor government, which did what Hayek warned about nationalized everything. That's when you had the national health service, socialized men, all this stuff, right? Took over the whole is like real full on socialism. And this guy, my wife's grandfather, Sir Anthony Fisher, had this thought which was like, what was it all about? We were fighting for freedom and now we've got all this. It's crazy. Hayek, who wrote that book at the time was teaching at the London School of Economics. he went, this guy, Fisher went to see Hayek and said, I've read your book. It's like really great. I wanna... do something to advance these ideas. I want to run for office and be a conservative MP, member of parliament. Anyway, Hayek said, that's crazy that you've got to win the battle of ideas first. You've got to just win in the public opinion and academic. It's just not where we need to be. Before you can change the politics, you need to change the ideas. You should set up a think tank. So that's what he did. And he set up this think tank called the IEA Institute of Economic Affairs. By then it was the fifties. And that was this formative place where the free market revolution in the UK was born. Mrs. Thatcher, when she was a young member of parliament, she used to go there. She read all their pamphlets. That's where she learned all about free market. That's founded that whole thing. The IEA anyway, then this guy, Sir Anthony Fisher, he moved to America. His second wife was American, think, moved to Europe. He founded here in America, the Manhattan Institute. That was my grandfather-in-law. Then he moved to US. Then he moved to the West Coast and he founded this think tank called PRI, it's less well known, the Pacific Research Institute, which is really the main free market think tank here on the West Coast. He founded all of that. wife's grandfather, in fact, PRI, the Pacific Research Institute, their big annual dinner is called the Sir Anthony Fisher dinner. And so all of that came from that book. speaker-1: I know it. That's crazy. I had no idea. That's the, feel like I just got a scoop. This is, that's amazing. Wow. Well, you know what? That is the power of the free markets and look at, and look at God, look at God all the way full circle. Now Steve Hilton sitting in front of me right now running for governor. Thank you, Hayek. Thank you, sir. Anthony Fisher. ⁓ and thank you Steve Hilton for taking on this enormous task and for stopping by just to. Give us one, I'm gonna release you to the general population after this. don't have you on the show a lot, because you're a busy guy, but I'm gonna release you to go out there and finish the work in these last two weeks. Before I let you go, Steve, tell everybody where they can find you, where they can look up more about all of your plans. speaker-0: Steve Hilton for governor.com fo are Steve Hilton for governor.com Follow me on social media at Steve Hilton X and I'll see you out there. Thank you speaker-1: vote the entire golden ticket. Steve. All right, I'll talk to you later. speaker-0: Bye bye. All right, thank you so much. I better run. We uploaded 99. We gotta leave it for a second. Let me just.